Grizzly Encounter …

Grizzly Encounter …

This past weekend Lindsey came up to visit.  She and I got up early one morning and took a little drive down to Mt. Engadine to see if we could see any moose.  As it happens, there were no moose in the meadow but on the way home we saw a nice little grizzly.  He looked about 2 years old and was busy eating berries by the side of the road.  He didn’t really care too much about his audience…two other cars and ours…but was very interested in the berries.   I’m not sure if you can see his claws clearly in the top picture, but you get a good view of the in the second picture.  I’m sure he could do some damage with them if he wanted to.  I was talking with an old fellow who was camping here the other day.  He said he’s been coming up here since the 1950’s and at that time there was no organized campground…you just found a level spot and camped there.  He said he had taken his family out on the lake fishing and had noticed a momma bear and cubs on shore.  He enjoyed seeing them but got quite a surprise when he got back to his trailer…the whole side of it had been ripped off.  The bear was after a big bucket of jam that the campers had brought with them and though it was packed away inside the trailer, the bear smelled it and wanted it…I guess nothing was going to stop it from having a nice taste of jam.  We’ve not heard of anything like that around now though.   I think a lot of it has to do with the amount of people in the area and the way the bears have been conditioned to seeing them and reacting to them.  In any event, the guy told a great story and Lindsey and I really loved seeing this young grizzly.

The flower of the week…it seems this is some sort of sweet clover but is much darker purple than I’ve seen before.  It smells beautiful!

Though the sun has not been shining as much as we’d like the last few days, there hasn’t been much wind either and the lake has been like glass.  It is so beautiful and so peaceful looking.  The boys have been out a couple times on the party barge or just swimming and they seem to be enjoying themselves.  Their dad, our friend Darrin is coming to get them this weekend…we’ll miss them for sure, but they are looking forward to seeing their friends and playing on their quads and dirt bikes so they will be happy to be home I’m sure.

Tom’s son, Marc, is coming to visit next week.  He’s an avid rock climber, mountain biker and hiker so I’m sure he’ll think he’s landed in paradise up here.  It will sure be nice to see him too.

Oso and I were out for a walk this morning and there in front of us was a momma grouse and her three babies.  The babies were not tiny…about half the size of momma, I’d say.  Boy, those birds are certainly not very smart.  The momma bird walked right toward us until she was about four feet away.  When Oso finally barked at her, she got all flustered and off she flew leaving her babies behind.  The babies scattered in all directions either running or flying away.  It was almost like she didn’t see us…maybe their eyesight is not very good.  I’ve heard of animals approaching humans to protect their babies, but this bird simply didn’t know we were there.  

Another grizzly picture…it was good of him to pose so I could get a nice profile shot of his head…pretty boy!