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Show BEARS IN PENNSYLVANIA, The; Are More Plentiful Than They Wore Forty Yea Ago. - "It may sound strange and "improbable," "improba-ble," said Phin Anderson, a veteran woodsman of northeastern Pennsylvania, Pennsylva-nia, to a New York Sun man, "butitis a fact, nevertheless, that bears are becoming be-coming more plentiful every year in the lumber regions of Pennsylvania. Ihave a theory to explain this which may seem paradoxical, but I believgjt is correct, cor-rect, all the same. There are more bears to-day in Pike, Monroe, Clinton, Potter and other backwoods counties in Pennsylvania than there ' were forty years ago, for th reason that the woods have gradually disappeared; I have been laughed at scores 'of times-for advancing ad-vancing such 'a theory, but no one in the backwoods denies that bears are more plentiful, and certainly no onecandeny that woods are much less in area than forty years ago. It is very plain to me. : When the timber was thick the bears were compelled to skirmish more for food and had to depend to a great extent ex-tent on roots and bark and on the rather scanty supplies which the sheepfolds and pigsties of the scattered settlers afforded. af-forded. The clearing away of the woods has been followed by the appearance in limitless areas of all kinds of berries, which bears especially relish and on which they thrive. While bringing about such a condition, the cutting away of the timber has in no way affected af-fected the character of the dense swamps, in the confines of which bers find safe places for hiding and eluding dogs and hunters, and for bringing forth and rearing their young. The rocky ledges, with their ravines and caverns, still remain, and there the bears find winter lairs as secure and comfortable as they were when the forests grew above them. ' Besides, the clearing up of the forests - makes room for a large collection of sheep pastures and pigsties, pig-sties, and thus-odds to the field for forage. for-age. You may set it down for a fact that bears in Pennsylvania and not only in Pennsylvania, but in every eastern east-ern state where bears, are found are more numerous and bigger and fatter than they were Kin our grandfathers' days, and will keep on being that way longer than anyone now on earth will |