Boundary History
We wrestled bears in our living room Part I
May 27, 2005, 07:42

The Kramer children wrestled bears in their living room, swam with an elk in the lake and bottle fed mountain lions after school. That is not telling tales out of school either. They even had an African lion given them by a friend of their father's from Coeur d’Alene. They had white-tailed deer, badgers, raccoon, bobcat, cougar, pheasants, fallow deer, great horned owl, and many different types of birds, mostly animals that were native to the area. “My parents had the first private licensed wild game farm in the state of Idaho,” said Cliff Kramer.

Cliff Kramer, co-owner with his wife, Mary, of Feist Creek Restaurant in Moyie Valley, stands before his helicopter he flies as a hobby.

Cliff and his wife, Mary, now own and manage the Feist Creek Resort located on County Road 34 in the Moyie Valley. During an interview for RuralNorthwest.com, Cliff displayed the fishpond he excavated for the restaurant landscape. “Those fish in the pond are all pets,” he said. “Go ahead, pick one out and I’ll tell you its name.” When doubt prevented a selection on the part of the interviewer, he said, “That’s OK, I was going to tell you its name was Fish.”

Cliff fondly displayed photos of an orphaned elk that visits neighbors down the road from the Feist Creek Resort. He also shared a photo of a bear in a small tree that visits the Eastport Post Office, not far from his restaurant location. Obviously, wild animals are a part of Cliff’s heritage and will be a part of his life forever. He also asked that memories of each of the Kramer siblings be included in this article. Subsequent interviews with each of the Kramer children, Donnie, first born, Charlie, Clifford, Reenie (Laureen), and David are paraphrased below and recall their memories of growing up in Boundary County during the 1960’s and 1970’s.

During the early years of her marriage to Cliff, Mary Kramer played with the unique pets he raised as a child. Here she holds Nicky, the cougar, on her lap.

Don’s memories:

I remember when it started, though Dad got a lot more animals after I moved out. It all started when one of Dad’s truck drivers hit a deer and brought home an orphaned fawn. It was a little buck and we named him Skip. He was with us for a couple of years, though met his demise when a donkey or mule we had did not get a long with him.

Dad had always liked animals. For a hobby, he raised birds. We had an incubator and he hatched all different kinds. The farm sort of snowballed after that.

I left Bonners Ferry in 1965 and returned in 1994. The place got a lot more wild game after I left. All of us except Cliff have returned to live on the place now. I have built a habitat for the geese and they come back every year and make a real mess! We also get moose here at the place now that we never had when I was growing up. The elk and moose population have really grown. The area behind the house used to be brush and had mule deer every year. Now it has grown up with woods and we have white tail deer we never used to have either…times change.

Dave’s Memories:

It seemed like a lot of work to me then, to care for those animals. I look back now and realize what a privilege it was to have had them. I remember when Charlie took the bear to the University of Moscow for a game event. While they prepared the bear’s cage for the event, they put the bear in the town jail. That bear would do anything for marshmallows, even roll over on her back and beg. To get the bear into the jail cell they fed her marshmallows.

One of the elk from our farm was on the Mutual of Omaha Wild Kingdom television series. Our brother Charlie transported it to Southern Idaho, on location, in a horse trailer. Some of the staff from that TV series stopped at our park en route from Canada to another shooting location and rested their animals at our farm.

Cliff’s memories:

My old stomping grounds were on the right side of Hwy. 95, going south past Naples, at Stampede Lake. My sister, Reenie, and her husband, are building a place there now and my brother, Dave, and his wife live on a spot out there, too.

When my parents had the wild game farm, they kept most of the animals in cages. Others were in pens, like our bull elk, Elmer. Mom was a schoolteacher and the school kids used to come to our place for field trips.

We got some of the animals we cared for from rangers at the Idaho State Fish and Game Department because the animals were either injured or orphaned and too young to survive on their own.

One time, for example, the Fish and Game found two bear cubs just this side of the U. S. Canadian border. The rangers figured hunters killed the mother bear, as it was hunting season in nearby Canada at the time. When the rangers brought them to them to us, we fed them with doll bottles because they were not big enough to drink from baby bottles. The cubs were so small we could hold them in our hands. Bears are not much bigger than a mouse when they are born. Most visitors probably remember our pet bear Jody.

This is a photo of Elmer, an elk at the Kramer Wild Game Farm. Though the Kramer children swam in the lake with other elk they had at the farm, they would not swim with Elmer.

We had a cow elk and swam with it in the lake, though we never went swimming with Elmer. He was too mean. We raised a few mountain lion cubs, too, that were born in captivity. After I got out of school, I went to Aspen, CO to work on a construction project. That's where I met my wonderful wife, Mary.

Long time county resident and distant cousin to the Kramer's, Warren Bauman, recalled watching the Kramer children feed cougar cubs and said the cubs had to lie on their backs to hold the bottles between their front paws.

Cliff and Mary Kramer own and operate the Feist Creek Resort in Moyie Valley, where they have served visitors from all over the world.

Cliff and his wife, Mary, eventually bought 13 acres with a rustic cabin in the Moyie Valley. They originally leased the cabin to a friend, who opened a restaurant there.

Later, when he retired, Cliff and Mary decided to open a restaurant. So, in 1987, they opened the Feist Creek Restaurant. Their specialties are smoked BBQ ribs, prime rib, catfish, and hushpuppies. They also serve a 25 oz. rib steak. “We have guests come from all over the world,” said Cliff. He invites everyone to visit the Feist Creek Restaurant for great food and beautiful views of Feist Creek waterfall and Queen Mountain. They also own and manage the Feist Creek Hotel, which they built five years ago and an RV park located on the property.

Restaurant hours are from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m., seven days a week.

Look for Part II including Reenie and Charlie Kramer’s memories growing up on the Kramer Game Park.