Dinner

What’s for Dinner?

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If you are one of the two dozen yearlings in Wild Enclosures at ABR, dinner time is variable.  That is so that the little bears don’t get accustomed to a particular time for food to be delivered.  As you know, the curators toss the food over the fences into the enclosures, scattering it in different places so that the yearlings really do have to forage and find it.  There is plenty for all, but they have to find it themselves.  Here is a picture of the dinner for these bears, loaded on the “food cart” and ready to go.

Dinner

Good eats for yearlings. Looks pretty tempting to us, too!

The menu includes Mazouri Bear Pellets, pears and peanuts.  The yearlings in these enclosures spend their time alternatively foraging and napping in trees.  No interest in hibernating, and now that the weather has warmed a bit and there is no more snow (at least for now) they don’t spend much  if any time in the dens.

The bears in Wild Enclosure #2 include Tedford, Acorn, Pumpkin, Gamble and Chestnut.  Here is a photo of four of the five.  You can guess who is in the tree and who is missing.

Wild Enclosure 2

Four of the five yearlings in Wild Enclosure #2.

The two smallest yearlings are still in Acclimation Pens so that they can take their medicine, which is added to their food.  They have to be given soft foods like applesauce and yogurt to which the meds can be added.

When the UT vets were informed of Cecilia Bear’s weight gain the other day, they told the curators to increase the amount of antibiotics and reduce the number of days she needs to be taking them.  This means she will be out in the Wild Enclosure sooner.  When Curator Janet came to deliver her food, Cecilia huffed from her perch on the platform in her pen.  Huffing is good wild bear behavior.

Cecilia

Cecilia Bear, on the platform in the Acclimation Pen. She huffed at the curator.

The smallest yearling (although he is trying hard to catch up) is Skipper Bear, in another Acclimation Pen.  He didn’t huff at the curator, but scooted into his log as soon as he heard her coming.  Hiding is his strategy, and it is another good wild bear behavior.

Skipper

Skipper hid in his log, and all we can see is his butt.

Cecilia Bear and Skipper Bear are getting the soft foods with medicine added, but they are also trying the foods they will eat in the Wild Enclosure – pecans and pears have been added to their menu.