The Nolan Center hosted the annual Bearfest symposium last Thursday afternoon, July 23. The symposium brings together experts each year to give lectures on a variety of bear-themed topics. This year's symposium guest was Dr. Lance Craighead, who spoke about the history of bears themselves. Other local experts spoke about the Anan bear observatory, as well.
The history of bears, as animals, stretches back millions of years. Craighead said that all bears come from a common ancestor, which eventually evolved and adapted into the variety of bear species that we know today.
"The first lineage that led to bears was 'ursavus,' which was kind of a little raccoon-y thing," Craighead said. "It was the ancestor of all the bears. One line became herbivorous and ended up with only one bear, the giant panda. The other line evolved into the rest of the bears, the family ursidae."
About 15 million years ago, Craighead said, the ursidae family split into two "sub-families" known as short-faced bears and the "ursine," or the true bears that people recognize today. Around that same timeframe, he added, a group of short-faced bears crossed the Bering Land Bridge, a piece of land that once connected Alaska and Asia, and entered the North American continent.
The black bear line evolved around 5 million years ago, Craighead said, and crossed over into the Americas roughly 3.5 million years ago.
Like the short-faced bears before them, they also moved down south into the continent through the Mackenzie
corridor, and also down the west coast. With numerous predators to contend with, Craighead said that black
bears adapted to forest climates and the ability to climb trees to escape trouble.
"Black bears have been on this continent for three and a half million years, roughly, and they've been able to adapt and spread out," he said.
Brown bears, another relatively common sight in Alaska, evolved about four million years ago. One group of these bears, Craighead said, evolved into another bear offshoot known as polar bears. Brown bears are the most recently evolved species of bear, Craighead said. They adapted to tundra climates and prefer open country, he said. They are more specialized for digging than black bears are. They came to North America comparatively late, about 70,000 years ago.
Alaska's different bear species generally keep apart, Craighead said. In Southeast Alaska they usually have their own separate territories. The brown bears found on Admiralty,
Baranof, and Chichagof islands are the oldest lineage of brown bears in North America. They also make their home along the coastline, he said. Black bears, meanwhile, generally maintain territory in Southeast Alaskan islands further south, and on British Columbian islands. While they mostly stay apart, Craighead said, both species can be seen sharing space together at Anan Creek.
"Anan is pretty unusual for a bear feeding place, because there's black bears and brown bears," he said. "In most places it's one or the other."
This transitioned the symposium into a more general discussion of Anan. The area is now a popular bear observatory, but the creek has a long history of drawing people and animals together. Wrangell resident Sylvia Ettefagh explained that all the bears were at Anan because it was a very productive salmon run, so they all gathered together to eat fish and get fat. Fat equals survival, she said, so it makes sense bears would like the location. People liked the place for the fish as well, she said, not just the bears. Human beings have used Anan for a popular fishing location for a long time, she said, with evidence of people in the area dating back 1,200 years.
John Martin, Wrangell resident and Alaska native, also shared some stories of the Anan area during the symposium. Like the black bears and brown bears sharing the space, he said that many groups came together in Anan peacefully, when they would otherwise be fighting each other. He recognizes Anan as being a very special place, he said.
"It's real unique in that there were multiple clans in there harvesting fish, growing their gardens, smoking fish, at the same time," he said. "There's all that conflict potential, but it's not happening at Anan."
Tory Houser, with the Forest Service, closed out the symposium to briefly share plans for the future of Anan. The Forest Service is planning several construction projects to update the bear observatory, she said.
One such plan is to install a new deck by next summer, build new stairs, and to pull back the observation shelter to provide a better view of the creek.
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