The strength and power of bears have helped them earn a special place in Russian culture.

For years, bear populations were threatened, but now numbers of many bear species are stable.

At one bear rescue centre, a dedicated family is helping to keep populations healthy by painstakingly taking in orphaned bear cubs and returning them to the wild.

They watch on as an eight-month-old brown bear voices its displeasure that one of its own has been taken away, in this case to be tagged and weighed.

Valentin Pazhetnov, from the Chisty Les biological station about 450 kilometres from Moscow, says angry bears are just what they want.

"An angry bear is a bear that knows humans can be dangerous and they should be avoided," he said.

"And bears free from human contact, free from zoos, free from circuses; most of all free from hunters, is the end goal here."

Mr Pazhetnov is a spry 75-year-old, the patriarch of three generations that watch over the Bear Rescue Centre, sponsored by the International Fund for Animal Welfare.

Thirty-five years ago, Mr Pazhetnov and his wife Svetlana managed to do something almost no-one else ever had: raise a bear cub, teach it how to survive and release it into the wild.

Over the years they perfected their method and scaled up their operation.

Now, every year they receive as many as 20 completely helpless cubs, left orphaned by the popular spring bear hunt in Russia.

A promotional video shows how the cubs, just weeks old, need be taught virtually everything, from bottle feeding to learning how to drink milk from a bowl.

The efforts at the Bear Rescue Centre are part of some rare welcome news for Russian wildlife.

Over the last four decades bear populations have gone from endangered to stable.

It is now estimated there are as many as 150,000 brown bears in Russia. The numbers for other species have also improved.

Part of the turnaround is due to a ban on den hunting, when bears were killed as they hibernated during the winter. Poaching has also been targeted.

Then there are the efforts of the Pazhetnov family.

By the time these bears reach eight months old, they are no longer the small bundles of fur when they were when they got here.

They are still adorable, but with glimpses of the up-to-500-kilogram fearsome animals they will become.

For nearly half a year, they have had minimal human contact and have slowly gotten used to forest surroundings in a large enclosure.

One female - the one removed to be tagged and weighed - is being released. Her name is Lapa.

As the drug administered to remove her from the enclosure wears off, she becomes distressed as the box she is in rattles in the back of a trailer.

Soon she has been carried to a clearing. The door to the box is removed and keepers knock on its top, but Lapa will not leave.

They lift the box up from the back and try to pour Lapa out. Still nothing.

Finally, she pokes her head out to see her new world. One final hesitation, and Lapa is gone.

A shape moving through the tall grass, then she disappears. With any luck she will not see humans again.

That will mean another success in the fight to protect Russia's most treasured animal.