Hiking Backpack Zone

Posts Tagged ‘bears’

When I was a boy, I was fascinated with my grandfather’s stories about black bears. My grandfather had worked as a game warden in northern Pennsylvania for about 20 years (from 1930 to 1950). And so he always had an abundance of intriguing stories that delighted my brothers and me. We were especially fond of his tales about black bear encounters.

My grandfather told us a story that took place one year about a month before bear hunting season started. He told me he had often heard about bear wallows, but he had never been fortunate enough to see one. Well, this day he was walking along in the woods when he saw a huge tree that the wind had blown down, with the roots and soil all torn out of the ground to form a large hole. Rainwater had accumulated in this basin to make the perfect bathtub for bears.

Muddy paw prints emanated out of the bear wallow like a bunch of spokes from a wagon wheel. Grandpa guessed that quite a few bears were using the wallow. He told us that he supposed that bears have fleas and vermin to deal with and that they use these wallows to rub off any insects and to keep them off.

The ground around these trees was covered with the tips of hemlock branches. My grandfather observed that bear cubs avoided water like cats and were amusing themselves in the trees while their mothers bathed in the water. Apparently there had been a lot of mothers with cubs at this wallow, because all the hemlock trees nearby were lighter in color than normal, and the bark on the trunks was all worn down.

Grandfather said that he guessed there must have been a whole lot of cubs climbing those trees! However, my grandfather never could come up with a reason as to why the bear cubs wanted to break off the tips of the branches.

Finding a Bear’s Den

Speaking of those branches reminds me of my grandfather’s story about a hemlock thicket he once came across. He was actually out hunting bobcats when he found it. It was a dense thicket about eight or ten feet high.

It was so impenetrable that even the snow could not get through. Inside was a hollow room in which a bear had chosen to make his bed for his winter sleep.

The black bear had broken off the tips of the surrounding hemlocks, similar to what the cubs had done at the bear wallow. With the hemlock tips, the bear had fashioned a neat rug that was around five inches thick. Grandfather noticed that the the forest-green hemlock tips were bunched close together with the branchy part down. Because of this, the edges of this “bear rug” were as neat as a braided oval rug. He told us children that he could hardly believe that a bear had made it! “It was just one of nature’s wonders,” he said.

How to Observe Wildlife Unnoticed

I was curious how my grandfather could see so many wild animals. So one time I asked him, and he told me that he put something over his face and then lay on the ground perfectly still. He said that animals are scared of motion and also your face. If you cover your face, then you can often actually see the animals in action.

He related to us that once when he was lying still, with nothing covering his face but some grass he had stuffed under the edge of his hat, he had seen a covey of grouse walking all around him. He said that at one point, they all perched themselves on a fallen tree several feet away from him and preened their feathers. He supposed they were “chatting” about their adventures that day. However, suddenly, they became edgy about grandfather, because they couldn’t figure out what he was. However, my grandfather lay perfectly still, and so the grouse relaxed again and continued their preening.

On a different occasion, my grandfather was lying on the ground when a weasel jumped on his shoulder and then scurried across the whole length of his body, in hot pursuit of a squirrel.

Tad Brenk lives in the Allegheny mountains of southern Pennsylvania. His house borders a state forest, so he has lots of opportunities to observe wildlife. In fact, every summer one or more black bears visit his home. He invites you to read more of his game warden stories at The Knowledge Universe.