Neighborhood Bear
While I was sitting on the couch this evening, some movement caught my eye out our living room window in the road right outside our house. As I looked more carefully out the window, I could have sworn I saw a good sized Black Bear. I wasn't completely sure it was a bear since I only saw the rear half of the bear before he disappeared in our neighbor's yard.
Since there are quite a few kids who wander around this trailer park throughout the evening and early nightfall, I wanted to make sure I was seeing things clearly so I jumped up and quickly headed outside. Within a few feet of the house, I stopped in my tracks as a rather big Black Bear was slowly sauntering toward me. He also stopped, looked up at me, and then turned into our neighbor's yard across the street. It was clear he wanted to avoid human contact and that is a good thing but I still had some concerns about a bear wandering through the streets in our little neighborhood.
We continued to watch for the bear for the rest of the evening until it was too dark to see anything outside. I even warned some of the neighborhood kids as they walked by our house to watch out for this bear. It wasn't long after that we headed to the bedroom for the night.
At around midnight, I heard some noise outside again so I got up to investigate...
It was the same big Black Bear that we saw earlier and, this time, he found our garbage bin to be a tasty target.
As Sheila and I watched him from our living room window, we discussed whether we should call someone. I didn't want any guilt on my conscious if I didn't call and then one or more of the kids in the park got hurt by this bear so I decided to make a 9-1-1 call. The dispatcher connected me with the State Police... their response was "this is Vermont... bears will be in the garbage... just secure your garbage tomorrow when it is safe". I then briefly explained that my concern isn't my garbage, it is the kids in this trailer park who are constantly walking around the park but I was again reminded that this is Vermont and then advised that the Warden would be notified tomorrow.
On the positive side, at least my two encounters with him were indicating that he is not aggressive. As we shined the flashlight on him so I could shoot a photo or two, he sort of had that "guilty dog" look when you catch a dog doing something he shouldn't be doing. Sometimes, a flashlight can irritate and anger a Black bear... that didn't happen with this one so that is a good thing.
About 15 minutes after my short call to the State Police, we heard some loud bangs across the street similar to what I would expect to hear when a bear is trying to get into things... when I looked out our window again, the bear had abandoned our garbage bin and was nowhere to be seen.
Now I need to figure out some way to secure our Casella trash bins. These rolling bins are quite large so I have no idea how I'm going to secure them. I would need to build quite a sizable shed to house these bins behind locked doors... a rough estimate in my head for materials is about $500?
Also, now I have no idea what to do about using my telescopes at night... I certainly don't want to come face-to-face with this guy in the dark!
Since there are quite a few kids who wander around this trailer park throughout the evening and early nightfall, I wanted to make sure I was seeing things clearly so I jumped up and quickly headed outside. Within a few feet of the house, I stopped in my tracks as a rather big Black Bear was slowly sauntering toward me. He also stopped, looked up at me, and then turned into our neighbor's yard across the street. It was clear he wanted to avoid human contact and that is a good thing but I still had some concerns about a bear wandering through the streets in our little neighborhood.
We continued to watch for the bear for the rest of the evening until it was too dark to see anything outside. I even warned some of the neighborhood kids as they walked by our house to watch out for this bear. It wasn't long after that we headed to the bedroom for the night.
At around midnight, I heard some noise outside again so I got up to investigate...
It was the same big Black Bear that we saw earlier and, this time, he found our garbage bin to be a tasty target.
As Sheila and I watched him from our living room window, we discussed whether we should call someone. I didn't want any guilt on my conscious if I didn't call and then one or more of the kids in the park got hurt by this bear so I decided to make a 9-1-1 call. The dispatcher connected me with the State Police... their response was "this is Vermont... bears will be in the garbage... just secure your garbage tomorrow when it is safe". I then briefly explained that my concern isn't my garbage, it is the kids in this trailer park who are constantly walking around the park but I was again reminded that this is Vermont and then advised that the Warden would be notified tomorrow.
On the positive side, at least my two encounters with him were indicating that he is not aggressive. As we shined the flashlight on him so I could shoot a photo or two, he sort of had that "guilty dog" look when you catch a dog doing something he shouldn't be doing. Sometimes, a flashlight can irritate and anger a Black bear... that didn't happen with this one so that is a good thing.
About 15 minutes after my short call to the State Police, we heard some loud bangs across the street similar to what I would expect to hear when a bear is trying to get into things... when I looked out our window again, the bear had abandoned our garbage bin and was nowhere to be seen.
Also, now I have no idea what to do about using my telescopes at night... I certainly don't want to come face-to-face with this guy in the dark!
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