The Panhandle ‘Giant’: Big brown bear makes its presence felt by film crew, fellow ursines

A ‘GIANT’ IN THE DARKNESS

AN ENCOUNTER WITH A MASSIVE BROWN BEAR IN SOUTHEAST ALASKA

Two big brown bears feast on a humpback whale carcass in Southeast Alaska. But these bruins couldn’t match the size and legend of an elusive massive bear a ectionately known as the “giant.” (BJORN DIHLE)

A ‘GIANT’ IN THE DARKNESS

BY BJORN DIHLE

Iwoke to the sound of a brown bear crackling through brush near my tent. It was early April and I was guiding a small natural history film crew on an island in Southeast Alaska.

We were at the beginning of three weeks of filming, and our primary goal was to film brown bears feeding on a humpback whale carcass. I grabbed my flare gun and .44 pistol, unzipped the tent and crawled out into the black night. The bear paused 7 yards away, then took a step or two closer. He showed no signs of agitation.

The bear’s breathing was steady; there was no hu , jaw-popping or growl. He

Washed-ashore herring eggs are a ready source of food in spring for bears, but the one that visited the author’s camp surprisingly only left footprints in the roe mass. (BJORN DIHLE)

knew he was safe and that he had the advantage in the darkness. Another step or two and I would slowly rise and gently suggest he leave. I sensed the bear turning away. Branches snapped and cracked as he made his way deeper into the rainforest. I waited outside the tent for 10 minutes, listening to the quiet of the falling snow.

I wondered if the brown bear had been the “giant.” I’d seen the giant’s tracks nearby while my two companions and I had set up camp a few days before. The prints were bigger than any brown bear tracks I’d seen.

I’VE BEEN WORKING WITH brown bears for more than a decade, beginning with guiding wildlife photographers and for the last few years working solely with natural history film crews. I spend most of my time in Southeast Alaska, but I’ve also explored some of Kodiak Island and the Alaska Peninsula, where the biggest brown bears in North America live. This giant was an anomaly, a mountain of a bear, the sort of beast more commonly seen in dreams than reality.

In the gray dawn, I studied the previous night’s visitor’s tracks in the snow and on the nearby black sand beach. It was early in the year for bears. Most of those we’d seen to that point were the adult males that wake up earliest. Females, especially those with cubs, generally come out of their dens in May.

Last night’s camp visitor had been a very large male – probably a 9-foot bear – but he was not the elusive giant, which was easily a foot bigger. Massive schools of herring had spawned in the sound and turned the water milky. The beach by our camp was covered in a few feet of herring eggs. The eggs are traditionally harvested by the Indigenous peoples of Southeast Alaska, as well as targeted by a commercial fleet, and are a delicious delicacy, so I was worried bears would congregate to feast.

The previous night’s bear had walked through the piles of eggs, but not eaten any. Surprisingly, we would see no evidence of bears feeding on herring eggs in the days to come.

We were exposed to the stormy expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Wind and snow alternating with rain hammered us for the first ten days. We su ered the elements, staking out the whale carcass when the wind was from the south. When the wind switched to the north, we changed locations and hid downwind of a dead sea lion that the stormy sea had tossed high on the beach.

The bears mostly came out at night. We saw a half dozen during dusk and dawn but couldn’t get any usable footage. Some were large males, but none were that giant.

THE WEATHER BROKE AND overnight spring had arrived. Hundreds of gray whales arrived to feed on the eggs the herring had laid to any solid surface beneath the ocean.

We met two guys who work for Alaska Department of Fish and Game and were surveying winter-killed deer. They were blown away by the amount of gray whales. Migrating shorebirds rested and picked

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The tracks around the beach certainly indicated that the bears were active in this area. The giant was the one that had everyone’s attention during this coastal

expedition. (BJORN DIHLE) through the mounds of herring eggs. Sitka blacktails emerged from the forest and browsed the high tide line, and a few times it appeared they, too, were eating kelp covered with herring eggs.

Bears are generally more active at dusk and dawn, so we’d usually make the 2-mile hike from the whale carcass to camp in the dark. Sometimes we were treated to the northern lights streaming green above snow-covered mountains.

With each day that passed, I thought more about the giant. Each evening, I prayed he’d appear from the woods. Big bears are usually very shy, but I figured he’d visit the whale carcass every once in a while.

We met a couple from a nearby community who’d boated over to the

Dusk and dawn are the times when bears are most active, with the whale carcass serving as fast food. (BJORN DIHLE)

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island to go hiking. Both carried big handguns and seemed a little bit worried about our safety. When I mentioned the giant, they knew exactly which bear I was talking about. They hadn’t seen him, but they had come across his tracks in years’ past.

They had heard stories, too. One was how he’d harassed some deer hunters who’d said it looked like he had a tiny head because his body was so huge. At night, I would fall asleep thinking of him. I imagined his hulk moving through the darkness and wondered what he was doing at that moment.

The camera crew had gotten a lot of good stu , but, since we had yet to get bears feeding on the whale, morale was a bit low. I’d been filming on dead whales the last couple of years later in the season and they’d been crawling with brown bears. It was early, but still, I was surprised there wasn’t more bear activity.

We spent long hours, hidden 70 yards away behind a pile of logs, near the whale. Often, we’d hear something in the brush. Occasionally a big bear would stick its head out to survey the beach, then disappear back in the brush. That big of a bear was likely keeping other bears away. I wondered if it was the giant.

ON THE 17TH DAY, just as the sun was setting, two bears emerged from the forest and walked down to the whale at the same time. One bear was a goodsized male. The other was a 7- or 8-yearold male.

They were nervous; it soon became apparent the source of their fear was another bear just inside the guard timber. The bushes crackled as the unseen bear moved where he’d probably been bedded for some time. My bet was it was the giant. The two bears coming to the whale were using us as a bu er.

They figured the giant would leave them be and give them a chance to feed with us there. The bigger of the two claimed the whale and began feeding. Occasionally, the smaller bear would ease in and try to feed. Then the bigger bear would push him away.

The bush crackled – I could viscerally feel how pissed the giant was that his whale was being eaten by other bears – and the smaller bear came close to us. At any moment I hoped the bushes would explode and the giant would come charging out to claim the whale. But he was too smart for that. We filmed until it was so dark we could barely see, but the giant never showed himself.

A few days later, during one of the last evenings we staked out the whale, a gigantic bear stuck his head out of the woods 300 yards away. It was just after sunset and the bear was panting hard, a sign of agitation that 100 percent had to do with our presence. My guess was that he was the giant, though I couldn’t know for sure.

He was way too far to film. We were on pins and needles, hoping he’d come

Even the other bears were leery about the presence of the giant. This hungry critter nervously watched for the biggest and baddest of the bears hiding nearby in the brush. When finally spotted, he was too far away for the film crew to get footage, but his presence had been felt by all. (BJORN DIHLE) out into the open. He just sat there panting, occasionally lifting his nose to the breeze, and waiting. Minutes passed as the falling darkness slowly whittled away our hope. When there was barely light left to see, much less film, he came down from the forest like a hulking shadow moving through the dimness. There was zero hesitation nor was there much swagger – many adult males walk like cowboys – as he knew he was king.

He climbed atop the whale and stared at us for several long moments before lowering his head to eat. I shouldered my heavy pack, then backed away while watching the giant tear at the carcass until I could no longer tell him from the darkness. ASJ

Editor’s note: Bjorn Dihle is the author of three books, including, most recently, the Ban Mountain Book Award finalist A Shape in the Dark: Living and Dying with Brown Bears. Order it at amazon. com/Shape-Dark-Living-Dying-Brown/ dp/1680513095.