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Grizzly bears have entered polar bear territory, setting the stage for deadly bear versus bear encounters to come, suggests a study recently published in the journal Canadian Field Naturalist.
Should the bears meet, the grizzlies could do some serious damage."This is worrying for the polar bears because grizzly bears would likely hibernate in polar bear maternity denning habitat," explained Linda Gormezano, a co-author of the paper. "They would come out of hibernation at the same time and can kill polar cubs."
Gormezano and her colleagues documented sightings of the bears in Canada's Wapusk National Park. The bears are moving into the Canadian province of Manitoba in regions traditionally thought of as polar bear habitat.
"Grizzly bears are a new guy on the scene, competition and a potential predator for the polar bears that live in this area," said Robert Rockwell, who also worked on the study. He is a research associate at the American Museum of Natural History and a professor of biology at the City College of the City University of New York.
He shared that "the first time we saw a grizzly we were flying over the middle of Wapusk, counting fox dens" when Gormezano "shouted, 'Over there, over there—a grizzly bear.' And it wasn't a dirty polar bear or a moose—we saw the hump."
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