BEARSCARE

You may have thought that terrorism is limited to human beings, but this is proof that some bears have been recruited to commit hate crimes. In this case, a Syrian bear killed a common brown bear in cold blood at a zoo in Germany. No one is sure of the motive, but the bear is in custody. Funeral plans have not been announced for the victim.

Personally, I believe both bears are victims. What sicko put this bear up to such a horrible crime? I mean, this has made the news worldwide, so, to whoever crafted this atrocity, congratulations, we’re all REALLY impressed. You forced one innocent bear to kill another. This is absolutely disgusting.

In case you haven’t heard already, Knut, the AWESOME polar bear cub who captured our hearts and minds a year or so ago (pictured below), is BEING SOLD. I intend to buy him.

Look, here’s the thing. I love that bear. I never got to Germany to visit him and I can’t imagine going to some other loser country where he might wind up. My plan is to keep him in the middle bedroom of our apartment. There’s a red sofa in there that he can sleep on and a book case and I could even clear our stuff out of the closet. There’s only one problem: polar bears are expensive. BUT I’m taking donations. Please leave the amount you’re pledging along with contact information as a comment and I will get back to you. This is urgent. I expect I’ll need $100,000+ USD. Contributors will have some visitation privileges.

Today we went to the zoo in DC. Here is an incomplete list of animals we saw and my personal feelings on them:

1. Pandas – AWESOME
2. Lions – sweet
3. Tigers – similar to lions
4. Anaconda – scary/sweet
5. King Cobra – deadly (stay away from these)
6. Prairie dog – opposite of (5)
7. Elephants – Very large and friendly. These were the Asiatic variety.
8. Cow – I felt bad about my lunch
9. Orang utan – Me 10,000,000 – 100,000,000 years ago
10. HIPPO – wet

Writing for this website is a true joy. Usually. But, along with writing about great animal-related events comes the responsibiity of covering the tragedies. With over 14,000 site views, it is my sad duty to report that Knut’s loving keeper has died.

No one knows the cause of death yet and we should all just take time to mourn and remember. And we can’t blame Knut-it’s highly unlikely he had anything to do with it and he’s mourning too.

Here’s the story on CNN.

RIP Doerflein.

Some zoo in the UK has a SWEET new giraffe. Margret is very small for a giraffe, standing only about 5′ tall. But that doesn’t stop her from raging. Right now, CNN has the best video of Margret but, unfortch, it hasn’t shown up on youtube yet. Here’s a link. Youtube DOES have a video of Margret. It’ll have to do for now.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn7rn0DvTqg&rel=1]

Pandas are probably the most popular bear in the world but the suffer from low libido/ED. So, it isn’t surprising that panda cubs are few and far between. And that makes it even more exciting when one is born. Today is a happy day, my friends. A really happy one.

As the most comprehensive and well respected bear-oriented webpage in the universe, it is our honor to introduce bear lovers worldwide to Fu Long:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsaddsO4okc&rel=1]

Flocke. OK, I’m OK with this. The name is pretty deece.

YES!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWQZr3gJ8to&rel=1]

Germany has made a lot of mistakes in the past but it looks like they’re finally getting it together in the 21st Century. About a year ago, they rescued a polar bear named Knut (pictured below). He’s growing up and becoming vicious just like any other sweet bear.

Well, Germans finally know a good thing when they see it. When a mother polar bear, Vera, who is presently living at the Nuremberg Zoo, started acting like a maniac (pacing back and forth, carrying her cub in HER JAWS, etc) zookeepers decided to intervene [1]. And now we have a sweet, 4-week-old bear to hang out with.

Apparently the cub is doing well. Nobody knows for sure what sex the bear is, but there is thought that it is female. It is being called “Flocke”, which is German for “flake” (like snow flake–yeah, totally lame name), but the Germans are accepting suggestions for a permanent name since they aren’t creative enough to do it themselves [2].

The video below shows Flocke and her mother. The mother is clearly berserk, but still sweet. I’m glad that Flocke is going to make it.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RCwi1HUkpw&rel=1]

There is an excellent website devoted to Flocke here.

[1] http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5i26YSrioqHf1q-seU1ErRJ9DTxQA

[2] http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hhQQi1WKMMdbmNNE7_bMbrSj6LEwD8U3VNU00

So, the San Diego Zoo has some new grizzly bear cubs (see below).

They look pretty sweet and I’m going to free them.