Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Bears and Berries

Been noticing a lot of bear scat where I've been riding lately. I haven't had a close encounter with a bear in a while though. Last weekend when I hit the North Conway trails, I finished my ride by climbing up Black Cap Mtn a second time so I could ride down Red Tail Trail. On Cranmore trail along the ridge, I hit a pile of bear scat. Hmmm, that wasn't there three hours earlier. Kind of gives you pause.

Blueberries along Hemlock Trail in Bear Brook on Sunday would fall off by the handful.

Blueberries are abundant this year. I'm not particularly fond of blueberries but will stop to eat a handful from the trail when presented with them. I noticed bear scat during blueberry season looks very much like blueberry pie filling. Mmmmm! Just another reason to not like blueberry pie.


3 comments:

Michael Scott Long said...

I was eating when I saw this.

BillW said...

We have a ton of bears around us in the Berkshires when we MTB. I dangle a bell from the handlebars. Annoying but I don't like the prospect of running into Mama when she's not expecting it.

At least we dont have to deal with the spray like the boys in Wyo/ID/Mont.

Hill Junkie said...

I used a bell when I visited a few states out west and Alaska. One day I forgot to put bell on my bike in Alaska and had close encounter with black bear. Carried the spray there too. Haven't had too many encounters in the northeast. Scariest incident was riding at Mont Sainte-Anne in Quebec. Dropped down into gully on doubletrack only to come eyeball to eyeball with two fully grown black bears blocking the path and no egress options. We all just stared at each other for a moment before I screamed at them. They were not quick to retreat. No bell in that incident either.