Bear Trap

As I was driving down the hill from my house I saw the local Game Commission with their bear trap along the road.  I wondered if they had been setting up the trap and stopped to chat.

"No," he told me.  He had received a call that a deer had been hit and needed to be put out of its misery.  We walked over and the poor deer was already dead in the weeds by the road.  "Most of the calls we're getting now are for bears," he said.  Bird feeders (including hummingbird feeders) and grills with a good meat smell are very, very attractive to bears and they'll go right up on people's back decks to get to them.

Yesterday, Fitz saw what he estimated to be a 300 pound bear come out of the forest in front of his car.  It ran across the road, vaulted across the guard rail, and ran through some people's backyards.  

I cross my fingers in hopes that the bears find enough to eat in the wild and don't decide to make my beehives their dessert!


"Well," said Pooh, "what I like best -- " and then he had to stop and think. Because although Eating Honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn't know what it was called.
                                    -- Winnie the Pooh, The House at Pooh Corner

Mystery Creature

My neighbor and I were talking yesterday when all of the sudden my miniature schnauzer, Candy Cane, started going crazy after something under the porch.  We have a big roll of snow fence stored under there and whatever it was had climbed into the open section in the middle of the roll.  Candy Cane pulled out the center part with her teeth forming a sort of cone shape and, I think, squeezing down on and trapping the creature inside the tube.  We could hear it making "chuck chucking" noises every time we got close, but my neighbor and I couldn't imagine what it could be.  My biggest worry was that it would be a skunk or a small porcupine and the dogs would get sprayed or stuck!

I waited most of the day for the animal to leave, but I think it was crushed in there like in a Chinese finger trap.  I feared that if I left it, and it died I would have a nasty smell coming from under the porch.  So the kids and I unrolled the entire roll of snow fence - about 300 feet! - and as we reached the end a very relieved (and dizzy) squirrel shot off into the woods.

                                           



I hope the bear that attacked my beehives has learned its lesson.  The hive was intact yesterday.  I was concerned that he would come back again during the night.  We've been having a lot of rain, so I hope that if he did come to get the hive, his wet paws acted as a good conductor and he got a nice big zap off the electric fence.  Hopefully, that will deter him!

P.S.  Be sure to check out the new Language Translator in my sidebar!