Ants, an important food source thrived as burned trees fell to the ground and provided ant habitat. Whitebark pine seeds are an important bear food. Cone production of this species is highly variable from year to year, and has made it difficult to determine what if any affect the 1988 fires had on the grizzly bear population. However, fire is an important process in whitebark pine ecology because it clears competing trees allowing for establishment of whitebark seedlings and promoting stand regeneration and vigor. Over the long- term, the fires will have a beneficial impact by increasing the age class diversity in whitebark pine stands and insuring the longevity of this important grizzly bear food source.
Wildfires typically create a mosaic pattern of burned and unburned vegetation on the landscape.
The immediate impact to grizzly bears is the removal of vegetation in burned areas, which impacts the abundance of grizzly bear foods and cover. Grizzly bears are highly mobile with large home ranges often over 100 square miles. They are opportunistic omnivores meaning they forage on a wide variety of foods to include plants, insects, and other animals. Therefore grizzly bears respond to fire by moving to unburned areas to utilize alternate food resources and cover. Bears may return to burned areas in search of carrion from animals killed by the fire.