The Bears of Hull Island

Are there bears in the area?  Have you seen any on Hull Island?

After years of being asked this question, I could unequivocally say yes a few years ago when I was alone and a grizzly bear walked through the camp.  This year the bears were back in force and we had nine bear sightings on Hull and many more in the area. 

In May as I was loading the boat for a trip to Eve River, I was surprised to see three large brown bears on Hull about 120' away on the shore east of the dock.  I thought it was odd that the bears seemed to be traveling in a pack, then realized it was one adult and two large cubs.  The bears were unfazed by my presence and I spent a few minutes watching them flip rocks to get at the crabs hiding beneath.


On Hull, one adult, two children, all grizzly!

One morning in July, Catherine reported a tourist boat floating close by off the shore of Hull.  We all walked down to the landing to investigate and realized the tourists were watching two brown bear cubs playing about 100 yards away along the west side of the island.  After the bears disappeared into our woods we hunkered down in camp with bear spray.  An hour or so later we saw them swim from Hull to Triangle Island, then later swim over to Hat Islet.  It was such a pleasure that our family was there to see them.

While it was just getting light early one August morning,  Rod Taylor was head down to the Cookhouse on his phone when he caught movement.  Two brown bear cubs (maybe the same bears we saw in July?) walked within about 4 feet right past him.  Jeff and I were still sleeping peacefully in the cabin while Rod was visited by the furry friends.  Rod was so excited to tell us what happened!  The bears were within arms reach.

On East Cracroft island Liz and I watched from the safety of 2BRNR, an adult and two cubs feasting on crabs and horsing around.


From Hull Island we saw a black bear across Havana Channel on East Cracroft Island across and later two more swimming in Chatham Channel when Jeff, Rod and I were returning from Lagoon Cove.

All in all about 14 different sightings this summer.



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