There’s more than cuteness to be observed in this 30-second video of a black bear with cub in the mountains of the Cowichan Valley.

If you watch until the end, you’ll see the mother bear stand on her hind legs three times before she successfully pulls down a branch and enjoys a snack.

But what is she after?

I returned to the site and discovered the answer to be arbutus berries.

The berries are currently green but later turn orange-red, and feed a wide range of wildlife well into winter.

“They're ripe enough for the thrushes to gorge on them by mid-to-late September,” says Andy MacKinnon, co-author of the iconic Plants of Coastal British Columbia.

According to the Washington Native Plant Society: “The fruit is eaten by band-tailed pigeons, quail, flickers, varied thrushes, waxwings, evening grosbeaks, mourning doves, and robins. The fruit is eaten by raccoons and other mammals. Berries are … covered with small projections and approximately one centimetre in diameter.”

The US Department of Agriculture adds that madrone trees (as they are known south of the border) “provide edible berries and habitat for many bird species including robins, cedar waxwings and band-tailed pigeons, varied thrush, and quail. Mule deer, raccoons, ringtails, and bears eat the berries.”

Rob Butler, a retired bird biologist with the Canadian Wildlife Service, recalls surveying waterbirds by boat several years ago in the Gulf Islands. "We slipped in behind a point of land to get out of a blustery, bone-chilling winter wind. At the head of the bay stood several arbutus trees festooned with berries and where American robins had gravitated to the bay, berries and warm sunshine for an afternoon feast."