Alaska Bear Photos
Rescued Polar Bear Heading To Lower 48
On Friday, Qannik the polar bear held forth in her temporary home at the Alaska Zoo.She swatted ice in a plastic bucket, rubbed her ivory fur in the dirt and playfully attacked an empty plastic barrel as an audience of zoo visitors, officials and media snapped photos and recorded cell phone videos.
On Monday, the polar bear cub found orphaned on the North Slope heads to her new home at a zoo inKentucky.
The 5-month-old Qannik (pronounced kuh-NICK) was found on a gravel pad by oil workers in April, apparently separated from her mother. After a search turned up no sign of her family, she was rescued.
When the bear was picked up, she was stressed and scared, with weak back legs. She was also underweight. The ConocoPhillips facility had formula to feed the bear cub on hand, as part of a regulatory program that requires people to report bear sighting and be prepared for rescues.
Government agencies and oil companies had also just staged an oil spill planning drill, practicing how to handle an oiled or distressed animal.
"And here comes this orphaned bear," said Rosa Meehan, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife's Alaska marine mammal program coordinator. "It was a test case and it worked so well."
Now she's destined for a life "as an ambassador of her species" in captivity, said Meehan.
Life in the wild is the ideal, Meehan said, but Qannik certainly would have died without intervention.
Since the April rescue, the Alaska Zoo,Louisville Zoo, U.S. Fish and Wildlife, UPS and other groups have worked together care for the bear and prepare for her transport to her new home at the Louisville Zoo in Louisville,Kentucky.
The zoo was chosen as Qannik’s home because it has a new 4-acre state-of-the-art polar bear habitat designed to eventually house up to 12 bears.
John Walczak, the zoo's director, said crews are readying for the cub's arrival.
"We have a nice bedroom facility where she can acclimate, she has access to tanks and pools so she can learn to swim in baby steps… we're looking at everything from today to the future, taking it one step at a time and making sure we'll have everything she needs to enrich her life," he said.
The Louisville Zoo is already home to another female polar bear named Arki.
UPS, which flies 20 flights daily between its base in Louisville and Anchorage , a gateway hub to Asia, is providing Qannik's ride to Kentucky.
Flying a 5-month-old polar bear across the country really isn't too complicated, said Scott DePaepe, the state logistics coordinator for the company.
Alaska Bear Photos - News
On Friday, Qannik the polar bear held forth in her temporary home at the Alaska Zoo. She swatted ice in a plastic bucket, rubbed her ivory fur in the dirt and playfully attacked an empty plastic barrel as an
InnerSea's two ships follow loose, week-long itineraries through the thousands of acres of wilderness between Southeast Alaska's Ketchikan and Juneau, but nothing is set in stone. If a bear is spotted walking along the coastline, the ship will stop for
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Ashley's Adventures in Alaska: Alaska Bear Safety
I woke up early yesterday morning to a loud, guttural cry echoing through my house. After a quick check, I realized it wasn’t my dogs and wasn’t my husband, it was something outside, coming in through the windows we open at night. It was a loud and low “Ooooooooof” and unlike anything I heard before. I decided it must be a bear, and started banging on the bathroom door to get my husband, the bear expert, to come listen and offer some reason about how it wasn’t going to open the door and come eat me. I panic just a little bit when it comes to bears. Okay, a lot. The noise continued and started to become louder. Then, we spotted the culprit: a 2 year old brown bear cub standing right outside our living room window, very obviously distressed because it was lost and unable to locate its mother. It darted away before I could grab a camera for a picture, but continued to cry until the cry was echoed by a quieter, lower noise which we presumed was the missing mother. We stood on the back deck listening to the cries go back and forth until they were done, and then heard the crashing through the brush as the bears headed through the woods right behind our house back to their home. Do not cook near your camp, cook smelly foods, sleep in clothes with food odors, or bring any food or lotions into your tent. Store food, pots, lotions, clothes with food odors, and trash away from camp. If there are trees, cache your food out of a bear’s reach (see below). If there are no trees, hang food off of a rock face or a bridge, or store it out of a bear’s sight off the trail and downwind of camp. almost all charges are "bluff charges". DO NOT RUN! Olympic sprinters cannot outrun a bear and running may trigger an instinctive reaction to "chase". Do not try to climb a tree unless it is literally right next to you and you can quickly get at least 30 feet up. STAND YOUR GROUND. Wave your arms and speak in a loud low voice. Many times charging bears have come within a few feet of a person and then veered off at the last second. Most people who hike in Alaska’s wilderness don’t carry a weapon. They know that the best defense is common sense. Traveling and camping carefully are all that they need. If you feel the need for additional protection, consider carrying "pepper spray", a bear deterrent made from the juice of red-hot peppers.
Alaska Bear Photos - Bookshelf
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