Conservation of brown bears on the Kenai Peninsula is a complex matter. Our Fish & Game officers have always dealt with issues
like hunting opportunities and safety. But bear viewing has been concerned relatively few of us. No longer.
I was reminded of this as I watched the recent movie Instinct with Anthony Hopkins. I was struck once again by the wonder of wild
gorillas. By their majesty, their normal gentleness, their intelligence, their affection and care of one another. I wished once more
that I could spend a few weeks in Africa’s high volcanic Virunga region, watching these fascinating creatures. No doubt, many of you
felt exactly the same way.
For similar reasons, many of us enjoy watching bears. Not only are bears of comparable intelligence to great apes, but bears are
normally equally gentle and affectionate. I have been filled with awe and a sense of rare and special privilege as I watched from as
close as fifty feet as a mating pair gently nuzzled one another or wrestled like cubs. My heart has raced with machinegun speed as a
bear sniffed me from so close that I could feel the wind of its breath rippling the hair on the nape of my neck. One grizzly pulled a
stocking cap off my head with its paw. Others have invited me to play. A captive bear used a pair of its claws like chopsticks to pick up
peanuts and raisins from my hand. Yet, in the thousands of hours I’ve spent observing grizzly and black bears, I’ve never been hurt or
even seriously threatened.
Clearly, I’ve been very lucky. For some individual bears are simply savage, at least towards people. And even a bear can have a “bad
hair day”. But, beyond luck is knowledge, and I’ve spent decades learning to read their body language and how to interact safely – as
some of you may know from the Wild Things TV show about my work which has aired several times over the past year.
Just as people from around the world flock to Africa to see great apes, they flock here to see great bruins. It is on the coasts of Alaska
and British Columbia that bear viewing is safest, and where it is becoming increasingly popular among both residents and tourists.
Cache Creek on Admiralty Island has long been a Mecca. There is always a waiting list of people eager to spend a few days at McNeil
Falls. Thousands fly into Katmai National Park (just south of McNeil) each year, where most crowd into Brooks Falls. Those with a
bit more money fly onto the Cook Inlet coast of Katmai from Kodiak, Soldotna, or Homer. Luckiest of all are those who make the trip
from Homer to Katmai’s coast by boat with Katmai Coastal Bear Tours. Captain John Rogers takes guests cruising among some of
the most spectacular scenery in the world, to see dozens of grizzlies digging for clams, chasing salmon, or belly sliding as they graze
on sedge.
There was briefly a bear viewing area set aside on Kodiak Island’s O’Malley Creek. As these bears lost their fear of people in the
viewing area, question arose about whether this would also make the bears less wary away from O’Melley -- where most of the people
they meet aren’t watchers but hunters. Concerned citizens argued for a big buffer zone around O’Malley where hunting would be
banned. Hunters and hunting guides reacted to defend their sport or livelihood by curtailing bear viewing. For now.
Any single bear can be harvested by only one hunter, but watched by hundreds of people. And there may well be hundreds of times
as many people who want to watch bears as kill them. So far, hunting guides have had more political clout than viewing guides. But
economics will eventually rule, as the number of viewing guides sky rockets, and as more hunting guides shift to emphasize viewing.
Some guides not only make more money with viewing, but enjoy it more themselves.
Travel to Admiralty or the Alaska Peninsula is relatively expensive. Only a limited number of people can afford to make the trip.
And only a limited number of guides can profitably take them there.
What about closer to home? We’ve got plenty of bears and salmon on the Kenai Peninsula. Don’t we have places where bears
congregate to fish, places where people might gather to watch the bruins?
Obviously, the Kenai Peninsula no longer has any areas comparable to Cache Creek, McNeil, Brooks or Geographic Harbor, where
people can predictably find a lot of bears at a specific spot and watch them from such close range that an animal’s head can fill the
camera frame or the purr of nursing cubs is so loud that you can almost feel the vibrations. But do we have something almost as
good? Or can we create something?
These are important questions to those of us who want to spend a day now and then watching the bears or to make a living as bear-
watching guides. We also need to know how many “golden eggs” this “golden goose” can produce, and how we can keep the “goose”
healthy. For instance, how much pressure from viewers can bears tolerate along a salmon stream or clam bed without the bears
starting to avoid the site and losing a key food source?
Viewing also presents new challenges in managing other forms of recreation. How do we meet the growing demands for bear
viewing without seriously impacting opportunities for bear hunting? How do we balance the demands of viewing guides with those of
hunting guides? Or fishing guides? The places people like to fish are often the very same places preferred by bears. An influx of
people tends to drive some of the bears away, perhaps depriving them of their most important food. Bears that remain may end up in
conflict with people. Do we set up bear viewing in the same places targeted by fishermen, or reserve some sites for fishing and others
for viewing? How do we treat bears in viewing areas so as to minimize their fear that we want to harm them without losing their
respect for our ability to retaliate to any aggression from them? If bears are less wary of us at viewing areas, how will this affect
wariness where they are hunted, or their boldness when they smell our food or garbage?
These are just a few of the issues facing our ADF&G and the Kenai Brown Bear conservation stakeholders group. The group’s next
meeting will be on December 2nd at the Community Hall in Cooper Landing. Each of these meetings is open to the public.
BEAR WATCHING ON THE KENAI PENINSULA
Potential Opportunities & Problems
(c) 1999 Stephen F. Stringham, PhD
WildWatch Consulting
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