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McCain Sees Pork Where Scientists See Success
![[Map: Northern Divide Grizzly Bear Project Area, West Glacier, Montana]](http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2008/03/09/GR2008030900059.gif)
![[Screenshots from a McCain campaign ad]](http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2008/03/10/GR2008031000109.jpg)
A campaign ad for Sen. John McCain mocks the grizzly study as an example of wasteful Washington spending.
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And never mind the grizzlies: The Montana backcountry has many creatures with sharp teeth and questionable dispositions. A moose can stomp a person. A rutting elk is no bargain. And cougars will stalk a hiker.
Someone could burn up in a wildfire.
Or drown.
"I was worried about people getting killed in river crossings," Kendall said.
All through 2003 and 2004 she worried -- until the day it was over, and she had 33,741 samples of hair to send off for lab analysis.
That hair represented 563 different grizzly bears. That's just a minimum. Some bears left hair at multiple sites. By studying that pattern, Kendall can estimate how many bears there are in the entire ecosystem.
"By repeatedly sampling, we can estimate the number of bears that we didn't catch," she said.
Kendall may retire after she publishes a few more scientific papers emerging from her project. But she is still brimming with research ideas -- one, for example, inspired by something the bears kept doing. They would notice the researchers' motion-sensitive cameras, and walk up and lick them.
"We should do a slobber sample study for DNA next time. You can get really good DNA from spit," she said.
She hasn't yet figured out the funding.
