9.februar 2023

 Spy Balloons, Turkey Earthquake, Wannaska Bears

    “Are bears out yet? “ my wife asked me on Sunday after her walk through the woods. “I think I may have seen one up by John’s Stand. Sure looked black ...”
 

    “Nah, they aren’t out yet,” I said authoritatively. “It’s too early yet. This little warm-up we’re seein’ ain’t impacting them that much. You’re safe.”

    Not ten minutes later, she called me upstairs, then pointed toward her computer, “Read this!”

“GRIMSTAD GAZETTE”
FEBRUARY 5TH, 2023
 BLACK BEAR SOW AND TWO CUBS
POPPED UP FROM CULVERT
ALONG ARNIE BEITO MEMORIAL HIGHWAY.

 

Three Pre-Emergent Bears

    “What the?” I probably said in surprise. “No way! ... Wait! The only exception being if their olfactory sensory neurons were aroused by some ne’er-do-well drive-by litterer who in their callousness, threw out their old stale Halloween and Christmas candy, Fancy Feast cat food, and freezer-burned lutefisk along that ditch! Anybody around here knows, add a couple Pop Tarts and beef jerky to the mix, and you got killer bear bait!”

 
    I hadn’t driven down that north/south section line road for awhile as I wasn’t sure it had been opened all the way to County Road 8, from west of Wannaska. I would’ve seen this now-famous bear and maybe more, for sure. Uffdah!

 
    Well, it wasn’t like there was nothing else going on in the world to vie for my attention. There was all the excitement of the Chinese spy balloon, and then the horrendous earthquake in Turkey with the tragic death toll rising; and of course, The Grammys; I was stretched thin.

 

    What I can’t understand is how does a bear stuck in a ditch culvert in Wannaska, Minnesota (of all places) generate so much attention, (much less the Nation’s), all over some local springtime rite: “UnHibernation Day,” Wannaska’s own cabin-fever version of Ground Hog Day, when local bears and all their off-spring pop-up from area culverts up and down Palmville and Grimstad Township roads like so many pocket gophers on south-facing hayfields?

 
    Wannaska has a bear lottery game like a football pool sheet, that participants purchase from area businesses, social organizations, and enterprising individuals, that corresponds with month/day/location that bears come out of hibernation; bears along ABMH are among these populations.

 

    However, pre-emergent bears i.e., enticed/baited bears, who are lured from their dens by cunning participants who know that bears coming out of hibernation are typically HUNGRY, illegally ply the bears senses with baits as formerly described above; despite the catch being: “The bears must climb out of their dens under their own power.”

 

    When the DNR was quoted to have said “Let nature take its course,” it’s because a good number of their employees are on bear boards countywide, not because they don’t care about bears, good grief.