| Show in camp after bear hunt trapping the maine woods while occasionally in search of deer or moose the hunter comes upon an other animal the sight of which makes his heart beat faster than did ever the sight of antlered game and causes him to bring his rifle into speedy action more often it la the farmer living in an isolated re glon who comes upon this brute the maine black bear as the big fellow makes off with one of his lambs in either case be it sportsman or farm er who sees the bear the view he gets Is likely to be short unless he brings the animal down for this big brute with all his strength and tor teeth and claws Is DO fighter and prefers running to fighting on al most all occasions black bears are found in maine in every county in the state with the exception of the most southerly coun ties aest of penobscot bay but are of course most numerous where the deer and moose are also found in greatest numbers in northern hancock wash ington penobscot franklin and som arset counties and the vast region embraced by and arloa atoori counties most of which Is beav lly timbered years ago black bears were corn in the regions named but the advance of civilization has made tar greater inroads on their numbers than on the deer and moose the animals were hunted tor their fur and for the bounty placed upon them by the state legislature the bears had no friend they were killed at any and every time of year tor even in the summer months when their fur was of no value the bounty made hunting them worth while this indiscriminate hunting of course speedily thinned out the ranks of bruin few yc rs ago the bounty of five dollars was removed and since then the hunters have lost most of their fervor beers are killed now wherever they are found by the ordinary hunters but the men who made a business of trapping and hunt ing them have gone out of the busl ness except tor a few months in the vear when the fur Is in prime condl alon the maine black bear Is a queer animal in his makeup there seems to be a combination of the character of the human the cat the hog the raccoon the sai irrel and several oti er animals though his natural method of locomotion is on all fours ie can walk upright almost as easily and steadily a man and there Is something laughably human in the way one of these big brutes will sit up on his haunches and reach a fat forepaw around to scratch his riba at many times the bear displays al most bun an intelligence in the man ner in which he evades traps and dead fills set or his destruction na member of the cat family could be quicker with a stroke of its fore paw than lg a black bear and the bear has Us s armed with claws which a tiger or lion might anvy VV th his forepaws the bear can strike a b ow ath the swiftness and skill of a tra ned boxer and many are the woodsmen who have found this out to their cost when they have tried to kill one of these animals with the stroke of an ax one stroke oi that great paw will ward off a violent blow and another may send the wielder 0 the ax spinning 20 feet away A black bear will ascend a tree with the aall ity of a cat and does so frequently to get the various nuts which form a I 1 choice bit of his diet in general appearance the black bear resembles the hog more than any other animal the head with its round skull sharp snout short point ed ears and bright beady eyes Is like that of a hog while the bear will eat anything a hog will the bear roots about among the leaves in quest of nuts enters orchards to eat the apples which have fallen on the ground and if they are not there shakes the tree until the fruit comes tumbling about his ears wherein he has the ad vantage of the hog and resembles the human again more than one black bear has come to an untimely en because of his propensity tor entering corn fields and eating the sweet corn from the stalks a favorite occupation of the raccoon like the raccoon too the black bear ts an expert fisherman he will lie at full length on a og over some quiet pool and drop a bit of wood or offal on the water he watches the bait with his small bright ees until some unsuspecting trout or chub comes up to investigate then a quick sweep of one of those mighty paws lands the fish flopping on the bank and bruin makes a dainty meal off his prize when the cold frosts of fall arrive the black bear begins to think of a snug home during the winter months he looks about until he finds the place that suits him it may be in a hollow log and if the hollow Is al ready the home of a family of coons bruin has no scruples about turning them out it may be that the bear finds a where the passing beirs have deposited limbs and leaves until there Is a covering impervious to snow and rain and he crawls under neath and burrows into the scurf to sleep tor the winter it he can find a cave or a deep cleft in the rocks bruin is as well satisfied and he will sleep fully as comfortably until warm weather comes again the bear has no larder to resort to during the win ter and he wants none tor he sleeps soundly while his waste tissues are replaced by the great rolls of tat which cover hie ribs as a result of a summer s foraging on the fat of chef land i the bear retires for his sleep just as soon as the ground begins to freeze which Is usually al out the last of november this wl 1 of course not apply to all cases tor many bears are found roaming about until long after the first of Defrin ber but ordinarily they den up ea ly the maine black bear ha been a much maligned animal by old hunters that the favorite food of the bear Is vegetables nuts berries roots etc corn plaints have been made by farmers in the northern and eastern parts of the state of bears that have done damage to their sheep flocks |
