A Bear Story In Yellowstone Around 1977

Yellowstone Park is one of our national treasures, this is true story about one of the black bears in that land.

Yellowstone Park is one of our national treasures, the treasure part certainly has different meaning to different people who encounter that sacred land.

 

The people that comprised the population of Yellowstone on a Summer’s day would be made up of Visitors, that is to say the tourists. In those days were called “tourons“, a cross between turkeys, and morons, the name given to all who did not work within the boundaries of Yellowstone and because of the ridiculous behavior they exhibited at times. There were Government employees called, ‘the Feds’ and “the Employees“, that would be the many folks who worked for the concessionaires, and private contractors for a summer season.

 

There were many and different concessionaires that contracted with the Park Service each summer season. Some for hotels, food services, general stores, boat rental, horse packers, and medical services, only to mention a few. I worked for one of those concessionaires the summer of 73 through the summer of 78. A medical group out of Salt Lake City that provided medical service throughout the Park, which included the hospital at Lake.

 

Lake hospital is unique in that it is the only hospital in the United States that opens and closes each year. In those days the Salt Lake group provided medical and surgical services from mid May to September. And for a population of 40,000 people, employees, and tourists, that occupied the park at any one time between the dates of July 1 to August 15. As the only anesthesia provider in the hospital, I had a load of free time on my hands. There was not any scheduled surgery, only stand by availability for what ever may present to our hospital and one surgical suite.

 

In an effort to alleviate substantial boredom, I often occupied my self with establishing a ham radio station at my quarters, taking over 900 slide photos with my new Nikon picture taking system, and entertaining the nurses. I took many fishhooks out of park visitors on windy days when their casting abilities failed them. I drove the ambulance frequently, to all parts of the park, and West Yellowstone, and to this day hold the record time between Norris and Mammoth Hot Springs. Some misguided Park Rangers, in the art of life saving anyway, finally complained enough times about my speed, so that my ambulance driving duties were curtailed in the later years.

 

Part of the function of the Park Service was to keep people away from the bears, and the bears away from people. In those days, they often trapped bears that were encroaching on public areas and move them to remote parts of the park. One of the ways this was accomplished was placing a captured and tranquilized bear on a large heavy nylon tarp. The tarp was then drawn up into a sort of reverse parachute with the animal inside, slinging it to a hovering helicopter and flown away to remote parts of the park, landing and releasing the capture system allowing the bear to reside in new and different territory, hoping the bear would remain at the new location. Certainly a humane and efficient way to manage the rouge bear problem. During the many transports of such operations one of the capture slinging systems failed and a bear was dropped from altitude to their obvious death. This information had gotten to the, animal rights type people, and there were demonstrations conducted criticizing the Park Service for not only negligence, but for intentional efforts to kill bears. After working on the inside for all those years, it was clear that the Park Rangers had only one intention, as always, keep the people away from the bears, and the bears away from people. If the Park Service wanted to eliminate bears there were much easier and more economic ways than dropping them from helios at $500 per hour of helio flight time.

 

Since perhaps one or more bears had been accidentally sacrificed through transport, and since the media, or “we love the animals” groups had information that such incidents may have happened, the Park Service was sensitive to the management of bear transport, as well as other activities involving the tranquilization and transport of bears. Thus enters the Anesthesia Care Team as the present day nomenclature calls it. I being the only Anesthesia trained person within 90 miles of the hospital in Yellowstone National Park, made me the sole member of the Anesthesia Care Team. While this may have sounded great to patients in this remote locale needing Anesthesia services, how does this relate to the transport of black and grizzly bears of Yellowstone National Park.

 

One cannot say the words “On a nice bright warm day in Yellowstone National Park, that something or the other happened“, because at 7000 feet above sea level, in a region where it snows every month of the year, weather systems are born here and wisk through at random, nice bright warm days are limited. However, this day was one such day, and I, in my boredom was excited to receive a call from Roger Roberts, the district ranger for the Lake area. He described the situation of having a black bear, in a trap, that they wanted to tranquilize to tag, draw blood, the other scientific things that the Park biologists wanted to perform. He asked of me, “should there be an airway problem could I be available to help“. Of course, “Yes” came out of my mouth before I even thought about what I might encounter in providing this service. “What-ta Hell“, it was better than my current diversion, trying to figure out how to tie dry flies that I knew little about.

 

I inventoried the airway equipment we had at the hospital, and surprisingly we had a Miller 5 laryngoscope blade and a number 10 end tracheal tube. The hospital must have planned on a crow magnum patient, because these sizes of airway equipment are not intended for the normal population. However, they would be adequate for the bear population. Armed with these large caliber tools I wandered over to the Lake Ranger Station to report, as the airway expert, for any bear duties they had. Roger Roberts, Mad Dog Wilcox, and Park Biologists were on hand along with two bear traps, one unoccupied, and the other occupied with a medium sized black bear.

 

Bear traps are road culverts approximately 3 to 4 feet in diameter, modified on each end, a barred jailhouse type window on the front of the trap, and a trap door mechanism on the rear, all placed on wheels, and a framework that can hook up to a pickup, and be transported to any area that has roads within the Park for a setup. The bear trap is painted with the standard latrine green park service paint, and has a section for bait. The bait varies from, whatever the kitchen of any facility in the area has to offer, whatever menu is chosen for bait it is distinctively rotten. Therefore, a bear trap has a memorable smell, not sewage, not bad refrigerator, just plain rotten, so rotten that if you take a deep breath you can taste it. All of this fragrance is combined with a certain amount of bear s**t that is indigenous to the vehicle. It is a smell that cannot be duplicated, nor should it be, but to those of us who have experienced it, it carries on as, one of those life long remembrances.

Ranger Roger spells out the plan to us, very simple, they want to shoot this bear with the tranquilizer gun, do their usual animal duties, and have me stand by in case the bear doesn’t breath. The reason the bear would not breath as I found out, was because they were using a drug, succinylcholine, that totally paralyzes the bear, the drug stops all muscular movement, including breathing. We used this drug regularly in those days in the operating room.

 

Mad Dog Wilcox, was the bear expert on evaluating the size, weight, and temperament of the bear to determine an appropriate dosage that would render the bear motionless for a period of time, but not any overtime, because without respirations the bear dies. Thus the reason for me to be there to keep the bear’s airway open and functionable until the animal recovers from the drug. Even in those days there were far more better drugs for this purpose, but because of government, and the inability for change within the system, it would be 5 plus years before such a drug protocol could be changed according to the best judgment of the authorities of the Park, besides, “It is the way we have done it for years“.

To attend to all of the issues of this bear, in this trap, on this day, there was a number of collected experts present to jointly discuss what is going to happen in the next few minutes. Thinking as to what my mission will be , I note that the bear is presently in the trap with it’s head toward the front of the trap where the bait is stored, and the rump toward the rear of the trap, or where the trap door is located. I immediately suggest, as Mad Dog is priming the tranquilizer gun, that we should get the bear to turn so his head is near the rear of the trap, where the entry door is so, in case he does not breathe, I can have easy access to his mouth for airway support. I am over ruled on several votes because they want the rump to be in an easy, and direct line for the shooter of the tranquilizer gun. I figure what the hell, this is routine thing for these boys, and I am probably just here for a line in the ranger report that they had some sort of backup airway support system available.

 

The gun is fired and the dart hits the target at near point blank range, the bear flinches and over the next few minutes begins to lose the ability to hold it’s head up, and becomes flaccid, and of course ceases breathing. The rangers reach in to do what they planned to do. I have set the timer on my watch, and when the rangers have accomplished their tasks, I notice the bear has not taken a breath, for 2 minutes, then 3 minutes, then 4 minutes. I made an announcement at 3 minutes that there had been no respirations, and when I looked up before the 4 minute mark, all eyes were looking at me. Aw s**t, that was what I was here for, there was no time to argue with Mad Dog Wilcox as to why his estimates were off and the bear was not breathing, or to why they did not take my suggestion of turning the bear in the trap so his head was way more accessible then on the other end of that 8 foot long trap. I had to react. I began crawling into that bear trap, and since the bear occupied most of the floor space, I had to straddle the bear, bending over, with my feet inching alone the sides of the trap, my face and body inches away from the animal.

 

Since childhood a boy quickly learns, after the first traumatic encounter with his testicles, that protection of those organs is paramount to anything else that is going on in life, for that day in time. Believe me, straddling a full grown black bear in a trap brings great attention to that childhood survival instinct. As I position myself in the innermost parts of the trap near the bears head, in full straddle of this animal, it is without question that my anal sphincter could easily shuck a basket full of walnuts, one after the other, perhaps even two or more at a time, all in the midst of fresh bear defecation, plus the fragrance of rotting bait that filled the air.

I prepare my lighted laryngoscope, approaching the bears head completely reversed as to my usual approach to a patient because I am approaching from below the head instead of being at the head. As I extend the bears jaw with the instrument, and began to advance the laryngoscope blade into the bears throat I notice, and feel, the bear’s right paw being withdrawn past one of my legs toward his chest. This movement is a signal for rapid exit. Somehow unknown to me, in one complete stride, I reverse my position within the trap, bolt out of the trap, smacking my forehead on the lower part of the trap door, and well out into the parking lot of our operations area. My head is bleeding from the abrasion that I encountered with the trap door. The rangers are all excited, not for my wound, but because “He’s breathing”. The bear had metabolized the drug, and with my stimulating effort from the blade of my laryngoscope going down his throat to re-establish his airway, resumed his respirations.

 

Everyone seemed to be happy with their accomplishments, the Rangers for successfully processing a captured animal, the Biologist for gathering some blood, and I for preserving my manhood one more day.

That’s the way I remember it on 2-24-2007

Montana Tom

Author's Note

Ignore grammer and punctuation, read for information, and entertainment.