Bad Bear

I tell you, this bear is pushing it. This has been my worst year. I have cleaned up so much neighbor garbage out of my yard.

And now, not only is he disagreeable to photograph (which I respect because he really shouldn't be comfortable in my yard anyway) and a litterbug, but on Tuesday he took out a section of my fence. :|

Nim posing with damaged fence - Instagram Photo

He basically pulled the section down and stomped all over it. If there was any doubt in my mind that the bear did it - he left big palm prints in the fenced area.

Nim says he didn't do it.

The section he destroyed is not actually the section I have been watching:

For the past few weeks I have been going out it the morning and pulling this section of fencing back up, which is harder than you might think and the fence looks even trashier than before. As you can see, he was pretty hard on this area on Tuesday night as well. I wasn't positive it wasn't the elk with those dark bibs on their necks. I was finding black fur on the fence but no evidence of what a elk might be eating.

Unfortunately the plum tree deposits some of the plums within the fenced area and I don't always get them all cleaned out in time. I now can say it is definitely the bear doing this damage.

Nim stood watch in case a neighbor chicken perhaps wanted to jump into his mouth while I cut and stretched fence. The replacement fencing I used is thinner gauge which is unfortunate given a several hundred pound bear, but I can carry the roll myself and wrangle it and so that is the way it goes.

I also cut back all the salmon berry in that section as I suspect the bear used to leverage his approach (there is no salmon berry on the side he has been pulling on). I had been on yard work restriction due to a tight studying schedule, but I would really like to make it harder for him to take down the fence again.

No denying he is beautiful...