Big Game Aniinah of the Vellowslunc 429 



powerful claws on the tree-trunks are to be founfl all about. The 

 presence of such universally interesting animals should by all means 

 be encouraged and they should be allowed to become more plentiful, 

 but kept in their wholly wild and natural state. ': 



There are in Yellowstone Park probably less than 150 black bears. 

 The former Park Naturalist, Mr. M. P. Skinner, estimates about 

 125. and my observations in 1921 would lead me to consider this 

 figure a fair one. I did not meet with more than thirty dififerent 

 individual bears in three months' study and search. The black bears 

 fail to increase in numbers for very much the same reason that the 

 grizzlies do. Special feeding in the late autumn, after the hotels ^ 

 and camps close, would keep them inside the Park at a time of year 

 when they must eat heartily and store up fat for their long hiber- 

 nation of four or five months of winter. They cannot hibernate 

 successfully unless in fat condition and they should not be forced 

 by lack of food to hibernate outside the Park. The killing of black 

 bears in states bordering the Park should be absolutely prohibited, 

 as they almost never become cattle killers (though they occasionally 

 kill sheep and pigs) or interfere seriousl}- with the sort of agri- 

 culture practiced by the farmers of the Rocky Mountain states. Yel- 

 lowstone Park unfortunately produces very little bear food except 

 grass and the roots and bulbs of a few herbs, and in the lower val- 

 leys mice, ground sc[uirrels, and other small mammals. Berries are 

 far from abundant and there are no mast or nut producing trees or 

 bushes in the Park from which bears can secure much food. In 

 Yellowstone Park the hotels and camps close by September 20, thus 

 suddenly cutting off their artificial food supply. This is a very 

 serious and unpractical joke to play on the gentle and confiding bears, 

 who have been led to expect their regular daily rations. Thereupon 

 Bruin becomes a burglar (see fig. 53), or failing in his raids for food 

 he often leaves the Park on a foraging expedition from which he 

 probably will never return. We should, moreover, not forget that 

 well-fed bears are more likely to be well-behaved bears. Their 

 house-breaking depredations in the Park are all committed in the 

 autumn after the hotels have closed and the bears are left foodless. 

 A few hundred dollars spent annually by the Park Service for suit- 

 able bear food would keep the creatures at home during the critical 

 period, and also restore their confidence in the Park as a land of 

 plenty and a safe haven at all seasons. 



