342 
Forest and Stream 
THE GRIZZLIES OF THE ATHABASCA: 
THE BEST BEAR GUIDE IS TAKING A BIG CHANCE WHEN HE GUARANTEES 
THE SPORTSMAN EVEN A SIGHT OF ONE OF THESE WARY ANIMALS “ 
: 
By RAYMOND THOMPSON J 
N O form of hunting 6n this conti- 
nent is so apt to be tinged with 
disappointment as the pursuit of 
the grizzly. At times the best 
of guides and most experienced of hunt- 
ers seem to be out of luck in this con- 
nection; there is no animal that I ever 
had anything to do with that is half so 
erratic as this huge, shaggy, ambling 
individual. While one may read alluring 
accounts of expeditions into localities 
where all you have to do is to take your 
stand and shoot up a half dozen of the 
species known as Ursus horribilis, I will 
say frankly that such accounts are fic- 
tion; the best guide in North America 
is taking mighty big chances when he 
guarantees the sportsman even a sight 
of a grizzly ! 
The habits, size and color of grizzlies 
vary according to range and climatic 
conditions so much that it is almost im- 
possible to accurately describe the brutes. 
What I don’t know about grizzlies would 
make a fair-sized volume, but I am not 
alone in that respect, Show me a man 
who claims to know “all there is to 
know” about these animals and I’ll show 
you one who really knows very little 
indeed. I don’t know much about the 
coast grizzly, still less about the Alaskan 
grizzly, but I have had some experience 
with the gentleman in the district covered 
by the accompanying map. I would like 
to pose as an international authority on 
the subject, but I fear I would never get 
away with it. 
As a general thing, the grizzlies of this 
section are fairly uniform in color and 
are locally known as “Silver-tips,” dark 
in shade and somewhat tinged with gray- 
ish hairs. On the average Silver-tip the 
under fur or hair is so dark as to be 
almost black, and at a distance these 
bears will appear that color to such a 
degree that one is apt to mistake thern 
for black bears. Again, I have seen a 
few bears that almost resembled the de- 
scription of their Kodiak cousin, being 
considerably smaller, of course. 
I have been a professional trapper in 
this district for seven years, and during 
that time have seen a good many bears, 
a fair percentage of which were grizz- 
lies, and to show how the critters act 
under some conditions I will relate a 
rather unusual account of one spring’s 
hunting and trapping which happened 
several years ago. 
T N the fall of 19 — , a Mr. R. brought 
^ nearly a hundred head of horses up 
over the old G. P. Trail and turned them 
loose on the Baptiste River flats, confi- 
dent that they would winter through in 
fine shape. At almost every bend in this 
river there are open meadows where, 
ordinarily, large numbers of horses 
might have spent the winter in compara- 
tive comfort, for the cayuses of this 
country can almost live on snowballs ! 
At that time I was trapping on the Bap- 
tiste and remember that it struck me as 
a rather unusual idea- — turning those 
horses loose without a soul to look after 
them. As it hajjpened, there were very 
few wolves in the country that winter 
and no untoward event occurred until 
January, when the snow came down 
steadily for nearly three weeks. As a 
result, these poor cayuses died like In- 
dians stricken with the ’flu. 
That old saying, “It’s an ill wind that 
blows nobody any good,” proved true in 
this instance ; inside of a month that 
particular country was full of foxes and 
brush wolves. When spring made its 
Map showing good grizzly country 
belated appearance I had a nice bunch 
of furs, but decided to stick with the 
trapping and see how many bears I could 
get. 
What always puzzles me is that as 
much as I have wandered through the 
wilderness I have discovered remarkably 
few bear dens, and was never really sat- 
isfied that any of these belonged to a 
grizzly. Twice I have killed black bears 
in their “diggin’s” ; they will choose any- 
thing that represents any kind of a hole, 
such as appear under the roots of up- 
turned trees, and a great many go to 
the trouble of digging dens under stumps 
and logs. What few caves there are in 
this country are in such formation as 
to make it decidedly unsafe for bears 
to den up in, being in sandstone banks 
where huge slabs are continually falling 
from above. On the other hand, I do 
not believe the grizzly has any particu- 
lar kind of a den and will crawl into any 
kind of a retreat where the snow is apt 
to cover him. It is a well-known fact, 
and one I have proved to my own satis- 
faction, that the grizzly is often taken 
with a desire to wander around during 
the real warm days of winter, for I have 
seen their tracks in the Little Smoky 
country as late as the middle of De- 
cember. 
The weather was very unfavorable, 
that particular spring, for some time; 
the rain and snow made things very dis- 
agreeable, and it was the middle of May it 
before things cleared up and bears made ci 
their appearance. I believe that anyifi 
member of the bear tribe is greatly jai 
affected in his movements by the con-|f 
dition of the weather, especially in la 
spring. When they first leave their dens fi 
I do not think they go very far away f( 
for a number of days; most likely they ci 
are in no fit physical condition for ram- cl 
bling about much. This very fact is tl 
responsible for the failure of so many tl 
spring bear hunts; many sportsmen go g 
out annually and after waiting around si 
for a week or ten days, give up in dis- c 
gust. The coming of spring varies so '' 
much that it is impossible to tell before- 
hand just what time to start on an ex- 
pedition of this kind. Some claim that ' 
the grizzly comes out later in the spring v 
than his black cousin, but personally I I 
have never noticed a great deal of dif- s 
ference, one way or the other, though, f 
as I said before, the grizzy is apt to stay v 
around later in the fall. p 
While I had been waiting for the bears I 
to make their “debut,” I made a trip up j 
to Kimberly Lake, some sixteen miles t 
north of my headquarters on the Bap- 1 
tiste. When I got back the bears were d 
running all over the place ; a large black t 
bear had been digging within thirty feet t 
of my cabin! The next morning, about is 
ten o’clock, I happened to look back on t 
the slopes facing the south (where the 1 
grass was getting nice and tender), and 
there was a bear, the like of which I 
had never seen, running loose in the 
woods, about three-quarters of a mile 
away. I grabbed my rifle and started out. 
To get within shooting distance of 
this gentleman, I had to cross a swamp 
which extended right back against the 
hill. This offered me excellent cover 
for approaching, and if I hadn’t been a 
little bit excited everything would have 
gone beautifully. When I got to the foot 
of the hill I had a good look at this 
grizzly at perhaps a three-hundred-yard 
range. Since then I have stopped bears 
almost a half mile away, and I don’t 
know what possessed me that I tried to 
get closer. I crept up over a hogback 
and got a running shot at the largest 
Silver-tip I have ever seen and scored a 
clean miss ! 
Now, according to a thousand and one 
stories written on the same subject, I 
was due to be charged by this fer«cious 
monster. On the contrary, the way that 
bear traveled out of that country would 
certainly have put some of them to 
shame, and at the rate he was hitting it 
up I might have been excused for look- 
ing behind me to see if he hadn’t circled 
the earth by the time the report of the 
rifle had died away. But, as I never saw 
his tracks around there any more, I con- 
cluded that he must have stopped off 
somewhere near China unless he was 
