Face to face with one of the famous black bears of Yellowstone Park, U.S.A.

Publication

Face to face with one of the famous black bears of Yellowstone Park, U.S.A.

Description

The three most popular animals of the Park are the bear, the beaver, and the buffalo. The popularity of the two first named is due to their fearlessness and apparent confidence in man, allowing one to approach very near them at times. In fact the bear within the past few years has become almost too familiar by ransacking tents of campers for food, especially for sweets. It must not be inferred from this, however, that Bruin means any harm to the camper for he is not at all dangerous. There are two species of bears in the Park, the grizzly and the black bear. Their food consists of nuts, berries, honey, etc., and they are found every night pawing over the garbage heaps of the Park hotels, poking their noses into fruit cans, licking out carefully any vessel that might have contained sugar in any form. As many as a dozen will sometimes congregate on one garbage pile and enjoy themselves for hours, until, perhaps, the search light which plays over the geyser basin at night is turned upon them when they will generally scurry for the woods, shuffling along at a most ungainly and apparently not very rapid pace, soon to return, hovever, for they have learned that no harm will come to them from man. Their number in the Park is on the increase and it would seem that ere long some of them will have to be destroyed lest they become an intolerable nuisance. It should be a matter of pride to all Americans that we thus have in our country the most magnificent zoological park in the world; one so well adapted to the wants of the animals that for the most part, the problem of keeping the animals on the incrase has to be given little attention.