On about July 21, in the late afternoon, I was crossing to
my home in the late afternoon, from one house across the street to my home on
the other, a fairly typical occurrence. I didn’t expect anything out of the
ordinary, and there in the side yard—meaning, a relatively undeveloped part of my
yard that looks pretty woods-y—was a sizable bear, passing generally away from
me.
Relative to how I was walking, if you consider 12 o’clock to
be straight toward (and perpendicular to) the back property line of my
property, and my general direction (when closest to the bear) was toward about 12:00,
then, in the most dicey phase of this situation, my goal was to get to the
“back door” of my house, at about 11:00, and the bear (from me) was at about
2:00, and about 50 or 60 feet away from me. It was also traveling away from me. There wasn’t so much a clear
and calculable danger of it crossing paths with me, which would, generally, be
a dangerous situation to be in with a bear.
I find that bears, in general, when passing through and not
stopping to eat, move in fairly direct lines of their choosing, and I remember
hearing years ago from a state expert (in a public presentation) that if you
don’t want trouble from a bear you’re near, then don’t challenge it for the path
it’s taking. Also, though I never heard anything specifically on this,
following a bear also doesn’t seem smart. In this case, I was heading in a
direction at maybe a 60 degree angle from where it was going. I could have
played it safe and gone back from where I came, at a much bigger angle from the
bruin’s path. But, taking a little chance, I kept moving toward the house.
The bear paused—apparently having heard me—and turned to
face me, when about 50-60 feet away. Whenever a bear looks at you, you’re
struck by what a “bear face” it has—pretty much what you see in any photo
you’ve ever seen. When I see this, it doesn’t snarl, make a face, or anything
like that.
This one looked about 350 or more pounds—definitely larger
than a yearling, which is basically a big cub (a “teenage”/“young adult” bear).
This one also had a scruffy patch on its side—I don’t know whether it was dirt,
weird coloring, or the results of an injury. Maybe it was Wawayanda Mountain
crud. Also, there was no evidence of ear tags, which you (not uncommonly) see
on bears in this area—meaning it has already (in some past day) been caught by
a rep from the state Fish and Wildlife department, and tagged (it also typically
gets a tattoo, with identifying number, put on its gums).
This bear turned its head back toward the direction (away
from me) it was going, but it paused near a tree. It suddenly let out a big
snort, a big, ragged noise that was different from a deer’s snort, which deer
give out, either singly or in groups in the woods, meaning a cry of fear. Deer
signal each other to a danger this way. In this case, the bear wasn’t signaling
to any other bears, which to all appearances weren’t around (if they travel in
a small group, like mother and cubs, you see this quickly—the companion(s) are
close behind). This lone bear seemed to be giving a sound of warning—to me.
Right away I felt nervous.
And in immediate response, the dog at the house next door
(on the other side of my house from this bear), which probably couldn’t see the
bear but heard it, let out a single bark. It was odd that it was only one bark.
(Often you can assume a bear may be passing through a block
or so away if several dogs in that area are barking agitatedly.)
With the bear clearly not heading to me, I continued on to
my house, deliberately put the key in the lock, and got in. From a window, I
watched the bear continue on out of the yard, through low brush toward a street.
Allusion to an
academic matter
The snort, and its immediate response in me (fear) and in
the dog (the drive to bark), brings up, for those who may care, the James-Lange theory of emotion. This was proposed, originally independently but
usually remembered with the two theorists mentioned in tandem, by psychologist/philosopher
William James and scholar [?] Carl Lange. The theory said that any human
emotion has two components, physiological and
subjective/intellectual-intrepretation. Per the theory, the physiological side
occurs first, and the interpretive
side follows—which order people
ordinarily (or without education on the matter) consider counterintuitive regarding
how emotion really occurs.
Back to the specific bear anecdote: When a bear lets out a
ragged snort like that, it doesn’t need to speak English (or Spanish or…). It’s
saying, “DON’T MUCK WITH ME!” And you get
it. And you know this by feeling afraid, and being physically on guard in a
way. Your body seems to get it a little bit before your mind does. And the dog
next-door gets it quickly too—with a single, maybe-startled-type bark.
And this bear moved on, probably really only concerned where
its next meal was.
By the way, in these recent hot weeks, two piles of bear
poop turned up in my immediate environs—one in my yard and one in the yard
across the street I often go to. That happens infrequently enough that this
instance tends to suggest that a range of local bears are a little discomfited
by the weather, with all else.
