The story of Ethyl the grizzly bear fascinated both the public and wildlife officials. The animal ended up traveling more than 5,000 miles across Montana and Idaho.
Now, officials believe that the grizzly may have traveled so far to try to find her way back home.
"It may have been that she was trying to find her way back to where she lived," Cecily Costello, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks research wildlife biologist told Cowboy State Daily. "After relocation, some bears can beeline it back to where they're from. In other cases, it takes them a while to orient themselves."
Ethyl originated in the Flathead Valley region of Montana. But FWP ended up relocating the animal after she ended up moving her in 2006 after she ran afoul of locals. The bear returned, caused trouble again, and they moved her again in 2012.
Grizzly Bear Wandered For Years
Well, officials believe now that the animal traveled so many miles because she was trying to make her way back home. She traveled more than 5,000 miles across two years and probably farther. In 2014, the grizzly lost her radio collar, and experts never saw her again. They do not know if the animal eventually made it back home, but she was headed in the right direction.
"She still never made it quite back into her home range while she had her collar on," Costello said. The expert believes that Ethyl probably died since then since she was 20 in 2014. However, the grizzly could still be alive but very old. "I would not expect that she's still alive, but we have had bears live into their late 20s and even into their early 30s."
Wyoming Game and Fish Large Carnivore Specialist Dan Thompson weighed in on the grizzy bear's activity.
"Therein lies the beauty with all wild animals doing what they want to do, any time we as humans try to predict or explain why we think they do something they show us they'll do whatever suits them," he said. "There are always unique individuals that do things outside the 'norm' and the newer technology gives us an idea about total distance traveled during a walkabout rather than just calculating distance between start and end points."
