Irresistible
Orphaned black bears flood Lyme [NH] sanctuary
FTA:
Kilham has worked with bears for 25 years. Ben, his wife, Deb, and sister, Phoebe, operate the not-for-profit bear center. It costs approximately $2,500 per bear annually just in food to keep rescued cubs alive. A large barn with mesh fencing for walls serves as an indoor/outdoor enclosure with three levels of trees and platforms with boxes for hibernating. Human visitors are not allowed in order to keep the bears wild. A separate 8-acre outdoor enclosure contains healthier, fatter cubs that have already entered dens for the winter.
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Kilham removes the blanket and cuts the zip ties. The cub scrabbles claws on the plastic kennel floor startling a bear overhead that drops down and scampers away. “Oh and they might also poop on you,” Ben offers without a hint of a smile. The cub sprints from the open kennel to the far wall of the barn while peeing, obviously terrified. From
overhead dozens of bears shift around and watch the new arrival scramble up to a platform. None of these cubs will be fitted with radio-collars to be tracked. These are rescue bears, not study bears. Kilham has a local veterinarian on call to help care for any sick cubs. The simple goal for the cubs is to minimize human contact, help them gain weight and get them back into the forest as quickly as possible next spring. Ben says “these cubs are wild and have already had 11 months experience with their natural mothers. They will go wild easily” when released next spring.
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“If we could only get one week without new cubs coming in, the bears would all get to know each other and bond,” Ben explains. “Bears have the ability to make friends and given time, they do. Almost any other mammal would have difficulty being around so many of its own kind. The number of incoming bears will slow at some point.”