| 1 | Brown bear steals 100 beers |
Norway, 2012. The Nilsen family were relaxing in their Oslo home, waiting patiently for the long hunting season to come. They would be based out of their 26-square foot cabin in Jarfjord in the country’s frozen north-east, which the family had stocked with a hearty supply of meals, snacks and beer. But when Even Nilsen’s mother and grandmother unlocked the front door of the wooden building, what they witnessed was total devastation.
The cabin itself was torn apart, and the pair were hit with a stench that revealed the obvious presence of bears. A mother and cubs had torn off part of the wall, climbed through, and devoured the family’s hidden marshmallows, jam and chocolate spread. The honey wasn’t spared either, but apparently, the party had really started when the bears located the family’s beer stash. Between the 3, they had gulped down 100 cans. It looked like this was more than one cub could handle, as the bed sheets were rumpled as though one bear had collapsed to sleep the night out.
“They had a hell of a party in there,” said Even Nilsen, owner of the cabin: “It’s almost like taken out of Goldilocks and the three bears”. The saga ended on an ominous note, with speculation that the bears now realised that they could break into a cabin whenever they felt hungry, or of course, whenever they fancied a can of Stella Artois.
| 2 | Austrian bears vanish into oblivion |
Early 2012 marked a grim chapter in the long recovery of brown bears, as the small population in Austria, reintroduced in the 1990s, had gone extinct yet again. The last confirmed bear was Moritz, but in 2011, no sightings were recorded at all. The pool had evidently failed to multiply enough to cling on.
Conservationists were puzzled, because neighbouring Slovenia has a population of 400 bears, despite being much less mountainous. The reintroduction efforts started by accident in 1972, when a male bear named Ötscherbär wandered into Austria from Slovenia and managed to survive in the woods. From 1980 to 1993, 3 bears were introduced to Austria and over the next 2 decades, at least 35 lived there.
“Unfortunately there is no bear left in the Northern Limestone Alps,” said Christian Pichler of WWF Austria. The main bears in Austria lived in the Ötscher region of the Lower Austria province, and did well until the turn of the century, when secret poaching and unlucky accidents (including an avalanche) suddenly started to pile up. The WWF also blamed the small pool of bears introduced in the first place.
Austria was once considered to be prime bear country, but by the 16th century, peasants and farmers were authorised to shoot this “vermin” by any means necessary. An order rang out on June 23rd, 1788 to destroy any bears and wolves remaining in the Austrian empire, and the last bear in Austria was officially shot dead in Tyrol in 1912. The last bear in Salzburgerland died in 1838, in 1840 in Styria, and in 1884 in Carinthia.
| 3 | The polar bear connection weakens |
In April 2012, a bombshell DNA analysis emerged which changed the entire timeline of the polar bear’s ancestry. The previous consensus was that polar bears split off from existing brown bears around 150,000 years ago, and quite possibly in Ireland. But the new study found that polar bears may have actually been around for 600,000 years, far longer than previously thought.
The scientists compared samples from 7 black bears, 18 brown bears, and 19 polar bears. Grizzlies and polar bears remained more closely related to each other than black bears, but the study concluded that they actually shared a common ancestor, rather than polar bears evolving directly from brown bears.
Instead, the old Irish findings may have come from interbreeding long after polar bears first diverged. The resulting hybrid (grolar bear) might have fooled scientists into thinking that the fossil was only a half-evolved polar bear, a work-in-progress.
Consequently, polar bears and grizzlies were deemed to be more of a separate species than previously believed. This dampened the calls for polar bears to be redesignated as an ursus arctos subspecies. Part of the mystery with polar bears comes from their skeletons all falling into the ocean as the sea ice melts, removing them from geneticists’ clutches.
This study made such a splash because it used nuclear DNA (taken from inside a cell’s nucleus) rather than the less accurate mitochondrial DNA of older studies. This same technique discovered the modern belief that Neanderthals and modern humans bred with each other in the distant past.
| 4 | 3 legged grizzly returns to action |
In summer 2011, an 800 pound grizzly bear was spotted limping around Denali National Park in Washington state. His leg was missing, and in its place was a gruesome stump with bright red blood dripping from it. The consensus among bear enthusiasts was that Tripawed, as he was later dubbed, would never survive the winter. How could he possibly gather enough food? Yet by May 2012, he was spotted leaping over a guard rail in Denali National Park. “They said he looked very agile,” said wildlife biologist Pat Owen.
Apparently, Tripawed looked much healthier than the previous summer, when the wound was visibly fresh. By now, it had healed over nicely. Nobody knew how Tripawed had lost his leg in the first place, but one theory is that he stepped on a trap intended for a fox or lynx.
Soon after, Tripawed managed to sniff out a tasty caribou carcass which had been lying by the road for a week. He dragged it away to a more secure forest location, and spent the next week extracting every morsel of food he could from it. Apparently, this caribou munching was the final proof that Tripawed was in good spirits. The only problem was that he now had to dig with one paw instead of two. Rangers considered tranquilising Tripawed and fitting him with a radio collar, but decided that his life was already hard enough and left him be.
| 5 | A grim discovery in Russia |
Evil is afoot in the icy plains of Siberia. In July 2012, police in the far eastern city of Ulan-Ude received a tip off from local mushroom hunters enjoying a fun day outside. Arriving on the scene, they discovered a grisly graveyard of 11 bear skeletons, lying side by side. Telling, each one contained a near identical bullet hole in its skull. Only poachers could have been responsible.
The bears were apparently caught in traps by their paws, traps so well designed that even an 800 pound bear couldn’t break free. Then the hunters had approached and shot them in the head in a methodical manner. The rest of the skeletons had their paws cut off.
The reasons were obvious: the poachers were profiting from the booming Chinese market for rare animal parts in folklore medicine. The bones were found in a quiet suburb, but police believed that the slaughter had taken place in the wilderness, with the bones being hastily dumped in a graveyard to disguise which region the poachers typically operated in. The bears were skinned, and even their fat and bile were removed, which are equally popular items on the black market.
Sadly, the poachers were never discovered, but the clock was ticking. The same report mentioned how two weeks earlier, 115 bear paws were discovered in a Mercedes crossing the Russian/Chinese border. A kilogram of bear paw can net you $1000 in China.
| 6 | Orphaned cubs released in Greece |
One morning in February 2012, two bears cubs awakened in a hibernation den to realise that the entire north of Greece was now their personal playground. The story started in late 2011, when Nikitas the bear and his brother Little John were rescued from the wild. At first, conservationists tried to reunite the cubs with their mother, but when they failed, they began feeding them bottled milk themselves. The Arcturos Bear Rehabilitation Centre had a pen area which encouraged all the survival skills they would need in the wild – trees to climb, nuts to forage. Gradually, Little John and Nikitas became bigger, faster, stronger.
Meanwhile, out in the nearby wilderness, the team was patiently constructing a hibernation den. It took 3 days to prepare, digging through deep snow and installing a webcam so that the bear’s progress could be monitored.
When the day came, both Little John and Nikitas were sedated. They were given one last medical check up by the vets, and fitted with a radio collar to track them. Then the bears were transported from the facility in comfortable blankets and laid down in the hibernation den.
Gradually, the cubs awakened. In a snowy scene, the bears ventured outside into their new world for a second, before going back inside to doze and play with each other. Then they completed their hibernation, waited until spring, and disappeared completely – which was exactly what everyone wanted.
| 7 | Man swerves moose, hits bear instead |
Norway only has 150 brown bears as of 2020, but unfortunately, the land of Vikings and trolls seems to be somewhat cursed. In August 2012, a man was driving down a mountain road approximately 170 miles north of Oslo, minding his own business, when he noticed an elk crossing the road incredibly slowly. Satisfied that it wasn’t a fancy dress party gone wrong, he swerved the wheel and avoided the animal at the last second, with all the driving skills he could summon. But one thing he didn’t have was luck, because he then drove straight into a brown bear which was happily minding its own business.
Thankfully, the man was uninjured. Surprisingly, the car came off worst in this story, with the bear simply running away. Wildlife experts tracked the bear and found blood strains consistent with internal bleeding, but no update was ever given, which is a positive development, because it means that no corpse was found. These events took place near the tiny rural village of Hanestad.
Did the man breath a cartoonish sigh of relief just seconds before the bear torso emerged from the fog? We’ll never know. Were the bear and elk friends, or maybe even planning something? Nothing is impossible.
| 8 | Bulgarian bear mayhem |
2012 was the year when Bulgarian bears pulled all their publicity-grabbing skills out of the hat. It started positively, when Bella the brown bear randomly decided to give birth to 3 cubs in Ayazmoto park zoo. She was a former circus bear, and this was her tenth consecutive batch of annual cubs. She was a breeding machine, making 20 cubs in total with her boyfriend.
By October though, the government had commissioned a census of the brown bear population. Farmers were furious, as the first 9 months of 2012 had seen a record 50 attacks on livestock in the Southern Rhodope Mountains. One village called Starnitsa had seen 7 attacks in 2012, and a 91 year old woman claimed that two of her sheep had been eaten. Residents claimed to be apprehensive about killing a bear even if it was ripping their backyard to shreds, because the penalty was a 5000 BGN fine. The government was accused of siding with bears over people.
The surprising thing? Just 8 days later, on October 25th, the Bulgarian government completely ignored the people: they decided to scrap all hunting quotas for brown bears and impose a total hunting ban. The quotas were originally introduced in 2011, but the EU had been bullying them to abandon the policy ever since.
Fun facts: Bulgaria has 400-700 brown bears as of 2020, divided into two subpopulations which rarely intermingle.
| 9 | Bears expand their Yellowstone turf |
In Montana and Wyoming, a rugged mountain range stretches north to south for 75 miles, with one portion occupying north-western Yellowstone and the rest lying in Gallatin National Forest. We’re talking about the Gallatin range, and according to frantic web reports in 2012, grizzly bears are slowly but surely reconquering its slopes.
The Gallatin mountains are rugged and cool, with plentiful forests, but not the thick deciduous forests of black bear country. Over in Yellowstone Park, conservation efforts had been so successful that the 500 grizzlies were competing heavily for food resources. Expansion was inevitable, and in 2012, bands of marauding grizzlies were reported to be moving northwards. Steve Herman and his wife Betsy were particularly interested, as they’d been tracking the grizzlies for 6 years beforehand, finding 300 samples of matted hair in the forest. In 2012, Gehrman estimated that 21 males and 7 females were now roaming the northern Gallatin range.
For the first 3 years, the signs showed up in a limited region of the southernmost Gallatin mountains, until gradually, more and more bear fur started appearing in the northern reaches. Gehrman was “real curious” as to what would happen next, but biologists now feared that a conquering grizzly army could soon be looming over the rapidly expanding town of Boseman. Apparently, it was inevitable that the bears would reach the bustling highway. If only we could tag the first one and give him a medal!
As of 2022, the prophecy is being fulfilled, as grizzly sightings are now appearing in Gallatin newspapers more than ever.
| 10 | Loki rises again |
One morning in a simple Liverpool zoo, the Norse god of mischief decided to embody himself on Earth as one playful newborn bear. Loki the cub was born in a makeshift hibernation den on December 14th, and throughout 2012, he made headlines aplenty, starting with his public debut on May 11th.
According to park manager Gary Gilmour: “He is a fantastic wee chap and is very playful”. After leaving his hibernation den with his mum Nellie, Loki climbed a small tree and got stuck on a branch within the hour, before taking a detour to a playful splash pool. Loki wasn’t trapped in a grimy cage; he had a wide open safari park to explore.
On October 18th 2012, Loki ripped open a Jack-o-lantern which spilt its scrambled egg contents all over him. 4 days later, zookeeper Nicola McCleery smeared a pedalo with strawberry jam and hid some grapes inside it. Nellie and son leapt on the pedalo and spent the whole day playing with it. The goal was claimed to be “mental and physical stimulation”.
When December 14th rolled around, Loki had a birthday party fit for a king. He was presented with elephant dung, which he rolled around in with sheer ecstasy, and some wood chippings which he used to groom himself. His lunchtime consisted of fruit cake decorated with dog biscuits, and he also received an old tire and ball to play with.
Sadly, Loki’s sister died a few days after birth. But Loki lives to this day (see this video).
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