Yellowstone Bear World was founded by some people who grew up in the area, and had always gone to Yellowstone Park growing up, and seen bears there. Back then there were always bears around, because people fed them, but that started being really dangerous. Now they are very strict about not feeding the animals, but you just don’t see as many either, and it is very rare to find bear.
At Bear World they have set up a place where you can see and feed bear. Initially that sounds like it might be a little irresponsible, but it ended up being really cool. The main part is a drive through. If you have ever been to Wildlife Safari in Winston Oregon, it is similar, though that is much bigger, and most of the animals are African. Here, they were all Yellowstone animals. So the first section contains bison, elk, deer, and mountain goats. There was also a ground chuck (or marmot) in with the goats, though those probably tunnel in on their own.
Then you come to a separate gate that they open for you to let you in, and that is where the bears are. They have over 40 bears, including three grizzlies, and then lots of brown and black bears. We saw bear everywhere. We got a lot of good pictures. Since you are in a car, you can’t always get the shot you want. You are strictly instructed not to roll down your windows. You are also supposed to not stop, but at one point there were two cars in front of us, surrounded by bears, and we had to. The deal was that the one car was staff, and he was making sure one of the old bears got food, and so many bears were hanging around, because there was food. The other car had stopped to watch, and we did too, and then we did roll down the window so the staff guy could fill us in, which he did. That was pretty cool.
There is another gate that they open for you, and then we parked and went to look at the petting zoo and other things. They have recently added some rides, more for little kids, and they have two enclosures with three bear cubs each, who were just adorable. Near the petting zoo, but not in it, is a duck and trout pond, and then there is the moose. I have never seen a moose up close before. That was cool. Then in the petting zoo there were deer, goats, and chickens and a pig. The pig was penned off where you could not pet him. I know they stop being cuddly as they get older. There were some peacocks too, but the birds are not really into petting. We pet goats and deer, basically.
Looking around the gift shop, I realized that we had not seen any wolves, so I asked the salesgirl about them and she explained that they were in with the bears, but in the afternoons they were often napping under cover. You can go around as many times as you like, though, so we should try again.
Actually, she was really helpful. I was getting a magnet and she pointed out that the lettering was rubbing off so had me pick out a new one, and she offered fudge samples, and then was explaining how the one, Bridgette mix, was named after one of the grizzlies. See, they have Bridgette and Bridger, who are brother and sister, and then the other grizzly is their father. Bridgette mix is dark chocolate with caramel, nuts, and sea salt, and Bridger mix is like that, only with milk chocolate. I asked if that was just random or if it fit, and she said it worked, because Bridgette was a lot sassier and more social, where Bridger is kind of mellow, so it makes sense that she is the dark chocolate and he is milk. Overall the customer service was great. They seem to get a lot of BYU-Idaho students.
We took another round, looking carefully for white or grey, because the other thing she told me was that they had one white wolf, one grey wolf, and one black wolf. There were black bears, so we could get confused there, but if we saw white or grey it was definitely a wolf. We were most of the way through, without any luck, and then Jenn said she saw one, and I thought I saw it too, but we were looking at different ones and we suddenly realized all three of them were out there sleeping in the grass. That was a good payoff. We were not able to get any good pictures of the wolves, but we still saw them. All of them.
As we were leaving, one bear came from the side of the track, and it was like he was going to cross in front of us, and then he kind of stopped. We were not supposed to stop, but I was sure we were not supposed to hit the bear either. He started moving again, walking right in front of us, and then alongside us. At this point we were almost at the gate, and they started to open for us. We wondered if the bear was going to make a break for it, but he didn’t, and only humans left the enclosure that time.
They have two options for feeding the bears, neither of which we did. There are limited spaces for it, but you can bottle-feed the bear cubs (they eat three times a day), and you pet the cubs and get your picture taken doing that. For the adult bears they also have a high truck, where you can hold food down and the bears will reach up and take it. I would not be against those things, but it just didn’t work out, and of course, we were trying to stay frugal.
We did end up seeing some elk and bison at Yellowstone the next day, and I was grateful for that, but for getting an up close view of lots of the animals, Yellowstone Bear World was a great option.
http://www.yellowstonebearworld.com/
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