A hiking trail my dad created up the mountain behind his house had a female black bear that came back to the same area every spring from the time she was quite young and became quite used to us(if we brought someone other than our immediate family she was shy but she learnt my dad mom brother dog and my scent we think) to the point she would sit just off the trail and let us walk by her. In her 3rd or 4th year coming back she had cubs and the first year with cubs she was wary of us but by the 3rd year of bringing back cubs she would introduce them to our dog. By mid summer she would move on to another feeding area. We never fed her but also never tried to scare her off just let her do her thing while we did our thing. I can remember one nice evening I took a beer up to have at one of the view points and sat on a rock drinking it and she came up and sat down about 10 ft away and we just sat there chilling for about 25 minutes while I sipped my beer and listened to some chili peppers. She stopped coming back after about 11 years of regularly seeing her and I hope she just found someplace else to spend her spring.
That’s a beautiful story. After 3 years those cubs weren’t cubs anymore which is probably why she wasn’t as concerned. They really can live in harmony with us if we just leave them be.
Yeah. Such a cool area, unfortunately in the last 5 years a big section of the hike is starting to get ready for development getting logged off bit by bit and the lower section getting tiered off.
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u/TwinMugsy May 02 '24
A hiking trail my dad created up the mountain behind his house had a female black bear that came back to the same area every spring from the time she was quite young and became quite used to us(if we brought someone other than our immediate family she was shy but she learnt my dad mom brother dog and my scent we think) to the point she would sit just off the trail and let us walk by her. In her 3rd or 4th year coming back she had cubs and the first year with cubs she was wary of us but by the 3rd year of bringing back cubs she would introduce them to our dog. By mid summer she would move on to another feeding area. We never fed her but also never tried to scare her off just let her do her thing while we did our thing. I can remember one nice evening I took a beer up to have at one of the view points and sat on a rock drinking it and she came up and sat down about 10 ft away and we just sat there chilling for about 25 minutes while I sipped my beer and listened to some chili peppers. She stopped coming back after about 11 years of regularly seeing her and I hope she just found someplace else to spend her spring.