Ursus Versus

I think that delectable chicken I put out last night for the fox may have attracted a bear instead. This is what I found today just west of the deck:

It is bigger than it looks here.  I should have put something, besides that leaf, next to it for perspective.  I looked up bear scat on line and this is what I found on www.bear-tracker.com.  About the right size and shape.  

 
According to the North Woods Field Guides site:  "Black Bears are omnivorous, their diet consists of animals, nuts, berries, grasses, insects and aquatic life. Evidence of these will show in their scat. Often times bear scat may contain partially undigested parts of only one food source. Their droppings are one of the largest being 1 to 2 inches in diameter."


I don't see any berries in this scat out in the yard and there are still rose hips on the wild rose bushes, so maybe this is just dog or wolverine?

 

Photo by Filip Tkaczyk found on Alderleaf Wilderness College site

According to the Alderleaf Wilderness College website, wolverine scat is:  Cylindrical, 3/8 – 1 inch in diameter and 3 – 8 inches long. The scat can contain bones, fur and feathers.

The size and shape seem right, but I don't see any bones, fur or feathers, either.  So maybe I'm just blogging about dog feces! 

We do have black bears here, though.  I saw one once when we were vacationing here when I was a child and I've heard other villagers say they've seen them.  I thought maybe it had been so warm the bears were coming out of hibernation. 

 

Photo from Colorado Division of Wildlife website

According to http://wiki.answers.com:  "Bears hibernate during winter, but aren't sleeping the whole time. Hibernation for bears simply means they don't need to eat or drink, and rarely urinate or defecate (or not at all).  [Oops!  Comment mine]. There is strong evolutionary pressure for bears to stay in their dens during winter, if there is little or no food available [Italics mine.  What if here is food available?]. But bears will leave their dens on occasion, particularly when their den gets flooded or is badly damaged. [Or they smell chicken!  Comment mine.].

"Weather does play a role. In the colder, northern parts of Alaska, bears hibernate about 7 months of the year. Bears in the warmer, coastal regions of the state hibernate for 2-5 months, with the longer hibernation time for bears raising newborn cubs."  [If you'd been asleep and hadn't eaten anything for two months and you smelled chicken, wouldn't you get up and investigate?].

I also read that I'm supposed to be working to keep bears wild and shouldn't be putting out food, but it makes me feel good to do it. 

If this is the same animal that visited early last fall, it is driven wild by chicken.  I had purchased one of those broasted chickens at Wal-Mart.  At the recommendation of the "chicken lady," who said they had some really special garlic chickens coming out in fifteen minutes and they would be on special, I waited.  By the time I drove from Longmont, the car smelled like one big baked garlic bulb.  I put the chicken inside a cooler, inside the woodshed.  In the night, something strong and determined kept trying to get into the woodshed.  First it would pull at the door on the west side, then it would run around and pull repeatedly at the access my Dad had built on the east side.  I was really curious and got up and shone the flashlight out first the north window, then the east window, then the north window as it ran back and forth, but I couldn't see anything.  I didn't have courage to go outside, and it finally gave up and left.  

That's about as wild as life gets here.  What's your idea of wildlife?  Teddee