An Arctic grizzly bear stomped its way across the Northern Interior this summer, crunching through twigs and grasses as it foraged for berries. A video camera bobbed under the bear's neck — it was one of a dozen Arctic grizzlies that had been fitted by cameras by researchers with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game and the Washington State University Grizzly Bear Research Center.
Ellery Vincent, a PhD candidate at Washington State, is heading up the project to study this northernmost subpopulation of grizzlies, which is made up of only a couple hundred bears. While the bears hibernate, she's working with a team of undergraduates to comb through hundreds of hours of what Vincent calls "Bear TV."
"It's a slow process," she said. "But so far, we're seeing a really wide range of things."
She said a bear's currency is calories, and the tundra is in short supply. Way up north, the growing season is short, and Arctic grizzlies have to hibernate up to eight months out of the year.
Vincent said the cameras are giving them clues as to how the bears make it work.
"In the springtime, when there's no vegetation and there's snow, they're utilizing overwintered carcasses that have been sitting on the landscape," she said. "And then, once the vegetation emerges, they're eating a lot of horsetail and bear flower, and then a lot of berries."
Vincent said some of the bears even hunt caribou — both calves and adults.
In recent years, caribou herds across the Arctic have taken a downturn, and there's been controversy about what role predators like bears might play.
Mark Nelson, the Fish and Game biologist for Northeastern Alaska and a partner on the bear monitoring project, said he doesn't believe that Arctic grizzlies are making much of a dent in the herds.
"There's very little evidence that predators are actually driving these population changes," he said.
Nelson said the department's primary interest in the project is learning about what sorts of habitats they're using, and when. He said Arctic grizzlies aren't a popular hunting target by themselves, but some caribou hunters up north like taking grizzly bears, too, if they spot one. Nelson said the data from this study can help Fish and Game sustainably manage the population.
He said the department also hopes to gain a better understanding of how people interact with the bears, which are known to wander around oil and gas developments and along the Dalton Highway, which cuts through their territory.
"There's interest in trying to understand how we can minimize and mitigate those interactions and concerns," Nelson said.
Practical matters aside, Vincent, with Washington State University, says it's been exciting to finally have a window into the lives of these exceptionally scrappy bears. She says they even caught some surprising bear romance.
"It's known that the males will follow the females around for a while as they're breeding," Vincent said. "But what we found is that they really follow each other around for quite a bit of time. Like, if all their needs are being met, it almost looks like a couple of the bears were playing, which was really unique and cool, because it's tough out there, and they're trying to survive."
She said she's pleased with the data they've gathered so far, but the project is still in its beginning stages. The group has two more years ahead, and dozens more bears to catch and attach cameras to.
Copyright 2026 KUAC
