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My 13-year-old son and I were hiking the Rescue Creek Trail in Yellowstone National Park, an 8-mile point-to-point trek which began in open meadows, ultimately descended a wooded canyon, and finished crossing arid semi-desert just outside the park's northern boundary. About three mile into the hike, on a grassy hillside, we heard a scraping sound to the north. Ultimately, we spotted a young (yearling) brown bear scrambling up a large pine, undoubtedly disturbed by our presence. Soon, we spotted the second young bear up the same tree, which was perhaps 200 meters distant. There was no sign of Momma Bear (and we certainly looked!) but we weren't too worried, as the distance between us and the bears was sufficient and we were not closing; the trail lead away.
Back in the early 1950's I as a child I would spend my summer vacation with my grandparents in Eastern Tennessee. My grandfather was a nature nut along with my grandmother. We would go too the Great Smokey Mountains several times over the weeks I would stay with them. This trip luckily my mother was with me.. My grandfather thinking it was cute he started throwing chunks of his Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwich out for the bears. My grandmother was having a fit and he finally gave in and threw the remainder of the sandwich away..his shirt sleeve caught on the mirror or window crank and the sandwich ended up on the hood of the car.At age 4-5 and seeing a million pound bear on the hood of a car does thing too a child seeing the bear inhale the sandwich and then look through the windshield looking for goodies and using the wiper blade for a tooth pick as a kid I was looking for some were too hide.. I had dreams of that bear for years..
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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My wife and I were camping in Yosemite, and went to bed in the camper about 11pm. The next campsite people were still playing cards by candle on their picnic table. We heard yeling and looked out the window to see a big back bear wandering between us and the picnic table.
The people took off and followed him. After a while I looked out again and saw their picnic tabe on fire, the candle had burned down and the wax on it had flamed up. Had to pull on my pants and put it out just as they got back.
More recently, our local school two block from our house was locked down at lunch due to a bear spotted by a teacher between the school and woods next door.
At Yellowstone, a bear ripped the toneau cover of my brother's MG to shreds while we slept in a pup tent about 15 feet away. There were traces of food in the car and he apparently smelled them. Since then, my brother has become more bold. When a bear went after his bird feeder (this is in Vermont) he grabbed his pistol and ran out into the snow buck naked to scare him off. I'm sure the bear thought him crazy, as he didn't come back.
In western Colorado I was walking along a river and saw a mama bear fishing with two cubs about 400 yards from me. I backed away slowly and watched from a distance. The cubs were playing in the water, very cute to watch. The mama bear stood up, and holy cow, bears are not cute cuddly, the muscles were amazing. I choose to quietly leave.
Then, there were the two bicyclists near here who had a close encounter:
I've had many experiences with the black bears of Northern New England (VT, NH and ME). I spend a lot of time in the woods, usually off trail, and I've also hunted bears. Most of them are pretty well terrified of humans and will run off at the sight of a person, but they can be unpredictable and dangerous if they have cubs and feel the cubs are in danger. The big exception is an old, sick, starving, desperate bear, or a bear that has been fed and associates humans with food. I wouldn't say bears are a huge danger in the woods here, but I won't say there's no danger, because there is some potential for it.
The wildest experience I've had with a bear was during turkey season a few years ago. I was headed down a mountain and came around an uprooted tree, the trunk facing me uphill. When I came around the root ball of that tree a bear that was sleeping there got up and ran so fast I barely saw it. I was inches from it. If it had been cornered I would have been in trouble.
I've been out hunting bears in dense spruce-fir forest in Northeastern Vermont and Northern Maine before where I could see just a few feet ahead of me through the dense trees. Several times I've jumped bears in those conditions, you never know where you'll see one and you can't tell if you're between a mother and its cubs either. More than once I've returned the way I came and found fresh piles of scat where I had just walked through, meaning the bear came through there right after I did.
Grizzly bears and black bears are two very different animals. Black bears in my experience in my area are eating more plant matter than meat. They're opportunistic and will take any meat they come across, but it's not the majority of their diet. Grizzly bears are far more aggressive and carnivorous.
Years ago I lived in the woods. One day my husband (now ex) and I were walking down a dirt road not far from home. Over the noise of our walking on the dirt and gravel road, I heard a cracking sound. I looked up to see a black bear in a old apple tree. The branches were cracking with his weight. The branch he was on broke and I told my husband that I just saw this bear. Once the bear hit the ground you could no longer see him. He had the choice to either run towards the large river we lived next to, or run across the road in front of us and up a hill. He chose to run right across the road in front of us, bust through a barbed wire fence and away. That gets your heart going...
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