Don't bottle it up, let people know how you feel.
Quote from: taxed on October 13, 2021, 08:24:11 PMI'm curious about this one....
OK...
One of my closer bear encounters
It was a day like any other day, I ate breakfast, grabbed my mining pack, consisting of a snipe, classifier pan, clear plastic bottom bucket, heavy flathead screwdriver, Winchester, and my container for gold
I'll briefly explain these tools. The Snipe is nothing more than a turkey baster with a broken off car antenna shoved up the tube. This allows me to suction the cracks and crevices for gold.
The gold gets vacuumed up the tube and turkey baster to the bottom while silt and light debris gets blown back out the tip of the baster.
The screwdriver is to open up the cracks in the bedrock of the creek, and the bucket with a plexiglass bottom allows a crystal clear view of the bottom, like being underwater with goggles on.
Oh, and lunch, coffee and TP, always a necessity in my mining backpack. Rifle strapped to my side I head out on a half mile hike down to my creeks confluence.
On one particular day I get to the bottom as usual, I walk to the clearing where I normally drop my gear, but this day was different, the moment I was ready to drop my gear, dogs at my side, I spot two very small bear cubs 12' to my right.
My very first half second thought was "Oh How Adorable", interrupted by the rest of the second of, "Oh Shit, Where's Mama?" The cubs were on my right, while I was standing directly between mama and her babies, with mama on my other side no more than 16' away.
Holding my bodily functions intact, I calmly said, "Come", and my dogs quietly walked backward with me, all the while the cubs stood quietly in place, mama watched as we slowly backed up.
Now about 15' back I told my dogs, "HOME", they turned and headed up the trail, within a few seconds mama's body language directed the cubs in the opposite direction I was going, it must have been a look, because I saw no change in her position, beyond a very subtle head movement. She slowly followed them, then stopped and turned my direction, and partially standing still exhibiting calmness. I stopped and waved a slow so long, she turned and ushered her cubs up the mountainside.
This was probably the only time I made that hike for nothing, never went back that day. I don't know if she knew I meant no harm, or knew what a Winchester was, but she sensed we meant no avarice.
I look at it this way, I'm the intruder, the forest belongs to the wildlife, I've never killed anything while I've lived here, I can afford to buy food leaving the natural balance intact. I think they know which is why I've never had an issue in more than 30 years. Over the years I have come to recognize the local wildlife, some come, so go, but I know who lives here and who is passing through.
Sure, I've had other encounters, like the time a bear was about to bust down my 5' field fence because he smelled the dogs food baking in the sun. No time to grab a camera, he was coming over, I grabbed my rifle, fired three shots at the ground in front of him and he took off.
This was the biggest bear I had ever seen in my life. I described it to my local State fish and game officer in great detail, that it stood about 6' plus at the shoulders, a solid foot and a half higher than the fence with all fours planted firmly on the ground, estimated weight well over a thousand lbs., with an odd hump on his shoulders, he assured me it was a grizzly.
He's seen footage of it in the area and confirmed it was the same one that could have walked over my fence like it was made of paper, which is exactly what he was about to do. My dogs stood still, the Shepard barked while the wolf growled a menacing sound I'd never heard her make before, she was a quiet type.
That encounter had me concerned, because I knew there was no place safe against that bull dozer, and even my 30/30 was no match for a charging grizzly.
Other encounters like the Fox that used to come past my property nightly, whom I'd met on an earlier occasion, would come through around 10:00 PM, starting at about 100' below, he'd start barking a Rowwrrr Rowwwrrr, every 3 seconds till he knew he had safely passed.
This was odd in that, I'd never seen this behavior ever, I assumed he was telling the dogs, "I'm coming through, so don't get excited, and they didn't, ever. They'd just lay there and watch him pass by unmolested.
Befriended a skunk once. I was down in the creek clearing my spring line that fed my holding tank, from which I pump water to my house with a solar pump. Yes, free water, no utility bill.
Well, I needed to get a little higher so I could get a better grip on the pipe. Just above me is an old Yew tree with a hollowed out cavern at it's base, I bend over to look at the pipe and feel a cats head bump my head, I reach up thinking it's my cat and scratch his head.
It was neither a he or a cat, it was a mama skunk with a litter of baby skunks.
I stood in awe frozen, because any quick moves would have put me ass first on the bedrock of the creek below smelling like a feed lot. So I stood there, she calmly circled, kind of saying hello and showing off her pride.
I patted her head and climbed down. The only time I had trouble with skunks is when my dogs would piss them off, and I'd suffer the consequences.
Imagine 2:30 in the morning and waking to a full dose of skunk coming through the floor of your bedroom. No, I had yet to finish the floor, so without insulation the gas came straight in. I was up the rest of the night with nothing to do but wait for the overwhelming stench to clear.
Other milder encounters was a Pygmy owl in the middle of the night literally sitting in my window braced against the screen, and then screeches, I about came out of my skin.
You see, it's so quiet in the forest, that you can hear a limb fall a mile away. When I first moved here, I had so become accustomed to the quiet that the littlest sound woke me up. One night while lying in my bed just about to fall asleep, I hear something walking outside my window.
I hear what sounds like a huge bipedal creature slowly walking and crunching the forest floor below his feet. I sit up quickly and listen, nothing, it stopped. I lie back down, and within seconds I hear it again, Crunch, Crunch, with a sliding sound of heavy feet dragging very softly, I can't describe it any other way.
OK, about 15 minutes of this crap has gone by, and no, the flood light exposed nothing, and going outside heavily armed and no footprints anywhere to be seen, I go back inside and listen intently as never before.
It dawns on me, I'm hearing the blood rushing through my carotid artery. Never heard that in my life, and never since, now that I'm an old fart with hearing loss. Point is, for some it's too quiet, but once accustomed, you can never go back to a city dwelling.
So be prepared, the quiet is extremely addictive, and I've only heard a siren up here twice in all this time, and even gun shots all have a distinctive meaning. Daytime, typical target practice, early evening, single shot scaring off critters, double shot late night, same scaring off critters.
Late night single shot followed by several erratic shots means an intruder, either protecting stock, or God knows what, and this is usually followed by a phone call checking on everyone, the one that doesn't answers gets neighbors showing up.
We may not be close, we may never only speak once in a decade, but we're all still friends and neighbors and we look out for one another. This is off grid living, though in the beginning, I had absolutely no neighbors.
This blew a hole in my plans of building a homestead and raising a family. You know how hard it is to find a young lady wanting to raise a family away from city essentials? As they call it.
Almost forgot, you can't live in the wilderness without dogs.
After Bear and Ursa passed, I needed another dog, found a three year old West German Shepard purebred that needed a home, her name was Heidi.
We bonded quickly, and she became my shadow, I knew her language and she knew mine, we read each other clearly.
Same old routine, mining bag, hike to the creek and mine all day long, take a lunch break, make coffee, grab my roll of TP and hit the latrine/bushes.
My Shepard had seen this day in and day out and knew exactly what TP was for, though I didn't know she observed me this intently till later.
I guess it had been about three years on since I had gotten her and it was a typical winter day of mining, snow on the ground, sun beating on crystal clear water, I'm mining doing my thing, and Heidi is down stream barking up a storm, but I could tell from her bark it wasn't danger, more curiosity of something in the forest.
I go back to my mining and here she comes, full speed barking, hits the brakes and throws snow all over me.
I say what's up girl, Timmy stuck in the well again? Of course I was joking with her, but she was dead serious, so I said take me to Timmy. I'm running behind her and apparently not fast enough, she runs back and barks even more excitedly.
I get to an opening and she freezes and points like I'd never seen her do. Up about 12' above the water is a brown ball of fur, a golden reddish brown fur color, really fluffy, and neither one of us know what it was, it looks like a bear cub, about 20bs, and a head the size of its body.
I climb up and cautiously lift it off the ledge it had fallen on. You See, above the creek on that side is an old logging road long abandoned and it's literally cut into the cliffside with an old D12 back in the day.
I surmised this critter had followed the old road and slid down the mountain and the rock outcropping stopped his slide to the water.
It was safe to say he spent at least one night there in below freezing temps because there was no way to climb down without falling in the raging creek and drowning.
I set it down and looked at it, even Heidi was nervous about this thing. We walk back to camp, it's limping pretty bad, but seemed to free up within about 20', that's when I started realizing it was a red Pyrenees about 8 weeks old.
Yes, I put up signs, no one responded, so Heidi took it upon herself to raise him as her own, time goes by and they're inseparable and he adores her, they lay against each other when they aren't off exploring together.
One night about a couple of months into their relationship and him about 60lbs heavier. I awake to Heidi upset, so I get up to make coffee but she won't let me pass, so I step past her, she gets to the kitchen doorway and blocks me again.
I know something isn't right, but I have no clue, it's still dark outside and no light in the Livingroom, I see Pal, that's his name now, I see him laying with his head down looking kind of glum.
Anyway after sternly telling Heidi to move out of my way, I reach the front door and ask if they needed to go out, Heidi's upset, and Pal isn't moving, so I turn on the light and right in front of the door is a circle of dog poop, no big, judging from the 12 piles in a perfect circle, it had to have been Pal.
Well now it makes sense, I guess who ever had Heidi prior to me dealt with this sort of issue harshly and left a horrible impression on her, but I didn't care, he didn't do it on purpose.
But here's the thing that made me realize just how caring Heidi was. Remember that TP roll I kept in my mining pack?
Heidi had taken it out of my pack and placed it perfectly in the center of the mess, I could even see the bite marks in the roll where she had struggled to free it from the pack.
Bear was a Shepard as well but nowhere her level of intellect. She was very much the typical GSD, always checking in like clockwork, about every 20 minutes she'd come and lick my face just once, wag her tail, wait for her "Good Girl" and repeat her rounds. See ya in 20 girl...
Heidi died shortly after I met Toy. A week later Pal and I stayed at her house, Pal, lonely for Heidi, walks up the stairs and dies of a broken heart. Yes, he missed her more than life. She was 13 and he, maybe 10?
God that was hard to write, but I'm glad I did as a celebration of her life with me.
Oh, I'll gladly take up arms against terrorists trying to take over our country, but I'm not pissed at them, I see them as a cancer that needs to be removed. (would you want an angry surgeon?) :biggrin:
To be angry is an emotion that fogs your mind and interferes with your objective.
Never fight angry, fight with purpose. I've moved beyond emotion, I see them for what they are, a very tiny percentage of people with a huge megaphone in the media, including FUX Snooze.