As we reported in our last post ABR Bear #258, nicknamed Summitt Bear, was moved from the Cub Nursery into The Cub House when he showed by his behavior that he was ready to get out of the confines of the pen in the nursery.  In no time at all, he has settled into the much more spacious Cub House and seems content (for now).  He is still getting medicine in his applesauce, so it’s not possible to release him into a Wild Enclosure just yet.  The curators are monitoring him to watch his progress.

Today we have just one photo of Summitt in his new digs, but it’s a very good picture.  Being a bear yearling he feels most comfortable when he is up high.  As soon as a mother bear brings her cub(s) out of the den when they are about three months old she teaches them to climb a tree on her command and stay there until she calls them down.  That location is safest for them.  Since Summitt is a yearling, he learned this lesson a year ago and probably spent much of his first year of life in trees.

Summitt Bear immediately started climbing to the highest point in The Cub House, and in the photo we see him resting on the shelf that is high at the top of a “tree” placed there by the curators.

Summitt Bear relaxes on the shelf in The Cub House.

There are two rooms in The Cub House, separated by a sliding door that allows the curator to place food in one side and to clean out the other side while the bear is eating.  Summitt is eating well, and as this image shows he is climbing well.  Hard to believe that just over a week ago he was so anemic that he required a blood transfusion.  He looks like a picture of little bear health now!