permaculture

[Mikal Jakubal <mjakubal@asis.com>]

At 09:30 AM 3/29/00 -0800, you wrote: 
>
> my friend has a bear that comes around when she is not there and takes the
> door off the house .  its been back 3 times in daylight and also when i was
> up there last there was a mountain lion in the drive.  what is a good way to
> keep wild life back away from the house? is there a noise maker or electric
> fence or what kind of dog or what size gun etc.  what would u all do.  she
> said she had a talk with the bear and told it not to come back but it did.  
> I worry about her.  what do u do when u face a bear or mountain lion?  


 Around here (Humboldt County, CA), people are really slack about leaving cat
food, compost and other bear snacks out in the open. Hungry bears come around,
get used to humans and start breaking into houses. Once inside the houses,
they
figure out how to open refrigerators, drawers, tin cans, coolers and cupboards
to look for food. No kidding! Imagine waking up to find a bear poking
around in
your fridge. It happens all the time here. Most people get annoyed but think
it's funny at some level. Unfortunately, the well-trained bears then break
into
the house of someone less willing to share their food, and get shot. That
happens all the time here too. As the saying goes, a fed bear is a dead bear. 

What to do? Quit feeding them! This may mean building a special
extra-heavy-duty bear-proof door. It helps to not leave food around inside the
kitchen after meals--bears can smell this from a great distance. If you have a
composting toilet or outhouse, that is a good place for kitchen scraps,
especially if you dump them in before using the toilet. 

There is a strobe light unit called (I think) "critter gitter." It's triggered
by a motion sensor of some sort. I've been told they work well, but only if
the
bear thinks there's nothing to eat there anyway. If a bear smells food, it'll
eventually get used to the lights.

It's really about learning to respect the fact that we don't own the world,
and
the bears were here before our houses. If this is too much work for some
people, perhaps a city center apartment might be a better place to live.

Mikal