Grizzly bears scatter like gigantic mice at the approach of a combine in a Montana cornfield, in a video reportedly taken Thursday near the tiny Rocky Mountain Front community of Augusta.
As many as seven grizzlies can be seen fleeing every which way as the noisy farm implement rumbles in, apparently disrupting their corn feast.
One of the bears turns and starts running back toward the combine. But then it cuts back toward the corn, as if trying to run and hide, before changing its mind and turning tail again.
While the video might seem completely crazy to outsiders, it depicts what’s increasingly looking like just another day in the area, local saddle maker Sparky Wallace told Cowboy State Daily.
Asked if the incident in the video surprised him, Wallace’s response was instant.
“Oh, heavens no. Heavens no,” he said.
A 'Herd' Of Grizzlies
Local Rancher Neal Collins had a similar response when contacted by Cowboy State Daily.
Such incidents have become “common enough that it doesn’t get talked about that much,” he said in a text message.
In June, Collins had what he described as a “herd” of seven grizzlies on his property.
The video was apparently taken by another local, Ben Wipf, who could not be reached for comment by publication time.
Wallace and Collins live near another small Montana community, Choteau. The Choteau-Augusta area has been a hotbed of grizzly activity for years, with grizzlies moving out of the nearby mountains along stream beds to reclaim their natural prairie habitat.
Wallace said he thinks the video of the grizzlies scattering across the cornfield was taken about 12 miles from his place.
Collins said he had “seen nothing up close” to his property lately, but there are “videos all the time in the area.”
Bunches Of Bears
Grizzlies generally aren’t social animals. Mature males are frequently alone, and females will travel about with their cubs.
However, they’re known to be tolerant of each other’s presence if there’s an abundant food source available, such as a ripe cornfield.
In August 2025, wildlife filmmaker Casey Anderson spotted 47 grizzlies in one day, gorging on moths high in the Absaroka Range of northwest Wyoming.
Collins said after his encounter with the grizzlies on his property, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks personnel helped him install electric fencing. It seems to be working so far.
Elsewhere in the area, some beehives were recently “scattered,” apparently by grizzlies, he added.
Wallace said someone he knows recently reported losing livestock to grizzlies.
Locals have done their best to adjust to what seems like an ever-growing number of prairie grizzlies, he said.
“When my wife goes for her walk down our road every night, she carries bear spray,” Wallace said, adding that he frequently carries “bear spray and a pistol.”
At first, it seemed the bears were moving back and forth between the lowlands and the nearby Rocky Mountain Front, which includes the Bob Marshall, Great Bear, and Scapegoat wilderness areas.
Plains Are Natural Habitat
Grizzlies are descended from brown bears on the vast Steppes of Russia, so they are naturally adapted to life on the prairie.
They once roamed a massive swath of territory, including most of the Great Plains west of the Mississippi River.
As white settlers moved west, they frequently killed grizzlies and pushed the surviving bears deep into the mountains.
Grizzlies in the Lower 48 were down to just a tiny pocket population in and near Yellowstone National Park when they were placed under Endangered Species Act protections in 1975.
Since then, they’ve been steadily increasing in population and expanding their territory.
The prairie around Augusta and Choteau was one of the first places they re-established their presence on the prairie.
“I think for the most part, they’re living out here (in the prairie) now,” Wallace said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
