Alberta, Canada Brown Bear Hunting Guides and Outfitters

The Brown Bear: This big game animal was once widely distributed across the Northern hemisphere, but has been hunted to near extinction throughout the last two-hundred years by setters and sportsmen, and more recently hunting guides and outfitters. The brown bear, Ursus arctos, was also common throughout Europe, reaching northwestern Africa, and extended through Asia as far as Siberia, China, and Japan. At one time it occupied much of western North America from Alaska and Alberta, Canada {Alberta} to northern Mexico.

Today, although still fairly common in Scandinavia, The Soviet Union, Syria, parts of China, and in Alaska, and northwestern Alberta Canada, it has been exterminated in most of its former range. Hunts and trips into the unknown west of the United States and Mexico and eastern Canada. In Europe it is presently confined primarily to disconnected locales in the Pyrenees between Spain and France, in the Alps, in central Italy, and in the Carpathian Mountains of central Europe. Mainly because these areas are more remote and brown bear hunts and trips are not common. In Japan it is still found on the island of Hokkaido.

Alberta Canada’s brown bear were once thought to constitute a rather diverse group. In North America alone, the brown bear were divided into about 80 different species. Today, although differences do exist and are recognized, they are considered of minor zoological importance, and all brown bears are now scientifically regarded as a single, widespread species, with many geographical races, or subspecies. Hunting guides and outfitters are governed by laws and regulations in regards to Alberta Canada’s brown bear and hunting trips for this big game animal. The grizzly bear, U. a. horribilis, and the Alaskan brown bear, U. a middendorffi, for example, once considered full species on their own, are now classified as subspecies {indicated by the addition of a third scientific name} of the brown bear. American brown bears, once found as far east as Texas and as far south as northern Mexico. Presently range from Alaska and Alberta Canada including other parts of western Canada {Yukon, western Northwest Territories, British Columbia, and western Alberta} through west-northern Mexico, only into Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming.

Coat color in brown bears ranges from a creamy white through various shades of brown to bluish and almost jet black. These colors help hide the brown bear from hunting outfitters and guides on a trip or hunt for this big game. In Europe the most common color is a dark brown. {The name “bruin” for bears comes from an old Dutch word for brown and was the name given to the bear in medieval European tales about Reynard the Fox}. In North America including Alberta Canada, brown bears vary from yellowish through dark brown to nearly black. The hair, especially that on the animal’s back, may also be white-tipped, giving the outer coat a grayish, or grizzled, appearance. These colors help this big game blend into it’s surrounding so it can hunt for food such as deer, elk, and other sources of meat. Such grizzled coats, however, not only occur in the American grizzly bear but also in the brown bears found in the Tian Shan range on the border of western China and eastern Kirghiz of Russia. Entirely grayish white coats may occur in brown bears in the Himalayas, and brown bears from Syria may be a pale reddish brown.

Alberta, Canada Licenses and Fees

Alberta, Canada Regulations

The Alberta Canada links shown above are for information on the laws and regulations on brown bear hunting and other aspects of this big game animal. The hunting guides and outfitters are also governed by these regulations and laws.