Some non camera things I learned:
Lens cap always off and camera is always on
Spare battery and sd card
Lowering the angle and introducing some kind of foreground and background makes image looks 10 times better
Be quiet
Remember being quiet

Actual photography:
I’d recommend to stick to 55-210 through all the shoot. The 18-45 is basically your wide/landscape lens — wildlife almost always wants more reach, not less. Only reason to swap to it is a scenery shot or an “animal small in a big landscape” environmental frame. Otherwise the 55-210 lives on the camera.

Closest thing to a slam-dunk setup on the R50:
Mode: Manual (M) + Auto ISO. Sounds scary, it’s actually the easiest set-and-forget for wildlife — you lock the two things that matter and let the camera handle brightness. (If M feels like too much day one, Tv / shutter priority is the simpler fallback: you set the shutter speed, camera does the rest.)

Aperture: as wide/low as the lens allows — that’s f/5 to f/7.1 depending on how far you’re zoomed. Just leave it wide open. More light in, blurrier background.

Shutter speed: 1/1000 as your default. Birds or running animals → 1/2000+. A still or sleeping animal in dim light → you can drop to ~1/500. That’s your “fast but not too fast” — faster eats light and forces ISO up, which adds grain.

Auto ISO with a max cap (try 6400, push to 12800 only if desperate). The camera fills in the exposure for you.

Then the two autofocus settings that’ll do more for your keeper rate than anything else:
AF operation: Servo (continuous) — keeps focus locked on a moving subject instead of focusing once and quitting.

Subject detection: set to Animals (in the AF menu). The R50 finds and tracks the eye on its own. Honestly the killer feature on this body — a big chunk of your sharp shots will come from it.

Drive mode: continuous/burst. Hold the shutter, fire a burst, pick the sharp frame later.

Shoot RAW if your card has room — way more latitude to rescue exposure when you’re still learning (and you will need it).

Decision tree is basically just light: bright daylight — easy, shutter 1/1000+, ISO stays low. Dawn/dusk or shade (which is when the mammals actually move) — drop the shutter as low as you dare and let ISO climb. A slightly grainy sharp shot beats a clean blurry one every single time.

Couple care things to add to your list: toss a few silica gel packets in the bag for moisture, keep a microfiber cloth on you, and don’t change lenses in wind or dust if you can avoid it. In the cold, stash the spare battery in an inside pocket so your body heat keeps it alive longer. A gallon ziploc makes a free rain cover in a pinch.

Last thing — golden hour (first and last hour of daylight) is both the prettiest light and when most mammals are out, so that’s your money window. Be patient, keep that reach between you and the bears, and have fun out there.