Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - Grizzly Bear Attack - The Soda Butte Camp Site Grizzly Bear Attack

Episode Date: July 3, 2023

Wes shares another tragic story of a grizzly bear attack, once again taking place in Yellowstone National Park. Afterwards, the guys talk about their favorite camping scenes from pop culture, and a discussion about recent animal encounters somehow turns into more Transformers talk. ~~ To advertise on the show, contact us! ~~ Tooth & Claw is brought to you by QCODE. Support the show and get access to an extensive library of exclusive episodes like this by supporting the show on Patreon or joining the Grizzly Club on Apple Podcasts. For the latest updates on the show and all things wildlife, follow us at toothandclawpod.com and social:  Instagram: @ToothandClawPodcast Twitter: @ToothandClawPod Wes: @GrizKid Jeff: @jefe_larson Mike: @mikey3ds    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is tooth and clob podcast. We got our wildlife biologist. That's me. One of my favorite brothers, Wes Larson, with us. That's good enough for me, dude. Top two. Yeah, top two. We got Mike Smith, our producer.

He's feeling a little under the weather, but he's... He's here. Rain or shine. He's a trooper, you know? He's like an NBA player who sprains his ankle. keeps playing. Just tie up my shoe a little tighter. I just, I can't wait until I feel on top of the weather again, you know?

How come no one says that? Like I feel on top of the weather today? Over the weather. Yeah. Yeah. Add it to your gripes, dude. Typing it down. Why do we say under the weather in the first place?

It's a good question. I don't know. Maybe like if it's nice out and you feel sick, you're like under what the weather is. Seems like one of those questions. Maybe if you're sick in the winter, you're over the weather. I don't know. Hi. Yeah, I, it's as logical in answers I can come up with.

Yeah, I got nothing here. And then I'm Jeff Larson. Oh, hey, Jeff. Glad you're here. I was West's field tech, and I just love podcasting, so that's why I'm here. Yeah, field tech on my Black Bear project. I have another hernia. Ooh.

Oh, man. Maybe we'll get another pain med. Is this the third one? Episode, like my subscription Fox episode. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. What number of hernia is this? I tried to read like a paragraph and I just couldn't do it. This is my second.

Cool. You're going to go for the turkey? Yeah, I'm planning on lifting heavy weights afterwards still. Oh, dude, we know how much you love that. We've talked about that a lot. Like I got to 200 now. It's 300 for Benji, you know? That's the next goal.

So you're saying you think this hernia, did your doctor say? I can't stop lifting weights. Did your doctor say this is because you bench way too much? That's why you're getting these hurt years. You know, I couldn't really pay attention to him. He was so boring talking about it all. Yeah. All right.

He was like, take off your shirt. I just want to see how much it looks like you've been lifting recently. But like... He doesn't even have to look at anything else, but your pecks. Yes. He's like, oh, you have heard you. No wonder you ever heard of that. Like a year and a half.

Well, like, I had my last one. my last surgery like a year and a half ago. And then like seven months later, I started getting all the symptoms again. And I went to a doctor and they told me I didn't have a hernia. And I like knew that I did. So I went to a new one finally. And he was like, yeah, you have a hernia. But I just have like constant lower back pain.

Right. That's what I had before. And let me tell you, I went to Costco like two days ago or is yesterday. And I sat in the massage chair. And it was a better massage than a huge. humans ever given me. Really? What do you like so much about it?

So it like really stretches you out. And it, Mike, I feel like it might hurt you even more than me because like I have kind of big calves and it was really squeezing them hard. Oh man. I can't. But then it like squeezes your legs and pulls your back back and leans you all the way back. Oh, interesting. And it just like moves you all the way around.

Like it moves so much. So it's like an intense massage. But then it like stretches. your back out and massages. That's really cool, actually. I don't know. It feels so good. Can I tell you a funny story about a massage?

It's not what you're thinking. It's going to start off like it's what you're thinking. I was in Taiwan with some friends and we went to this massage parlor and like... It'd be funny if it does go that direction. At the end he's like, and then she like started touching. No. So the whole time we were there, we were with a friend who, spoke Mandarin, and so we were able to navigate Taiwan just fine. It wasn't a problem. But we like split up

that night and all the boys went to get a massage and the girls like went to go do something else. So my friend that spoke Mandarin, Clara, wasn't with us. And so we went to this massage parlor and we like couldn't communicate. And I, me and one of my friends that were there like, I don't like a really heavy massage like the kinds that really hurt. And so I was like, hey, give me a light massage. And the guy I just like, I had a male masseuse. He had no idea what I was talking about and just proceeded to give me the hardest, most painful massage I've ever had in my entire life. And at one point, he just bends down into my ear and just whispers, no resist in my ear.

Oh, man. And then I hear my friend Rory from the other massage bed who's like even more into like a soft massage. I just hear him say, gentler, please. It was really funny Hard massage is like so uncomfortable Oh it's just painful I do feel like I need it sometimes

Yeah Have you tried the cupping? Love cupping It hurts too but I like makes me feel so much better Dude there's once I like couldn't breathe And I was like I hope she takes these off soon Because I like might die I kind of like the feeling of the cupping more than I like

The feeling of a really hard massage She put like 50 of them on me. Yeah. Yeah, me too. And then my bruises stayed for like two months. Oh, yeah. Have you done it, Mike? No, I've never done cupping.

Is it kind of just like a hickie, but without like the nice part? I've never tried hickies. Yeah. Yeah, what's a hickie? No, it is. But it's like the guy that did it for me was like an acupuncturist. So he did some acupuncture and then he did cupping. And I had like a pinch nerve and it really helped with it.

Oh, nice. Yeah, I recommend it. I'm telling you to go to these Costco chairs, though. I'm going to, like, shave my face again and look like my driver's license picture, just so he won't recognize me and I can, like, give it another ride. Is there a limit to how many times you can go on it? I feel like he'll tell me no if I'm just, like, going back. I don't know.

I used to have a blog where all I did was go to Costco and sample the samples every day and write about him. Samplesaurus. You should try to get your job at Costco about. Then you could just do it every day. That'd be great. Who had a job at Costco? Didn't you work at Costco, Jeff? Oh, yeah, you did for a minute, right?

No, I could, that's actually... I forgot about that job. Maybe I could get the dude's job who's, like, doing the massage chairs. Yeah, why not? Shoot for the stars. I like that job. That was a good job. Well, yeah, I think you should go back.

Anyway, I don't. I don't know what I'm saying. Well, I got a real dozy of a story today. It's one that I've thought about a lot that I've kind of saved for a while, and I don't really know why. And then I spent- You just said, speaking to Costco, I've been saving this story for a while. See, that's why you write the segways. You don't even write them.

They just pop into your head. No, this is a story that I've been sitting on for a while because it's a yellowstone one. It's one that I've heard about a lot when I was working in the park. It's one I knew about before I worked in the park. It's one that you guys actually know about. you're going to figure out why at the end. I'm going to give you a little hint. It's because of the bears involved in the story.

You've already told this story before on the podcast? No, but it'll make sense. And then I just, I wonder if he could get away with that with us. Just like read out of the same story. Oh, I for sure probably could. For sure, probably could. Anyway. For sure, probably.

I know. I hate when I do that. So I was just in Yellowstone for a couple weeks. And I was staying in Cook City for a lot of that time. which is the town just outside of the northeast entrance of the park. And as I was staying there, I was going back and forth, and I kept driving beside the campground where this incident happened. And so I just kept thinking about it.

And the people I was there with, I kept telling them about what happened. And I just kind of, it was another one of those stories where it was so fresh in my mind and I had just spent so much time right by where this happened that I felt like I needed to tell the story. So that's what we're going to talk about today. How is the food there? In Cook City? Oh, because it's Cook City. It's just all cooks.

I'll cut that job. There's like one good restaurant in Cook City, but it's pretty good, actually. That's why it's not Cook's City. Yeah. That's where they all come from. That's the way of Ramsie learned it. Do you think Gordon's just his humble roots in Cook City? It's also a story that I know some of the people that responded to this incident after it happened,

so I'd kind of heard about it from them as well. So again, it's just one that's kind of close to home. So we're going to talk today about the 2010 Soda Butte Campground Attack. And this is an attack that involves my favorite animal, the grizzly bear. It was spoiler for how much do you like it? Well, you know that already. I've changed my answer. I changed mine quite a bit too, but they are currently my favorites.

All right. They're my second favorites right now. Well, spoiler for your answer then, too, Jeff. All right. So on the 21st of July 2010, a woman was jogging on Highway 212. between the northeast entrance to Yellowstone National Park and the small community of Silvergate, which the two are just a few miles apart, and then Cook City's one mile past Silvergate. Her late morning jog through the beautiful alpine area suddenly cut short because a female grizzly

with three cubs walks out of the woods and onto the road. The bears immediately noticed this woman, and the female bear stands up in this effort to get a better look at the woman and this approaching possible threat. The cubs, on the other hand, panic and they start running down the side of the side of the the road toward this running woman and this causes her to you know obviously get a little scared she stops in a place and she starts yelling hey hey hey which causes this female grizzly to stop her charge that she had just started and heard her cubs back into the woods so this woman had a pretty like hair-raising experience powerful oh hey yeah she's running suddenly she's charged by a grizzly with

cubs which is something that can happen in yellowstone so she goes back to the ranger station she writes a bear report and that's that. One week later, the Wilhelm family was settling into their campsite in the upper loop of Soda Butte campground. Now this campground sits in a forested valley. It's about five miles north of Yellowstone and it's pretty popular. There's 27 campsites spread out over a medium sized campground. Almost all of them are separated by these groves of conifers that provide a bit of privacy for each of the campers. So it's not a campsite where it's just like everyone is right next to each other. Most of these campsites are broken up by trees, so you get like kind of your own little corner, which is nice. Yeah. So they're spread out over this medium-sized campground.

In addition, it's only about three-fourths of a mile from Cook City, which makes getting like extra supplies or food or whatever you need really convenient. It's pretty shocking to me actually. Who named this place? Soda Bue. Cooke and Cook City. They're just like hungry, Joey Chesson. They're like, hey, we can't eat lunch until we come up for names of this campground in the city. They're like, that's fries falls over there. And that's Burger Creek. Anyway. Burger Creek.

I don't know. Gross. Creeks a good name. Yeah. So this campground also butts up against Sodebute Creek, which is this really beautiful mountain creek. It's somewhat big for a creek. And it keeps the campground quite cool in the warmer summer months. and it also provides a lot of ambient noise.

And for me, personally, I love sleeping next to a creek. I love hearing the babbling sound of the creek as you're sleeping. It's very relaxing to me. So the Wilhelms had traveled from Texas for their family vacation in Yellowstone, and these parents, Paige and Don, were really happy to be resting from an eventful day with their two sons on the night of July 27th. So Don was actually a wildlife biologist, and this trip to Yellowstone was especially exciting to him because he understood that Yellowstone was a complete ecosystem in the Rockies, still had all the original wildlife that you could find there hundreds of years ago,

which includes everything from small animals like yellow-bellied marmits to big animals like grizzly bears. So that evening, in the campground, they had a pretty uneventful, normal, peaceful camping evening, but that peace was shattered at 2 a.m. when the Wilhams woke up to screams in the Soto Butte campground. Oh, man. So a little bit about grizzly bears in the Yellowstone ecosystem. system. We've talked a lot about grizzly bears. We've talked about a lot about grizzly bears in Yellowstone. So I kind of took this a different route today and I want to talk about what grizzly bears eat in Yellowstone. So what do you guys think they eat in Yellowstone? If you were to say like the top three things that they eat in Yellowstone, what would they be?

Smaller grizzly bears. Grass. Grass. All right. Berries? Berries and what else? I'm going to go with cream. Bison, calves. Thank you, Mike. I'm glad you got that joke. Bison calves. Fish. Fish is a good guess.

All right, I won't make you guys keep guessing. I'm going to tell you. Garbage. Not anymore. That used to be a really good answer. All right. So in a paper published by Kerry Gunther at all in 2014, Carrie was my main Boston Yellowstone.

It's titled Dietary Breth of Grizzly Bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. And he and these other authors outlined, all of the different species that Yellowstone grizzly bears consume. They counted 175 plant species, 37 invertebrate species. So that's like insects and stuff. 34 mammal species, seven fungi species, seven bird species, four fish species, one amphibian species, one algae species, and one type of soil. So, yeah, bears are true omnivores, like in the tree.

is like in the truest sense. They, in total there is more than 260 something species that they're eating in the park, which is pretty crazy. Yeah. So this ability to eat so many different types of food is like really one of the main reasons that grizzly bears or brown bears is they're known in other countries are able to occupy such differing habitats and why they're so widespread across the world. So like this exact same bear that you find in Yellowstone also lives in the Gobi Desert.

It's just a different subspecies, but it's the same species. And it's because they have this plasticity with them where they're able to really switch from food source to food source. You know, this is something that we wish polar bears could do because then they wouldn't be nearly as at risk from climate change. But they're just focused on marine mammals, you know? I just wish they would be a little less picky. But we can't. Eat a salad every once in a while. Yeah, exactly.

Try some bugs, polar bears. Dirt. Do you think grizzly bears have eaten like every type of mammal that's in Yellowstone? It's got to be because they said 34 mammals. Maybe not like a wolverine. That would be a hard one to find. So the thing is, they analyzed 11,478 bear scats for this paper, which, you know, in the words of Ian Malcolm, that's one big pile of shit. That's dino dino doodoo?

Isn't that what it says? I can't remember. Anyway, it's a lot of scats that they analyze. And these scats go back decades and decades. So I wouldn't be surprised at some point they had some Wolverine in one of these scats. Where do they keep those? Do they just have like a big vault full of like copper lights? Yeah, I think they dry them out and they're probably just in bags.

But when I was in Yellowstone, there was a undergrad that was working on analyzing scats. And she would just kind of have to like break them down. and then use like forceps to pick out all the stuff and then was always looking through a microscope and stuff to identify different things. And you were just mad that you had to like manage bears that I'm out. To just look through sleep all day.

Oh boy. I would not have traded her jobs. The grass is always browner on the other side. Anyway, the top five things that they found were consumed by grizzly bears were, number one, grass and sedges, which were found in 58.7. percent of scats. Number two was ants, which was found in 15.8 percent of scats. Three was whitebark pine nuts, which were found in 15.4 percent of scats.

Four was clover, which was found in 11.9 percent of scats. And five was dandelion, which was found in 10.9 percent of scats. Interesting. Elk sat just outside of the top five being found in like 8.3 percent of scats. They're much more likely to kill elk than they are bison. And that would be the, that's the first. meat that appears on that list, right? That is.

Yeah, and that sits out. And these are, I do want to make it clear that four interior grizzlies, they eat a lot more meat than typical. Like if you were to go to grizzlies in interior British Columbia or even like Glacier National Park, they're not getting nearly as much meat because they don't have nearly as many ungulates around them. But Yellowstone, there's a lot of elk and bears kill about 50% of their caps. So bears get more elk in Yellowstone than they do. do in a lot of other places. That's a lot. Yeah. Bison, it's just because they're better at protecting their calves. They're really good at protecting their calves. Yeah. And a bear can't take on an adult bison,

but a cow elk can't stop a grizzly from killing her calf. So here's the thing, like, those are the top five things that they found in their scats, but those aren't necessarily the things that are most valuable to grizzly bears. So when you look at that, when you look at the stuff that's most beneficial to them in a nutritional sense, you get a different breakdown. Number one is Army cutworm moths, which have 7.91 K-cals per gram of energy. So more than anything else. How do those taste, Wes? I've never tasted army cutworm moths, but I can't imagine they taste that great,

because moth wings stick to the roof of your mouth. But I will say there are places now that grizzlies go in the ecosystem, where they go way up high on these rock slides, and all they do is flip over rocks and eat thousands and thousands and thousands of these moths. And it's become a really important food source for those grizzly bears. Number two is ungulates, so elk, bison, deer. It's about 6.8 k cows per gram. Number three would be cutthroat trout, which is 6.1 k cows per gram.

Four is clover, 4.8 k cows per gram, and five would be small mammals, which is about 4.5 K cows per gram. So when those food sources are abundant, you'll see bears really key in on them. So, for example, we've talked about this a bit, but during elk calving season, a lot of the grizzlies are really looking for elk caps, because it's a really good source of energy. And the same thing when they have these Army Cutwar moths or Whitebark pine, it's just really good sources for them and they'll really pay attention to them.

So they're able to catch cut throats out of the rivers there? So what used to happen, well, we'll talk about that a little more, but I'm, you know, I'm going to get to that. Put a pin in that. I'm going to get right back to it. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I just had some weird deja vu.

All right. So, oh, actually, that's right now. that I'm going to get to that. Deja vu of just what just happened. Yeah. All right. Over the years, there have been some really big shifts in food sources for bears. So for a good chunk of the 20th century, they were eating a lot.

So we're unpinning it now. Yeah, we're, take that pin out. We're almost to it. Like, slowly take it out because we're going to get there in a second. I hadn't even putting it in yet. Okay. Well, then don't worry about it. Just hold it with your finger for a second.

So over the 20th century, they're eating a lot. lot of human trash and food waste, which by far has the most caloric content for these animals. Like the K-cals per gram in our trash and our food waste just totally eclipses any of this other stuff that we just talked about. So it was obviously a very enticing, very important source of food for all those bears that had access to it. But when they removed the dumps and when they removed all the sources of human food for those bears, those bears had to switch to natural food sources. So that was a big shift, and it was hard for a lot of those bears to get used to that. And then another big one was cutthroat trout. So cutthroat used to be a major source of food for a

percentage of the grizzly bears in the park. But with the introduction of non-native lake trout, prevalence of whirling disease, and then some long periods of drought, all of those things really substantially affected this cutthroat population in the park. And now the cutthroat are starting to come back, and there's still a very small percentage of bears that will catch spawning trout in the Yellowstone ecosystem. So does that answer your question, Jeff? Kind of, but like, so like in Alaska when we watched them catch salmon, it was like the salmon were pretty easy to catch. Like we even went in there and caught him with our bare hands because they're dying.

It's the same general idea. Like think about at Lake Otocomi when the cut throat are in there spawning in that little like spawning. stream. Yeah. It's kind of the same idea. They're going to spawning streams and there's wading right by the stream and they're grabbing and it's kind of shallow. Big spawning cutthroats when they swim by.

Yep. Okay. It's not like they're out there fishing for just like normal cutthroat trout. These are spawning trout that are in shallow water. Okay. So, but when they lost this food source, they have to make a shift. And in this case, and they would go, they would shift toward more elk predation often. And then white bark pine is another key food source.

for bears that's changing in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem. So the nuts of the white bark pine tree in the cones, they're really high in natural fats, and they're collected by red squirrels who store those pine nuts in their middens. And that's M-I-D-D-E-N-S. We've talked about this before. I'm not saying mittens. And so what the bears do is they sniff out these middens,

and they'll go and rate them, and they'll eat all the pine nuts that these squirrels have stored up for the winter. And so it's a really good food source for them. It's a lot of fat. It's nice of the squirrels to do that. Great of the squirrels. I'm sure that like imagine being one of these squirrels and coming home and all your pine nuts are gone. And your house is destroyed.

You know, we've all, we've all been there. All right. Anyway, mountain pine beetles are this species of beetle that's been able to establish themselves in whitebark pine trees as a direct result of milder winters due to climate change. So they kill those trees and a large percentage. of white bark pine trees have died in the past 20 years. So once again, grizzly bears lost this really important food source for the most part. They still have it, but not the ways they used to. And once again, they show this really incredible nutritional plasticity,

and they switched alternative food sources in the absence of really dependable whitebark pine. And again, a lot of times that included increased predation on elk. So you kind of have to think that like every time grizzly bears are losing a new food source in the park. The elk cats are just like, mother fucker. Anyways. And didn't they like reintroduce wolves to the park like 20 years ago or something? Yeah, that's actually been great for the for the bears, but not for elk.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking to elk still. Elk are just like, can't catch a break. Yeah. Yeah. It's a hard knock life. The wolf free introduction for bears has been great because they will often steal carcasses from wolves. And wolves leave a lot of just like half. dead carcasses all over the, or not half dead,

half eaten carcasses all over, and bears will take them. So they're great. Anyway. Yeah. Have wolves ever killed a bear, Gina? Not that I know of, but I know that it usually takes like packs of more than 10 to push a bear off of a carcass, like a big adult grizzly bear. Oh, wow.

All right. So a little bit more. When it comes to nutritional strain in Yellowstone National Park, no one's going to feel it more than grizzlies with dependent young. So even though cubs are weaned at about seven months old, they're no longer necessarily nursing, their mother is still essentially responsible for their protection until she kicks them out around 2.5 years old. So this means she has to spend a lot more time being vigilant.

She's potentially avoiding some of the best food sources because there's increased chances of running into other bears. So for example, if a bison were to die in Yellowstone or like wolves kill a bison, a bear takes it over, you rarely see that bear being a female with cubs. because a big dominant male is going to come in, and she doesn't want anything to do with that. She wants to avoid those males because they will kill her cubs. So females with young aren't necessarily going to these spots where they might run into other bears, and those spots often are associated with the best food.

So they really, not only are they taking care of cubs and often getting food for cubs, they also are spending a lot more time being vigilant. And what this is called is interference competition. and it means that mom can take a really big hit nutritionally and that she may be willing to take advantage of unconventional food sources when they pop up, which may be what happened in the very early hours of July 28, 2010 at Sotomayuk campground. Yikes.

At first, I didn't think it was real. I woke up to this blinding light and I was transported to another place. Pluto TV. Then I heard a voice. Come with me if you want to live. There were thousands of movies and shows, and they were all free. The truth is our sin. It's just so beautiful.

On Pluto TV, free streaming of Terminator 2, Fringe Arrow, the 100 and the X-Files may cause excitement, loss of sleep and sudden belief in extraterrestrials. No credit cards or alien encounters necessary. Pluto TV, stream now, pay never. So, the initial screams had come from Maria Fleming, the girlfriend of 21-year-old Ronald's singer, who had been camping. She had been camping with Ronald and her family in two tents in site 16 of the. the upper loop of Sotomayu campground. So really quickly, I'm just going to give you guys a basic breakdown of what this campground looks like. There's kind of this long elongated upper loop.

And then in between the upper loop and the lower loop, there's a couple hundred yards of just like trees and meadows in one little road that connects them. And then there's a much smaller lower loop, which sits a little bit closer to the creek. So that's kind of the basic layout of the campground. So this is in the upper loop. Ronald and Maria had been fast asleep in their tent with their dog when Ronald wakes up to his tent being moved several feet all at once and a really intense painful pressure as something large bit down into his leg. He immediately starts punching the mystery assailant

which causes the animal to let go and disappear. So he's been bitten by something big. It moves the entire tent by grabbing him and then he looks out of his tent through this hole that the animal had ripped in the screen and he can't see anything. It's completely gone. He's just like, what the heck?

Yeah, exactly. And so Maria turns on a light and they look at his leg and his legs all torn open. And he starts screaming and she starts screaming. He has two large lacerations down to the bone in his leg. So the Wilhelm parents hear the screams, a lot of shuffling noises from a campground, just a handful of sights down in the upper loop of Soda Butte. And they lay in silence for about 10 minutes. And they're doing their best just to explain these screams away like they're thinking,

this is probably just rowdy teenagers, maybe it was a domestic fight, and then suddenly new screams erupt in another campsite, this time just a couple of campsites away, as if the screams were working their way toward their campsite. Oh, no. This time the screams identify what was going on, and the Wilhelms clearly hear a woman say, it's a bear, I've been attacked by a bear.

This woman was 58-year-old Canadian dead Friel. F-R-E-E-E-L-E. I'm not sure if it's freely or, or freal. I'm going to say frill because I love their shakes. I'll say freely. I like Ace Freely. From Kiss. Yeah. So she had been fast to sleep in her tent when a noise and some movement woke her up and then a few seconds later she feels teeth

grinding into her arm. And a split second later she realized she's being attacked by a bear. So here's her quote. She said, I realized at that split second I was being attacked by a bear but I couldn't see it. It was behind me and I screamed. I couldn't help it. It's kind of like somebody else was screaming. And then it bit me harder and more. It got very aggressive and started to shake me. She kept screaming, but then realized if she didn't do something, she was going to die. I decided at that

point the only thing I knew to do was play dead. I just went totally limp, got very quiet, didn't make a sound. And a few seconds later, the bear dropped me and walked away. She said the bear was silent. I felt like he was hunting me. All right. So the first victim, Ronald, had kicked the bear and it dropped him. And then this woman decided to play dead and the bear dropped him. Or dropped her, which is a, yeah, which is a little strange. The first guy definitely did the right thing for a campsite attack. You definitely want to make sure that you make that animal know that you're not food.

And that's what he did. I don't, I can't say why this bear dropped dead. It seems very, she really just got lucky here because you would think if it was looking for food. Yeah, for real. Real. It would want to just, you know, would think, oh, this is an easy meal and maybe I just killed it. Mike's just shaking his head. He hates that joke so much. It was pretty good.

All right, but during this attack, so she also was bit on the leg at the same time as she's being bit on the arm. So two bears were attacking her at the same time. And during this attack... What? Really? Yeah. So during the attack, part of one of the canines of the bear had broken off. So the Wilhelms are stunned. and Don Wilhelm was later interviewed

where he said that words can't possibly describe what it feels like to hear someone being attacked by a bear. Well, that's why the bear dropped her. Why? If you broke your tooth biting someone as hard as you could, wouldn't you let go? I would, but bears do break their teeth quite often. All right, so the Wilhelm sit in their tent

completely quiet, and when some soft huffing and shuffling noises came from outside their tent, they instantly react. They get their two sons, age 12, nine into their minivan and they drive to the campsite where the woman had been attacked. They could see her laying on her sleeping bag near her flattened tent and her arm was crushed and bloodied. But because the bear could still be nearby, they're afraid to get out and help, but instead they drive through the upper campsite loop and they start just honking their horn and doing their absolute best to scare the bear away from other campers.

Now unfortunately, they didn't take their van to the more secluded and much more quiet lower loop and the bears had headed in that direction and they were approaching site 26 and the sleeping person there. Jeez. So Kevin Cammer had arrived to Soto Butte campground the day before and he was assigned campsite 26, which is one of the more desirable campsites in the lower loop, both because it's really close to the creek and because it's the first campsite after that big gap between the lower and the upper campsite. So you have a lot of like, it looks very natural there. You have this big meadow and trees and everything, you don't have campsites on both sides of you. And then plus you're pretty close to the creek. So it's a really great campsite. And this 48-year-old man had come out to

fulfill a lifelong dream of fly fishing in Yellowstone National Park. He was an avid outdoorsman. He was a big-time fly fisherman. He loved kayaking. And he was married and a stay-at-home dad to four children in Michigan. He had set up a small orange and yellow tent on the day of July 27th and was no doubt planning his next fishing outing outing, really excited to be in Yellowstone. Again, this was a trip he'd been looking forward to his entire life and laid down to go to sleep on the evening of July 27th, not knowing that that would be his last night alive. A bit after the sun faded, he crawled into his tent and he falls asleep to the gentle rushing noises of the nearby Soda Butte Creek. That's crazy. Those other campsites aren't like that far away. He must kind

to be a heavy sleeper too. Well, yeah, we're going to get into that. So it's the middle of the night. Put a pin in it. Yeah, put a pin in it. In the middle of the night, the distance from upper loop. God, it's so funny. So I'm going to talk about that right now.

Take your pin out. In the middle of the night, the distance from upper loop and the sound of the creek was more than enough to drown out, the screams and the chaos happening just a few hundred yards away. And then much more than enough to also mask the noises of the footsteps of an approaching bear family and their airy woofs as they're testing the air with their noses. As they get closer to Site 26, they once again pick up the scent of what might be potential prey. And then in a really swift, almost singular action, they collapsed the tent. They grab the stunned Kevin Cammer from his head and shoulders.

They rip him free of his sleeping bag and his tent. All right. In the upper loop, both Ronald and Deb had been rushed to help, and emergency personnel was already looking over their injuries. And so they had also called help, and officials from Park County, Wyoming Sheriff's Department, and the National Park Service had responded to the calls, and they're busy clearing out the upper loop of all the campers

and then searching for the responsible animals. It was a little after 4 a.m. when they finally go into the lower loop, and they find the collapsed tent of Kevin Cammer. About 10 feet away lay his remains. The upper half of his torso was almost completely consumed by the bears. A large puddle of blood was found about four feet away from his tent. And that was likely where Kevin had been killed by exinguanation. So again, exinguanation is just when you bleed out.

And often that is the case of death like we talked about with bear attacks. Jeez. Because the bear isn't dispatching the person. They're just feeding on them. And then they die from bleeding out, which is so horrific to even think about. And then knowing this, like, this one was hard for me because I'm, you know, I'm not too much younger than this. I love fly fishing. I love camping alone.

I love, I know the feeling of like looking forward to a trip and kind of getting away from your day-to-day responsibilities. And then also like having people back at home that love you that much. And like just thinking about this. I don't know. This one really affects me. It really gets me. So he had been dragged a short distance, a way. away from his tent where he died, and then they dragged the body a bit further into the trees to feed.

And the campers in the sights near Kevin's site hadn't heard a single thing. One camper was quoted as saying, I didn't hear a woof, a growl, a moan, a whimper, nothing. So these bears had really found a sight free from the noises. So hopefully they did kill him pretty fast. I think it must have been quick. And like with four bears all at once, I think that this is much quicker than like, a single bear, like Brigida Friedanagan, who also died in Yellowstone that we talked about, there was kind of this trail of body parts.

So how big are these three cubs? They're yearlings. So they, like, they would be probably somewhere around 100 pounds at this point, maybe a little bit bigger. They're big enough to do some damage. So we got like 800 pounds of bear right now. Right. Yeah, probably a little bit less than that. I think she was a little on the smaller side.

But, yeah, probably close to like, like six or 700 pounds. Yeah. So what I was just saying, though, like with Brigida Friedenhoggan, they think there was quite a struggle because of kind of the trail that was left behind. This did seem very open and shut. Like the bears pulled him out, they killed him, dragged him away and fed on him. All right. So a quick investigation was launched, and both prints and scats revealed that the attackers had been a family of bears. There had been one large set of prints and then a number of smaller sets. So they immediately placed traps. in the campsite. They used some big horn sheep meat that they had on, like, on hand. And the rest of the campground was completely emptied. And by six o'clock on the night of the 28th, the same day that he was killed, a door was down on the trap. And they had an adult grizzly. The female grizzly was sedated. Samples were collected for analysis and her teeth were inspected. And sure enough, she's missing part of her canine. And they still had the fragment from Deb's tent and there's like a cavity that perfectly matched when they put it on there.

So they knew they had the bear. They still want to need a good lawyer. Yeah, exactly. That bear needs Johnny Cochran. Yeah. But they still ran DNA analysis and whatnot. But when they captured the female, they could see the yearlings moving in the willows. So they pulled these other traps out and put them really close.

And then they put the female back in the trap, let her recover from the drugs in the trap. And that's a really good way to catch. young is they want to hang out by their mom so they'll come into those other traps generally pretty readily and they managed to catch all three of these these cubs as well all right so DNA analysis confirms that this is the responsible bear family and the female was immediately euthanized humanely the cubs had not initiated the attack but they had fed on kevin so they weren't killed but they also couldn't be released back into the wild so they were transferred to a

zoo and then transferred to another zoo. Can you guys guess which zoo they're at? They the Hogle Zoo Bears? This is the Hogle Zoo Bears. I've seen those bears. Yeah. So they are still there. I think they may be, though.

Okay, so that's why you said that we would know the bears. Yeah. Sorry Hogle Zoo for telling your secret. I don't know if they keep a cigarette, but... I bet you like most of them don't even know that. Not many people do. They have on the little plaque there, they say that like their mom had to be removed. for management, but it doesn't say that they killed a man.

Well, if they had a plaque that was like these bears ate someone. Yeah, I mean. Crazy plaque. Yeah. You think the other animals at the zoo are like, dude, you hear about those two bears over there? They killed a guy. I don't mean to make light of this. But it might just be too now.

It's crazy. It's weird to go to a zoo and know that those are like, they're man eaters, you know? Right. I think about it every time. I go to a hogo zoo all the time. And every time I see him. I'm like those bears eight and now and now you're going to know the whole story it is so sad it again this can be a learned behavior so you can't like it's a huge liability to let them back out not only

because they could do it again but because if they do do it again the agency that decided to let them out is could be financially responsible so that's why you just absolutely cannot put those cubs back out it's pretty it's surprising that these cubs weren't put down to be honest so I am glad that they got the second chance. I think they have a really good life at the Hogo Zoo. I love the Hogle Zoo. Any reason not to put them in a zoo? Sometimes zoos just don't have space.

It's really hard to find a zoo like that quickly. And so there's just this whole process that you have to do to get an animal into a zoo. And it can be really complicated. And it takes time. So yeah, but I agree. Like, I think they should make every effort to get them into a zoo or a rescue or something. Or like the Russian grizzly bear hockey league. Yeah, the RGL.

RGHL. They'd be good enforcers. All right. So analysis on the female did show that she was a bit malnourished and that she had a pretty high parasite load. But that's not uncommon for bears. And she wasn't outside the range of average bear sizes in the greater Yellowstone. So this means that while she could have been a little bit nutritionally stressed,

it's not like she was starving. and she didn't have any really debilitating injuries or anything. And she was in the top 8% of bears when it comes to plant-based diets, which means that 92% of bears in the ecosystem were eating more meat than her, and she had absolutely no trace of human food in her system. So she wasn't food conditioned. And with human food, they can do isotope analysis. So you're looking for, like, isotopes that are found in corn

and other things that, like, all of our food has in it, essentially. and you can like essentially look way back in an animal's history to see if they've ever eaten human food. Oh, wow. And like with her, they just didn't find any traces of it. So they don't think she'd ever gotten in any trash or any human food. So the reason I bring that all up is that there's really not a good explanation to why this bear decided to lead her cubs into a populated campground, attack multiple campsites, and finally kill a man. it may be that she finally found a high calorie food source that she didn't need to compete with other bears for it may be that she's just curious and the first bite like triggered something in her it's really impossible to say

but what we can say is that she wasn't food conditioned this wasn't a particularly habituated bear or a particularly food stressed bear so it's hard this is a hard one it's a hard one because not who you would think to do it but it's a grizzly bear. bear still. Right. And I think exactly. Like that's exactly what I wanted to talk about next is that this is a grizzly bear. This is an animal that every once in a while is a predator, you know? They like, yeah, they're opportunistic. Yeah, they're omnivores. Yeah, generally when you see them in Yellowstone, they're just kind of grazing and they look almost like slow and just like a animal that eats grass. But every once in while they do shift into predator mode. And this was a bear that didn't do that often.

but for whatever reason on this night in 2010 she did. And I think the thing that this really highlights is that bears are unpredictable. And even with all the information that you guys are learning on this podcast, even with all the behavior, stuff that we have, even as a bear biologist, someone who I feel like I feel very knowledgeable and as comfortable as you can be around bears, they're still going to sometimes act unpredictably. And that's why I'm never truly comfortable around them.

The Leard River bear is another great example of this. This is a bear that had no real reason to eat those people in Learred River, and it did, you know. And I think the reason I bring this up is we've talked about bear safety a lot on this podcast, and I don't want people to think that all of the information and all of the behavior stuff that you learn is a safeguard against every single bear because it's not. and that's why you need to take other precautions and one of those precautions is having a deterrent like you absolutely need to have a deterrent

I that's that's completely true but this this one feels like it wouldn't have it wouldn't have and so that's what I just got him out of dead sleep by the head yeah you know so that's what I was going to get into next personally I think if you're going to camp alone in a place that's a really good bear habitat grizzly bear habitat I'm this doesn't necessarily

apply for black bears. Cover your head in bear's brain before you go to sleep. That's not what I'm saying. There's some really good tools out there for you to protect your campsite. They're really cheap, portable electric fences. I know that sounds like overkill, but it's not. And like they're easy to set up and it's enough to deter these bears that might otherwise not be deterred. There's even these little like campsite alarms that you can use. They're called critter-getters. There's a few different things that you can set up. And honestly, if I'm camping with multiple people in grizzly bear habitat, I'm probably not setting up one of these personally because I feel like I'm going to hear if something's happening to my fellow camper and I'm going to be able to respond and vice versa. But alone,

I do think you really want to consider doing those kind of precautions. I know it's so rare. The death before this guy, I believe, was Brigitte Friedenhagen. So this doesn't happen very often at all. Like there was a 30 year gap in between or almost 30 year gap in between these attacks. It's incredibly rare. There's probably dozens, if not hundreds of grizzly bears that went up sniffing at tents in that time that did absolutely nothing. But it's an awful, terrible way to go. And you leave behind broken lives, you know.

And so I just think a $30 electric fence if you're camping by yourself in grizzly bear habitat is worth it. It's probably more than that. It's probably like $100. But it's worth it. It just is. I would use one. If I was camping alone and so to be a campground, I would probably set one up.

I'm saying probably now, but I probably would. Anyway. Yeah. It highlights that unpredictability, though. You just no matter what, you don't, you're never 100% sure what's going to happen. I've been like alone with those bears at the zoo before, just like no one else around them. Yeah. And I was like, you guys shouldn't hate someone.

Yeah. I told them that. They didn't react. Yeah. They got a great life in the zoo now. They just get fed. That's true. I feel like grizzly bears do pretty well in zoos.

I think they do. They just, yeah. They were out there eating like 90% plants and now I'm sure it's getting more meat than that. Yeah. How much dirt do you think they eat the Hogle zoo? I don't know. Probably not that much dirt. I will say, I think now this is like maybe even our third.

or fourth campsite grizzly bear attack that we've done on the podcast. And I don't want this to feel like this is more common than it is because we've done a number of them. I think the reason I pick these is because they are so rare and it's like such a crazy story when it does happen. But I will say, because we're not really going to do a what would Mike and Jeff do on this one, a quick just refresher on what you are supposed to do if a grizzly bear ever comes into your campsite.

you're supposed to be as aggressive as you can to get it out of your campsite. This is specific to campsite attacks because if it stays in your campsite after you're being loud and aggressive, it means that there's a good chance it might want to eat you. And you just need to convince it that it doesn't want to eat you. So that's if hopefully you have bear spray, you're spraying that bear. Even if it comes in your tent, spray it because I know that's going to suck and it's going to burn your eyes too. it's going to get the bear out of there. Kick it, do whatever you can to get it out of there,

and then as soon as you can, get to a safer place. Like if I had a car, I would get in my car. If I was in the back country, I would honestly, if I had bear spray, this is one of the few situations where I'd probably climb a tree. I just am trying to get somewhere away from the bear and in a more safe location. Yeah.

Yeah. And then... Don't give it cocaine. Don't give it any cocaine. We know what happens. when you give them cocaine. You guys remember the tip for like what to do with your bear spray in your tent? Sleep really close to it.

What's something a little bit more specific than that even? Wasn't it like have a spot in your tent where it's like your bear spray spot? Exactly. Exactly where it is. Yep. Just keep it in the same spot every single time you camp with it. And just before you even go to bed, just remember like that's where my bear spray is. And this isn't grizzly habitat.

It's not a bad practice in black bear habitat. a tattoo. I would still have it, but in Grizzly, you definitely need to have it. Is there like an app where my phone could just spray bear spray? I don't, we don't have that just yet. You should develop that. That'll admit, there you're going to make a million. You know that question we got last episode, what sauce you would want to be able to push out of your finger? I would want bear spray. Bear spray. Yeah. It's not a sauce. There's got to be, there's got to be some super person that shoot stuff. Like Palpatine, shooting that lightning out of his fingers.

Do that if you can. That's what I would suggest. All right. Well, really quickly at the end of this one, I do just want to say again, this is one that really affected me. I went in and read the obituary for Kevin. I read some things that his family said about him. They were all extremely nice. Sounded like he was just a kind, loving, wonderful father and friend to everyone that he came in contact with and just like hearing that he was like a stay-at-home dad with four kids really really broke my heart. They interviewed his brother-in-law and he just pretty much said yeah in retrospect we wish he hadn't gone but I was glad he was out there pursuing his dream and pursuing what he loved to do and I am like there is some beauty to that that he at least was in like an incredibly

beautiful place and living his dreams you know it's not like he died in a car accident on like an Ohio turnpike or something. Yeah. So, which is my- Ohio catching strays. It's always like. Ohio turnpikes. It's always like, I don't know,

there's nothing you can do in this one. Right. Like, yeah, you could have had the electric fence, but he really didn't do much wrong. It's just he didn't do more right. He had a really clean campsite. He didn't have food in his tent. You're right.

He wasn't doing anything wrong. And most people, especially in 2010, like didn't know that they should be doing more. And those electric fences were a lot harder to come by back then too. And bear spray wasn't nearly as touted as it is now. And so I really, yeah, I agree. Like this isn't one where we're going to try and correct anything he did because it was just like, again, a really unpredictable bear

that did something really outside of typical bear behavior. Yeah. Yeah. It's heartbreaking. It is. I can't imagine. It's crazy that it has. act like two other people and just gave up.

I know. I was like, all right, I'm done giving up. Yeah, this one's like especially horrifying. Like, it just, I think it just finally found the quiet that it wanted. You know, it just had, there's too much chaos. It's like the three porridge story. Yeah, I guess. The three porridge story.

It's a really morbid. The classic fairy tale. Goldilogs. Goldie logs and the three porishes. All right. That's it. for this story. Let's take a quick break and we'll be back for categories. I wrote a little song to remind you, Choice Hotels, gets you more of the experiences

you value. The Cambria hotels got it all. A rooftop bar, have a ball. Cocktails up here feel just right. Is Cambria amazing all right? Bring a date, your team, or even your mom. Book direct at Choice Hotel. Let's get into our categories. So my first thing that I wanted to ask you guys, we've done Grizzlies a bunch of times. So I'm going to say, what's your favorite camping scene for any movie or TV show? I'm not going to go first.

Mike, do you want to go first? Yeah, so it turns out Wes and I, we found out right before we started recording, we have the same one. It's the three amigos, the blue shadows scene where they all start singing their little campsite song. Yeah, all the animals come out. Yeah, the horses start singing along and the turtles, like, bobbing up and down. And then Martin Short has, like, the voice of an angel. And Steve Martin gives, like, the funny, he's good at, like, really funny looks, but he gives the funniest look over to Chevy Chase when Martin Short starts singing.

It's such a, like, weirdly beautiful scene to me, too. Like, there's something so soothing about it. And I just love the idea of, like, a warm desert night, like, around a, like, sunset campfire. And I also, I love in that scene how the sunset like slowly fades into night too, but it's very hokey kind of like Disneyland-esque backdrop. I just, there's something about that scene that just really like hits all the right chords for me. It's, it's my favorite scene in that movie and it's without a doubt my favorite campsite scene. So we did pick the same one.

I'm going to go with Bone Tomahawk. Oh, God. Okay. Well, like, I liked where they like laid the perimeter. with like strings and bells. Yeah. And then when like an intruder would come, they just like shot him right away. Yeah.

I always thought those camp scenes were good. Yeah. Jeez, that's a rough movie. That movie, I remember watching that and being just like shocked by how violent and brutal it was at the end. And then like maybe five years later thinking, there's no way it could have been as bad as I remembered. And like kind of thinking like, I think I actually really liked that movie and rewatching

it and being just like. like equally as horrified. Well, it hits especially hard because it's like not as a whole. It's not that violent of a movie. Right. But then like it gets like as violent as anything you've ever seen. So then it hits super hard because it's like, wait, the rest of the movie hasn't been like this far. You know?

Yeah. It's kind of like a Western adventure. And then all of a sudden it's like this is brutal torture horror. Yeah. Like a snuff film. Yeah. You know what's another runner up for me is 310 to. Yuma. There's just some really intense camp scenes in that. I'm not a big fan of that movie.

I also really like the movie, The Proposition. I feel like there's some camping in that movie. Oh, yeah. There's a good camp scene in Django where you like tells Django what his wife's name means. Yeah, Broomhilda or Brumilda. Yeah. All right. So my second question then is your favorite place that you've ever personally camped. So I'm going to go first on this one. I've camped in a lot of like really amazing places. One that first... That's nothing. You should see where I came to the idea.

One that first came to mind was this place, this place, this place in southern Utah that's like right by a really beautiful desert river that's in this really cool canyon. But I think my number one actually is when Jeff was helping me with my Black Bear project, we had a trailer and then we had a tent. And we would just switch off nights and who would sleep in the same. the tent and who would sleep in the trailer. And the tent was just out in this little meadow and we had a queen-sized memory foam mattress in there. And the fly was off so you could just like see all those great stars at Bryce Canyon. And the temperature at night was always like so perfect there and just great

birds and everything. And sleeping for whatever reason after like long days doing bare work, sleeping in that tent at night was just so peaceful and relaxing. And I think about it all the time. So that's the one I'm picking for my favorite camp site. Yeah, Bryce is like world renown for its like dark sky bright stars. Yeah, it's a dark sky park. I'm going to go with high park lake in the Mission Mountains. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't think it's like actually the prettiest spot I've, it's probably not even top five prettiest I've camped in. But I think it's like the first real like mountain lake I backpacked. back to and then like like real wilderness camped at and like that was just so cool to me to like it's just like my first real experience the mission mountains are beautiful and I just really like that spot plus you have to earn it to get to that lake especially if you're gone like that yeah yeah because he gets lost he gets lost every single time and use bush wow he doesn't get lost as much as he's like only like 10 more minutes when you have like an hour and a half I've

gotten full on lost in that one, where I'm just like in willows up to my chest and it's just awful. Yeah. Mike? I just thought of one. I was with Jeff and your cousin Brent. We were down, I think, in Zion's National Park. And Zion, yeah. Zion, yeah.

We just pulled off the side of the road and like kind of stumbled down this really shrubby gulch and just like the grossest little spot. If anyone would see that in midday, they would not see a camp. site. An option for... It's a terrible spot. It's like illegal. Well, I'm getting to my real one. I'm just thinking, this is just a funny story.

I think Brent brought up that there was like a mountain lion sighting close by and everything. So it's just like the worst place. We were like in like this sand of like a riverbed from like flash floods. I feel like. Awful. But my real one is Mount Shasta in California. It's just like the prettiest starry sky I've ever seen at night. and we slept under the sky and it was just amazing.

Man, this makes me want to go camping. I'm going to switch mine to just, we get a real small-sized houseboat as a family and go to Lake Pal. Yeah. And just like sleep up on the roof. That is fun. And that's probably my favorite. Yeah, I like that. So my next category I wanted to do, so recently a friend, my friend Dan had written and he said he and his son had gotten a little bit of our argument over a cage match.

And his question was a full-sized grizzly bear versus an African lion. And it actually made me think about it quite a bit. And so I wanted to put them together. Male lion? Yeah. I want to put them together in our cage match this week. So I think, in this, you know, grizzlies are constantly being matched up against stuff in cage matches and so are guerrillas.

And I think it's just because they both have so much potential and you don't really know. But I did, in this one I decided if you took the... Can I clarify it a little, though? Yeah. So are we doing like a grizzly bear from Yellowstone? Well, that's what I was about to say. Because like a Codiac grizzly. Put a pin in it, Jeff.

Yeah, you beat me. Kind of a different... You beat me to the punch here. If we're taking the average size of both of these animals, so like grizzly averages over the entire species across the world, I think you're looking at like a 350 pound animal, and lions are probably even a little bit, they're probably around that or maybe a little bit bigger.

Then I'm picking the lion because lions kill, like that's what they do. They hunt. Like they are hunters. They're obligate carnivores. They're really good at killing. Yeah. You know, they break the neck or they bite the windpipe. I would give the advantage to the lion.

So a full-grown African lions beating any grizzly bear in Yellowstone? I'm not saying any, but I would say if I were a betting man, which I am, I would probably put my money on the lion, but I think it's a really good fight. Now, if you're taking the biggest of each animal, if you're taking the biggest grizzly bear ever versus the biggest lion ever, then I think the grizzly bear has a really good advantage, because then you're looking at like a 1,500-pound animal versus probably like an 800-pound animal. So in that case, I'm picking the grizzly bear.

Otherwise, I'm picking the lion, but again, I'm not like, man, this is a sure bet. I'm really happy with this matchup, you know. Yeah. So it's a good argument. It's a good argument, yeah. But he also, you know, his son needs to learn a little respect and just not argue with his dad. It's, you know, he just needs to be a bear son. Gray, if you're out there, just be nicer to your dad, okay?

Even though he was wrong, he picked the grizzly bear. Not necessarily wrong, but I think he made the worst bet. All right. So the next category I wanted to do, because I have a fun. one so we're going to do it again your most memorable recent animal encounter do you guys have one we did just do this i guess well me and mike didn't really do it last time okay do you guys have one or wait yeah we did i did i did i picked cows on the mountain uh i saw the new transformers movie and it had like a robot gorilla in it oh you did see it boy was that movie bad wait put a pin in that mike okay

Wait, hold on. I need to come up with a good noise for putting pins and something. Yeah. I'll just say like an hour ago, I went on a, or two hours ago now, I went on a little walk. And right when I was walking my door, this squirrel got, like, ran by me, but got super close to me. So I kind of feel like we have an established trust within each other now. Like, he knows who I am and he's not afraid of me. Do you nod at it?

Yeah. Just like a little nod. Yeah. I'm waiting for the nod back still. All right. They acknowledge me. So I just spent a few weeks in Yellowstone. I saw so much stuff.

Like I saw badgers. I saw grizzlies. I saw wolves. I saw all these different birds. It was an incredible trip. But my last afternoon there, I'm like coming back to the hotel I was staying in in Cook City, which again is just like three quarter mile from where our story happened today. And one of the people I was guiding was sitting out on the porch.

He was like, hey, how big is a pine martin? And I told him like, oh, they're more than a foot long, couple feet long. They look like a big weasel. And he's like, oh, that's not what this was. He's like, this tiny little weasel just carried two mice like by my feet. And I was like, what? And then he's like, oh, there it is. And this little like cigar-sized ermine was carrying a mouse or a vole, I think, like twice as big as it.

And was just going back and forth and completely obliterating this family. of voles and killed like seven of them within like an hour and a half we just watched and it would just go right back and forth and it always ran the exact same route like right in front of our feet and it was one of the most like amazing animal encounters I've ever had because like pound for pound this is probably the most impressive predator in the entire ecosystem and it's just obliterating these mice it'd be like if one elk killed like seven or one wolf killed like seven elk in a single day. That's what this was like.

And it was just lightning fast and just so amazing. So I'm still thinking about it and just buzzing about it. And I took a really good photo of it, like jumping through the air with a mouse in its face or a vole in its mouth. So anyway, that's my pick. That's nothing. Yeah. That's nothing.

I saw a robot gorilla. Yeah, I did. I'll remind you. What was its name? Oh, it's like, I think it was just called primal or something. Prime for us. Put a pin in it. When can I take,

I'll let you tell me when the pin can come up. Jeff, do you have any listener questions for us? Or Mike, why don't we do our Patreon once? Yep. Okay,

so first question, this is from Noah, one of our lovely patrons. Hey, gang. I'm wearing a shirt that says Noah. What the heck? Did you guys plan that? Holy cow.

Where was I? I was just starting to ask, right? Hey, gang. If you all had to, yeah, don't interrupt me. I'm already lost. You,

you like, can't ask. Where you were if you haven't. Totally lost. If you said like one word. Okay, hold on. I need to figure out where I am again. You're like my dad going up to High Park Lake.

So Noah. Hey, gang. If you all had to choose an animal to be raised by Tarzan style, which would it be? That's a good question. I think I would pick a raccoon. I just love that. I think raccoons are just like so great how they're just. kind of always making the best of their little situations.

And I like how they wash their hands before they eat. I don't know. Being very vague here. Good table mails. I like that. I just like how rascally they are. And I'd love to just. And you'll like outgrow them so you can be the leader once you get older.

Yeah. And I feel like they're just formidable enough that like stuff doesn't necessarily want to mess with them. But they're also not top dog. And that's kind of where I've been my whole life too. so I just feel like I can relate with the raccoon, you know. Sure. All right. I'm going to go.

I'll go with dolphins. Oh, that's a good. What are those dolphins we see in Mexico all the time? It looks so fun. Bottle nose or, yeah. There's also like Pacific Spinner or. I want to do bottle nose. Okay.

Yeah. We'll teach you how to breathe underwater. I won't be able to like swim as well as them. So they'll just like push me by my feet all day or something. with their noses. Oh, because we're still a human in this, aren't we? Yeah. Oh, okay.

No, I was picturing myself as a little wreck. No, I don't like yours anymore. They just immediately leave you. Yeah. All right. No, because they're raising me. They can't leave me. I feel pretty dumb now, just being a massive human around a family of raccoons.

Whatever. Mike, what's your pick? There's a lot. So that's a good answer, in my opinion, still, because I'd want to be somewhere in garbage, Wes. Oh, man. They would. It's just in the dumpster with arms.

Dercoon family. And, like, sedges all the time. Yeah. I'd still rather be garbage, probably. No, it's talking about bears. Yeah. Well, if you're getting raised by raccoons, you're more than likely going to, like, if you're digging through dumpsters and stuff, you're going to run into some more humans and kind of

figure out where you're actually supposed to be. So, like, there's another little wrinkle. That's a good answer. But, yeah, anything in the forest is going to be my answer to. I was thinking maybe Jaguar, just live in the rainforest. I crossed my mind. Jaguars. You get bit by bugs all the time.

That's true. But the jags, they'd eat the bugs before they could get me. I guess. I don't know about that. All right. It's a great question, Noah. Next question. This one's from Leah.

Y'all inspired me to watch Paddington for the first time. Freaking amazing. So I'm wondering what kind of... The podcast paid off just in that right thing. All right. I'm lost. This has all been worth it. So I'm wondering, what kind of sandwich would you keep in your hat for emergencies?

Oh. It wouldn't go bad or anything, so you don't have to worry about, like, the logistics of, you know, sandwich upkeep and stuff. Right. I'm keeping, like, in that case. Like a Nutella sandwich. Because for me, I feel like the only real cravings I ever get are sweet cravings. So I would want, like, a Nutella sandwich just to, like, fill me up and then also hit that sweet spot for me. I'm going to go with, like, a meatball sub.

In your hat all the time? Yeah. Right. Because it doesn't spoil. And then, like, that'd be the most impressive thing to pull out of your hat. It said it doesn't spoil in this. Yeah. Okay.

Explicit. That is a good thing to pull out of your hat. So when Paddington, does he ever eat his, what is it, marmalade? Does he eat those sandwiches? That's like his thing. He, like, sticks it in someone's mouth once. Oh, he eats those sandwiches. But, like, does it come back?

Does he always just have one? Oh, he sticks it in his mouth. He's always got one in there. Yeah. So I was thinking one of those like six foot long party subs. Yeah. Just like solve world hunger that way. I like that.

It's such a cool hat, too. A top hat for sure. Or a long Santa hat. Okay, next question. This one is from anonymous. Sorry, we didn't catch your name when we put you on our spreadsheet. But the question is this. Ignoring typical diets, what animal do you guys think would be the most evenly matched

opponent for Joey Chestnut in a hot dog eating contest? That's such a good question, too. We didn't get their name. I think that was actually my fault. So here's the thing, because, like, he went against a bear, right? Joey Chestnut, and the bear just demolished him. Does that happen? But then, like, you know, is the Japanese guy.

That was Kobayashi. Yeah. Still, it's crazy that that happened. He lost by, like, 300 hot dogs or something. Right. Oh, my gosh. So not a bear. Like, the bear.

just scarfs them. But then, like, I can't think of an animal that's going to, like, keep eating hot dogs as fast as a bear. Like, the bear, when it sees a just mountain of hot dogs, just keeps flurping them down, you know? Like, I feel like a coyote or something, they're going to get distracted. They're not going to keep eating them. Right.

So it's really a hard question. Maybe a big cat, like a lion? Like a mountain. Yeah. Lion or it. Yeah. I still, like, cats, I don't feel like just, like, keep eating. Like, would they just scarf down, like, 70 hot dogs?

I don't know. They don't really eat bread. No. They wouldn't know the trick to, like, dunk in the water, either. I think most evenly matched would be, like... I'm going elephant because it has to, like, take time with its trunk for each hot dogs. It's just snorting dogs up through their trunk. I don't think it does, though.

They don't eat through their trunk. Yeah. Yeah, they don't eat that way. Oh, man. I'm picking, I would pick like a kangaroo. No giraffe because it takes forever for the dog to even get on the way down. They probably is not even going to eat hot dogs, though. Like a chimpanzee maybe?

Yeah, chimpanzee would be a great pick. He'd beat a chimpanzee. There you go. All right. Great questions. Sorry I forgot to put your name down. Mess is another one. Let us know.

When you hear that, I'll make it up to you. All right, Jeff, to you. All right. So I got some questions from. Instagram. Jesse Rath wants to know the best baker of us three. Hmm. Mike, you got that like whole baking kit.

Yeah. I feel like I used it more than you when we were roommates. That's probably true. I think I'm a pretty good baker. I bake really good cookies. You got a good chocolate chip cookie. Yeah. But we had a contest once and you beat me, but it was close.

Yeah. I'm going to vote for me, but I also bake really good bread. I'll go for Wes. Sure. Why not? He seems the most confident. But I think that you're the best natural baker if you just put your heart into it, Mike. Yeah.

What tells you that? Yeah. Should we put a pin in that one too, maybe? Well, let's unpin the Transformers. Oh, great. So Riley Chaffee asks, this is for Wes. I'm open it to all of us, but Wes, you go first. Who's your favorite transformer?

I know the names of two transformers. Optimus Prime and Bumblebee. I'm definitely going to pick Bumblebee over Optimus Prime because Optimus Prime seems like a dad. He seems like a stern dad to me or like a cop. So I'm picking Bumblebee is my favorite transformer. Yeah, that's a pretty solid choice. Okay.

Mike, you want to go? Yeah, I'll go with. You just saw the new one? Yeah, it's, give it. One to ten claws. I'll give it five. I actually really liked the first, like, 45 minutes. I thought it was a really cool kind of like inner city New York.

I liked the main actor quite a bit. He was this really cool younger dude that was like... I saw him in that musical. In the Heights, yeah. In the heights, yeah. He's great. The last half falls apart completely. It's, man.

It was the first time I was, like, strongly considering leaving the theater out of just, like, sheer boredom. And you're still giving it a five? Dude, the first half is pretty sweet. I like the first half a lot. How was Pete Davidson's transformer? He was kind of annoying, if I'm thinking of the right one that he was. I actually like Pete Davidson. I think he's got like a jean sequo, but this one was not quite his best work.

I think he deserves all those girls he dated. Deserves is a weird word, but sure. Well, like, I, what, they're in his ballpark. Says that he shouldn't have been with any of them. Well, that's just me. You're saying they're in his ballpark. Yeah, sure. I'm not saying he's like a king that deserves our best women.

No one, yeah, no one deserves. They're not paid for something. Mine's bumblebee, but just in the first movie where he can only use the radio to talk. Yeah. Because that was funny. That makes him a lot less annoying. Once he, like, starts talking, he sucks. I hate him.

when he talks. Hey, I need to ask myself a question really quick. Hey, Wes, what were the sources that you use for today's episode? Oh, I'm glad you asked that, Wes. I actually read all 70 pages of the actual report that was typed up for the, like, that the Park Service and the federal government made on this attack. So that was my main source that I used. I supplemented it with the book taken by Baron Yellowstone by Kathleen Snow.

Sorry, I forgot to say that earlier, so I just snuck it in. There you go. Our listeners ask better questions. Leave it to them next time, Wes. Stinkio wants to know who shot first. Han? Question mark. Yeah, hasn't, haven't they, like, haven't they settled that?

What's the word that they added into that? Isn't there like a word that they, like, have the guys saying that? No. I forget. But I feel like he just says in the, there's like dialogue. It's weird. In the original cut, it was Han, though, and they didn't, Lucas didn't like that. And then it was like murder or something.

Yeah, because like Han killed Grito or whatever his name is. Yeah. A lizard guy. Dude, it's crazy that he just, like, made his movies way worse, but then made way more money doing it. I remember when they're like... It's McClunky. He says McClunky for some reason. Grito.

Who says that? Oh. McClunky. They added it in like the Disney version release. Yeah. I love that it's just eating away at George Lucas somewhere. He's like, you should have said McCrunkie. He shot first.

I was the perfect age for when the like heavily altered ones came out, but now I absolutely hate him. But when they came out, I was like, this is amazing. I will say the one thing he changed that was better is like when you see the first Java, the huts versions, he like, wasn't that cool looking. But towards the end, they got it. Yeah.

I don't know. No, if you saw the first Java, you'd agree with. Okay. I mean the ones that were, like, in the late 90s that he added all the digital shit to. Right. Like, that's what I hate. Alien that, like, sings for, like, 10 minutes. Oh, that's, like, the worst addition anyone's ever made to an movie in, like, in the history of cinema.

It's so weird. Yeah. Uh, we got another one from Dr. Fuzzy But he always asks good questions. Who would win in a fight? T-Rex from Jurassic Park or smog from the hobbit? Oh, it's smog, without a doubt. Oh, yeah, wait, so that's a terrible question, actually. Yeah, that's not even a fight.

No, the T-Rex gets, like, burnt up. Right. He doesn't even land any blows. And Smog can, like, talk. Unless the T-Rex catches smog in the toilet, then I think he could get him. Yeah. Or if there's like five dinosaurs that team up and save the day, like in all the other Jurassic movies. Yeah.

If Smog's like trying to eat a human, the T-Rex could sneak up and kill it. Or if smog gets all talky and just like is bragging about. The monologue. Yeah. T-Rex doesn't do that. Amligomo asks, I hear Wes mentioned sub-adult bears often. What are the gross stages of bears? Yeah.

So they're like cubs of the year are cubs that were born that year. We often call them coy. Then the next stage. Who's your cub of the year this year? One of the black bear cubs I saw that like fell out of a tree just holding like one arm up and then fell. I keep. Then after that you have yearlings. Then after that you have subadults.

So when the mom kicks them off and they're on their own, they're subadults. The reason that we call them that is because they're not yet sexually mature. but they're also out on their own. So it's kind of like an adolescent stage for bears. And then after they progress that part, past that point, it would be adults. So you've got Cubs of the Year, yearling, subadults, adults. Okay. Yeah.

Thank you. Yeah. Alyssa Bloy wants to know what's the correct position to sleep in. You want to just lay flat on your stomach and crank your head completely to the side. is the best way to fall asleep. I heard flat on your stomach and crank, and I didn't know what you were about. I sleep on my side with a pillow between my legs, generally.

That's like the best for your back, I think. I think laying on your back is the best, but I snore if I do that. That's my most comfortable, but I just can't fall asleep. Yeah. Mike? I'm not, yeah, I usually fall asleep on my back, but wake up on my stomach, so I don't know.

It seems like my body wants to be cranking on the belly, you know, or whatever you were saying. Can you guys, like, sleep if someone's touching you or, like, cuddling or something? It's hard for me. I can do it, but I usually wake up and, like, need to get space. You know, the best way to sleep is just melatonin. That stuff puts you out, but it's hard to wake up. It gives me weird nightmares. It gives me weird nightmares. Rockin Russian boy wants to know. three favorite i think you should leave sketches oh that's a hard one you needed a mike you haven't seen it right no i haven't well let's just name a couple well i'll go first

and then you can think while i'm naming them so my favorite's probably the like car design focus group with like the super old italian guy who dabs that's probably he i think he's the guy he did the tooth and claw yeah i think he's italian i'm pretty sure okay i'm pretty sure he's cute but we can look it up later. And yeah, he did our cameo that Jesse bought for Wes. Check that out on our Instagram if you haven't. And then the, I really like in this newest season, the nude egg. Okay, I like that one a lot too.

He's playing that weird game. You're a rock stop. Yeah. And then I like coffin floppers. You know? Yeah. Just naked, dead bodies smashing pavement. That was going to be my number one.

So coffin flop is number one. Then probably the focus group. And then it gets a little bit trickier for me. After that, I would probably say, man, I'm trying to think. I would probably say maybe Dan Flashes or the Scrooge one. Yeah, one of those two. Yep. Cool.

Okay. Totally Kyle 24 wants to know who won the rock eating contest at Lake McDonald. Oh, he's Cuban, by the way. I just looked it up. Oh, man, you're always right. Hmm. I feel like it wasn't the contest that you had to name the exact number of rocks that you had in your mouth? You put the most in your rock, but then you didn't count them so you were disqualified.

You just put a whole handful of rocks of sand. That's cheating. It wasn't cheating, but he had to count them all, and he didn't. I made up a number, yeah. So it wasn't me. I think it is between me and Mike. Yeah, I don't know who won. I think it was a match.

Because I was trying to hot dog, so I picked, like, huge rocks, and I could only get, like, four or five in there. Yeah, I got like 11. It started to feel dangerous, so. Jeff, yeah. Wes got like 200, but you just couldn't count. Majestic rock queen wants to know what's the scariest hike you've ever been on? Me and Wes have the same answer here. And I was a majestic rock queen when I had all those rocks in my mouth, wasn't I?

The scariest hike? What's our answer? When we got like stuck on the cliff side of chief. Chief Mountain. I was thinking about it yesterday. I was like, man, like we'd probably. like we're pretty close to just die. Yeah, that was like a 50-50 kind of situation.

Yeah. We took a wrong route on a really dangerous trail and we couldn't get up to the main trail. So then we like... Just tried to scale the face. Kind of just like climbed a cliff and then we had to like climb back down the whole cliff. Like we had to like stick our legs out over a cliff where you couldn't even see where your feet were going. and then like feel around for footholds and then like lower ourselves down that

and it was terrifying. It is a bad one. It was. Yeah, that same thing actually happened to me. Okay. Really? Yeah, it was crazy. Sorry, I didn't mean to laugh.

I just didn't, I thought you were joking, but then I didn't know. Well, on top of me and Weses too, once we got down, it's like... Dark and we were in Grizzly Bear Country. Dark night at Grizzly Country, yeah. We'd seen huge tracks on the way up. Like, what's yours? Do you have one? That happened, that same exact crazy thing.

It happened to me exactly the same way. At Chief Mountain? Yeah, same thing. Nice. I think it happened before it happened to you guys, so I'm better. Ken Ken Kirsting is dying to know. Have any of you all been to Minnesota? Yeah.

Minnesota. Only in my dreams. Yeah, I've been there. You've never, yeah, Mike, you've like had a weird desire to move there for a little bit. No, that's Wisconsin. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I can't stop thinking about it.

I hear people love living in Minneapolis. You know, they brag about their lakes there, and I didn't really buy into the hype. Then when I drove through Minnesota, I was like, you know what? They're right. They got a lot of lakes. There's a lake everywhere. I'd love to go to lake side property. Just go to Minnesota.

I really want to go to like. Pretty much have to live on a lake. Northern Minnesota, like where there's wolves and lots of moose and stuff. I feel like when I say Minnesota, I kind of give it the little Fargo. Midwestern twang. Yeah. Minnesota. I would have moved there, but the Jazz traded Gobert and I'm not living in the same state.

You hate him so much. All right. You already, you did your time. I think that's good. Yeah. Did you have a little disclaimer you wanted to say about questions? Oh, yeah. So, yeah, just to give an idea for listeners for next time we ask.

So we ask our questions on Instagram, and it's just kind of, if you see it, you see it, and you can ask a question. It's maybe like once or twice a month we ask for them. But if you want to ask a question that gets asked on the show, like avoid asking us when we're going to do a certain episode. Like, you know, we know about Treadwell. know about the big stories. We're spacing them out a bit.

So just we're not going to ask that on the show. Avoid asking for recommendations about where to go in like national parks or different areas of Montana. Like we're just probably not going to answer those. That's also just one where it's like takes quite a bit of work to type all that up and like think it all through. And we get a lot of questions from a lot of people. So that's just like, that's just a hard one for us to get to.

Sorry, guys. Like, well, every once while on the show, we're going to give recommendations. But outside of that, it's pretty hard to do it. Our Glacier episodes, we talk about our favorite places in Glacier and stuff like that. So, yeah. And then, yeah, you get one a lot. One I get a lot that I wanted to just briefly answer again on the podcast for people that have asked this. It's another one that takes quite a bit of time for me to come up with an answer.

I should just have one, like, ready to go. But people often ask me how I got into my field and, like, what I did to become a wildlife biologist. And so really quickly, I had studied biology as an undergrad. I'd planned on going into some sort of medicine. I shadowed some doctors that were optometrist. I hated it. Decided it wasn't for me.

Knew I always wanted to work with animals, but I'd really put it off because I thought I needed to make more money. And then I really just turned back and decided to do some. I was passionate about. So I studied really hard for the GRE. I did pretty well on it. And then I started talking to professors. And I found Dr. Tom Smith, who initially didn't give me really, you know, any time and said, you know, I've got a ton of other people in line that were wildlife undergrads. And I just went back in and talked to him every week, formed a friendship with him. He knew that I really wanted it. He gave me some little jobs around the office. Then he gave me a tech job. And then he took

me on as a master student. That was really my foot in the door. And then everything since has come out of that opportunity. So I would say if you really want to be a wildlife biologist, don't follow my route because that was like very unique to me. The things that you should start doing now are volunteering, getting as much experience as you possibly can with any kind of nonprofit or government organization that has need for wildlife volunteers. And then if you're still doing your undergrad or whatever, try and do it in wildlife. Go to a school where they have a good wildlife program, try and do it in that. And that's going to set you up perfectly to go into a graduate degree or to go straight into some work. So it's really an education thing generally. So that's my basic answer for

you guys. And then one more thing is we've been going for a while and we get a lot of repeat questions. So I actually, I have a terrible memory, but for whatever reason, I think I have a pretty good memory of what questions I've asked before. Yeah. So the more, like, specific you can be, the better. So, like, instead of saying, like, what's your favorite animal? Say, like, what's your 43rd most favorite animal? Right.

Or, like, ask something. Yeah. Yeah. That's something, like, you know, that you don't think anyone's asked us if you want to hire a chance. Like, people have asked us about, like, what extinct animal we'd most want to see you or, like, stuff like that, you know? Yeah.

So yeah, those are my suggestions. And once again, like, thank you guys for asking these questions. I read all of them. You make me laugh every time. We haven't read yours. Like, you know, sorry we haven't ever read it, but like we do read it here and like I acknowledge it. And thank you for asking them.

We genuinely feel so lucky with like the people that listen to the podcast and interact. Like, I don't know how many times I've texted either Mike or Jeff and been like, man, it's unreal how much people like this thing and are reacting to it. And you guys prove it in like the questions that you ask and the comments that you send us. So it really does. It means the world to us. So thank you. Yeah, for sure.

All right. You're welcome. Briefly, we'll do how much do we like this animal. I'm not going to go on a conservation right now. Zero claws. Because the last Yellowstone one I talked about it. So claw rating, again, like this is my platinum, 10 out of. a 10 gilded claw animal like this is the one that more than any other animal is probably

going to occupy that spot so 10 out 10 claws for me a perfect animal good job nature yeah i'm i'm bumping it down one spot okay so it was my favorite animal for like the whole show that we've been going for like three years now but i'm bumping whale shark to number one spot interesting I just don't think I've ever had a better interaction with a wild animal than with a whale shark. And like, I don't think I've ever been more impressed by an animal than whale sharks. So sorry, grizzly bear. You're going to have to show me something if you want that spot back. All right.

What's your claw rating really quick before we go to Mike? Okay, 10 claws. Mike, you're up. My contrarian brain has this process almost impossible to tell how I honestly. feel about grizzly bears at this point because like i give you guys love them so much yeah i give you guys so much crap and like that's kind of my thing is to like just take a huge dump over what other people like that's a terrible way to live it's a great thing don't grow up to be like me kids um but honestly i mean i like them for sure i'd probably say eight but i think that's probably low last time you said

nine i don't know did i okay yeah yeah you're dropping it was the thing that you always made fun of us four that you just admitted. Oh, yeah, the Montana water. He admitted that it's better. Oh, that's unreal. It's better than Utah, for sure. Man, you've come along the way, Mike. All right.

Yeah, baby steps. Well, thank you, everyone, for listening. Again, I think this was an episode I've been thinking about for a while, so I'm really glad to get it out there. I'm happy that we can talk. This is like probably our 10th or more grizzly bear episode, and we can still find cool. fun ways to talk about them.

So thanks everyone for listening. I guess I don't know if it was cool or fun. You guys can be the judge of that. But thanks so much for listening. We really appreciate it. And again, if you feel like it, check out our subscription channels, both Patreon and the Apple Grizz Club.

Prices stayed the same since we started. So feel free to check them out. We'd love to have you on there. We got some really fun, interesting content on there as well. All right. Yeah. And check out our store. I have, I just made a new shirt I like a lot with Laurie and Stern's art.

Cool. And then, yeah. And if you've had any issue, like, I think most everyone with the store has been smooth sailing, but if you've had any issues with it, you can shoot us a DM or something on Instagram and we'll take care of you. Cool. All right. Love you guys. Love you guys.

See you next time.