Becoming Unbearable

The first couple of times it was really kind of cool. We have a bear that lives somewhere in the neighborhood. Getting to see a bear in town, well, the suburbs, actually, but still, getting to see a bear was a thrilling treat. A sow and her cubs or a big male, it was neat. Mama bear was teaching the babies to find food. Fortunately, if you holler at mom and she starts to wander away the babies will follow. If you holler at dad he will mosey away as well.

The first few times there is a novelty to it.

“This is a nice neighborhood.”

“Thanks. Yeah, but we gotta watch out for deer, foxes, the occasional coyote and a bear that lives around here somewhere. Of course, there are raccoons and squir…”

“A bear!”

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Yes. The picture in the middle on top, where he is standing up and looking in the can, is my driveway and my trashcan. The rest are in my neighborhood. Having to clean up after him is a real pain in the neck and as the summer draws to a close it will be happening more and more. They have a wide range, so he still only makes it around here once in a while, but it can be really nasty when he does.

When you look up these problems online nobody offers any solutions that are reasonable for us. Comments about keeping human trash away from them aren’t helpful. different websites offer suggestions like keeping the trash in the garage. I don’t have a garage. Build a bear-proof enclosure. No such thing. I have a neighbor who tried a wide variety of enclosures including chain link but with no success. The most ridiculous suggestion I read anywhere was to put your trash in the freezer until trash day. How disgusting is that? Besides, if you have a biggish household like ours you would quickly run out of room and the kind of trash that attracts animals is also pretty disgusting.

One of the workable solutions was to buy a bear-resistant trashcan. This sounded like a good idea until I actually started shopping around and found out the starting price is $300+. I may wind up having to do that if I don’t want to clean up after him every few days. Then I would have to hope that someone wouldn’t steal it. I did find out how they know if something is bearproof or not. They use bears to test it. We don’t have Grizzly Bears in Colorado so if it passed these guys’s test I think it would stand up to anything. I found these videos a little educational and a bit entertaining.

Remember, the Good Book says, “David said moreover, The LORD that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.”