Originally featured in Points West in March 2008
Grizzly Bear 104’s Last Offspring
In the spring of 2001, famous Grizzly Bear Number 104 was struck by a vehicle and killed on the highway in the Shoshone National Forest, near the East Gate of Yellowstone National Park. Although she was often seen and photographed near the East Gate, she had largely avoided conflicts with humans and death until that fateful spring morning.
Grizzly 104 has inhabited our Draper Museum of Natural History Mountain Meadow environment since we opened in June 2002. But the story does not end there: When 104 was killed in 2001, she orphaned a yearling cub, known to wildlife managers as G86. In all likelihood, according to these officials, this was the same bear that was later captured in May 2003 at Pahaska Lodge, just outside the park’s east entrance.
G86 was captured after numerous conflicts involving humans and food rewards along the North Fork corridor of the Shoshone River. Because he had become habituated to people and thus posed a danger to people and property, the three-year-old grizzly bear was euthanized. In November 2007, the taxidermy mount of this bear was reunited with his presumed mother in the newly enhanced Draper Natural History Museum grizzly bear meadow, helping us present common causes of human-bear conflicts and how to avoid them.
Grizzly bear cub G86, the presumed last offspring of Bear 104. Scientific name: Ursus arctos. Taxidermist: James J. Marsico. DRA.305.67
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