Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center

A few of our tours stop at a place called the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. It is a place for injured animals to be rehabilitated and for orphaned animals to learn basic skills without a parent. Some of the animals at the AWCC include black bears, brown/grizzly bears, a fox, an eagle, elk, caribou, wood bison, musk ox, and Sitka black-tailed deer. It is kind of like a zoo considering all the animals are caged, but the brown/grizzly bear exhibit alone is 18 acres, which is much better than they would have a zoo.
Of course this wouldn't be a complete blog without a picture of a moose, so here you have it! Two black bears in their "den".
Unfortunately, our SD card ran out of space RIGHT before Andy almost got eaten by a brown bear. That is a slight exaggeration, but for the first time since I have known him, Andy was scared! The bear you see in the following video was coming towards us from the little lake in the background. Andy grunted at the bear to get his attention and the bear instantly stood up. Not sure how many of you have seen a bear stand up, but suddenly they go from this cute little bear moseying around to this NOT-SO-NICE-LOOKING-GIANT coming at you. Andy grunted again and the bear grunted back and began to walk towards us. Now you have to understand that all animals at the AWCC are behind fences, but if they wanted to, they could get out pretty easily. I think the bear saw Andy as competition and had we not gotten out of there right away, he would have come right through that fence! It was really quite funny at the time, but could have taken a turn for the worse. Next time I think we'll leave the bears alone!


Finally, this picture is for Mr. Paul Nye. I can't get it to turn, but I think you'll understand! Ü