This story was posted November 28th 2002 by me on the DSF. I decided to store it on my site and add some never seen before pics I made. It includes a situation sketch of one of the many bear encounters I’ve had. N-joy.
Hiyaz,
Life here still is awesome. Snakes decided to come out and show themselves. Lucky me! I saw 4 rattlers totally by now. Also saw a hognose snake, which was kinda awesome.
This is the beautiful hognose snake I saw. They bluff when threatened (if they can't get away), hissing loudly and inflating themselves big time. When it doesn't work they convincingly play dead.
I also had a very close encounter with a rattler... I was driving on a road here on the refuge, and turned another one. Immediately after I saw an Eastern kingsnake 5 yards ahead of the car. "Oh Hell yeah!" I thought, grabbed the camera, Bruce Lee'd the car door and jumped out like a man posessed. I walked straight towards it. Then there was this rattle snake immediately in front of the car, which I hadn't seen. I stepped 1 ft (30 cm.) next to it. It rattled like crazy, and I instinctively pulled my foot back. (Fast movements around snakes isn’t a good idea, but my reflexes acted faster than my brains.) Fortunately the rattler didn’t charge. Sheesh! Bugger startled me! Eastern kingsnake got away though... ;-(
Here's a pic of one of the Timber Rattle snakes I have seen during my time in North Carolina. As you can see they are beautiful creatures. Unfortunately many people kill them because they fear them.
Later on I was checking some hair snare corrals. These are corrals with some barb wire around them. In the middle we put some donuts, which attracts bears. They step over or crawl under the barb wire, and leave some hair. Later on we come back to remove the bear hair for DNA research.
I checked a series of these on my own. I was in the middle of nowhere, and nobody was in that whole area! The trap was about 300 yards (over 250 meters) away in the woods. It was POORLY flagged, and the way back is even worse. I reached the trap though and started checking for hair.
Then I heard something. "Probably a bear" I thought, which didn't feel too good in the middle of nowhere. I decided to make some noise to scare it away and immediately clapped my hands. "Paf! Paf!" Sheesh! That sounded a lot like the sound of a shotgun going off I thought. And I had heard from hunters that such sounds attract bears because they associated it with food (shot deer.) So I made some other noise as well (shouted "Hey! Hey yey!") I decided to quickly check the trap and get outta there. Barb number 25 had some cursed hair (pardon my language, but I wasn't too happy about it.) Put that stuff in one of them small envelopes, and heard some more noise. I turned my head and saw, 15 yards away from me, a decent sized black bear! It was looking straight at me. "That's it, I'm outta here!" I thought. I stepped over the wire and left. I knew not to run since that stimulates a chase response, so I walked. The bear then moved like hell! Branches, boughs, trees, hell I know what broke on my right hand. It was moving and it was moving FAST! It was trying to go around me and perhaps charge. Then a second later after the sounds on my right hand had started, similar sounds started on my left hand side. THERE WERE TWO BEARS! They were moving fast, and made more noise than a herd of mad elephants in a glass shop!
That shit scared me, since I had 300 yards to go through the woods to my car. And bears are faster, especially if you walk! Still I walked, hoping that they wouldn't see me as a running prey. After 15 - 20 yards, still hearing their sounds I lost the freakin' path! I was #$%&-ing lost in there! To get to the 'path' I had to go back. And the one thing I didn't want is to go back! I picked the direction which I thought would eventually lead to the car, and went there in a straight line! Those parts of the woods were places where nobody had ever been before. The woods were thick there! vegetation, branches, thorns, trees, more branches, more thorns, hell I know what; it was freaking there and slowed me down! I couldn't see further ahead than 2 or 3 yards (perhaps 2 meters); the vegetation was soooooo incredibly thick!
I made a lot of noise, screaming "Hey! HEY YEY!" as loud as I could, hoping it would keep the bears at bay. About 30 or 40, or was it 50 yards, hell I don't know further I stopped. I turned around. Where are the bears? Are they about to attack me in my back? What is their position? What are they gonna do? I had to know! If they would attack I’d use that freakin' bush axe I held tight. Still not a nice idea to get an encounter that close. I heard jack shit, and thought I had lost them. That would be good!
I moved on, but then about 10 seconds later something black passed me on my right side with a lot of noise of breaking twigs and branches and hell I know what. It was going about 20 or 30 mph (somewhere between 30 km/h and well over 40 km/h)! It was black and it was incredibly fast! It was about 10 yards away from me. Too close for my comfort! They were on me! They were coming closer and closer! They knew where I was and where I was going. I walked on. Didn't run. And I'm man enough to admit I was scared too! I hoped I had picked the right direction. That cursed vegetation up there was so freakin' thick! I couldn't even walk faster than 2 mph! And them #&$#-ing bears just ran through that shit like it was nothing! I felt fucked up, but kept on walking. A bit later on, I heard some more noise. Didn't know where it came from anymore, but they were still there!
Then after several minutes of thinking (and walking) what my chances against two bears were, and deeming them not too high, thinking I probably would die, the vegetation became less thick. I knew now how people felt who were about to die. Sure I lived (I guess, pinching myself) but I didn't know then I was gonna live. I had a feeling that was it, that was the last day for me. I saw about 50 yards ahead of me a row of thick vegetation, and in the middle some thorn bushes. About 4 ft (1.2 meters) high, and 2 yards (almost 2 meters) thick. Behind it I saw the blue sky. I knew the road would be behind it. I moved. Then on my left hand I heard vegetation break and snap; something ran towards me on my left hand! It was the second bear! I saw him! He saw me and stopped about 15 or 20 yards away from me! I held my bush axe tight and prepared myself for a fight with the bear. "Where is the other bear?" (The one I heard just several seconds ago on my other hand.) I asked myself. "Was this an ambush? Was the bear I faced just a decoy? Were they gonna attack me? If so, from which side would which bear attack me?"
I decided to make a lot of noise again. I hollered: "HEY WRAAH! HEEEY!"
and "GET AWAY FROM ME BEAR!" just in case somebody would hear me, though I knew deep down there was nobody in that whole area, especially since you need a key to open the gate to the road I was heading to. I backed up, again walking. My clothes got stuck on a branch, and thorns attacked my skin. I ripped myself loose. Made hell of a lot noise, destroyed small trees and everything that was near me in seconds. I was trying to intimitate the bear by pretending to be a barbarian going ballistic. I didn’t use the axe, being afraid it would get stuck in a tree or something. Then it moved again, but not away from me. It was following me slowly. It didn't go away. I walked a bit and stopped again, preparing myself for a fight. I just knew that a fight with two decent sized bears, even with an axe, is not something you can win. Still I wasn't gonna go without a struggle. I knew they just had to come within range of my bush axe, and I WAS GONNA CHARGE THEM! It was they or me! I knew it was probably gonna be me, since bears can handle a lotta damage, and humans can't. I tried to find out where the other bear was. Then I walked again, making hell of a lot noise. I managed to reach the thorn bushes, two yards thick of them. I heard the bear again, and then I heard something from my other hand. They were so freakin' close! This was my chance! I reached the thorn bushes, and went through them. I fell. I struggled loose. I heard the bears come closer behind me, but I couldn't see them. "GO GO GO!" I thought!
I managed to get through, full of thorns, but I didn't care. I found myself 40 yards (you do the math this time to get this distance in meters) behind my pickup truck. I walked to it, didn't run. I kept a beady eye on the thick vegetation, seperating the road from the woods.
I expected them to come out and charge me on the road. They didn't, and I managed to reach the truck! Thank GOD! I opened the door, then threw the bush axe in the back, and stepped in. I made it! I was safe!
I'm telling ya, being in the middle of nowhere, 300 yards away from the car without a cell phone or radio, and then meeting two decent sized bears (the one on my right was definately the bigger one though) really is a scary thing!
I turned around, and had turned on the radio. It was P.O.D. with Satelite. I drove off keeping my foot down making the engine roar like a tiger. I reached the gate further down the road. I had to get out and open it. The lock was messed up and opening it was hard. I looked back to see if the bears were on the road now. Maybe they were even heading towards me! I didn’t have time for the #%$&-ing lock and jumped in the back of my truck to get the hammer. What a great tool that is! I used it to loosen the lock and opened the gate. I got through, closed the gate and got out.
- Please note that I would never attack a bear if it doesn't attack me. I have the outmost respect for Wildlife and hope you do too. -
The END
Here's some more random pics I have taken in North Carolina.
Above is a black bear attracted by the corn used to lure woodducks (in order to band the ducks.)
The animal of the upper pic of the three above is an Eastern ribbon snake. Pic below that one is of a Green tree frog. Lower pic is of a snapping turtle.
