As promised, this post is about the release on November 30 of three of our “first wave,” or larger bear cubs. The cubs released were Ellis, Charley B, and Peanut Bear. Peanut (a TWRA cub) came to ABR in July while Ellis and Charley B Bear (GSMNP cubs) arrived in August. We will show a couple of earlier photos to remind you of how they looked when they arrived and how they grew while residing at ABR.
Here are photos of Ellis and Charley B back in August.
Ellis Bear in August.
Charley B Bear in August.
They started eating heartily and by September they were growing fast.
Ellis and Charley B in September.
The two brothers were the largest cubs onsite, and looked very different by November.
Ellis Bear in November.
Charley B Bear in November.
Although in these photos they almost appear to be of adult size, when you look at the following photos taken during their workup for release, you can see that they still are far from full grown bears.
Ellis Bear was the first to be worked up for release.
Ellis is carried to the workup area.
Ellis weighed 123 pounds!
Each cub was measured in turn.
Each cub received a lip tattoo.
Ellis gets his GPS collar.
Ellis is ready to get on the truck.
Charley B is brought to the workup area.
Vital signs are recorded.
Charley B weighed 124 pounds!
Charley B is ready to go.
Charley B in the transport cage on the truck.
In the next post we will see the actual release of these two bears and the workup of Peanut Bear. Stay tuned!