Morality is not determined by the church you attend nor the faith you embrace. It is determined by the quality of your character and the positive impact you have on those you meet along your journey
Eleven-year-old Zach Landis will never forget the sound of a black bear bursting through the double-paned window of his bedroom late Monday.Zach said he shot upright when he woke to the crash. He saw a figure the size of a grown man in his room. In the darkness and clamor, he struggled to make out what was near the foot of his bed. He watched it scratch at the walls and climb back through the window from which it entered before he could let out a scream and figure out what he had just witnessed — a bear crashing in and out of his garden-level bedroom.
The boy ran so fast from his room that he slipped twice on his way upstairs. His parents, Alisa and Jon Landis, were asleep when their alarmed son woke them.
"I said, 'Mom, Dad, there's a bear in my room,' " Zach recalled.
"My first reaction was, 'You must be having a bad dream,' " said his mother. The story seemed implausible.
Well in fact it was plausible, a black bear DID in fact perpetrate a home invasion into Zach's room.
Now there have been a few stories like this up here in Alaska over the years, though they are quite rare, but this one comes on the heels of two bear fatalities, and a number of attacks.
And this is especially concerning since the Landis family lives literally just up the road from my house, and guess who has a sliding glass door leading to the backyard from their bedroom.
Now look I have started taking all of the appropriate precautions when hiking in the national park near my house.
I walk on open, well traveled trails only.
I make sure to hike with a partner.
I make lots of noise while hiking.
And I keep an eye out for any sign of bear activity near the trails.
However I am in no way prepared for a bear actually jumping through my window in the middle of the night.
I mean sure I do have a samurai sward near the bed, but somehow I do not feel that is adequate.
So I think we should establish some damn rules with our ursine neighbors.
I will not get between you and your cubs, or disturb you while you are eating a tourist, if you will stay the hell out of our bedrooms at night.
So Dennis has been working on this rather incredible website for awhile now and late last night he decided to launch it publicly.
It is called Alaska Trekker, and it is chock full of interesting facts, amazing original photos and video of the Alaska outdoors, and even information on travel to and within the state.
Dennis did this purely out of frustration that there wasn't already a page that had all of the things that people are looking for when they are thinking of making a visit to our fair state.
Personally I am just happy that now people will get to see some of the amazing pictures that Dennis has been sharing with me for years. The guy is really good!
Anyhow if you have a moment head on over and leave a comment. I know he will appreciate it.
Courtesy of KTUU:
Michael Glidden was wandering the ice-blue remains of a glacier in the Chugach National Forest Saturday when he spotted one particularly, deep, dark tunnel, he says.
The Anchorage retiree and his two American Eskimo Dogs, Shasta and Aspen, ventured inside. Temperatures had dipped to 29 degrees along the riverbeds outside.
It wasn’t until he got home and began posting pictures online that
Glidden noticed an unusual shape, hidden in the shadows, had been there
in the cave with him all long.
The photo was cloudy but the claws gave the animal away.
Good thing that bears are heavy sleepers this time of year.
Alaska, where you are constantly only yards away from something that could definitely kill you.
A new CNN poll reveals that one in three Americans agree with my call for President Obama’s impeachment. That’s a huge number – especially considering how misconstrued the issue is when relying on media to explain impeachment. Let’s go around the media filters and acknowledge this ourselves: many Americans haven’t heard what impeachable offenses really are; but when they do, more citizens will rise up to hold their government accountable. (Actually most Americans already know that the President has not done anything worthy of impeachment, just like the Republicans in Congress realize that pushing the issue would destroy their party in the upcoming elections. As for the CNN poll? Well there's a reason we call them "Fox light." And even a Fox poll only showed that 36% of respondents favored impeachment.) On the heels of this new poll, The Hill reports that the Obama White House is now taking talk of impeachment very seriously. They can’t poo-poo this as liberal followers want them to because they know they’ve done wrong. (No, they don't. Because they haven't.) The article states, “Dan Pfeiffer, a senior advisor to Obama, said Friday that the White House is taking the prospect of impeachment in the GOP-controlled House more seriously than many others in Washington, who see it as unlikely.” Pfeiffer then noted that a large block of the conservative base favors impeachment. (I truly think that Pfeiffer is trolling the Republicans here, and attempting to bait them into making the attempt to impeach Obama because he knows that is our best bet for holding the majority in the Senate, and possibly capturing it in the House.)
Okay everybody's favorite outlet for batshit crazy goes on, and on, and on about impeachment, tries to tie it to the current "immigration crisis," and pimps that CNN poll like Todd Palin with a bevy of beauties at an oil executive retreat.
But I have no intention of posting the whole thing and then picking it apart on such a beautiful Sunday afternoon.
Especially since I just returned from hiking on one of my favorite trails, and came inches from stepping in a pile of steaming hot bear scat, which as you may imagine convinced me to take an alternate route in order to avoid becoming the ingredients in the next pile of steaming hot bear scat.
(I mean seriously, could you imagine the irony if I were to end up being mauled by a mother grizzly protecting her young in Alaska? That would be a bit much to take, even for me.)
However I will say this.
If Palin is so impressed with a poll that suggests only one third of the country supports impeaching Obama (By the way the headline for the CNN article about the poll is "Majority say no to impeachment and lawsuit."), then how does she feel about the Wall Street Journal poll which says that a full 52% of Americans would like her to shut the fuck up?
Now THAT is a poll in which the numbers are guaranteed to grow as time goes on.
I had a teacher in high school whose job it was to wrangle bears on the North Slope.
He was not allowed to carry a gun, and had to resort to firecrackers and a broom to chase the inquisitive creatures away.
Once he saw a truck by the side of the road with a bunch of yellow stuff piled beside one broken window.
When he approached and knelt down he realized that was the stuffing from inside the seat cushions.
He said that he had a moment of terrible realization and stood up only to come face to face with a huge black bear that had manged to break the window and squeeze itself into the small opening in order to dig for the sack lunch the owner had stored under his seat.
He said they both panicked and he fell back onto the ground while the bear somehow turned itself around in the cab and smashed through the other previously unbroken window to get away.
I have never left food in my car while camping since.
Bears that wake up hungry after a long winter’s nap aren’t as big a problem in Fairbanks as they are in other bear-infested cities like Anchorage and Juneau but state wildlife officials say it’s still a good idea for Interior residents to do some spring cleaning around their homes to dissuade any ursine intruders.
“We haven’t had as many problems in Fairbanks as Anchorage,” Alaska Department of Fish and Game spokeswoman Cathie Harms said of Alaska’s largest city 360 miles to the south, where it’s not uncommon for bears to be shot each spring for getting into garbage, tearing down bird feeders or ravaging neighborhood chicken coops.
“With that many bears in urban areas and bird feeders being such an attractant it’s a pretty big deal,” she said.
The department issued a press release on Tuesday noting that Gov. Sean Parnell has declared April “Bear Awareness Month” and reminding Alaska residents to take down bird feeders, clean up garbage, and store pet and livestock foods indoors or in bear-resistant containers. The release “was written from an Anchorage perspective” but applies to the Fairbanks area, too, said Harms.
As a lifelong Alaskan living in Anchorage, I have a few hard and fast rules in the spring.
Ouch! Well you've bot us there. Yes she is indeed a crazy thing.
But at least we know and these days never stop mocking her.
There are of course twenty more examples at the Buzzfeed link, but I really don't think any of them are all THAT crazy. You know with the exception of Snowdrift Snooki of course.
There is no end to the stories of anglers in Alaska being chased away from fishing spots, often sacrificing their scaly booty in the process.
However years ago I met a young man who did not recognize his place on the food chain and he decided to fight back, literally.
As the bear was approaching he kept reeling in his catch, which he described as the most beautiful Silver Salmon he had ever seen. The bear arrived on the scene just as the fish arrived onshore, and he started to lunge for it. My friend used his pole to pull the fish to him, and the bear followed the fish right up to where he caught it with his hand.
In a moment of pure adrenaline, and not an ounce of common sense, my friend punched the medium size black bear in the head, assuming, incorrectly, that it would back off.
Instead the bear reared up its hind legs and knocked the young man on his ass. Then the bear gave a final huff, and walked off with his prize towing my friend's favorite fishing pole behind him.
My friend used to be invited to schools, business conventions, and child care centers to tell that story. After telling it he would show them the scar on his left temple and remind the audience that NO fish is worth taking on a bear.
I once asked him what he would have done if the bear had been a Grizzly, and he said "I would have crapped myself and given him every fish I caught that day."
And THAT, by the way, is the appropriate response in my opinion.
A man was mauled by a bear near the Eklutna Lake Campground on Saturday after he threw barbecued meat at the animal, the Alaska State Troopers said Sunday.
The man was at the lake, north of Anchorage, for a church picnic, said Alaska State Troopers spokeswoman Beth Ipsen.
Sometime around 5 p.m. on Saturday he broke off from the picnic and decided to go for a bike ride, bringing some food from the barbecue along.
He came across a black bear somewhere between a campground fee station and an ice cream stand near the park, Ipsen said.
The man threw a piece of meat at the bear, which ate it, she said. Then he offered another piece, she said.
“That’s when it kind of went ballistic,” she said.
I am going to add this next part even though most of you re probably way ahead of me.
"He'd been drinking."
Yeah no shit!
I swear some people are too stupid to live here!
Look if you re planning to visit Alaska, here are some things to keep in mind.
EVERYTHING up here wants to kill you.
The mudflats around Anchorage can and will kill you.
The rivers and lakes can and will kill you,.
The weather can and will kill you.
Bears can and will kill you.
Our moose can and will kill you.
And yes, if there are enough of them, even our mosquitoes can and will kill you.
But if you are smart and check out the visitor's guide and make some basic common sense choices you will have a great time.
Trust me, if a panty waist like Sarah Palin can survive here, so can you.
P.S By the way I am supposed to go camping at Eklutna some time this week.
I have decided to leave the barbecue sauce at home, because apparently bears HATE that crap!
The teenage outdoor education students, having progressed to the point of being on their own in the vast Alaska wilderness, were lined up single file for a river crossing when the grizzly burst with fury into the front of the line, badly mauling two in the group and injuring two more.
Those in the front screamed of the bear's presence. The bear was with her cub when she attacked, according to Alaska State Troopers.
The teens were in a group of seven participating in a 30-day backcountry course conducted by the National Outdoor Leadership School when the attack occurred Saturday night in the Talkeetna Mountains north of Anchorage. They were rescued early Sunday after activating their emergency locator beacon and tending to their most seriously wounded.
Those in the back of the line heard the warning, with the two at the front of the line taking the brunt of the attack, trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters said.
Another group of seven students and three instructors was waiting about six miles away for a helicopter hired by the Lander, Wyo.-based NOLS, said Bruce Palmer, a spokesman for the organization, which leads many such excursions in Alaska and elsewhere.
Palmer said the worst injured with bear bite wounds are 17-year-old Joshua Berg of New City, N.Y., and 17-year-old Samuel Gottsegen of Denver. They were being treated at Providence Alaska Medical Center in Anchorage. Hospital spokeswoman Crystal Bailey said both are listed in serious condition after troopers earlier said the injuries were life-threatening.
When the bear broke off the attack, the teens activated a personal locator beacon they carried to be used only for an emergency, Peters said.
The Rescue Coordination Center operated by the Alaska Air National Guard called troopers around 9:30 p.m. to report the activated signal. A trooper and pilot in a helicopter located the students in a tent shortly before 3 a.m., but decided the two most seriously injured would need a medical transport aircraft with a medically trained crew.
There are basic rules that Alaskans learn to follow when going into areas that have bears:
Make lots of noise to give plenty of warning of your approach. I don't see how seven teenagers stomping through the woods could NOT have made a tremendousamount of noise,
Avoid deep brush so as not to surprise or crowd the bear. These young men were crossing a river, which you would imagine would provide a plenty of visibility to allow both the bear and the teens to see each other and take evasive measures.
There is safety in numbers. Seven is a fairly substantial group, but in this case not substantial enough.
Bears are unpredictable, especially mothers with their cubs. I believe that THIS last guideline made the others superfluous.
These unfortunate young men came upon perhaps the single most dangerous situation one could encounter in the wilds of Alaska, and that is a bear with cubs to protect.
From the description of the incident one would assume the bear had plenty of time to take her cub and flee the scene, but for some reason chose to attack instead. Even though it sounds like the teens were doing everything right.
Calling out to alert bears of human presence and give nearby animals a chance to flee is among the skills learned in the course.
"The students say they were" doing that, Palmer said.
I sometimes get a little attitude from the friends and family that I take out on hikes in the wooded areas round the city, for being overly cautious about wearing layers, bringing liquids, making lots of noise, and keeping to the paths while hiking in areas with limited visibility. But I always remind them that even only minutes away from our homes we are STILL deep in Alaska, and that Alaska is not aware that it has been civilized.
We have had quite a number of attacks in and around Anchorage, but you always tell yourself that if you follow the bear safety rules you should be okay. I think this incident with these young men is a reminder that even doing everything right, ultimately offers only minimal protection in a place as wild and unpredictable as Alaska.
John Toppenberg, director of the Alaska Wildlife Alliance, said scenes in an online trailer for the programme appeared to show the former Republican vice-presidential candidate breaking the rules of Wolverine Creek, a famous spot where bears – and humans – come to fish. "It's clear from the video that she violated the guidelines," he said, calling her actions "a travesty".
In a preview of Sarah Palin's Alaska, a part nature documentary, part candid camera of the daily life of one of America's most controversial political families, the former state governor is seen fishing for salmon with husband Todd and family members. She can be seen apparently holding her rod towards brown bears on the river bank, while the party's boat appears to be closer to the bears than guidelines advise. The Alaska department of fish and game says people in a boat must not fish within 30ft of a bear. "It's clearly irresponsible," said Toppenberg. "She is encouraging the violation of important guidelines. Humans can get too close to the bears."
The irony of a right-wing conservative, who boasts of hunting moose and shooting wolves while campaigning for more oil drilling in Alaska, transforming herself into a nature fan for primetime has not been lost on environmentalists.
Large brown bears gather in Wolverine Creek because the fishing is so easy and the animals have, in the process, become a tourist spectacle. But Toppenberg warned that by behaving in an apparently irreverent manner, Palin was doing nothing to foster responsibility among visitors. "She is encouraging the violation of important guidelines that allows tourism to flourish in Alaska. She is inviting future problems with the tourism industry and, in particular, the bear-viewing industry," he said.
This may seem like a minor infraction to people living outside of Alaska, but up here we take the guidelines about the proper way to behave around bears very seriously.
Remember millions of people will be watching this ridiculous program and assuming that the ex-Governor of the state, and a person who self identifies as a "Mama Grizzly", would know the proper way to behave around these potentially dangerous animals. If even a dozen or more people from the lower forty-eight come up here believing they can interact with the animals in the way that Palin does on television, we could have some very, very dead tourists.
We have seen just how deadly the failure to give these animals proper respect has been to even those who believe they know better.
Even when people know what to do the animals can be extremely aggressive and unpredictable.
And even those of us who feel relatively safe from bear attacks living in Anchorage have had some very rude awakenings in the last few years.
As an Alaskan I have been stunned, and horrified, at how Palin is misrepresenting our state and how to behave in the wilderness. From standing up in a boat that might have to beat a hasty retreat, to approaching feeding bears, to the proper way to handle a firearm, the show is one giant steaming pile of mooseshit.
As our Governor, and then as a VP candidate, Sarah Palin has been embarrassing Alaskans, and forcing us to correct misinformation, for almost three years now. Sadly it looks like she has no plans to stop anytime soon. I just hope that the foolish example she is setting does not get anybody killed.
Vandergaw, who for 20 years lured, fed and coexisted with black and grizzly bears at his remote Yentna River cabin, pleaded guilty last week to the misdemeanor charges. District Court Judge John Wolfe accepted a plea deal that Vandergaw, 71, hammered out with prosecutors that included 180 days of suspended jail time, the fine and three years probation. Before he was sentenced in the Palmer courtroom, Vandergaw told the judge he tries not to be a bad person. The conflict over "Bear Haven," as his property is called, has taken a toll on his family and he wishes he hadn't involved so many other people, he said.
Vandergaw was known for living in close interaction with the bears, which roamed his property and often entered his home. Photographs show him and visitors playing with and petting the animals.
"I've had a storybook existence," Vandergaw said. "I've had a chance to live in a different environment. I never looked at myself as a person who could go out and take a piece of land and then deny the creatures the right to be there."
Great day w/bear management wildlife biologists; much to see in wild territory incl amazing creatures w/mama bears' gutteral raw instinct to16 minutes ago from TwitterBerry
(Wait why did she stop halfway through her thought? "Gutteral raw instinct to....what?" Oh wait it continues again down below.)
protect & provide for her young;She sees danger?She brazenly rises up on strong hind legs, growls Don't Touch My Cubs & the species survives13 minutes ago from TwitterBerry
(You probably did not catch it because it was done with such subtlety, but I do believe that this is Governor Sarah's sly way of comparing her defensiveness about her family to a mama bears aggressive disembowelment of anybody stupid enough to even try to take a picture of her precious cubs. But I digress, why don't we allow the Governor to finally finish tweeting her thoughts.)
& mama bear doesn't look 2 anyone else 2 hand her anything; biologists say she works harder than males, is provider/protector for the future10 minutes ago from TwitterBerry
(Brilliant! Sarah has masterfully made the point that she is completely self reliant like the majestic mother bear that she seems to admire so very, very much. Well except for the hired nanny who took care of little Trig on the campaign trail, you know when one of the girls was not saddled with the responsibility. And besides the per diem she charged the state while she was staying in her own house. And I am not so sure how "mama bear like" it is to constantly blame everybody else for mistakes that YOU made. But hey other than that Sarah Palin is EXACTLY like a mama bear! For example, and I did not want to reveal this earlier, but I have it on good authority that Sarah Palin does indeed shit in the woods.)
I wonder if Palin is planning to tweet her new book? I mean who needs a stupid ghost writer when you have so much practice typing clear and concise messages such as these?
(If you want to have more fun with Palin tweets then go read Maureen Dowds imagining of a twittered conversation between Governor Bat-Shit and John "You know I was tortured in Nam" McCain.)
After 20 years of enticing bears into a remote compound tucked away in a little visited corner of the Yentna River valley, retired Anchorage school teacher Charlie Vandergaw said last fall he was ready to end his bear-taming shenanigans.
Filmmaker Richard Terry, the man to whom Vandergaw made the statement, didn't know whether to believe it.
Now skeptical state officials have taken action to make sure it happens. They have charged the 70-year-old Vandergaw with 20 counts of illegally feeding game. Also charged were two friends accused of assisting him.
The criminal misdemeanor charges, filed by the state Department of Law on Friday in Palmer, cover bear feedings from May 10 to Sept. 19 last year at "Bear Haven," Vandergaw's remote summer home north of the community of Alexander Creek.
Charging documents, however, note the bear feeding there has been going on for far longer than a year. In interviews with Alaska State Troopers last fall, those documents say, "Vandergaw acknowledged that he was feeding the bears at his cabin and stated that he couldn't immediately stop. Vandergaw admitted to feeding the bears for the past 20 years."
By this time most years, Vandergaw would again be out at Bear Haven putting out dog food for the bears that are like family to him, but not this year. The state seized his single-engine Bush plane after serving the search warrants in September. They have been holding it ever since, making travel to the compound more difficult and costly for Vandergaw.
And among the charges filed Friday was a warning shot for anyone who might choose to help Vandergaw with his bears.
Those of you who are frequent visitors to this blog probably already know that Charlie Vandergaw was my high school science teacher. I have written about him and his "Bear Haven" several times in the past, and have often struggled to decide exactly where I come down on his dangerous experiment.
However lately I have called for Mr. Vandergaw to please put a stop to his Club Med for bears because I fear for his safety. At 70 years of age his reflexes are not once they once were.
If Mr. Vandergaw were to be injured or killed by these bears that he loves so much he would undue all of the work he has done over these last 20 years to show them to be fascinating creatures, with complex personalities, instead of simply voracious killing machines. I know it would break Charlie's heart to leave that as his legacy.
Because I know Charlie Vandergaw I am very drawn to this particular story, since in many ways it fits so well with the personality of the man whose class I attended over 30 years ago.
The other reason that I find myself so interested in his work is that it is so fundamentally an "Alaskan" story.
Before the pipeline days this place was filled with the kind of no nonsense, make it up as you go along, freethinkers that thought nothing of going out into the wilds of Alaska for weeks at a time just to experience some new adventure. Charlie Vandergaw seems like one of the last examples of that very rugged, individualistic type of Alaskan.
Charlie was not content to simply have us sit quietly in his class jotting down notes while he lectured to us about the periodic table of elements. No he wanted us gathered around the Bunsen burners combining exotic chemicals, or interacting with electricity and testing how the human body worked as a conductor. (Of course we were kids so we spent much of the time shocking the crap out of each other, but we definitely learned to respect the power of electricity.)
Mr. Vandergaw was just one of the amazing, eclectic teachers who helped shape my own somewhat singular personalty. I can definitely trace my lifelong love of learning to these amazing educators, and I owe Mr. Vandergaw and his peers a huge debt of gratitude.
So once again I implore Mr. Vandergaw to simply walk away from his "experiment" and let these bears acclimate back to the life they were born to live.
Here is an excerpt from the documentary "The Man who Lives with Bears".
The National Parks Service has complained that a new program under which state workers will shoot wolves from helicopters in the Upper Yukon/Tanana region.
"We’re concerned that it would be difficult and potentially not possible for us to follow our mandates based on the state’s action in the control area," Greg Dudgeon, the superintendent of hte Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve, told me just now.
Federal officials are worried there are "fewer wolves than what [the state] believes," he said.
A Fish & Game Department spokeswoman told the local AP that the hunting is necessary to keep Caribou herds growing, and that there's no other way to keep the wolf population in check."It's a very large area and it's become apparent it's going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to reach those numbers with just [private hunting parties]," she said. "Helicopters are much more efficient."
I am definitely on the side of the Federal Government in this debate.
Those of us in Alaska are painfully aware that the the board of Fish and Game up here is completely controlled by hunters. And that what they call "predator control" is really just their attempt to keep wolves and bears from killing the animals that THEY want to kill. And if they can't kill moose, caribou, and Dall sheep like they want then they will just settle for getting a crack at killing more wolves and bears. Because it is not about feeding their families, it is about making them feel like men.
And when you have people with a blood lust deciding what should and should not die, well you get ideas like gassing wolf cubs in their dens, and using automatic weapons to kill entire wolf packs. And that is just fucking barbaric!
It is obvious that we need clearer heads to enter into this debate, and I hope the National Park Service will assume that role.
Just click the title and take a look at AKM's post on Sarah Palin and her vendetta against animals. Yes cute, cuddly, Alaskan animals. I knew you would be upset.
It is almost worth reading the post for the great graphic of Governor Sarah as a the Wicked Witch of the West alone. Too funny!
Anchorage residents love their creeks, their salmon and their bears, until they start to run a little too wild.The bears, in particular, ran wild this summer.
Three people were mauled by grizzlies. A handful more were chased. One bear was shot because she and her cubs had become habitual threats to humans, a whole bunch of whom were so frightened they abandoned Far North Bicentennial Park.
The Anchorage Waterways Council on Friday night pulled together some experts on bears, fish and creeks, to discuss what to do.
"Obviously, bears have been a hot topic, a highly contentious topic," said Sean Farley, a bear researcher with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. "We have some social decisions that need to be made."
The problem, as speakers quickly made clear to the standing-room-only crowd, is that those social decisions are tangled up in some sort of Gordian knot.
Almost everyone, and most especially the Waterways Council, wants to see Anchorage creeks filled with salmon. Along with being a sign that the creeks are healthy, the salmon, as Council executive director Holly Kent pointed out, nourish ecosystems with marine nutrients. All kinds of critters benefit.
Unfortunately, grizzly bears - which can be a threat to humans - are among those critters. Anchorage each summer hosts close to a couple dozen, if not more.
"They're not really a wilderness species like we once thought," Farley said; they are simply a hungry species.
Anchorage is uncharted territory here. There are no other major cities dealing with grizzly bears regularly roaming popular trails so close to so many people.
"Anchorage, as far as I can tell, is a unique city in this regard," Farley said.
I know this may seem a little off topic for this blog, but the Grizzly bear issue last summer essentially pushed every other issue in Anchorage to the back of our minds. It was that bad.
For the first time in ten years I did not go to my favorite hiking trials, and kept the kids close to the house or in the house at all times.
Like many residents of Anchorage I live right on the edge of a wilderness area and there have always been numerous bear sightings all around my house.
I was born in Anchorage, and have always been very aware that we share our city with a virtual menagerie of exotic creatures, but the Grizzly situation has never been as dire as it was last year. Most encounters are peaceful, with a few hikers or bikers receiving a bluff charge by a sow now and then and that being about the most frightening interaction. But last year there were three maulings in and around the Anchorage area.
As much as I love living in such a beautiful untamed area, I also do not relish being a prisoner in my own house. And if the bear situation continues to worsen then that may be exactly how many people in the city will feel.
I also do not relish the idea of more bear hunting close to my city. (We have enough domestic shootings already.) However I agree that something absolutely must be done.
Summer will be here soon and I understand that weather experts predict a very nice one indeed. I am planning to hit the trails and I don't want to have to worry about serving as a chew toy for an 800 pound carnivore. I am sorry if that sounds selfish, but I prefer my ass cheeks "un-chewed".
