I built a mineral station up on the mountain behind the house a couple summers ago out of cattle panels and t-posts to keep the hogs out, posts driven deep below the panel tops so deer jumping in and out wouldn't rip their guts out, put salt and mineral blocks buried up to the top, also loose mineral on the ground, after hunting season i put wheat mids/barley sprouts and corn chops for the dove, quail, deer and turkeys until spring browse returns, squirrels and coons have a heyday there too.
All was going well till i had an old buddy run a cat dozer up the mountain late Feb '21 and build a nice pond for the wildlife, pond was nicely filled by late April, trouble is i now have at least 4 different black bears living there, they sleep in that mineral pen at night
, some are collared, i called the bear biologist and asked about the yellow collars, red/blue ear tags, he said not to worry, they're not problem bears, just research animals, the colored ear tags are for male and female, yellow tracking collars are for hunters to see as collared bears are not legal to shoot here.
This is where the real dilemma begins for me, there are two very large un-collared bears up there, for some unknown reason i dont know if i'd shoot a bear, something deep in scotch/irish/indian dna? some kindredship? i know full well one of them could stand on my chest while pulling my face off, i respect them, but would certainly shoot one for messing with cattle or trying to come in the yard and eat Wifes little fat Rottweiler puppy, but dont have the hots for killing a bear, anyone else have a weird relationship about bears?
I have an old bow stand on up the mountain from there, it'd be easy enough, they've worn the trail by the stand to near three feet wide.
