In the presence of bears
Water laps at the edges of the boat as the tide ebbs, the comforting, familiar sound of the Glendale River adds perfect a background to the scene before us.  I’m standing in the water knee-deep, holding onto my boatload of British tourists stationary in the river, keeping our position between Luke’s boat upstream and Shawn’s boat downstream. Our three boats float quietly together, all of us focused on the creature standing on the opposite riverbank. We’re watching a beautiful sub-adult female grizzly bear named Bonnie go about her business as if we weren’t there at all.

The sights and sounds can almost overwhelm the senses here some days, but this morning is calm and quiet; rain is softly falling in Glendale Cove, onto Bonnie and her viewers on this slightly soggy spring morning. All we can hear is distant bird song from the forest, the occasional bald eagle that flies over, calling out to us as it goes, camera shutters snapping away and Bonnie’s contented munching on the estuary sedge grass.

We sit quietly, the enthralled viewers barely moving a muscle as this little grizzly allows us to join her for breakfast. Bonnie tears off mouthful after mouthful of the sedge grass, occasionally flicking her intelligent brown eyes towards us, making sure we’re behaving ourselves. She pads almost silently through the long grass, out onto the stones of the riverbank and sits down, nose high in the air, reading the messages on the breeze.

The tide is quickly retreating from the river now, and reluctantly Luke, Shawn and I pull ourselves and our guests away from the beautiful little bear and start heading down river.  My guests make remarks about how they can’t believe we sat silently and watched her for almost half an hour, but then again it’s always surprising how fast the time goes in the presence of bears.

They know no concept of time as humans do – it’s meal time when they’re hungry and the tide is right, it’s play time when they feel playful and it’s nap time when they’re tired. Spring and summer for the bears are spent fattening up and possibly finding a mate when the time is right; fall is all about eating as many salmon brains and eggs as possible and winter is for hibernation. When they wake up the following spring, they awake as a slimmer, older and wiser version of their former selves.
At least one species of British Columbians have it figured out…

I’m back up here for my second season as a guide at Knight Inlet Lodge, and as always, Glendale Cove and all its inhabitants never cease to amaze. In my first 10-day shift of the season I’ve seen eight different grizzly bears, a handful of black bears, the rear end of a fast-retreating wolf, four transient killer whales, almost a hundred dolphins and on my last day of the shift, was lucky enough to find two humpback whales bubble feeding just outside of the cove – a rare sighting up here.

Rain or shine it’s beautiful here – this place enchants the people that visit with the birds and the beasts, the mountains, the ocean and the rainforest itself. I consider myself to be entirely addicted.
Words can’t do it justice – you’ll just have to come and see for yourselves.
Looking forwards to seeing you on the dock.
Moira

“Spring has arrived and the lodge is open.  Familiar furry faces are popping up everywhere and it’s shaping out to be a strong beginning to the season for us.  We’ve been open for a week now and already we’ve had multiple bear sightings in the estuary and the other morning we were woken up early by the blows of transient orcas in the estuary.  A small pod of four patrolled the cove twice in the day hopeful for the opportunity to feed on one of the many harbour seals and pacific white-sided dolphins that are abundant in the Inlet at this time of year.  We had an excellent view of the whales before they gave up their search in the cove and made their way back out of the inlet.

We are pleased to announce that the moms and cubs are very strong at the moment.  Lenora and her yearling cub Peanut have been regularily spotted in the estuary, and to our delight our famous white cub from last fall is out with her two siblings and impressive looking mother.  One small subadult has also been sighted feeding on the protein-rich sedge that’s coming up quickly in the estuary.”

This story contributed by Jamie Scarrow, Knight Inlet Lodge Head Naturalist and professioanl photgrapher. To see some of Jamie’s photos

One of the things I enjoy the most about my job with Knight Inlet Lodge is all the interesting people that I get to meet. Now I say meet but what I really mean is correspond with as very rarely do I get to meet them face to face.

Recently I had the pleasure to “meet” a gentleman who worked as a timber cruiser in Knight Inlet during the mid to late 1950’s. Alan first contacted me to purchase one of our “stop the hunt” wrist bands mentioning that he had worked in Knight Inlet. He told me how they found that the grizzlies became used to their presence after a few weeks and would avoid the crew, they knew there were lots of bears around from the bear scat etc, but they would rarely see a grizzly. After awhile the crew stopped carrying firearms to work as they no longer felt threatened by the grizzlies.  I found this unsolicited comment very interesting as it so closely mirrors what we find with the grizzly bears of Glendale Cove today. The fact that they regularly used the grizzly bears trails to travel in the forest gives you an idea as to their comfort level. As Alan commented the crew quickly figured out that the grizzlies knew the easiest way through the forest.

Alan is also the first person I have ever met that knew Jim & Loretta Stanton, well known Knight Inlet pioneers whose experiences were chronicled in the book “Grizzlies in my backyard”. Alan remembers Jim Stanton claiming that he could recognize the individual bears of Knight Inlet by sight, a most impressive ability to say the least.

All in all it has been an interesting couple of weeks learning some real first hand history of Knight Inlet. Alan has kindly consented to my sharing this information in a blog, hopefully with more to follow.

Jamie’s Antarctic adventure

I’m half away through my Antarctic season now, having just finished a lengthy 18-day expedition to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, and the Antarctic peninsula over the Christmas holidays.  We had amazing sunshine weather in the Falklands and enjoyed the upclose encounters with giant albatrosses and various penguins species.  Christmas eve was spent somewhere at sea between the Falklands and South Georgia in a Force 9 strong gale with 6m waves and over 60 knots of wind.  Not the nicest time with furniture flying from its moorings and dinner beings cancelled due to the violent movement of the ship.  Christmas morning was much nicer and our time in south Georgia was great.  South Georgia is always a special place with the thousands of fur seals, ten’s of thousands of King penguins, and amazing scenery.

The end of the expedition was spent exploring the Antarctic peninsula for around 3 days.  Most of the trips we do are solely based in the peninsula area enjoying the penguins, seals, bountiful whales, and scenery.  The scenery is second to none, with the endless glacial fields and icebergs highlighted in the prolonged austral summer sun.

Just over two more months to go until I return home to my home in British Columbia.  Soon after that I’ll be back in Knight Inlet with the bears again.

-Jamie Scarrow is the Head Naturalist at Knight Inlet Lodge, Antarctic Guide and a Professional Photographer. For a look at some of Jamie’s spectacular grizzly bear photos

winter at Knight Inlet grizzly bear lodge

As past guests of Knight Inlet Lodge know from personal experience our location in Glendale Cove features incredible scenery. Many people comment on the natural beauty of our area, saying they would love to live here year round. The standard response form our staff is you haven’t been here in the winter! The pictures in this blog will give you an idea of just how harsh our winter can be. These pictures were taken by our Caretakers for the winter of 2008 -09 Steve & Heidi.

As these pictures show it is a good thing that the grizzly bears of Knight Inlet are settled into their winter hibernation! Living in Glenadle Cove over the winter is a whole different adventure than viewing grizzly bears as they fish for salmon. So for those of you coming to visit Knight Inlet Lodge in 2010 remeber you do not want to be here in the winter!

Knight Inlet Lodge winter scene

Grizzly bear adventure lodge in winter

Frozen Glendale Cove

Hi Guys

Thanks for the opportunity to post a blog on your site.

grizzly bear in Glendale Cove estuary

Our three night staywith you late July 09 was out of this world the environment the wild life & the staff were exceptional especially our guides Luke & Moira their knowledge & passion for their work made our stay perfect. We had rain for two days but that didn’t stop us or dampen our enthusiasm how else would you experience the rainforest walk but in the rain! we felt very privileged to be in this remote & protected part of the world, we saw lots of Grizzly Bears including one Bear crashing through the water to try & beat two Eagles to a Salmon what a spectacle I would never have believed that the Grizzly Bear could move so fast, it only added to our excitement when walking along a Bear trail discovering Bear day beds, rubbing trees & listening to some of Luke’s many Bear stories, the food at the lodge was awesome, the chefs did a great job, we didn’t want to leave & would like to think we will return in a few years time & see how baby Bear Peanut has grown.

Rainforest walk in the rain

Over the years Knight Inlet Lodge has been fortunate to receive many excellent photos from guests. We thought that you might enjoy seeing some of them. Many thanks to the numerous people that have sent us photos over the years. The grizzly bears of Knight Inlet Lodge make for some exciting photography opportunities as they fish for salmon or just hang out in the estuary.  Over time we intend to post more of these pictures on our blog as a way to let everyone see our bears in the wild. Here is few of my favourite photos, enjoy!

grizzly bear with bus

grizzly bear cub in boat

grizzly bear running in water

October 18 saw the last of our guests depart and the remaining staff start on the shutdown procedure for the lodge. There was one litle wrinkle to this annual event as we hosted a film crew from the NBC Today Show. They were at Knight Inlet Lodge to film a segment that will air during the Winter Olympics here in British Columbia. The crew spent the better part of 3 days with us  getting outstanding footage  including some of our white grizzly cub. Once we know the date the footage will air we’ll post a blog so everyone can watch.

Over the next few months very little will be happening at the lodge outside of our ongoing Coho Salmon Hatchery. Glendale Cove is a very differnet place right now as days and weeks will go by without any visitors. Our Caretakers Ed and Bonnie are settled in to their new home away from home and looking forward to the advdenture ahead.

Knight Inlet grizzly bear

Following a recommendation from our daughter and son-in-law who honeymooned at Knight Inlet September 2007, we booked a few days there ourselves September 2009 as part of our long time planned Canadian “holiday of a lifetime”. Our two days at Knight Inlet definitely warranted what we found to be a somewhat typical Canadian word “AWESOME”. Of the four weeks we spent in Canada from Niagra via Icefield Parkway, Rocky Mountain Train and Vancouver island, our time at Knight Inlet was certainly the highlight our daughter promised !!

Grizzly sow with cubs

We saw bears, seals, otters, bald eagles, kingfishers to name but a few…. The whole experience was made even more memorable by the knowledge, understanding and friendliness of the guides – in our case specificaly Bob, Dean and Luke (a fellow Yorskhsire man!) and we still groan at the memory of some of Deans’ “jokes”.

Knight Inlet certainly deserves its reputation – our only one “problem” was to try and avoid eating too much of the delcicious food provided !!

We wish you all the best and look forward to seeing you again in the future, possibly in three years as we return to see the Coho my wife helped release as they return for spawning.

grizzly bear eating salmon

grizzly fishing for salmon at weir stand

summer at Knight Inlet Lodge

We were at Knight Inlet 7-8-9 August this year.

What a few days !!! After a spectacular flight from Campbell River over awesome scenery, we were greeted by a wonderfully warm staff group, so welcoming and happy (why wouldn’t you be when you work in such an idyllic place ??!!).

Knight Inlet

It just got better and better !!!!  Great orientation, full board of well-planned activities, well-informed and enthusiastic guides, excellent gear provided, fun fellow guests, fantastic food (with excellent accompanying beverages!!) and to top it all off……..BEARS !!!!! It is such a beautiful place, it was just lovely to be there…………….Apart from the bears, the staff made it such a memorable experience.  One staff member we found extremely entertaining, talented, informative and thoroughly good company……………….Kevin ‘07 ( a reference to our recent Australian election !!!)…….he was a scream !!!!  Thanks Kevin, and to ALL other staff for a truly memorable few days, fulfilling a long-held dream of seeing the bears in such an awesome setting.

Kevin giving his talk

Thanks team, we hope we get back there one day.

Glendale Cove, Knight Inlet