Wildlife Spotting in British Columbia

In northern Canada's Desolation Sound, Crai Bower discovers, salmon is everything

- By Crai Bower

When the Spirit Bear Appeared, I'd been tracking a black bear through the woods, so my heart was already racing. Cream-colored, with a russet wash on her nape and a prominent scar etched deeply above her snout, she began a languorous stroll along a fallen, moss-shrouded hemlock not far from where our small group was gathered. She stepped into the creek and grabbed a salmon, audibly crunching its bones, taking sustenance from what I'd soon come to understand is the basic unit of energy in this uniquely North American ecosystem. I had dreamed for decades of seeing a spirit bear-also known as a Kermode bear, a subspecies of black bear whose white fur is the result of a double-recessive gene in the wild. I thought of what Marven Robinson, a Raven Clan member of the Gitga'at First Nation and owner of Gitga'at Spirit Tours, had told us. "Remember how you felt when you first saw a black bear, and remember how you feel when you see a white bear. Black bears intimidate, but white bears provide company."