Bear in Creek County

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Okie4570

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Ok, I just did some more research. Maybe it wasn't a grizzly I saw dead, I was going by the reddish-brown color, but apparently there is a subspecies of black bear called a Cinnamon bear? Is that what this thing is?

Not an actual subspecies just a color phase. There are cinnamon phase raccoons too.
 

DRC458

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Ok, I just did some more research. Maybe it wasn't a grizzly I saw dead, I was going by the reddish-brown color, but apparently there is a subspecies of black bear called a Cinnamon bear? Is that what this thing is?

Very likely. There are all kinds of color variations of "black" bears. Certainly not a grizz. I've thought several times about hunting black bear, but I don't want a 'black' bear; give me a cinnamon!
 

mr ed

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In 1981 a guy I worked with lived in Kellyville and driving to work in Tulsa hit one between Kville and Sapulpa. It made the newspaper at the time.
 

jakeman

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I've never seen a black black bear.

Everyone I've ever seen was cinnamon, but I've only seen them in NM and Colorado.

I had one cross the road in broad daylight a few years back west of Red River, NM. He was just strolling when I saw him and then he looked toward the car and took off like a lightening bolt, and went straight up the mountain like it was flat ground. First time I'd ever seen one hauling ass like that, and I'm telling you he was m o v i n g. I stopped where he crossed the road and we watched him climb up about 100 yds before he turned around and started watching us. There had been a light snow that October morning and I took some pics of his tracks in the snow next to my foot and hand. They gots some really big feet!

I was trout fishing up in Colorado one time, and it was a 4 hour horseback ride from the end of the forest service road back into our camp site. We were way back in the wilderness. We were sitting in camp one morning glassing some elk that were feeding across the grassy top of a rock slide when my buddy told me to look at the bottom of the rock slide, and there was a big ole brown bear eating berries. We watched him for probably 30 minutes before he stepped back into the brush. It wasn't all that thick, but when his butt cleared the edge of the woods he just vanished. Melted into the timber. It was like he was never there. It was really neat to watch him and it was even cooler when he just vanished like that. He was as brown as a Kodiak, but clearly a black bear. No clue how big, but we saw some fresh scat on the horse trail out a few days later, and anything that would leave a pile like that I don't wanna mess with.

Bears are cool.
 

O4L

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The only time that I have seen a bear in the wild was thirtyish years ago near the Belle Starr camp grounds at lake Eufala.

There was a walking trail through some woods there and we found a small black bear in one of the trees.

Someone called the rangers and they came out and tranquilized it then hauled it off. At the time they said it was pretty unusual to find one that far west here in Oklahoma.

I once saw a big brown bear at a strip club. Guys were lining up to pay good money to wrestle that thing. It was kicking ass and taking names. It was quite entertaining.
 

BobbyV

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Black bears have been well known here in OK forever. I saw what I took to be a dead grizzly years ago on the side of the road on a backroad in Pontotoc County. It was the same brown color and I thought maybe it was a big dog, then I saw the claws and realized it wasn't any kind of dog I'd ever seen. At the time, I didn't realize they were not "supposed" to be in OK, or I would have taken a picture or something - but then, this was well before cell phone cameras.

Also saw a mountain lion up by Konawa about the same timeframe, back when they were still denying their existence in OK.

Partying by Bruno Creek or something? :)

I grew up in Konawa.
 

Oklahomabassin

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Ok, I just did some more research. Maybe it wasn't a grizzly I saw dead, I was going by the reddish-brown color, but apparently there is a subspecies of black bear called a Cinnamon bear? Is that what this thing is?
Black bear do have different colors. Cinnamon colored black bear is real.
 

mr ed

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Not all black bears are black—their fur can range in color from pure white to a cinnamon color to very dark brown or black. Most populations have a mixture of these colors, including the pure white form, which is found in some individuals in the island archipelago in southern British Columbia (Kermodi Island). This white black bear (called a spirit bear, revered by Native Americans) is caused by a recessive gene from both the mother and the father. Genes can also result in the light gray coat color of the blue bear, or glacier bear, in southeastern Alaska.

Despite these genetic variants, most of the bears in any region are black in color. Some bears have a white patch on their chests. They have a short, inconspicuous tail, longish ears, a relatively straight profile from nose to forehead, and small, dark eyes. There are several ways to tell a black bear from a grizzly bear. Black bears and grizzly bears can both have a wide variety of colors and sizes, but most commonly in areas where both species occur, black bears are smaller and darker than grizzly bears. Black bears have longer and less rounded ears and a more straight profile from forehead to nose compared to grizzly bears. Grizzly bears have larger shoulder humps and a more dished-in facial profile and much longer front claws that are evident in the tracks.

Black bears in some areas where food is scarce are much smaller than in other areas where food is abundant. Typically adults are three feet tall at the shoulder, and their length from nose to tail is about 75 inches. All bears, including black bears, are sexually dimorphic—meaning adult males are much larger than adult females. A large male black bear can exceed 600 pounds in weight, while females seldom exceed 200 pounds.
copied from nwf
 

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