My Bear

A smoky sunrise that I couldn't resist photographing

Last weekend I heard a story about a bear wandering around in a suburb of Denver. This time of year we hear a lot of these kind of stories because it is fall and bears are hunting for food to keep them going during hibernation. It seems like most of these stories end with the “authorities” loading them up and “relocating” them. I'm not positive but I think North Park might be one of the relocation destinations!  There have been lots of stories about bears getting into my neighbors' dumpsters and hanging around people’s ranch buildings and cabins even when there is a lot of activity going on. I have been living ( or spending summers) up here for over 40 years and had never actually seen a bear around here although I have seen lots of signs of bears on my daily walks. Our neighbors have had plenty of incidents and sightings even on our land but I must not be very observant. This brings me to the story of “My Bear”.

One evening about 9PM I was minding my business and reading my book when I heard a light scratching on the screen of the west window. I looked up thinking it was a chipmunk or bird even though it seemed too dark for them to be out. I thought I saw a big paw but just then the phone rang. It is a landline so I had to go across the room to answer. It was my brother and we had some business to discuss. The phone is located next to a big picture window with a smaller window on each side. The windows look out on our porch and then down to the creek.  One of those was open maybe about 6 inches. As we were speaking I looked out on the porch and right below the big window I saw a brown furry back of an animal. I thought it might be a coyote, so I yelled out the open window “Shoooo! Get off the porch!”  

The infamous window where the bear stared at me!

To my horror a bear stood up, put his front paws up on the big window and stared at me not 2 feet from my face with only a pane of glass between us!!!  The phone was still in my hand up to my ear and I screamed and screamed as loud as I could!  Poor Tip’s ears must still be ringing! (I had heard somewhere to make a lot of loud noise to scare bears away). The bear quickly ran away and I “calmly” said to Tip, “Well, that scared him away.”  My heart was beating fast and Tip had no idea what was going on!  I explained and he was laughing with me by the time we hung up. In my mind I was thinking, “His face sure did look like a cute Teddy Bear!”  That night I locked the doors and grabbed my air horn that my son-in-law insisted I take with me on my hikes, and took it to bed with me.  HA!

The next night I was in town until after dark and decided to stay with Danny and Kathi overnight.  We were visualizing me having to make a mad dash in the dark from the car to the door with “my bear” chasing after me! 

 When I told my neighbor about the incident she asked me if the bear had cattle sized ear tags, one in each ear. There were no tags. She had an incident a few years before and the Fish and Game fellows told her if they were tagged they were relocated bears. Mine had no tags so I guess he was wild.

Well, that’s my bear story!  I have some other wildlife stories to tell but none that exciting!  Oh, and my grandsons wanted to know why I didn’t take pictures!  I told them I was too busy screaming! Hehehe!