Denali Road Lottery driver

[geoand]

Wife and I flew to Anchorage and rented SUV with sunroof and took some amazing photos imho. My shots were the bears and her shots were the good ones of the scenery.

Testing this url to some of my bear photos.

http://s231.photobucket.com/albums/ee25/geo1new/

 

[Timeshare Von]

I LOVE Alaska . . . nice photos. That was the one disappointment I had on our trip last summer is that we saw no black bears at all . . . and no grizzlies out and about outside of Denali NP. Looks like you were especially lucky to win the "lottery" to drive inside the park!!

Nice photos. Hope you'll share more with us

 

[Kay H]

I LOVE Alaska . . . nice photos. That was the one disappointment I had on our trip last summer is that we saw no black bears at all . . . and no grizzlies out and about outside of Denali NP.
Nice photos. Hope you'll share more with us

I didn't know that Alaska had black bears. All of the bears we saw were honey colored.

 

[DeniseM]

I didn't know that Alaska had black bears. All of the bears we saw were honey colored.

The Ursus Americanus species is called "Black Bear," but they can actually range in color from jet black to white- more info.

 

[Timeshare Von]

I didn't know that Alaska had black bears. All of the bears we saw were honey colored.

The "honey" colored ones (with the hump in their back) is commonly known as the grizzly or brown bear although they can be many variations in color. Those are the ones you'll find in Denali NP.

Black bears are not in Denali as they are more forest/woods type bears and are built for climbing. You will see them largely in the Kenai Penninsula and similar types of environs. There was a momma with three cubs wandering around Kenai Fjord NP at the Exit Glacier visitors center when we were there last summer.

Here is a great Alaska webcam on the Alaska Grizz's at a fishing spot at McNeil River Falls . . . http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/wildcamgrizzlies/index.html

 

[ricoba]

I am not a bear expert, but more than likely, the brown colored bear on the bridge in Kapish's photo's is a black bear even though it's brown.

I have on more than one occasion seen "Black Bears" in the wild and they have been usually black or brown.

Alaska is home to three types of bear, Black, Brown (grizzly) and Polar.

 

[DaveNV]

So then, what is a Kodiak bear? A grizzly?

Dave

 

[Timeshare Von]

I am not a bear expert, but more than likely, the brown colored bear on the bridge in Kapish's photo's is a black bear even though it's brown.

Yep, if you look at his back (between the shoulder blades) you don't see that big massive HUMP, so it is a black bear.

 

[Timeshare Von]

So then, what is a Kodiak bear? A grizzly? Dave

From Wikipedia . . .

The brown bear (Ursus arctos) is a species of bear distributed throughout the Northern hemisphere. Weighing up to 130–700 kg (290-1,500 pounds), the larger races of brown bear tie with the Polar bear as the largest extant land carnivores. The grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis), the Kodiak Bear (Ursus arctos middendorffi), and the Mexican brown bear are North American subspecies of the brown bear.

The Kodiak bear (Ursus arctos middendorffi) is a unique subspecies of the brown bear. Kodiak bears live exclusively on the islands in the Kodiak Archipelago and have been isolated from other bears for about 12,000 years.

So I guess technically, both the grizzly and kodiak are subspecies of the brown bear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_bear

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodiak_Bear

 

[gdeluca]

Thank you for sharing those amazing photos!

 

[geoand]

I'm glad people enjoyed the pics of that bear. We have many more pics of the mountains, hills, etc in Denali. The colors are just fantastic. Will post them at a later date (when I get access to DW's Mac). We just returned from a 4 day road trip thru the Canadain Rockies and wow was that incredible. Mountains, clouds, fall tree colors (yellow and green) and even a few of Big Horn Sheep up close and personal.