The North American Bear Center in Ely, Minnesota is on a mission. They have set out to advance the long-term survival of bears worldwide by replacing misconceptions with scientific facts about bears. They want to show that bears play an important role in the ecosystems as predators by keeping it in balance. The Bear Center also wants to show the truth about the bears and their relationships with humans.

Since bears have also been unfairly demonized for centuries much like the wolves, they have been eradicated around the world through the use of legalized hunts, bounties, poisonings, poaching and trapping. The Bear Center is determined to replace these outdated misconceptions with the facts worldwide. They work to rehabilitate injured and orphaned bears back to the wild and to conserve bear habitat. They also work to reduce and eliminate conflict between humans and bears and to the stop the poaching for bear body parts.

To achieve these educational goals, the Bear Center is using an internet outreach program with the use of a live web videocam . The webcam is focused on the pond which is play and fishing area of the bear's home at the center. There are three bears that live here: Ted, Honey and Lucky.

Ted is the oldest and largest male black bear. In fact he may just be the largest black bear that has ever lived. When he first came to the center he weighed between 900 - 1000 lbs. He now weighs a svelte 860 lbs. Ted was raised as a family pet in Wisconsin along with Honey. He is very human friendly and sweet and is one of the few bears that actually prefers human contact over food.

Honey is the only female at the center and she is a brown phased black bear. She is on record for being the heaviest ever black bear female weighing in at 555 lbs. She was also raised by a human family along with Ted but does not exhibit Ted's unabashed friendliness toward humans.

Lucky is the youngest black bear and was brought to center as an orphaned bear weighing only 10 lbs at the time in 2007. He was afraid of both Ted and Honey for a long time but finally became friends with Ted. They now play together on a regular basis.

Please check in periodically on the live video which is available 24/7 and catch a glimpse of these wonderful bears in their daily life at the Bear Center. Get to know them up close and personal.



Live broadcast by Ustream

You can also watch this video of Lucky and Ted. It shows how bears make friends with each other.