5 ms·

Hi, I live in Grafton county. Bears killed my chickens and frequently loitered around the coop when I replaced them and strenghtened the structure of the coop.

Hi, I live in Grafton county. Bears killed my chickens and frequently loitered around the coop when I replaced them and strenghtened the structure of the coop. They also clamber up trees to steal bird food if we leave it out past the time that the game wardens recommend that it be left out. I have in fact filed reports with the game wardens when they show up on my property during daylight and nothing has ever happened (sorry fans of North Woods Law). Bears steal my garbage every time I leave it out after a certain time of the year. They drag the bags through the woods leaving litter behind them until I clean it up. So after the bears wake up I have to keep garbage in my basement. I have friends over the border in Vermont who say that the bears don't bother him and his neighbors that often because they shoot them more frequently so they become more person shy. This quoted paragraph is absurd: >He diagnosed a kind of xenophobia: People are often frightened of black bears for no good reason. Sure, the creatures are big—they can grow to 500 pounds or more—and they’ve got sharp teeth and claws. But according to Fish and Game’s public-education campaign, “Something’s Bruin in New Hampshire,” which is intended to “enhance public tolerance towards bears,” the animals “do not typically exhibit aggressive behavior.” Yeah, I'm a xenophobe because I don't like having to spend a half hour or more cleaning up after a bear adventure or replacing broken bird feeders and replacing dead livestock. I'm irrational or just a dumb hick if I don't want my dog to die if he gets in a fight that he can't win with a black bear. It's not 'phobia' when bears live on your land or right next to it and frequently raid your property: it's a rational prudence that comes with living near wild territory. That document mentioned also is nothing about increasing 'public tolerance for bears' and everything to do with teaching people what to do to limit the damage that they do to your property and your animals. You can read it yourself here, like I did before encountering this article: https://wildlife.state.nh.us/pubs/documents/samples/somethings-bruin-july-aug-2015.pdf https://wildlife.state.nh.us/pubs/documents/samples/somethin... You have to go out of your way to find hobos and 'poor rural stock characters' for this minstrel show in text in Grafton, which has a median household income of $58k and lots of affordable land. The county is also pretty big as far as this state is concerned and contains many more towns than just the one detailed. There are also bear hunting permits you can get that ration how many people can hunt it in any one season and overall the state does a good job in controlling the population without the hunting getting out of control. A libertarian can easily go door to door all day long here and never meet someone who even knows what the word 'libertarian' is supposed to mean. It has nothing to do whatsoever with the bear issues which are tricky but mostly under control. The bear hunting season is short but it does a lot to keep the population under control. Vermont has exactly the same issue with bears and they address it in a similar way.

naravara 8y ago
>loitered around the coop when I replaced them and strenghtened the structure of the coop. How does one bear-proof a chicken coop? I once saw a port-o-potty that was literally torn in half down the middle. It looked like a car after an accident. When I asked the ranger what happened to it she told me that a bear cub had fallen in and the mother bear just ripped the thing open like a cardboard box to let her baby out. In other words, seems to me like a sufficiently determined bear could probably make quick work of anything short of a bank vault no?
- gascan 8y ago
  What kind of bear/where in the country was this? It's grizzlies & kodiaks that you'd want for breaking into bank vaults. Black bears are comparatively a little less adept at the whole can-opener thing, though I'm not surprised a portapotty (aka plastic box) didn't stop a bear, regardless of breed.
  - j-c-hewitt 8y ago
    Black bears are pretty small for the most part. Athletic, but on the smaller side.
- kingbirdy 8y ago
  Good lumber should do the trick just fine - a couple inches of wood will do a much better job stopping claws than the 1/8" plastic that port-a-potties are made of
- j-c-hewitt 8y ago
  My chicken coop is not a great example coop. It's a shed the previous homeowners converted into a small coop. In round 2 of reinforcement that has lasted for two years without incident I used heavy 2x4s drilled into the wall to cover the hatch that used to be there. Round 1 I used some thin plywood to cover the hatch that the previous homeowners had installed. That was destroyed by a bear (and before people ask I used a night wildlife camera to see what was happening). The guy just ripped it off. They have not bothered the heavier duty reinforcement. Other people in the area have had bears kill chickens but the highest kill count I have heard about came from minks, which was over 2 dozen in one night. Apparently at some point in the past someone was trying to run a fur farm with minks, and when they went belly up they released all of them into the woods. Minks and similar small predators are really effective at breaking into buildings and killing helpless/dumb creatures. Black bears are tiny dudes compared to grizzlies. They are pretty strong and very athletic, but they are not huge dangers to people unless you do something really stupid. They are more hazardous to livestock, dogs, and property. Deer and moose are more actively hazardous to people and far more numerous because they don't really understand the whole concept of looking both ways before crossing the road.

naravara 8y ago

>loitered around the coop when I replaced them and strenghtened the structure of the coop. How does one bear-proof a chicken coop? I once saw a port-o-potty that was literally torn in half down the middle. It looked like a car after an accident. When I asked the ranger what happened to it she told me that a bear cub had fallen in and the mother bear just ripped the thing open like a cardboard box to let her baby out. In other words, seems to me like a sufficiently determined bear could probably make quick work of anything short of a bank vault no?

gascan 8y ago
What kind of bear/where in the country was this? It's grizzlies & kodiaks that you'd want for breaking into bank vaults. Black bears are comparatively a little less adept at the whole can-opener thing, though I'm not surprised a portapotty (aka plastic box) didn't stop a bear, regardless of breed.
- j-c-hewitt 8y ago
  Black bears are pretty small for the most part. Athletic, but on the smaller side.
kingbirdy 8y ago
Good lumber should do the trick just fine - a couple inches of wood will do a much better job stopping claws than the 1/8" plastic that port-a-potties are made of
j-c-hewitt 8y ago
My chicken coop is not a great example coop. It's a shed the previous homeowners converted into a small coop. In round 2 of reinforcement that has lasted for two years without incident I used heavy 2x4s drilled into the wall to cover the hatch that used to be there. Round 1 I used some thin plywood to cover the hatch that the previous homeowners had installed. That was destroyed by a bear (and before people ask I used a night wildlife camera to see what was happening). The guy just ripped it off. They have not bothered the heavier duty reinforcement. Other people in the area have had bears kill chickens but the highest kill count I have heard about came from minks, which was over 2 dozen in one night. Apparently at some point in the past someone was trying to run a fur farm with minks, and when they went belly up they released all of them into the woods. Minks and similar small predators are really effective at breaking into buildings and killing helpless/dumb creatures. Black bears are tiny dudes compared to grizzlies. They are pretty strong and very athletic, but they are not huge dangers to people unless you do something really stupid. They are more hazardous to livestock, dogs, and property. Deer and moose are more actively hazardous to people and far more numerous because they don't really understand the whole concept of looking both ways before crossing the road.