An Angry Momma Bear

[NorthernFocus]

Female brown/grizzly bears have a legendary reputation for fiercely protecting their young. We watched this mother with three cubs charge and back down this much larger male bear. Interestingly the male bear was minding his own business fishing in a stream about 75m or so from the sow and her brood. After forcing the male to retreat, she returned to gather her cubs and leave only to decide the male was still too close. She did a repeat performance and the male retreated again. She repeated this six times. For the final attack she literally had to run over 200m and assaulted the male who was up to his belly in water simply trying to get away. The male bear was so much larger than the female that we feared she wouldn't survive if she kept pushing her luck with him. Three orphaned cubs would have no chance of survival.

We were amazed at this series of "andfurthermore" attacks by the momma bear. We decided the boar must have been the father of the cubs and had failed to help support the household

Shot with Nikon D810/500mm f4.

As always best viewed in the light box.

This series of photos is from the initial encounter between the two bears. In this first shot the boar has already retreated from the creek bank where he was fishing. They are in the marsh grass at the tideline.



Here you can see the male is back pedaling into the tide flat. The marsh grass is barely visible at right of frame.



Here both bears are on all fours and you get a better sense of the difference in size. In body mass the boar was easily twice as big as the female. There was an impressive volume of roaring and gnashing of teeth. But as far as we could tell no actual contact ever occurred.

[Shadowman]

Nice sequence.

[Mike Buckley]

Another terrific series of photos and narrative!

[rpcrowe]

Despite the NICEY-NICEY films produced by Disney and others, a male bear will most likely kill and eat a cub. That is why momma is so fiercely defending her cub or cubs...

[NorthernFocus]

Glad you guys enjoyed the post.

Despite the NICEY-NICEY films produced by Disney and others, a male bear will most likely kill and eat a cub. That is why momma is so fiercely defending her cub or cubs...

Other female bears are even more of a threat than boars. I'm always amused by how definitively the "experts" explain animal behavior when in fact it is all theory and supposition. For example it is explained that the boars kill the cubs so that the sow will come into season again. Yet ANY other bear regardless of gender will kill the cubs.

[IzzieK]

Interesting narrative, Dan...one must never pick up a fight with a momma bear, whether animal or human...there are some rotten mothers but not as much as good ones who will protect their baby/ies. Nice shots too apart from the excellent sequence. The boar look like he's henpecked...

[Wandjina]

... and I always thought bears were such nice folk!

Great photos Dan.

[bnnrcn]

Thanks for sharing the images and the story Dan, very nice

[Donald]

Just amazing storytelling, both pictorially and in text. A pleasure to be able to see and read.

[NorthernFocus]

Thanks to all for looking and commenting. Glad you enjoyed the post.

We saw this momma bear and her three cubs every day while we were there. A day or two after witnessing this her cubs approached us while she was fishing. They came so close we had to scold them away. Having witnessed how protective she was we were really worried that she would come at us. But she ignored us completely. Over the rest of the trip the cubs continued to boldly pester us sometimes coming within just a few feet. The sow never reacted other than to huff at them to call them away. Clearly she didn't perceive us as a threat. It was at the same time gratifying and disturbing.

[KimC]

Amazing shots Dan! At what distance did you shoot the two bears?

[John 2]

Just excellent Dan. The Boar was clearly getting an earful. Ah well, we've all been there.

[rpcrowe]

I have mentioned this before but it seems appropriate to do so again.

One of my University Of Southern California Cinematography Professors, was also a cameraman for Disney films.

He was filming a mother grizzly bear with several cubs in the Montana wilderness when somehow a cub got in back of his camera position, placing him between mom and the cub. Mom charged him.

The only thing that saved his life was that he had a Jeep nearby with a metal topper. The mama bear did a job on the topper. The pictures looked like someone had attacked the Jeep with a fire ax! It was hilarious to hear him telling about trying to get his Jeep keys out of a tight pocket of his bluejeans while mama was ripping up the Jeep topper. But, it sure would not have been a bit funny to be in that situation!

[NorthernFocus]

...At what distance did you shoot the two bears?

Judging by the field of view obtained with the 500mm lens I'd estimate they were about 100 yards away. The posted image is cropped a bit from a D810 shooting in 1.2x mode. The image as posted is just about DX equivalent.

[Ziggy]

Special, thanks for sharing.

[Tom Barry]

Super sequence of nature in the raw.

[tbob]

Well done series and fascinating commentary. Interesting that they chose to not escalate to injuring each other. I suppose the risk/benefit analysis was such that they decided a potentially crippling wound was not worth it.