The Bad Humans and the Cute Bear Cubs

On my first bike ride after returning home, I found a scene that made my blood boil. It was on a short forest road that I use to access some other places but "campers" have discovered it in recent years.

They are not classic campers but people who choose to live in filth in the forest. They call themselves "travelers", "crusty kids", or a host of other names. They set up huge encampments. I was the first to find this one so they weren't aggressive toward me. They ignored me. That included the guy passed out on the road and the girl who had a needle in her arm.

This was the scene at one tent site two days ago. That's a pile of junk on the left and a tent. There was porn and food all over the ground. Since then, a couple more tarp shelters have been built in this spot.

Just across from that tent, there was a pile of garbage. It was horrifying, including household stuff, clothing, a barbie doll, a weed wacker, a computer printer, and food remains. A neighbor went into the area last evening, and his photos show this pile to be substantially bigger already. He was aggressively harassed by the "campers" who literally forced him out of the area.

Here was the main camping area. I couldn't show the many tents and tarp shelters but there were probably five. There are even more today.

A girl had a needle in her arm, as you can barely make out in this photo. They ignored me the whole time because no officers had been there yet to investigate.

Now, the situation is explosively tense because officers have been to the area many times since it was discovered. The "campers" are gathering more and more of their cohorts to join the site. They are preventing everyone but them from using this section of forest or the forest road that they are on. I am too scared to go near the area.

I've been working tirelessly contacting authorities, writing letters, and networking to try to get this site shut down. I'd like it to be permanently shut down with a big gate blocking vehicle access to the area but I may be dreaming too big.

Thank goodness that there was footage on my trail cams to make me smile and laugh in light of the terrible situation relatively nearby. Mabel (our den sow) and her cubs are together, despite that scared cub video that we saw recently.

Here they are near our house.

Mabel's mange has healed well, and her two cubs are looking healthy.

I also got video of Dot and her cub at a bear tree, which the cub seemed to think was a jungle gym. And, I got the first footage of Mabel with her cubs in a watering hole!!! I hope that you enjoy the video as much as I did. You can watch it here or at Youtube.

Now, let's all hope that the bear family does NOT go near those awful "campers" despite the food that is lying on the ground all over the area. If only law enforcement would just take action, we wouldn't have a dark cloud hanging over our neck of the woods.

Bathing Bears!

At 3AM, I was awakened by Shyla. Her body was jerking as her muscles spasmed rhythmically. They'd spasm and then release, about 20 times per minute. It was not a seizure because Shyla was fully conscious, responding to me, and able to walk. I got her up and walked her around, and the "jerking" stopped while she walked. Then, it restarted when she laid down on a dog bed. I kept walking her around, and then letting her lie down, hoping that the jerking would go away for good. It didn't after about an hour of this routine.

So, we got to drive to the Emergency Vet at 4AM this morning. Fortunately, the jerking finally stopped on the way to the vet. The vet didn't know why it had happened but sent us home with the instructions to video it if it happened again. It hasn't happened again so perhaps it was a one-time thing. I hope so.

Today is the anniversary of the deaths of two of our dogs, K (4 years ago) and Acadia (13 years ago). My heart really didn't need to start the day in the vet hospital with Shyla. At least we weren't in the same room where K took her last breath - a small blessing.

So, it comes as no surprise that I am still not feeling well - probably due to the accumulated stress from the fire plus our foray to town at 4AM. Sorry this post is so late - I'm at half speed today.

To cheer myself up, I made a fun video of some bears playing in a spring on the 4th of July. There's nothing that I love more than seeing bears take baths - they make me laugh! Plus, both of the sows who bathed have cubs so I bet that we'll get to see the cubs play in the water pretty soon!

Here's a photo of one mother bear arriving at the spring with her cub in tow. Her cub didn't bathe but you can hear the mother bear grunt to call her cub at one point in the video.

Here's the video which you can watch here or at Youtube.

I will soon show you a video of Socks, our former lost yearling cub, hanging out with the big males of our territory during mating season. She's now about 5 years old so it makes sense that she may be about to have her first litter of cubs. I am overjoyed that we'll probably get to see Socks raise cubs next year. Here's a photo of Socks, which should remind you of why I named her Socks (her black legs)!

I believe that Socks is Cinnamom's daughter, a bear who long-time readers may remember. If you search for "Cinnamom" within this blog, you'll find lots of posts about her and her cubs. Cinnamom was killed by authorities late in 2014. If you look at the old posts, she already had a strike against her as shown by her ear tags. A "strike" means that she went too close to humans or human residences. A bear with ear tags doesn't get much leeway from the authorities, and thus, Cinnamom is gone.

I love having the daughters of bears who I adored watching carry on their traditions - like Socks is doing for her mom, Cinnamom. Similarly, Shyla is carrying on the traditions of our previous female Labs who died on this date, Angel K and Angel Acadia.