Bears - IUCN

een marked. This could be done along the roads, it could be done at the camp
fire talks, it could be done in many ways. We found that an average visitor is
extremely interested in seeing a marked animal if he knows why it's marked
and for what purpose. I really don't see how you'll get even a guestimate of
the grizzly bear population in Glacier until you begin a marking program for
individual animals.
F. Craighead. I'd like to mention that early in our studies in Yellowstone we
solicited the help of the rangers, of various people working in the park, as well
as some visitors in making observations. We eventually had to dop the
analysis of all of this data, which more or less constitutes a monitoring system
similar to the one described, because we found that most of these people, including
some of the rangers, could not distinguish between a grizzly bear and
a black bear, particularly at a distance of 3 or 4 hundred yards.
S. Herrero. I'd like to ask John Craighead what the future of the grizzly bear
research project which has now been going on for 12 years, would be in Yellowstone
Park.
J. Craighead. I wish I could answer that question. I think I could say what I
think the future should be. We still have a large number of marked bears in
the population. As I indicated, we feel that the phase-out of open dumps should
be slow, and we feel that there should be an objective evaluation of it. We
believe that, in view of 12 years of experience, that our team is probably as
qualified to do this as any other team that might be placed in the parks to
evaluate this in the future. It's very obvious that if Trout Creek is closed down,
as has been stated is the policy of park service, there are going to be tremendouse
changes in the movements and habits next year, more so than this year.
I would even go so far as to predict that if it is done, there's very likely to be
a fatality in Yellowstone. I think that this requires objective evaluation, not
by the agency responsible for the resource, but by a group not responsible.
That agency can accept or reject the information and so, to answer your question,
we would like to continue to evaluate this situation for a number of years.
In our research in Yellowstone, this has all been done under a memorandum of
understanding in which we state exactly what we will do within the park, within
the regulations of the national park, while the National Park Service states
what it will do; in other words we have an understanding on paper. In the case
of this grizzly bear study, we obtained funds from a large number of sources,
covering over a million dollars in the 12 year period. None of this money
came from the National Park Service, in other words, we were conducting an
independent research project as far as financing was concerned, and we would
like to continue to do this. In a recent letter to the superintendent requesting
renewal of the memorandum of understanding, we were informed that the
memorandum would not be renewed. Hopefully, this is not so because, all
personal considerations aside, in the interest of the resource, what takes place
in Yellowstone—phasing out of these open pit dumps—should be very carefully
and throughly documented.
G. Cole. Could I make a point here that in the program that was made available
to those of you who were interested, there are two points that I think should be
brought up. In Item No. 11 it is apparent that the Park Service is to work with
towns, private individuals, and other state and federal agencies, to encourage
the proper sanitary disposal of waste so as not to attract bears to places of
human habitation outside park boundaries, and I'm positive that this has been
going on with the adjoining towns. Then, in the overall program, there is a
section called 'Contingencies' and if I may read the first item—'Continue to use
the Trout Creek dump beyond the scheduled 1971 closure on a phase-out basis
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