Original photo has been deleted but can be viewed HERE.
These pictures were taken just outside of Banff on the old highway, Bow Valley Parkway 1A, between Banff and Lake Louise. It is interesting as the two cubs were brown, and the mother a Black Bear. Just to confuse things, a Black Bear, can actually be brown. In Canada we call the Brown Bear a Grizzly bear. There are only 3 types of Bear in Canada: Black Bear, Grizzly Bear and Polar Bear. You will only see the Black and Grizzly in the Canadian Rockies. A Grizzly can be identified by several features including distinct shoulder hump. This hump is due to large muscles necessary for digging roots, tubers and ground squirrels.
For photographs of bears and other animals in the Western Canada, visit the summer photo gallery.
Olga
July 26, 2008 at 9:56 am
Beautiful!
We were in Banff earlier this week and saw a small bear on Bow Valley; I am still unsure what kind of bear that was. It looked like a 2-years-old cub abd I’d say it looked like grizzly although I only saw it for 10 seconds or so, I didn’t notice a shoulder hump. But it had small ears and its nose was the same color with the face.