David P – Yikes man! That freaks me out a bit just looking at the pic.

http://lh5.ggpht.com/_F3X4vpr0oTc/SkNZ6scPqHI/AAAAAAAAASg/vyHlwBGKZlc/s800/7%20Bear%201%20he%20sees%20the%20food.jpg

This was our second encounter of the day. Earlier he had chased us away from our lunch in a clearing. He followed us to camp later, ate our supper and then tried for the ‘bear bags’. He didn’t get them, but I heard that he was later shot after harrassing a number of other groups.

A perfect example of what happens when bears get a taste for human food and why campers need to be responsible with food and trash.

The police were trying to get the crowd to leave the moose alone and leave the area so that the moose would come out and they could tranquilize it, but they wanted to keep gawking at it for some reason. (Personally, I have no interest in being near a moose during rutting season.)

The cops eventually pulled out a shotgun and killed it since the people wouldn’t go away. There were some great letters to the editor the next morning from people who were horrified by what happened and instead wanted the cops to have tranquilized it instead; apparently they thought that having it drown to death was a better way to go than getting shot. That they might listen to the police and leave it alone long enough to wander out of the water where it could be knocked out without killing it never seemed to enter their minds.

At least the folks at the soup kitchens had plenty to eat for a week or two.