Perhaps the most famous bear in the Rockies was killed Tuesday night (October 22, 2024).  Grizzly 399, a female, was beloved and admired by many over the many years of her life.

She was 28 years old – a long life for a grizzly bear (life expectancy is 20 to 25 years). Over her long life, she had given birth to 18 cubs – eight of whom survived to adulthood.

Photographers and others would visit the area each Spring waiting for a sighting of her with a new cub. She thrilled thousands who saw her over the years. As an ambassador for the wild places and the grizzly bear itself, she was without peer. She was even the subject of a PBS Nature episode (see excerpt below).

I’ve seen a number of grizzlies in the wild – one a female with two cubs that passed within 30 feet of the rear of my car. Each sighting was as thrilling as it was rare. I had been through Yellowstone for at least three decades before my first sighting of one.

Many saw her and her cubs near roads – where it was thought she felt safe with her cubs from predatory male grizzlies who would have killed her cubs.

Sadly, that proximity to a road likely resulted in her death on a very dark road in the Snake River Canyon south of Jackson, Wyoming.  I’d been on those roads at night – very, very dark that even headlights don’t illuminate much.

The status of a cub thought to be with her remains unknown.

With all the other death and destruction in the world, perhaps the death of one grizzly bear seems inconsequential. But in the death of that one bear, we are reminded of how fragile life is for everyone and every living creature.

And I think we can be thankful that by her life she reminded many about the need to protect the wild places.