by Roger Ager
One warm mid-September day, I was hunting moose on the Kenai Peninsula. The aspen and birch had begun to yellow. That morning my partner Tom and I had hunted higher ground. Late afternoon we decided the moose might be laying in the creek bottom to keep cool. Tom headed upstream and I went downstream. We decided to meet at the truck at dark.
As I still hunted near the creek, I noticed there was a lot of salmon in the creek. Every deep hole contained from two to four fish; silvers that had been out of salt water for awhile, turned red and hooked jaw. I was about a quarter mile in when I noticed the first bear track; very fresh. The farther downstream I went, the more bear sign I saw; trampled grass, parts of fish, tracks in mud. The front pad looked to be 7 1/2" to 8" across. Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) formula, add 1" to width of the front pad, change inches to feet, and get a length of the bear. That made him 8' or 8 1/2', nose to tail, a loner, probably a boar. No use hunting moose here, not with this guy living here. I decided to head southwest away from the creek and hunt my way back to the road on higher ground. I was about 70 yards from the creek when I noticed the fresh dirt and matted grass. I went to investigate. The disturbed grass led over to a clump of alders. Always curious about animals, I followed. It stopped at a hole in the ground and a mound of dirt. Next to the hole lay the skin of a 5 ½ foot black bear, turned inside out, fleshed clean. Leg bones protruded from each end and its skull lay completely intact and licked clean of all tissue.
Brown bears sometimes feed this way as if to make a trophy of bones and skin. Wolves will crush and scatter bone everywhere, leaving only bits of bone and hair. It was a spooky sight. The sun was getting low. I flicked the safety off of my 308 rifle and glanced around me in the leafy gloom, backed away and headed for the road. I thought later about the bears. The brownie heading downstream looking for fish and the black bear doing the same coming up. The black was probably a young adult not smart enough to know it was playing with fire. The brown, an old bear, moving more cautiously, seeing the black bear first, not moving, letting it get as close as possible. If the black bear saw or smelled the brown, it was already too late. The powerful legs and longer stride ran him down in 70 yards, killing with a crushing bite to the back of the head.
The black bear is a powerful predator in its own right; but, this is Alaska and there is a bigger kid on the block.