I give up

No, seriously, I never give up. I can't find where to post a pic. Like an artistic eye I probably don't have, but,
Art? Forum? Ahhh, cannabutter...
This is a birdbath in a glass bowl with harmony stones inside. I love coming out on a late summer morning and flocks of birds take flight. They clean up insects great.
The other pics, I, uh, found on the innernet

PioneerValleyOG said:

No, seriously, I never give up. I can't find where to post a pic. Like an artistic eye I probably don't have, but,
Art? Forum? Ahhh, cannabutter...View attachment 5153566View attachment 5153567
This is a birdbath in a glass bowl with harmony stones inside. I love coming out on a late summer morning and flocks of birds take flight. They clean up insects great.
The other pics, I, uh, found on the innernet

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, they also poop on your plants . Ask me how I know. Just be ready to bud wash your plants at harvest, which you should be doing to outdoor plants anyway in my opinion, and you'll be good. I have multiple feeders on my deck and love the activity and songs. Just not the bears that come with them if I forget to bring them in at night. Great organic pest control too as you said, get a bat house and you're going to really see a decrease in the bugs around if you can attract a colony. I love my little bat army, they're mosquito and gnat assassin's.

FirstCavApache64 said:

Unfortunately, they also poop on your plants . Ask me how I know. Just be ready to bud wash your plants at harvest, which you should be doing to outdoor plants anyway in my opinion, and you'll be good. I have multiple feeders on my deck and love the activity and songs. Just not the bears that come with them if I forget to bring them in at night. Great organic pest control too as you said, get a bat house and you're going to really see a decrease in the bugs around if you can attract a colony. I love my little bat army, they're mosquito and gnat assassin's.

Click to expand...

Yes I have a bat house too. I'm aware of the bears, definitely. That's why the water, not food, lol. They've shotgun blasted a feeder or two. Note: yellow sticky pads

I lost one two weeks ago because I left them out. My motion sensors were going nuts and I was in the back room and ignored them until I heard the crash. Ran up front just in time to hear him crashing down into the woods. I put up some more deterrent measures and try not to leave them out again but life happens lol. We have wine berries and black berries all over our property and are right on the Blue Ridge Mountains so bears are a common thing. I just don't like them on the deck or porch, that's where the line gets drawn. The yard is fine and we can be friends but the front door is a little close for a 400 pounder.

FirstCavApache64 said:

I lost one two weeks ago because I left them out. My motion sensors were going nuts and I was in the back room and ignored them until I heard the crash. Ran up front just in time to hear him crashing down into the woods. I put up some more deterrent measures and try not to leave them out again but life happens lol. We have wine berries and black berries all over our property and are right on the Blue Ridge Mountains so bears are a common thing. I just don't like them on the deck or porch, that's where the line gets drawn. The yard is fine and we can be friends but the front door is a little close for a 400 pounder.

Click to expand...

Firecrackers work great. They use shotgun shells on a timer in the berry fields around here. They decimate the corn to the chagrin of farmers. Bear population in Mass is out of control. If they don't introduce measures to cull them, I believe the rate is like 6-7%, basically 500 new bears a year in a small state with over 5000. Won't be long before people start getting hurt.

Oh we get along pretty well. I've lived up in the mountains for a long time and the worst they've done is tear the doors off my sheds. That one was really bad and the game Warden issued me a kill permit because he was really aggressive and kept coming back but once I had the permit it dissapeared. It's like he knew the gig was up. I usually get a little visit once a week but I have motion sensors everywhere and security cameras and I have really bad insomnia so I'm usually up at night when they show up. I'll just go yell at them and most will haul ass and not come back. The problem bears get rubber buckshot in the butt and they don't come back. We had a really bad problem with them being sick last year from mange which was sad and a lot of them had to be put down as there's no cure and it's really contagious. I had a bunch on camera that were bald and skinny as hell. Really sad.

I talked to the Game Warden and they tried trapping them and treating them for mange and then releasing them in a fairly good sized study with the State bear biologist, yes their is such a guy and he's really a good dude, and they all were sick again very soon after. It's a horrible illness and they waste away from malnutrition after a long period of time. Trapping them and euthanasia is the only decent thing to do unfortunately. They get dangerous at the end when they're starving and sick. My area had 3 just in one year that I had on camera. The biologist said my county had seen 27 cases by the summer last year. Over population and idiots feeding them, which brings them closer in together to come in contact with the virus, spreads it. Don't feed the wild critters folks.

Mommy???

Wife's coming home after 10 day cruise. Sounds like you've got quite the paradise. Sad about the bears. Question, if there was a big mange issue, why wouldn't you just put the bears down the minute you saw <a sick> one?

PioneerValleyOG said:

View attachment 5154689

Wife's coming home after 10 day cruise. Sounds like you've got quite the paradise. Sad about the bears. Question, if there was a big mange issue, why wouldn't you just put the bears down the minute you saw <a sick> one?

Click to expand...

Game wardens wouldn't allow us to. I asked for permission as it seemed like the humane thing to do but was denied it by the local warden. He was worried about people shooting healthy bears I think. I was working with the State bear biologist and we trapped the 3 worst ones I had around me that year and they were put down. Those pics are not fit for publishing. They are bald and you can see the ribs on them. It was so sad. I haven't seen any this year with it yet so I'm hopeful it has been eliminated or at least knocked down for now in my area as I've been seeing plenty of bears including a mom with 3 babies. I cut down a tree on my property even they used to use to rub on and scent mark because I was worried it was so infected and burned it with my neighbors help. They all would scratch their backs and rub on it to relieve the itching I guess and they had worn the bark off it. Looked like a really heavy deer rub if you know what that looks like but much bigger.

FirstCavApache64 said:

Game wardens wouldn't allow us to. I asked for permission as it seemed like the humane thing to do but was denied it by the local warden. He was worried about people shooting healthy bears I think. I was working with the State bear biologist and we trapped the 3 worst ones I had around me that year and they were put down. Those pics are not fit for publishing. They are bald and you can see the ribs on them. It was so sad. I haven't seen any this year with it yet so I'm hopeful it has been eliminated or at least knocked down for now in my area as I've been seeing plenty of bears including a mom with 3 babies. I cut down a tree on my property even they used to use to rub on and scent mark because I was worried it was so infected and burned it with my neighbors help. They all would scratch their backs and rub on it to relieve the itching I guess and they had worn the bark off it. Looked like a really heavy deer rub if you know what that looks like but much bigger.

Click to expand...

Ya, I've seen a deer rub or two. I wonder if the bears were getting mange /disease from the ticks? They started calling them Ghost Moose up in Maine when they started rubbing the fur right off their hides, to the hides... <https://www.nationalgeographic.com/...moose-animals-science-new-england-environment>
If I may ask, what geographic state or area your in?
Bears are very earthy, stinky, buggy, kind of nasty critters. I was hunting a spot I'd harvested a deer a few days earlier, climbed up a rocky steep hill and was hiding in the rocks when a bear came rolling in. He stood up like a man about 30 yards from me down in the gully. He was looking up the gully, working his nose, but my scent free regiment and the correct wind, there was no way to wind me. He sniffed around, and suddenly ran up the hill I was on and was 20 feet to my right. Couldn't see me in full camo.
Wasn't me he was real interested in. He ran down and pawed under a log, pulling out that deers gut pile, he'd stuffed a long, gucky chunk under it, with his treasure trailing like the length of his body, he romped off to eat that nasty shit. I got some good video of him. He was around me it seemed like an hour, but was more like 10-15 minutes.
Doesn't seem right they don't let you put down a sick animal that's suffering. I come across one in the woods, whatever it is, sick and suffering I'd like to think I'd put it down, warden be damned. However, I wouldn't risk my house, land, nor freedom for it, you live there and obviously have a good relationship with the wardens, which is important.
On the other hand, they do know what they're doing, although at times it may not appear to make sense to me, gotta respect that.

I'm in VA and I'm sure he thought he was doing the right thing by not giving people permission to shoot the sick ones. There's a big problem with bear poaching for their gall bladders for the Asian black market and I'm guessing he might have been worried about people using it as an excuse to illegally harvest healthy bears to take gall bladders. That's just supposition on my part but it makes sense to me. The best thing is so far this season I haven't see any sick ones and I have at least 4 different bears hanging around on camera so hopefully they've done some good with all the culling from the last two years. I love having them around, keeps me on my toes.

FirstCavApache64 said:

I'm in VA and I'm sure he thought he was doing the right thing by not giving people permission to shoot the sick ones. There's a big problem with bear poaching for their gall bladders for the Asian black market and I'm guessing he might have been worried about people using it as an excuse to illegally harvest healthy bears to take gall bladders. That's just supposition on my part but it makes sense to me. The best thing is so far this season I haven't see any sick ones and I have at least 4 different bears hanging around on camera so hopefully they've done some good with all the culling from the last two years. I love having them around, keeps me on my toes.

Click to expand...

Oh yea, the gall bladder poachers. Loathe poachers.
Had an issue here with that close to me, I'm pretty close to both VT and NH borders, guys were baiting which is not legal here, and selling the glands and parts.. However, very soon they will have to introduce dogs and baiting, as the population is rapidly expanding.
I have the utmost respect for bears. It is the only animal that triggers a deep, uncontrollable fear that will put the hairs up on you before you even see them, and launch your body into immediate protection mode. Definitely put and keep you on your toes. They are fascinating creatures, the ghost of the forest. Can be so silent for their size. But it's their nose that's amazing too. The old Indian saying, "A pine needle falls in the forest, the Eagle saw it fall, the deer heard it fall,, the bear smelled it fall." Qnd their strength is insane. I found an old oak stump that had an anthill in it. A bear had ripped that oak stump up as if it were a cheese ball.
You're right about the wardens calling the right shots. Out here, hunting is a dying past time. Most of us left are extremely honest and follow the laws to a T. Would suck to lose the privilege of hunting.
I started a fb page, Hunting Western Mass, did a lot of videos, mostly during deer season, reporting field conditions and phases. Became a hunting activist, started petitions got thousands of signatures for hunting on Sundays in an attempt to revive hunting...
Did some work with Field & Stream and the Rut Report.
Damn, the cannabutter has kicked in and im babbling.
Beg pardon.