Living in the woods like my wife Judy and I do, you would figure that the chances for seeing wild animals was pretty good. That is the case up here. We live on one of the foothills in the Berkshire Mountain Range. Our cabin is about two thirds of the way up and is only 1100 feet to the top. This is all wild with a mix of deciduous and conifer trees. On the top, or close to it, I have seen some caves and many good rock crevices for a bear or some other wild animal to use as its home.

Judy and I had been living on this mountain for twenty years and never saw a bear until five years ago. That is his photo on the top left of the story. Click on him for a larger view. We called him Boo-boo, just like Yogi Bear's friend Boo-boo. Boo stayed around just feeding off our birdfeeders and he very seldom broke anything. Then, one day, he was gone. I think it was a signal of what was to come.

For since the Boo-boo days, we have seen many American Black Bears and their baby cubs pass through, maybe hang around for a time, and leave. Just like this mom and her cubs that visited us for awhile. It sure was fun watching the cubs play and grow right before us. Mother Bear would bring these guys to the birdfeeders almost everyday but they were not as destructive as other bears. A little damage but not bad. Click the photo for a larger view. Some bears have been more aggressive than others by destroying our feeders but none have ever done harm to us or our pets. They only want to eat, that's all. Please click on the photos in the left side to see the larger photos.