Saturday, April 30, 2011

Bears in Connecticut? Yes!

Just before dark an hour ago this bear came walking through the woods and past our front door! My husband, two sons and I were having dinner. I was the first one to see it. Everyone whipped out their phones. Of course the boys took videos. We went from window to window watching the bear. As you can see we don't have a lawn yet, having moved here in December. The only green plants here are the hosta plants that we bought today and set near our front walk (below). Yeah, I know they eat meat too. This bear was close! In the photo above it looks like there is a tag in his right ear. By the way, that's our driveway, not the road (above). I wish the focus was better, but I was a little excited, as you can imagine. We never saw a bear in CT before but I saw a bobcat here a while back. Yikes. Do you have any fearsome wild animals where you live?




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20 comments:

DianeY said...

No, thank heavens! I don't think the mongoose qualifies as fearful!

sallgood said...

Wow!! I'm in the Pacific Northwest, and ours is a wooded neighborhood,so we have lots of wildlife. I love seeing deer, racoon, squirrels, river otter, bobcat, coyote, bald eagle, blue heron, quail, hawk, owl,....but I really didn't like seeing the squirrel IN OUR HOUSE!!! (I haven't seen a bear here, but our quilt group was just talking about bear in a neighborhood close to us.)

WoolenSails said...

I haven't seen any in RI and hope I do not, lol.
We were out in the woods today and I kept thinking, if there was a bear or bobcat, this is where they would be;) I saw lots of big holes, so hate to think what was living in there, I am thinking fisher cats.

Debbie

Glen QuiltSwissy said...

Bears!! Wow! We have lots of different snakes, I just killed a copperhead in the yard last week. Ugh!!!!

We also have armadillos, opossums, lots of stupid squirrels and a gator ot two in the swampy parts!

Jan Maree said...

Man! Whilst it is exciting to see the bear on your driveway when you are all tucked up safe inside I am such a wimp I would never want to leave the house again! I will stick with our koalas I think!

Carla said...

Wow! Keep singing when you are working in the yard, from now on...they say sound scares them off! A bobcat sauntered by our deck last summer while my husband was sitting out there having a glass of tea after working in the yard. We have scary snakes too! At least, I think they are scary!

Tina Craig said...

I am terribly afraid of bears! I hope I never see one in our yard, but there has been one in our town in southern RI. Our friends had a birdfeeder demolished by the hungry bear last fall. We have lots of deer and two groundhogs. We used to have a fox family, but they moved away a few years ago. They had the cutest babies!

LN in TX said...

Wow, a bear! How cool!
We have deer, armadillos, roadrunners, squirrels, snakes, skunks, tarantulas, scorpions, and an occasional fox.

Nicky said...

We have fairly fearsome pheasants! Hee hee - well they make a lot of noise! Don't think I'd enjoy being a neighbour to the bear - but the feeling would probably be mutual!

Little Island Quilting said...

Does the mother-in-law count as a fearless animal? ;-)

Sylvia Reguero said...

That news story intersante, should be really exciting

June Calender said...

That's great -- a bear and a bobcat, and I pictured you in dull suburbia. Where I am I treasure the little squirrels, the shy possoms and even the noisy geese and crows that visit the law -- I hear there are coyotes but I've never seen one.

quiltingdiva07 said...

We have had reports of mountain lions in our area. My parents had one on their property. I've not seen one here, but I did see one early one morning while in Montana last fall.

Anya said...

We have lots of black bears here in north central PA. But don't worry, as long as you don't get in between a mama bear and her cubs, the bears are more afraid of you than you are of them. But if you have bird feeders, you may want to put them inside at night unless you want to see them destroyed by these guys!

Lisa Martin said...

Have you Bear Proofed you garbage YET?

Jo said...

And here I thought my grandkids were missing so much wildlife and such living in Colchester instead of out herein Oregon......be careful.

JoAnne in southern California said...

Coyotes, rattlesnakes and mountain lions, kind of creepy if you think about it. Lots of squirrels, rats and gophers, bunnies too but they're not scary, they sure do love to eat our lawn! That's southern California for you!

Elsa said...

only wild life I've seen here in Portland, OR are squirrels, raccoon and lots of birds. I'm sure out in the woods near here there are other sorts, but glad there's not any bears running around the neighborhood!

patty a. said...

Fearsome? Probably not, but I do have lots of deer (they wander thru the backyard and make the security light come on at night - I live in the city by a metro park in Ohio), racoons, skunks, owls, squirrels, grinneys (chipmunks), woodpeckers, pigeons and rabbits (the owls like them!), hawks, an eagle, blue heron, and various other birds. I saw a ground hog once in the backyard and almost hit a possum on the highway. I am sure there are bears somewhere in Ohio, but they are not in my neighborhood and that a good thing. Be safe with that bear hanging around.

Barb said...

While we were in Fla we did have gators (my friend had 3 in her yard last week) and we had bobcats as well. My closest encounter was with a Sandhill Crane. While that may not sound terrifying they stand about 4' tall and can be very intimidating when they are flapping their wings and screaming at you. Saw a video once of one backing an alligator down.