Black Bears...should I be worried?

[farmlifedreamin]

Congrats on the chicks! I just picked up 8 more on Saturday as well. They are in my brooder on my dining room table.

My bear keeps coming around, and getting a little too cozy for my taste. I picked up an air horn that is powered by a can of compressed air and a 2500 lumen LED flashlight that shines 700 yards. Last night he was in the yard, on the other side of our chain link fence so I went outside, got within 20 feet of him and lit him up with the spot light and blew the air horn at him. He took off like a shot into the woods. I followed him a bit, and lit him up one more time with another loud blast from the horn and he scooted off across my field. Can't get him thinking my backyard is his new home! We live next to several thousand acres of woods that is state owned protected land, so he has plenty of other space to make as his home.

Took this pic a couple of days ago on April 1.

You know, funny enough (and it was a complete coincidence) the same day I got the chicks...the bear came back that night. The BIG one!!! I tried to get a picture of him but I couldn't get a clear one.

 

[Folly's place]

He's handsome, but way too happy to be close to you and your home! Electric fencing is best. Is the air horn really going to help? Mary

 

[thomasboyle]

The air horn worked the first time! He was 30 feet from my back door, on the outside of our 30" high chin link dog fence. He watched me as I came out the back door and walked to within 20 feet of him. So he is not scared of people, which is not good thing. It will get him in trouble with the law or DEP. It was only when I blasted the air horn that he leapt up and took of into the woods.

I have an electric fence around my chicken yard, and have not had a single predator attack in the 3 years that I have had it up. Works extremely well even against bears. But putting one around the entire yard would be a challenge, It would have to cover 7+ acres.

 

[bjo_6]

Last summer a bear ripped the wall off my chicken coop (refurbished shed) and snatched my poor birds off their roosts one night... he ate all of them leaving feather piles and one wing. Then he moved onto my Flemish giant rabbits but fortunately that's when I got outside to chase it away. All of this happened within 75 feet of where my hounds were tied up and barking... we get a lot of bold bears in our yard oddly enough and never have much trouble with them... but that's the thing with bears... it only takes one to ruin your day! That bear was just traveling through fortunately but I heard of a boy who lost his meat birds several miles away to a bear.
We have quite a few bears and bears with cubs that frequently visit with no trouble, aside from my dogs barking ALL summer long!

There's not too much you can do to keep a bear out if it's determined to get something. Electric fence is a good option.

Prior to my bad experience I had read that bears don't usually attack chickens but go after their food and then may hurt the birds in the process but the bear ate my birds and didn't touch the buckets or bags of food in the coop...

Best of luck with the bears, they are a beautiful animal to watch and black bears are quite docile but there's always bad ones too. The best thing to do is not provide a food source like bird feeders or anything... that will make it keep coming back! Maybe it will move on

 

[thomasboyle]

Very sorry you had such a horrible bear experience! If a black bear developed a taste for meat, he would have to go.