Grizzlies in The Bob

Perhaps no other animal embodies wilderness more than the grizzly bear. Feared or revered, this species is often thought of as a ferocious predator. The actual diet of the grizzly is much more diverse and includes berries, forbs, tubers, nuts, insects, and mushrooms. We encountered 2 grizzlies during our 10-day expedition into the Bob Marshall Wilderness Area (commonly called The Bob), documenting the Montana Remote Spot. We saw signs of several more. The grizzly that left us the sign below gorged on the berries of the mountain ashes growing in the high meadows.

Our first sighting of a grizzly occurred almost halfway through our trip. We saw the bear ambling across a slope meadow, across a creek valley from us. We didn’t get a picture of the actual bear, but below is a picture of where we saw the bear.

Our second encounter was along the trail on our second to the last day. We were walking and talking and all of a sudden I (Rebecca) saw a flash of brown run across the trail about 50 yds ahead of us. “Bear!” I shouted and we all stopped while it ran up a ravine and stopped. Then Vika, the fearless traildog, barked and scared the large grizzly into a run and out of sight. The next day we saw tracks of a bear, going in the same direction as we were along the trail…definitely heightened our awareness.