We live in an area with a large population of both brown bears and black bears but this week truly has been Bear Country out here. Things started last Monday; one of our neighbors who was at his vacation cabin on the lake went for an early morning workout in his kayak. While paddling around the lake he heard something crashing through the woods. He didn’t have to wait long before a cow moose and her calf of the year came barreling out of the trees and hit the water. Before they swim half way across the lake here comes a newly emancipated brown bear hot on the trail. John sat in his kayak without a camera or camcorder and watched a once in a lifetime scene. The cow swimming across the lake, her calf in tow, while the brown bear less than a minute behind. As John watched the cow made it across and hit the woods, not even waiting for her calf that was just a few seconds behind her. The bear was gaining fast when the calf made it to the shore and high tailed it to its mom. The last John saw of anything the bear had got across and was headed to where the two moose had gone into trees. John waited around but didn’t hear if the bear got his breakfast or not. It was a young bear so the calf had chance even if it was a slim one.

About one o’clock Tuesday morning our lab, Bear cut loose barking, he barks at everything that moves so I didn’t think much about it. I needed to go out anyway so I did my thing as I headed to the back door something up the hill around our caches went crashing. I looked up just in time to see a medium sized brown bear dragging a box of bait I had been using for black bear at one of my bait stations into the weeds. I walked back to the house and got my rifle by the time I got to where I could get a clean shot the bear saw me and headed south. I manage to put a round in the weeds where he went in I was hoping that would keep him going. It didn’t our lab played tag with him for a couple of hours before things got quit so we could get back to sleep. That morning I went out to see what all he trashed I was lucky he had only dumped one plastic tote of bait. Between what I could see of the bear earlier that morning and some of his tracks I of his I found where he came through the garden I figured he was a fairly small bear, maybe 7 – 71/2 foot range. We’re hoping it was the same bear John watched from his kayak the morning before. I it was the calf probably survived if it isn’t that means we probably has two young dumb bears. I decided to spend the night up in one of our caches in case he came back, he did, but I had also left our dog out and Bear kept the bear back in the brush. Last night was the first night he hasn’t stopped by to aggravate the dog hopefully he has given up and is looking somewhere else for easier pickin’.

It is looking like the people of Unimak Island need to take care of Unimaks wolves themselves. If they are becoming a threat it’s time for the locals to take control, they still have 19 days left in the extended season. It is only a matter of time before there is a repeat of the jogger at Chignik who was killed by habituated wolves or Icy Bay where a child was attacked by wolves in the logging camp. Predators are just  that, predators not cutesy little puppies. When one food source is gone they will hunt out another if they can’t find a new one they starve. The people of Unimak can’t wait for the feds and state to punch it out in court, the ball is in their court.

False Pass residents worried about bold, hungry wolves

Published: June 9th, 2010 01:01 PM
Last Modified: June 10th, 2010 11:17 AM

Residents of False Pass, on the same island as the federal wildlife refuge in which the state wants to shoot wolves it says are depleting a caribou herd, say they’re unnerved by the numbers and boldness of wolves in the area, according to an Alaska Newspapers Inc. story in The Dutch Harbor Fisherman.

Read more here

or here

Alaska is probably one of the few places where you can view wildlife from your front porch. In the winter moose are a common sight in downtown Anchorage.  Summer bring in the bears, bear’s are so common place in Anchorage the cities web site has a special map for bear activity.   All  human/bear encounters have the potential to go bad as in this Anchorage Daily News article. In this case it was the bear that got the short end but things could have turned the other way had it not been for the ladies dog and her quick thinking husband.

Anchorage Daily News photo

Dog intervenes in grizzly attack, but bear is eventually shot
EAGLE RIVER: Woman hid behind a truck; bruin returns after husband fires warning.
By LISA DEMER
ldemer@adn.com
Published: June 1st, 2010 06:58 AM
Last Modified: June 1st, 2010 06:58 AM

A longtime Alaskan says his dog probably saved his wife’s life after a young grizzly bear charged her Sunday night by their home in the Eagle River canyon, near the nature center.

Michael Weiman, 64, scared the bear off with warning shots, then, when it returned, he shot and killed the bear, Anchorage police said.

Weiman said his wife, Marianne Hamilton, was walking their 10-year-old boxer, Mojabe, on an abandoned airstrip that’s part of their property on Bear Ridge Circle. It’s an area of big lots where homeowners are used to seeing a lot of wildlife, including moose and grizzly bears, he said. They had seen a bigger grizzly earlier in the day on Sunday.

That evening, they were enjoying the sunshine. Around 9 p.m., Hamilton went to walk the dog.

“The dog stopped and wheeled around. Marianne turns around, and here comes a bear,” Weiman said.

It was on the airstrip, in the open. Its ears were back, and it was coming at her, he said. “She kept remarking about the eyes, the eyes. The eyes were big and coming,” Weiman said.

He heard her screaming, grabbed his .44 pistol, ran outside and saw the boxer “intervene and cut the bear off.” Hamilton ran behind a pickup truck. The dog chased the bear across the road.

The bear turned toward the dog, and Weiman fired three shots into the ground next to the bear, each one closer, as he tells the story.

“Over the hill it went,” he said. But as soon as they all got inside, the bear was back.

“The words I said were ‘Hell no,’ and I grabbed my .30-30,” Weiman said.

He fired. “Very swiftly it was done and I’m not sorry,” he said.

He said he’s lived in Alaska 41 years, been a hunter all his life, but never hunted bears. He said he’s a nature lover. That bear, though, was acting dangerously. The grizzly was young and smallish, maybe 150 pounds, but its claws were 3-inches long and razor sharp.

He called 911 and Anchorage police officers came to his home and told him what he needed to do. He skinned the bear and will turn the hide in to the state Department of Fish and Game, which auctions the hides of bears killed in defense of life or property.

Residents of the area are used to seeing bears, most of which never cause a problem. Most people carry a gun or pepper spray when they are out walking in the spring and summer, Weiman said. But on Sunday, winds would have whipped spray into the user’s eyes and the bear could have attacked, he said.

“People get so complacent and they think the bear is a little teddy bear. They aren’t.”

Find Lisa Demer online at adn.com/contact/ldemer or call 257-4390.

Read more: http://www.adn.com/2010/05/31/1301997/dog-intervenes-in-grizzly-attack.html#ixzz0pcAy2ZIn

Bear Country or Bare Country either way that’s where I live, you see my little corner of Alaska is what Tom would call a predator pit. We got bears and we got wolves but no moose, it has been ten years since I have been able to hunt moose in my back yard. The big difference up here is you can’t blame Fish & Game or the Board of Game. Alaska has several different types of consumptive user along with multiple land mangers. You have sport hunters, subsistence/personal use hunters, state managers, and federal managers. We have our share of infighting between the various consumptive users but they are more like typical sibling rivalries. The real management problems come from the non-consumptive side. There are two basic factions, one the blue haired grandma’s who ride the park service buses hoping to see a bear or wolf doing their thing along side the road. I don’t really blame them bears are fun to watch. However I don’t think they are the main problem, although they are gullible and swayed easily. The one I consider the real enemies to Alaska wildlife are the Walter Mitty’s and the outright Gia worshippers. These people have an agenda and the money to back it up. The Walter Mitty’s, they have such boring little lives that predators have become their alter ego, the bigger and badder the better. And how dare another human pop their bubble. Even worse are the Gia crowd these folks believe that except for a select few that man should not live or tread outside the concrete jungle, you guess who the “select few” are. They believe the wilderness is their personal church and has to be protected at all cost. No hunting, no logging, the hell with peoples needs, just hail Gia, the all knowing all seeing Gia.
You can depend on one or both of these groups to file a law suite every time the Board institutes a predator control program. Even though they know the state is going to win they file anyway because if they can be tie up things in court until the end of the season they have effectively won even though the courts rule in favor of Alaska most of the time. They are also very much aware that states have limited budgets, the more a state spends on lawyers the less it has to spend on game management. Slowly but surely Alaska is gaining just in my home unit we are starting the second year of our black bear snaring program. We also have a predator control program for Alaska residents where, in designated areas we are allowed to take any and all black bears with out a bag or possession limit. It is taking time and money but Alaska is winning the predator war, a war that has to be won so our children will be able to enjoy the resources as previous generations have.
Well so much for the soap box stuff, at least for now.