Until she spotted a mother and cubs on north Vancouver Island in July, wildlife photographer Catherine Babault had never seen a grizzly bear on the island.
While grizzlies often swim over from the mainland in the spring and summer, Babault said she hadn’t encountered them in her years of documenting elk in the area.
“I was very surprised and also very cautious,” she said.
“I’m very privileged to witness that. This is a very rare thing.”
Grizzly bears are not common in the area. A map from the Nature Conservancy of Canada shows the distribution of grizzlies across Canada.
While they’re found in most parts of the province, the map shows, they don’t tend to live year-round on the island.
Nicholas Scapillati, the executive director of the Grizzly Bear Foundation, said sightings of grizzly bears on Vancouver Island have been increasing, especially in the north. He added that it’s difficult for cubs to swim long distances to hop island to island, which indicates that these young bears were born on the island.
“This is the first real documented case of grizzly bear cubs that were born on Vancouver Island, so that’s very exciting,” he said.
Scapillati added that grizzly bears are keystone species in the ecosystems where they roam.
“They’re critical to the ecosystem, and they’re great cultivators,” he said. “They’re eating and pooping seeds all over … and it’s going to be very helpful for the North Vancouver Island ecosystem.”
Babault had been documenting a herd of Roosevelt elk, which often graze in the field. Near the end of the month, she returned to find the bears in the patch just as the elk approached.
“I always wondered what would happen if elk came face to face with the grizzlies?” she said. “I had my answer that morning.”
Very quietly, from about 500 metres away, Babault aimed her telephoto lens at the bears and started to film.
Once again, she was surprised to see the elk run at the bears.
“The elk there were super confident, just telling the rules of the games to the grizzly bears,” she said. “[The elk were like] ‘This is our patch, move. We need to feed ourselves.’ It was pretty cool.”
Babault said she’s not sharing the exact location of the grizzly bears so poachers and residents don’t disturb them..
She said she’s wondering where the bears will go as the seasons change.