Orphaned bear cubs get new winter den in Colorado. See the ‘happiest’ wildlife rescue

A pair of orphaned bear cubs will have a new chance at life — once they wake up from their long winter slumber in an artificial den in the Colorado wilderness.

The timing of the cubs’ relocation on Friday, Feb. 2 was “lucky,” as heavy snow was forecast over the weekend, which biologists hoped would “convince the cubs to stay in their new home,” officials said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The cubs were orphaned “for a couple different reasons,” according to Travis Sauder, assistant wildlife manager at the Colorado Springs office.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife posted photos showing one of the cubs when rangers rescued it in May 2023. The cub was found running around a southwest Colorado Springs neighborhood without its mother anywhere in sight, McClatchy News previously reported.

The “sow had four cubs, which is extremely unusual,” officials said in a news release. Biologists believe she might not have been able to take care of all four cubs, so she abandoned the runt of the litter.

Officials did not provide photos or information about the other orphaned cub’s situation. Wildlife officers sent the cubs to a wildlife rehabilitation facility in Del Norte, where they were nurtured for seven months until they reached the proper weight for their ages, officials said on Instagram.

Then they were ready to go back out into the wild, Sauder said in a video shared to Colorado Parks and Wildlife Southeast Region’s X account on Feb. 2.

“This is one of those really positive events where we get to take a wild animal and put it back out on the landscape and let it go about its life,” he said in the video. “This spring when they wake up and go back out on the landscape, they’ll hopefully just continue their life as a wild bear. So this is a very rewarding process for us.”

Videos show a team of about 30 people from the wildlife agency, Colorado Springs Utilities and the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo securing the cubs onto sleds and taking them on a ride through deep snow to the artificial den set up on Pikes Peak. Wildlife officials tuck the bears into the den, which was constructed mostly from natural materials, Sauder said.

“Hop on a sled with a sedated bear cub and ride down to a den built by (Colorado Parks and Wildlife) officers in one of the happiest wildlife rescue efforts they conduct all year,” officials said in an X post. “Great care is taken to ensure the cubs will survive in the wild and live long lives.”

Officials then tagged the cubs’ ears with GPS trackers that will transmit location data and information about the cubs’ preferred habitat, officials said.

“It’s a really unique opportunity to look into the life of these bears as they go about kind of figuring out how to be a wild bear,” Sauder said.

Zoo members voted to raise money for the GPS ear tags, according to Rebecca Zwicker, animal care manager at the zoo.

“It’s a real treat … getting a couple of black bears put into dens for a new chance at life,” she said.

Someone on X asked how the cubs would learn to survive in the wild.

“All creatures are born with powerful natural survival instincts,” Colorado Parks and Wildlife Southeast Region responded. “They will use them, and their GPS trackers will inform scientists of their progress.”

This adorable bear cub had Colorado neighborhood in a ‘tizzy.’ See it high in its perch

Young bear was starving when wildlife officials found her. See her amazing turnaround

‘Orphaned’ bear cub captured, wouldn’t have survived without mom, Idaho rescuers say