Wildlife in my back yard

One evening after dinner last May my husband and I got a big surprise when we saw this huge black bear in our yard!! He had torn open the suet feeder,had eaten it, he had ripped down another feeder and was busy eating the seed from that one.
We have had many bears in our yard since we've lived in this area but never one that size, he was enormous!! Normally the bears come around after dark.

In bear season we take the feeders in at night.

I had just started to use the new digital camera so focus is not that good!;-)

Yikes! I thought that the raccoons tearing up my bird feeders was bad!

One has to wonder, mscash70, about the eating of the suet. Did he/she eat it in one gulp, or savor it slowly one lick at a time? Marvelous backyard photo. Sorta sorry we don't see them in this neck of the woods.

Wow, that's some huge bear. So nice that you got a picture of it.
I've seen a cub, last Summer, who ran across the road, in front of me, when I was driving up the hill. Mom was certainly not very far.
I turned around to go warn a man and his son, that were walking up.

Somehow I don't think he ate the suet one 'lick' at a time! The suet cage was pretty well mangled, my husband did managed to straighten it out well enough so that it was usable again. From it's size we can be quite sure it was a male.
We have had mamas with cubs in our yard numerous times, especially when the crab-apples start to ripen.

That looked like a big bear. We had one up here last year. I always worry about my dogs when one is around. Good picture.
Vickie

Wow, what a big surprise that would be to see. He sure was beautiful.

Great picture, what a handsome fella. We have them up here to and I do look forward to seeing them in the spring.

My Gosh, That is one incredible bear!

wow do you have other bear pictures? Also do the same bears come back?

I have a few more bear pics Seedtosser.

Yes' they sure do come back, the one in the previous photo came back the next night and tried to break into the shed after the suet that my DH had put away for the night along with the bird feeders, next day we got rid of the suet until winter.
We have crab-apple trees and they come check them out to see if they are ripe, then we have to pick them and DH takes them and dumps them in the bush so that they are not wasted.
They can sure make a mess of the trees and leave some pretty impressive "calling cards" :-}
I just wish that we had gotten a digital camera earlier so that I could have gotten a lot more pics of our many bear visitors!

The bear in this pick was just a little one, 2 or 3 year old.

This message was edited Jan 31, 2010 8:01 AM

WOW another awesome shot. Have you seen the live web cam of Lily, she gave birth on the 22nd. Its been such a thrill to listen to the cub, it has some set on lungs on it already.
Christine

No Christine I have not seen Lily. Could you give me the link for the web cam?

Margaret

Margaret, Sorry I didnt see this sooner, I've been so busy watching the web cam LOL. Here's the link to Lily and Cubbie.
http://www.wildearth.tv/static/wildearth/channels/we_bear_den_notransparent.html
There are alot of links to check out, you will love this I'm sure
Christine
P.S. Cubbie is becoming very loud already :>)

Thanks Christine,
I checked out Lily and her cub, couldn't see too much except mom breathing, but I could hear the cub;o)

Margaret

Margaret, Good Morning. Your welcome :>) I did see cubbie this morning so hang in there and you'll get to see he/she too
Christine

Thanks to you Christine I have enjoyed watching Lily and her cub daily and have gotten to see the cub quite often, she is so cute. I was really glad to get rid of that awful hum after they put the new microphone in yesterday. That was pretty neat, I could here the Bearman talking to Lily and reassuring her that it was ok.

Here are a few more bear pics, these were taken by my sister through her patio door, momma bear was close by.

Baby bear is really cute! And look at that gorgeous fur coat!!

Baby bear was was looking for birdseed and the squirrels peanuts.

Hi Margaret, I'm so glad they changed the mic too, it was very annoying. Great pic's of Baby Bear, its amazing how fast they grow.
Christine

CAUGHT IN THE ACT!!! Wed. 17/03/2010-8:34 to 8:44 pm.

All winter this handsome mule deer buck has been jumping the fence to our back yard on a regular basis and eating up all the bird seed.

He hears me at the back door, gets a little nervous.

He turns to leave via his usual escape route.

It's so dark all I can see his his white butt, the camera with flash shows him looking at the new lattice we topped the fence with to keep him from jumping in at that point, I added white plastic ribbons so that he could see it.

Can't jump the fence...guess I'll eat a few seeds on the ground!

Getting bolder! Came back to the feeder closer to me.

He's looking at me as I step out on the deck.

He goes back to eating.

He looks at me as I move closer, I start talking to him.

Back to eating!

I move closer, still talking to him.

He kept licking the seeds (look at the tongue) as I'm moving closer, now less than 20 ft. from him.

He was eating seeds on the ground, I was still talking to him, I tried to go down to the patio but he got really nervous and ran back to the other side of the yard. I decided to leave him alone so he could calmly leave the yard.

We bought higher fencing for the front that will go up tomorrow so hopefully that will keep him out of the yard.

Photos aren't great quality due to the lighting conditions and the limitations of my camera.

Wow! He sure is relaxed to have you in the yard with him. I hope that the higher fence will keep him out.

JuneyBug I loved seeing him in my yard the only thing is I know he will eat my tulips and daylilies and all of my other flowers when they come up and bloom.

Unlike the suet-eating bear, the mule deer appears to savor its evening snack. Thanks for pointing out the tongue action!

Awesome shots again Margaret, he's been eating good, our white tail are on the thin side now.
Christine

Hi...
Awe those Bear cubs are soo cute! Thanks for posting them.

OH MY Gosh, well slap me in the head, lol.
You have just answered my question on who has been robbing my bird feeder.
I keep filling it and have been so agitated at the squirrels, but now I think it has been the deer.
makes perfect sense.

cute pictures of caught in action.

Hi Seedtosser,

I told DH that if the deer didn't eat my plants and flowers I would treat him as a pet but DH said no way... we don't need another mouth to feed, we spend enough already on the birds!!!...LOL

Margaret

Just checked out the bear den...how cool!