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bears/kaflia
Posted by twodux on Feb 04 2006
The bears of Kaflia lagoon and Kukak bay Shouldn't be confused with the ones at McNeil River Hatfield. They aren't habituated to people by a long shot. They encounter very few people compared to the bears at McNeil. I've spent time in that area seining for salmon and digging razor clams and I know one thing, I wouldn't be comfortable camping there. In Kukak Bay, we would see 20 to 30 bears in a day. I got to witness two boars fighting. That was a trip! They'd tear into each other and roll around on the ground, then just stop and stare in different directions. Then at some seemingly predetermined point they'd whip around and attack each other again. Also watched a huge boar tracking down a fairly small cub. The cub ran out on the beach and was frantically running up the shoreline looking over it's shoulders as it ran. It finally ran into the brush and headed up a hill. We were wondering what was going on and then the boar came out of the brush where the small bear had and moseyed up the beach seemingly not paying too much attention to anything, but occasionally lifting it's head to sniff the air. Right where the cub went back into the brush, the big boy turned and followed. Not in any hurry, but you could tell he knew where he was going and what he was after. I watched a bear on Kodiak tracking three deer one time and it was the same thing. The deer knew the bear was behind them and they'd scramble up the hill and come to a vantage point and stop and watch their back trail. That's how I spotted the bear was I saw the deer and was wondering why they were acting so spooky so I glassed where they were looking and there came the bear. It was acting like it was out for a stroll, but it followed the deer on every twist of their back trail. It was relentless. The last I saw them, the deer circled back on the bear down into a big alder patch and the bear eventually followed them.
When we were clam digging, we were a little nervous going to the beach as we had seen bears in the area. The problem was, once we hit the beach we were stuck, because the tide drops so fast there once you hit bottom you're almost immediately high and dry.(30 feet or more in six hours or so) The first day almost as soon as we started digging, a bear came over the bank and walked tithin about 50 yards from us, but he payed us no attention and walked on down the beach about a half mile away and was doing his own digging. We then had a fox come down and he had no fear of us at all, in fact he started getting into the skiff and stealing clams from us. We fixed that by throwing the badly crushed ones in his direction. He'd grab them by the neck and shake his head so quickly, the shells would fly off and he'd gulp the meat down in one bite.
Then we went up to Hallo Bay and there were about six bears on the beach digging that day. They seemed content to leave us alone as long as we left them alone. But after watching the casual way they track things down to kill, I always wonder what is really on their minds when they seem to ignore me.
Anyway, Katmaii is a huge area, most of the bears there don't even go to McNeil River, so don't ever make the mistake of thinking they are all habituated to humans.
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