Grizzlies in Alaska sometimes eat salmon The cubs stand nearby and watch as their mother waits patiently The river roars The mother knows that sometimes salmon will jump right out of the water But she is too hungry to wait Instead she drops one of her massive paws into the water when she sees a fish swimming toward her She pins it with this simple move The anxious cubs run over She walks to the bank with the wriggling fish in her mouth She will
share this catch But it will be up to the young bears to find their next meal The Challenges Grizzlies Face As many as 100 000 grizzly bears once roamed the western half of North What's the Difference Some people call the grizzly bear a brown bear This is neither a mistake nor a nickname The grizzly bear is actually a North American subspecies of the brown bear Grizzly bears are found in western Canada Alaska Wyoming Montana and Idaho A small number of grizzlies are also thought to live in Washington The Kodiak bear is the other subspecies of the brown bear in North America It is found only on the islands of the Kodiak Archipelago in Alaska America This enormous bear species could be found from northern Mexico all the way to the Arctic More than 50 000 lived in the lower 48 states By 1975 that number had dropped to less than 1 000 Today the species has completely disappeared from Mexico and the southern United States They remain in Canada and the northern United States
Conflicts with humans are among the biggest reasons for the grizzly's decline Over time people have moved onto land occupied by grizzly bears The construction of homes and businesses has reduced available A Big Change On March 3 2016 the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed that the grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem be removed from the federal Lists of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants The grizzly population there has greatly increased in recent decades In 1975 only about 136 grizzlies lived in the region This region includes parts of Montana Wyoming and Idaho Today the area is home to more than 700 of these bears Many biologists worry that the species will decline again if the government removes federal protections Without these laws states could make hunting grizzlies legal again Some people think hunting could be too much for the grizzly population to sustain habitat for bears in much of their range Grizzly bears adapt quickly to change They will go wherever they must to find food Gardens farms or even trash can attract these hungry animals But humans usually dislike the bears presence If a bear continues to feed near
Grizzlies may look for food in landfills humans management agencies may relocate or kill the bear Climate change has also created some challenges for grizzly bears One of the bear's primary food sources is whitebark pinecone seeds These seeds are also called pine nuts Mountain pine beetles are killing many whitebark pine trees Warmer temperatures and droughts are making these problems worse
