In nature, it has always been survival of the fittest. Some animals are prey and some are predators. It is in this dynamic that nature sustains itself.
Often, the smallest and the most vulnerable have very slim chances of surviving when faced with a predator.
For example, bears love it when it is calving season when a good meal is easy to catch.
Calving season is when animal species, such as elk, give birth.
Although there is a chance for the predators to be caught by the parent elk, the newly born calves are easy prey.
The elk calving season in Yellowstone National Park falls generally in late May and early June.
In 2015, park visitors witnessed a huge cinnamon-colored black bear devour an elk calf that was still alive. The whole encounter was recorded on video.
The black bear was seen sniffing for, dragging, and finally devouring a live elk calf.
Yellowstone National Park Bears
The National Park Service records two types of bears in Yellowstone, namely, grizzly bears and black bears.
Grizzly bears have a much smaller range than black bears in the United States.
They are typically larger than black bears, with a large muscle mass above their shoulders, a concave facial profile rather than a straight or convex profile, and much more aggressive behavior.
The grizzly bear is a brown bear subspecies that once roamed vast swaths of the American West's mountains and prairies.
It is only found in a few isolated locations in the lower 48 states, including Yellowstone National Park.
The grizzly bear is known as the brown bear in coastal Alaska and Eurasia.
The park implores visitors to be aware that all bears are potentially dangerous. Park regulations require that people stay at least 100 yards from bears unless they are safely in their car as a bear moves by.
Park management reminds people that it is against the law to feed any park wildlife, including bears.
Only the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and northwest Montana have recorded large grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) populations south of the border.
Due to unsustainable levels of human-caused mortality, habitat loss, and significant habitat alteration, grizzly bears were federally listed as threatened species in the lower 48 states in 1975.
The presence of a viable grizzly bear population in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem poses a continuing challenge for its human neighbors due to the potential for conflicts with human activities, especially when human food is present.
Also Read: Missing Body of Montana Man Found After an Attack from a Grizzly Bear, Officials Say
Black Bears
In North America, the black bear (Ursus americanus) is the most common and widely distributed bear species.
The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, on the other hand, is one of the few places south of Canada where black and grizzly bears coexist.
Park managers allowed visitors to feed black bears along park roads from 1910 to the 1960s, despite the National Park Service's official prohibition.
Along with Old Faithful, black bears became a symbol of Yellowstone for many people during this time, and are still what some people think of when they hear about Yellowstone bears.
Park staff have been attempting to prevent bears from becoming accustomed to human foods since 1960.
Related article: 'Highly-Predatory' Brown Bear Killed 28 Newborn Reindeers After Waking From Hibernation