Week #9:
Fundraising at Lilypad Picnic

July 28, 2017

This past week we had one of the Bear Center’s largest fundraisers- the Lilypad Picnic.  Supporters of Dr. Lynn Rogers came from all over the United States to celebrate his 50 years of research and the North American Bear Center.  They were all very positive and supportive, and probably loved the bears as much as we do.  They love tuning into our broadcasts we put on every day and watching our live web cams we have on bear.org.

We decorated goody bags to sell and made four special ones for each of our bears to auction off.  The winners of the auction got to give the bears their goody bags.  The smaller bags we sold were hidden in the big enclosure by the Lilypad peeps for the bears to find and forage.

Ted found his in the morning and loved it.  However, he developed what I call turkey dinner syndrome.  He had eaten so much, all he could do was sleep it off.  He went to the window den and slept for HOURS.  We weren’t able to let Lucky out until before dinner time because Ted slept all day in the big enclosure.

We also went to the Wildlife Research Institute again this week.  We saw four new bears!  We got to see One-Eyed Jack again.  But we also got to see Crackle, a cinnamon phased black bear.  Ty, an 8 year old male, who loved to pick M&Ms out of the trail mix.  V-dot who was a huge bear and named for the white v-shape mark and dot on his chest.  We also got to see Pete in the distance eating at a different food station.

It was good to see how they approached the feeding stations, what food they preferred, and how they interacted amongst each other.  The bears are now starting to enter hyperphagia, which is when their main focus is food and gaining plenty of weight to survive hibernation.

At the end of the week, all of the interns got invited to a canoe paddle event called “This Land is Our Land”.  We went to Northern Tier and paddled on Moose Lake.  I was with Alex and we got up close and personal with some loons that didn’t mind us.

This event was held by the National Conservation Alliance and was a nationwide event celebrating America’s public lands legacy.

I had a great time, and the last big event in my final two weeks here will be the upcoming Blueberry Arts Festival that brings people to Ely from all over the country.