This footage shows the adult female bear, Raspberry, playing with her young cub who’s been nicknamed Jam. Jam is Raspberry’s third cub, after two nicknamed Snow and Rocky.
Unfortunately, from the first two only Snow made it. Clearly, from the footage, Jam is healthy and full of energy as she plays with her mother, climbing all over her and the surrounding environment.
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Even when Raspberry puts one of her huge paws on her cub in an attempt to stop or slow the game, Jam can’t be denied and just fights back all the harder.
Grizzly Bears In Yellowstone
As grizzly bears, Raspberry and Jam make up one of the two bear species in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, with the other being black bears, which are more common.
The numbers of grizzlys are on the rise though, with the park estimating their numbers at being close to a thousand, which is up from less than two hundred in 1975.
Raspberry’s cubs will contribute to that rising number, although they are still considered animals at risk even if they’re not endangered. The biggest risk to them is humanity.
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Jam and Raspberry aren’t aware of the greater dangers they’re facing as a species, however, because they’re busy being lost in their game. Like many other kinds of animals and predators, their games involve play fighting.
Experiences like these are vital for Jam to develop her own hunting abilities to help supplement her foraging. Grizzly bears are excellent at remembering where to find food, so all she needs to learn is how to fight to get meat and to defend herself.
Her fighting style is quite acrobatic in nature, with her little paws batting against Raspberry’s solid, musclebound frame. She must think she’s got the upper hand until Raspberry sets her straight with a single blow that knocks her back.
Bear Parkour
This little cub has absolutely boundless energy, and she even uses her environment in her game, sprinting up and over the scattered tree trunks that are almost as big as she is.
Raspberry runs after her cub, but Jam is already up and away, jumping from one trunk to another. Parkour’s not something that will come to mind for most people when they picture grizzly bears, but they make for good climbers.
They might not be as good as other animals due to their bulk, but cubs are still light and nimble enough that they can scamper up to high places without much difficulty.
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Close Encounters Of The Bear Kind
Aside from showing off her natural agility, Jam seems most concerned with hitting Raspberry as many times as possible in a short space of time. Raspberry seems to give off an annoyed air at several points but this isn’t her first cub and she knows the drill.
While Raspberry and Jam can play up close with each other like this, people are not to get close to bears because of the risks involved, and any visitors to the park should not feed the bears under any circumstances.
Jam has since begun living independently from Raspberry. Although the two lived together for longer than a cub would typically stay with a parent, Jam seems to be thriving in the wild now.