In the weeks before hibernating, bears pack away enough apples, berries and salmon to put on 100 pounds or more under their brown fur. Their bad cholesterol jumps and blood pressure spikes. But unlike humans, their health doesn’t suffer. Bears’ arteries don’t clog from the gorging, nor do the animals battle heart attacks or turn into diabetics. To figure out why, WSU researchers draw the bears’ blood, biopsy their fat deposits and listen to their hearts—carefully.
Few places are available for this kind of bear study. Washington State University says it has the only facility in the world housing adult grizzlies for research. Behind chain-link fences, the 12 bears wander along grassy hills and among Douglas firs and Ponderosa pines, or they relax inside concrete dens and runs. When winter nears, they hibernate.
Bears at the center, set up 27 years ago, are either born at the facility or rescued from places such as Yellowstone National Park because they got too close to humans.