It's a love affair that began back in the 1920's when the Saint Louis Zoo opened one of the first barless bear exhibits in the country. and once that train left the station there was no looking back.
Through the years the place has been home to several brown bears including Bert and Ernie, but in 2015 the zoo became bare of the big omnivores which is why people can't seem to get close enough to the zoo's newest residents.
"Which one is that?" A kid asks his mom.
Huckleberry and Finley are grizzly bears that seem to be in their terrible twos.
"Well, they're very, very active and they're very, very destructive so I guess, as a parent, I would think that would be part of the terrible twos," Julie Hartell-DeNardo, Zoological Manager of Carnivores says.
She's a woman who's gotten to know the two quite well.
"These guys like to swim and you'll also see them soaking in their pool sometimes they'll just hang out and sit in the pool as kind of a nice relaxing way to cool off and just hang out and watch people go by."
They also like to eat, something they usually do several times a day.
"We kind of mix it up a lot with them so they'll have anywhere between three to up to 10 meals a day and we make decisions on how much to feed them and when to feed them based on their behaviors," she explains.
On average they'll eat between 10 to 12 pounds of food a day, a lot of which is produce.
"So there's just various things such as carrots, some melons, some grapes, some blueberries."
They also get bear chow something similar to a dog chow, but specifically made for zoo bears and once it's tossed into their exhibit they quickly sniff it out.
"So they have an incredibly great sense of smell. They can smell our trash cans or our dog food or even the bird seed that we put in our bird feeders."
So there are also educational components like tips on camping in bear country.
Grizzly Ridge obviously has more than the bare necessities. It's a place where you'll probably pull out your camera and then walk away in awe.
