SAWYER COUNTY
Bear hibernating in bald eagle nest

Associated Press

A bear is hibernating in a bald eagle nest at the top of a tree on the Chippewa Flowage while several of the birds look on. "You can imagine they're thinking, 'Now what?' " said Ron Eckstein, a state Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist who has spent many years researching bald eagles.
The bear was reported to DNR officials by Jennifer Ehrlichman of Hayward, who first spotted it while snowmobiling in Sawyer County with her boyfriend. She said they first thought they had spotted something in the nest at the top of a 45-foot aspen Dec. 31, and returned on New Year's Day with a camera outfitted with a telephoto lens. "We thought maybe it was a raccoon at first. We thought something was up there, but we didn't know what," she said. Her boyfriend climbed up an adjacent tree to snap some photos, and determined it was a bear.
Ehrlichman's boyfriend returned to the site a few weeks ago and saw three eagles in the area, including one perched about 10 feet away from the nest.
Natural resources officials say bears usually prefer to hibernate in caves, hollow trees or culverts. DNR wildlife biologists Monday could recall only one other documented instance of a beer hibernating in a tree in Wisconsin. That was in fall 2002, when DNR avian ecologist Pat Manthey saw a bear in an eagle's nest on the St. Croix Flowage near Gordon in Douglas County.
Eagles generally use their nests of twigs, grass and moss as nurseries. They lay their eggs and then rear the young hatchlings in the nest, but Eckstein said they sometimes use it as a platform to dine on fish. He said eagles generally do not pick quarrels with other species. "If a big bear came, they wouldn't be aggressive. They'd just be — 'Oh oh,' " Eckstein said.
Mike Gappa, a retired DNR bear ecologist, said it is hard to say why the bear chose to hibernate in the tree. "Maybe this animal in the past has had some disturbance on the ground" during hibernation and chose to climb up a tree, he said.
Although that bear may be the only one spending the winter above the ground in a bird's nest, there are 1.4 bears per square mile in that area, said Ken Jonas, the DNR wildlife supervisor for the Upper Chippewa area.
There are 12 to 15 territories staked out by eagles on the Chippewa Flowage in Sawyer County, said Lowell Tesky, a DNR wildlife technician in Hayward who surveys the eagle population there each year.
Jonas is worried that people will find out the bear's specific location and disturb the animal. He noted it is against the law to do so. Entering the den of a bear in hibernation carries a maximum penalty of nine months in jail and a $10,000 fine.