Brown bear country

By markontour, August 10, 2025

Slovenia, where markontour was holidaying recently, has the distinction of being both one of the most materially equal societies in the world (a 2nd placed Gini coefficient of 0.24, which is incidentally the same score the now 45th ranked UK enjoyed in 1979 prior to Thatcherism), but also has enshrined the rights of nature in its constitution. The result is a country that is visibly thriving (although I am sure there are a thousand problems not visible to the casual tourists’ eye) and brimming with biodiversity.

Indeed, Slovenia is the top ranked country in Europe for species density per square kilometre, which means that despite its small size (roughly the same landmass as Wales), Slovenia’s forested hills, Alpine mountains, clean lakes and tiny, tiny stretch of coastland pack in an enormous range of trees, plants, birds, fish, reptiles and mammals.

Over the course of a couple of weeks, markontour not only heard and saw compatriots of most of the summer birds whose song I enjoy in Britain, but also enjoyed meeting for the first time: Chamois antelopes high in the Alps, a female Crossbill perched on a pine tree (exactly where I have never been able to spot one despite five years of trying in Wales), the tiny Willow Tit and the even smaller Firecrest – a startling pinprick of burning colour among the trees, Yellow Bellied Toads, Wolf and Lynx tracks and, the main event, Brown Bears.

More of the bears later, but it seemed that the animal kingdom resident of which Slovenians themselves are most proud is the humble bee. There are an estimated 200,000 bee-hives in Slovenia – roughly one for every 10 people, most housing the Carniolan honey bee, and many decorated in bright, sometimes outlandish paintings. The gorgeous little Museum of Apiculture in Radovljica, near Lake Bled, houses a fantastic collection of these painted beehives, a good chunk of which depict tailors being chased by giant snails, for reasons which I was unable to understand despite the excellent translation.

The bee-cult was an unexpected bonus, however, and markontour’s main purpose in Slovenia was to get close to brown bears, which meant travelling to the forests of Kočevsko in mid-south of the country.

The rolling, hilly landscape in Kočevsko is not unlike that of mid-Wales, but with the huge difference that Slovenia’s hills are most forested right to their peaks and, entirely connected, there are barely any sheep.

There are over 170 protected forests in Slovenia, of which Kočevsko boasts 14 that are fully left to natural development, including a virgin forest that has been protected since 1892. Here the beech trees rule. Their sturdy ancestors survived the last ice-age and then, when the glaciers finally retreated, marched back out again across Europe, and today they dominate the forest, albeit having made space for a great variety of other species.

The prevalence of beech trees is one reason why there are so many brown bears here – beech nuts being the core of their diet. But bears, we learned, like variety and forage widely to take advantage of a vast array of food available in the forest – from the apples, pears, plums, slo-berries, and strawberries that are in part of vestige of the abandoned gardens and orchards of German-speaking conclave who fled their homes when Italy took control of that part of Slovenia during the Second World War, to wild garlic, mushrooms and even a few grasses.

Humans tend to think of bears as ferocious predators and it certainly would be unwise to get into a fight with one (in the unlikely event that we had come face to face with a brown bear, we were advised to talk gently too them, while steadily backing away), but 85%-95% of their diet is plant-based, and meat is only usually consumed when someone else has done the killing – often a wolf or lynx.

As our wonderful guide, Petra (whose tours can be booked from her website), explained: for a brown bear, pulling together a meal is mostly nose-work. The Slovenian saying goes that “when a pine needle falls in the forest, the eagle will see it, the deer will hear it, and the bear will smell it” and it was certainly the case that every bear we saw spent a good chunk of its time with its nose inquisitively in the air.

Adult brown bears are loners, but are not particularly territorial and so while we were apparently very fortunate to see four separate bears in one evening, it was not at all surprising that multiple bears were in the vicinity of the bear watching hut of an evening.

The two older bears whom we met first (from a safe distance inside a hut) – had a smell-lock on the food that had been hidden for them,but took their time to properly check out the area before tucking in. They seemed less concerned about human presence – they all clocked us – and more cautious not to bump into another bear.

Thus it was a beautiful surprise that the last two bears to visit came hot on each other’s heels and were then happy to feast together. Petra’s guess was that they were two siblings who had only recently been kicked out of their mother’s den and were teaming up for a little while they worked out the rules of the forest.

These two made only a perfunctory attempt at reconnaissance and it was a good job that the recently present big male had been scared off by a noise, because he was a good deal bigger, heavier and fiercer than these two youngsters put together and probably wouldn’t have agreed to share his dinner.

Having been warned it could be several hours before a bear showed up, or not at all, our encounter started soon after a lovely b-movie of inquisitive Jays (such an elegant forest bird) stealing some of the cache intended for the bears, and a very laid-back red squirrel which spent a contented 20 minutes munching through an entire spruce cone while perched on a fallen log.

Moreover, the bear watching was only the culmination of a day-long bear education, which started within 10 minutes of setting foot in the forest when Petra spotted a fresh adult rear-paw print in a mud patch. Alongside were the tracks of a fox and roe deer, all of which were likely to have been attracted by a thirst-quenching puddle, whose sole visible occupants while we were there were a pair of laidback yellow-bellied toads.

The brown bear’s paw-print really is unmistakable – it is simply huge for one thing – and we learned that to calculate the weight of the bear who made it one needs to multiply the width in centimetres by ten (meaning that our first bear was likely a medium sized adult, weighing in at around 120kg).

It had rained a little the day before and so there were plenty of opportunities to spot more bear tracks (obvious once the guide had pointed them out – totally invisible otherwise!), alongside those of badgers, a wolf (there is one flourishing pack in this region), red and roe deer. We even got excited about a possible lynx print at one point, but it was probably a dog.

Further along the way we saw the remnants of an ants’ nest which had been ripped apart by a bear, eager to harvest its’ protein-rich occupants. Brown bears will also target bees’ nests, which is why the multitudinous, brightly coloured human-made beehives which are prevalent throughout this honey-mad country, usually have electric fencing around them. Contrary to the beautiful impression of Winnie the Pooh, it’s usually not the honey which bears are interested in, but rather the larvae, again because of its high protein content.

Next up, Petra pointed out a heavily clawed pine tree trunk: a bear’s scratching post. Soft brown hair was visible stuck to the resin seeping out of the tree, which bears smear over themselves as a bug repellent.

The preamble concluded with a swift stop at a state-run farm, a wonderful vegetable stew and the best apple strudel I’ve ever tasted. Then it was on to the bear-watching hut, deep in the forest and with the last part of the journey made on foot in the protective company of “the bear hunter” (surely a mis-translation, not least as he didn’t carry any visible weapon).

We were warned that we needed to make ourselves as unobtrusive as possible – speaking only in whispers, avoiding sudden movement, with the wearing of deodorants or perfumes, and all food strictly prohibited. Moreover, once inside, we were advised that we wouldn’t be able to leave again until the bears had finished feeding.

When the first bear arrived she was very cautious at first, sniffing the air all the time and taking a circuitous route from the depths of the forest. Then, purposefully, this 5 or 6 year old female with thick brown fur and sporting a lighter band across her back, began to paw out the hidden corn and apples.

Twenty-five minutes later she seemed to be finally relaxing only for a noisy little Doormice to engaged in a little fracas above and below our hide and in a blink, she was gone.

It was like a disappearing trick and our guide advised us that this ability to move quickly and silently is common to all brown bears. They are big animals, but they pass through the forest like ghosts, their soft padded paws spreading out their weight and their bulky, but lithe bodies avoid rustling bushes or cracking twigs.

After another interlude, this time watching a Nuthatch enjoy her/his share of the bear bounty, another bear ambled into view. This time there was little caution and one could instantly see why, for the second visitor was a fully-grown 160kg male, with a giant hump on his striped back and a look that said he was fully aware of his status as king of the forest.

Rather than clawing then sniffing, watching then nibbling, this bear just got straight on with clearing out the food-filled holes. But such is the bear’s caution – mostly about either human intervention or the risk of a stand-off with another bear – a sharp noise twenty minutes later caused him also to flee.

We assumed that was it for the night. Sunset was close and darkness was now drawing into the forest, but less than 10 minutes later and a much smaller, younger bear scampered in, with long black socks on its paws. It could clearly sense the recent presence of another bear but seemed confident that it now had the larder to itself – until 15 minutes late a second bear of similar size arrived. Rather than running off or confronting the newcomer, bear #3 just carried on eating, while bear #4 found his/her own stash.

According to our guides, these were clearly siblings, probably both female and recently kicked out of their mother’s den, or they wouldn’t have tolerated each other’s presence. Mature bears are solitary beings outside of the breeding season, but it is also common for young siblings to stick together in their first summer of leaving the den.

For the next hour these two bears got to work at clearing out every available morsel in front of our hide and provided markontour with a truly magical experience.

*We were truly lucky to benefit from a wonderful guide, Petra Draškovič Pelc, who has devoted her life to the study of bears, with a sideline in amazing nature photography. We learned so much on a relaxed full-day hike and bear-watch with Petra, from identifying animal prints to understanding their habitat, and it was wonderful that she seemed almost as excited as us when the bears finally showed up. Highly recommended as a guide.