Grand Slam of Bears

It has been for sometime a goal of mine to get the “grand slam” of North American bears (black, grizzly, polar and Alaskan brown) with a camera. I have numerous black bears in my photo stock that I have taken around northern Minnesota with some as close as my yard. In 1985 and 1989, after viewing the National Geographic Special "Polar Bear Alert," I ventured by rail from Winnipeg to Churchill, Manitoba, on Hudson Bay’s southwest shore, to photograph polar bears as they congregate there in fall when their migration brings them to Cape Churchill to wait for freeze-up so they can venture out onto the ice for seals after a summer of fasting. Both trips gave me opportunities to photograph numerous bears.

In 2004 and 2005 I traveled to Alaska to photograph grizzly bears. On both trips I toured Denali Park and was able to see approximately 50 bears. The 2004 trip had grizzlies within 100 yards of my camera. 

My third trip to Alaska, in 2006, had a goal of photographing Alaskan brown bears that are in the Lake Clark National Park located about 90 miles southwest of Soldotna, which is about 65 miles south of Anchorage. There I saw about 35 Alaskan browns with some as close as 40 yards. This is very close to where the "Grizzly Man" and his significant other had their bear encounters.

I have had a few potentially dangerous encounters with bears. I ventured too close to a polar bear on the Canadian tundra and was subsequently called by folks in Churchill the "Crazy Yank," had a black bear I had shot legally in Minnesota take a swing at me (I guess I can't blame him) and was left alone for 20 minutes in Alaska by a guide while I was photographing, during which time an Alaskan brown came within a little more than 100 feet of me. Recently I was summoned, as a Conservation Officer, to a problem bear in Duluth, Minnesota. My partner and I were evaluating the situation and the black bear bluff charged him (better him than me). We both drew our sidearms and fortunately the bear backed off - Whew!