Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10 The man's name was Stephen Weiss. He was a wildlife scientist, studying grizzly bears. He worked at the University of Montana. He told them all about his work as they sat outside the snack bar of the Lake McDonald Lodge. It was the big hotel across the lake from the ranger station. Aunt Cassie had suggested that Steve join them

for lunch. Because it turned out they had a lot to talk about. They bought food and brought it to a picnic table near the lake. The water was so still it looked like a piece of light-blue glass. Mel ignored her cheeseburger and opened up a bag of Bugles. She popped one of the cone-shaped corn chips into her mouth. They were a brand-new kind of snack and were all the rage at school this year. "I want to know everything about the grizzly that followed you last night," Steve said. He'd pushed aside his burger and bottle of Coke to make room for a notebook. He scribbled away with his pen as Mel told him how the grizzly appeared from the woods and wound up on the porch. "You did exactly the right thing," Steve said, looking impressed. "You stayed calm. I don't think that bear was going to attack you."

"But the way it rose up like that…" Mel said with a shudder. "That's actually not usually an aggressive stance," he said. "Bears stand up on their hind legs to get a better look at things. But if you had run… or if it had gotten into the cabin, I really don't know. Grizzlies are unpredictable. But I'd say you're lucky." Steve asked her how the bear looked, smelled, and sounded. He was especially interested in the claws. "How long were they?" he asked. Mel thought for a minute. She stared at one of her Bugles, then slipped it over her finger. It looked to be about an inch long. "Way longer than this," she said, holding up her Bugle-topped finger. Steve nodded as he wrote. "That makes sense. Grizzlies use their claws to dig for roots and little animals under the ground. It sounds like that grizzly isn't doing much digging."

Steve asked her a few more questions and then finally closed his notebook. "All summer there have been an unusually high number of reports of aggressive grizzlies," he said, picking up his burger. "You're not the only one who's had a frightening experience." "But why are the bears acting this way?" Mel asked. There had to be a reason. She gazed at the smoke rising over the north end of the park. "Is it the fires?" Steve shook his head. "It's not the fires," he said. "There have been wildfires in Glacier since before it was a park." He pointed to their table, which was now covered with half-eaten burgers, crumpled wrappers, ketchup-covered napkins, and bottles of soda. "This is the reason the bears are threatening humans." "Um… the bears want to eat our hamburgers?" Aunt Cassie said.

She glanced nervously at Mel. And Mel knew what she was thinking. That sounded, well, a little crazy. Steve shook his head. "Not exactly. The problem is garbage. Leftover food. There's trash everywhere in the park. On the trails. In the campgrounds. Dumped in ditches. It's become a bigger and bigger problem in Glacier." Mel thought of Mom, hollering at people who littered. She pictured her tiny mother standing on the trail, in her red bandanna and peace-sign T-shirt, scolding a gorilla-sized man for leaving his empty Coke bottle on the trail. Steve leaned forward. His eyes narrowed. "Grizzlies are eating the garbage. Some grizzlies have almost stopped hunting and eating berries and plants. They're now eating garbage and whatever food they can find at the campgrounds." Steve told them more about the research he'd been doing. And suddenly what he was saying

didn't sound crazy at all. "As part of my research, I've also been studying grizzly scat," Steve went on. Mel tried not to smile. Scat was another word for wild animal poop. And it had become Kevin's favorite word. "I have to go make a scat!" he'd said yesterday morning as he ran to the outhouse. But what Steve was saying was serious. "I've been finding grizzly scat with glass in it, pieces of metal and plastic," he continued. "Last month the rangers found a grizzly near a garbage dump. It had starved to death. It had glass embedded in its teeth. It probably couldn't eat." "How terrible!" Aunt Cassie said. Mel pushed away her food. She'd lost her appetite. "It is," Steve went on. "Some of these grizzlies are really suffering. And they're becoming more and more dangerous to people. They don't want to stay away from us. They think of us as a source of food."