N.J. Family Comes Face To Face With Black Bears Brazen Animals Apparently Like Playing With

wcbstv ^ | Jul 29, 2010 | Lou Young

[Coleus]

Too close for comfort. Residents of one New Jersey town said they're used to seeing black bears near their homes, but not like this. An entire family of the wild animals were captured on video playing and lounging where children had been moments before.

Ushanti Gerri shot the video Tuesday afternoon, shocked to see bear cubs at play only steps from her back door. Not just two, but three of them, standing on their hind legs, sparring, exploring, acting like children, under the watchful eye of their very large mother. The bear family spent more than a half hour playing among the sandboxes and toys laid out for her kids.

The sighting has changed everything about how she and her family are spending the summer. "It's scary to go outside and to make sure the children are safe. Who wants to be a prisoner in their own house?" Gerri said.

There are woods around here, but it's not like they're in the middle of a forest. It's the middle of a development. There are neighbors and the bears come right in and make themselves at home. They're particularly fond of the kids' toys. The balls have baby bear bite marks on them. It's interesting but a little unsettling.

The man of the house worries now about heading off the work in the morning. Brian Gerri bought the place in 1997 and said the bears have never been so numerous or so bold but remembers a lull in such encounters after the last state sanctioned bear hunt five years ago.

"After the last bear hunt, yeah, we really didn't see them for 18 months, maybe two years and after that the population grew again. They say there's 3,500 bear now and if half of them have two of three cubs, how many we gonna have next year?" Brian Gerri said. New Jersey has a bear hunt scheduled for this coming December. The Gerris hope it helps gives them a little more room to live.

[Malsua]

>>bout 20 miles northeast of me....I keep saying it’s just a matter of time.<<<

I’m about 20 miles closer than that.

Here’s some pictures I got in my backyard last month.

http://thewellrats.com/malbor2/bears/6-13-10/

[Doogle]

They'll get serious when some kid gets killed

[Malsua]

They'll get serious when some kid gets killed

Up and down my street, in about 1/2 mile in the last 5 years or so, we've had two full bear home invasions(ransacked interiors, folks home at both times), one half invasion(bear got halfway into my kitchen before the wife ran him off) and 2 pets killed. We have daily sightings, bear resistant cans trashed regularly and bird feeders get eaten so the town asks us not to use them.

After we bought this house in 92 none of the above happened for 5-7 years with the exception of an occasional sighting at a distance for a second. Back then you could use a regular trash can too.

Within the town itself, there has been very little habitat change. There's been perhaps 10-15 houses built in 20 years, but even that wasn't into watershed area. The habitat hasn't shrunk, the volume of bears has grown.

[djf]

Kool!!

Did they chit in your yard?

[Doogle]

...a year ago, we had a bear/semi collision about mile north of me on RT206, also two bear carcasses were found last year along rt80 bout half mile apart......it’s way past the time when they’ll build a bear only bridge for three million dollars over RT80....

[Malsua]

A bear bridge, bloody brilliant!

It fits all the lib criteria:

-creates a solution to a non-existent problem.
-Spends massive amounts of money for zero payback
-employs union labor to build it
-requires union labor to maintain it in perpetuity
-panders to blacks (Black Ursines)

The conservative answer is to ask willing residents of NJ to pay the state for the privilege to eliminate any need for a bridge. In the process of doing that, each hunter will probably spend $500-$1000 in gear/firearms stimulating the economy.

Based on my analysis, there is nearly a 100% chance that a bear bridge will be built.