THE ALASKAN ADVENTURE Day 80 August 3, 2009 Sitka, AK Fortess of the Bears

We arose Monday morning to a sky full of smoke, well actually a light haze of forest fire smoke. They do not get forest fires here as it is to wet, the smoke is coming from the Yukon. It was only smoky enough to stuff Kathy up and make her a little hoarse, not enough to deter us from getting out and about.

In the early afternoon we headed out to the Fortress of The Bears. The Fortress of the Bears is a natural bear habitat that currently hosts two Brown Bears from Southeast Alaska.

The two brothers, Chaik who weights 600 lbs and Killisnoo who weights in at 500 lbs, are 2 ½ years old and have been at the habitat for 2 years. There were orphaned when their mother was shot when she wandered into a fishing lodge on Admiralty Island. They are housed in two unused industrial wastewater treatment tanks which are over an acre in size. This enclosure is nine times the size required by the state of Alaska and allows the bears the room to be bears.



Killisnoo

Chaik

The Fortress is a result of the vision and hard work of Les Kinnear. We met Les who is the Executive Director and his brother Brian who is visiting from Oregon. They are a couple of very nice gentlemen who really care about the bears and their future in Southeast Alaska. Many bear encounters are misunderstood and they are trying to educate more people as well as provide a home for orphaned bears. I think they are doing a very good job and are to be commended. Christine Fenwick is a bear biologist who also plays an important role at the fortress. Her main job is bear care and you can tell by just looking at the bears that she is doing a good job. These bears show no stress and are extremely healthy. You can find out more about them at www.fortressofthebears.org



Kathy and I stayed and watched the bears for about three hours. The first little while they just lay around but as it got a little cooler they got a little more active. We were able to watch them play fight, play in the water and chase each other around. It was a fun time. The only problem was keeping Kathy out of the enclosure, she wanted to go down and get in on the chasing around. LOL.













While we were watching the bears and talking to Les and Brian we learned that the bear activity in the area was very high. The run of Salmon was just starting to come in and the bears were lower down in anticipation of the feast. There had been quite a few sightings and a couple of sows with cubs. Two different sows had 4 cubs each which a rarity. I’m not sure if I want to see them or not. Hmmmm.

We finally tore ourselves away from the bears and headed back into town. We stopped and had supper at a Mexican Restaurant. Then it was time to head back to the campsite and call it a night.

Another good day after a good day.