A Grizz, Wolf, and Black bear take a walk

My buddy and I were driving along a backcountry road in ID and saw a pile of bear scat. Since we were scouting the area for bears we got out to see if we could tell how big the bear was. What we found were these three tracks, all together--all walking in the same direction in the same line. Our initial assessment was a Grizzly bear sow and a cub and a wolf. Later I got looking at the picture and now I've concluded that what I thought was a cub is actually a black bear, although I'm not sure. The pad and toe pattern looks like a black bear but the claw marks and the fact that it was with a regular size grizz make me wonder.

Does anyone want to weigh in on what made these three tracks? I have a theory about why all the prints were in a line on the road. (BTW, this area is known for having all 3 species).

haha, I don't know man, but that is way cool. Sounds like a target rich environment to me.

Looks like it could be possible. Im curious, whats your theory on why their all in a line on the road?

It looks to me like A Grizzly front paw track in the top photo and a grizzly rear paw track in the bottom photo. Often the rear track is narrower than the front track so this could be from the same bear or depending on the size it could be the cub of the first bear. The claw marks and the straightness of the track say grizzly to me.

It is pretty cool to be able to hunt in areas where within the same stretch of road you can come across the tracks from Grizzlies, Mtn lions, black bears and wolves.

sounds like massive predator country....makes me wonder what the deer population is like.

Eric Santana
www.SantanaOutdoors.com
"Premium Hunting Gear"

The bear scat we saw was filled with elk hair. I wonder if there were a variety carnivores taking their turn on it. Maybe the reason they were all walking along the same path is because the snow was recently coming off in this area and at the time they passed through this was a section of the road that was melted off. There were some other big snow banks in the area. The more I look at this, the more I think it really was a wolf, grizz and black bear.