Bear Play

Yes, bears do play, and sometimes it's rather comical. Catching a bear playing is really quite hard. I myself have only seen the play come out once and that was in a two-year-old cub. My first encounter with bear play was our very first summer here. We had only just taken a look-see, paced off our property corners, and had the surveyor come out and put our property on the map. On our next visit we brought the weed-eater and a small one-gallon gas can and we brought back the chainsaw and I'm sure we had a machete or two; it was time to clear the yard and see what we could make of the place so we could start building.

I picked a spot that was more grass than anything else, but six-foot grass can take a bit to cut. What brush we found fell to the machete, and small trees met the chainsaw. We decided to call it quits when we ran out of gas. We were all pooped anyway, even though the afternoon was barely half over.

Not wanting to carry all our tools back and forth every day, we found a place in a tree where we could hang the weed-eater and chainsaw, but there just wasn't anyplace to hang the gas can and we hadn't brought any rope. Maybe we could have thought of something, but really who's going to bother a gas can? So we stuck it in the fork of the tree.

Now, as I've recounted in a previous post, I live roughly half a mile from the river, so when we returned the next day we had the dubious pleasure of carrying a full sized can of gas. I'm sorry, carrying five gallons of anything is heavy lifting as well as awkward. Don carried it sometimes, but he also carried the gun and I'd rather he be able to use that, so I carried the gas. The boys were still young though my oldest could help too.

When we got to our tree, everything was just as we left it - everything except the gas can was gone, and not only move but totally not in sight. Well, we had to get on with our work and we had gas so we didn't spend much time looking for that little can. In truth, I can't remember when we found that gas can. As my yard stands now, it was clear across the front of the yard and down in a tiny cleft in the ground, totally out of my present keep-the-grass-cut yard but not far. The boys found it when they were playing, and if they were playing here, we had already moved here, though I think the house hadn't been built yet.

They came running up to us. "Hey mom, look what we found." They presented us with the little red gas can, but the poor thing would never hold another drop of gas. It had a multitude of holes in it all over, most of them quite small but ranging in size from toothpick size to a couple big enough for me to stick my little finger in at least up to my first knuckle. Considering all the holes and how far it was away from its starting point, at least one bear had a blast playing with it. I wish I could have seen it. My mind fills in all manner of details, rolling and kicking it up into the air, tossing it, shaking it, tackling it and rolling. Maybe there was two cubs and they wrestled over it. There's no way of telling.

I remembered this story because I now have another gas can that was similarly played with. Last fall it was down on the gas barrels and one day I found it on the other side of the trail. I didn't think anything of it and I didn't look very close. Planning to use it this winter, my husband wanted me to bring it to the house. Only when we were going to fill it did I see the holes. Something must have interrupted the play this time. And now, thanks to the receding show, it has become visible again.

If you watch bears carefully, you will see dog behavior, cat behavior, and even people behavior. They are fascinating creatures, and yes, they do play.

Tracking

I have this bad habit. The army tried to break me of it, but in truth, they didn't do a very good job. I watch where I walk, and by association I watch the ground all around. Because of that habit, I notice tracks. I like to think I can identify quite a few tracks. I've got a really rather good book with several nice drawings.

There's always been one puzzle rattling around in the back of my mind. Ever since I was a kid, I wondered about something. Do you remember the show, Daniel Boone? There was this one episode where an Indian woman was teaching Daniel's son (I think) how to track. While the boy's eyes were closed she walked around the woodpile. As she walked around the pile, she picked up a log in one hand, switched it to her other hand, and then replaced it on the pile. Of course the first thing the boy said when he told her what she'd done was "So, you walked around the woodpile, so what." or something of that nature. But that wasn't good enough. Looking closer at her tracks, he could tell she'd picked up something, he could tell when she switched hands, and he could tell when she put it back down. I always wondered how that was possible. It has been a mystery that has been hanging onto a tiny corner in the back of my brain for all these years.

Well, I think I've figured it out. I love snow, especially the packable kind. It lets me see tracks clearly. Did you know that if you're carrying something heavy in one hand, no matter how carefully balanced you are, both feet point toward the load to some degree. A tiny detail I didn't know. Now a years old mystery has found an answer.

In other tracking news. The other day, on my walks down to pack the runway, I think I saw martin tracks. The spacing was about the same as what a cat might make but the feet were like four times the size of a cat's feet and because of that, the tracks sank only a couple inches in the fresh snow.

I also saw the tracks of a young moose - very young, though not too young to be on his own. Normally he'd be hanging around his momma for another year but he wouldn't be dependent on her for food. I wonder what happened to her. But such is life and he has a good chance of making it. There's not many wolves or coyotes around here and he wasn't having any trouble finding something to eat - the snow isn't that deep.