Bears
 

This morning (5/13) had Mama and cub in our front yard. Cub was part way up a large pine tree. After I left for work, evidently, Mama wandered over to front of house and was about to climb up the front steps when our dog began to bark manically and the bears skedaddled.

More bears
 

Made the mistake of leaving the bird feeders out last night. 12:30 this morning I had three bears on my deck. Four of us lined up against the slider watching, they didn't seem to care, even when we turned on the light. After they finally took off, my son and I went out on the deck to clean up and look around with the flashlight. Brought the feeders in. Half hour later, one was back up on the deck looking for dessert

bears on the deck
 

You need to bring in the feeders. If you cannot attach a feeder to a window or someplace high where bears cannot get, they will keep returning. Bears remember good experiences, they also remember bad experiences! They are hungry right now, and most of their food sources (berries, etc) are not yet available. Person I know left their garage door open for a while in Center Harbor. They had Mama, yearling and 2 cubs in the garage going after the trash. Be careful. They are beautiful, though.

And even if they are up high, the bears might still come. We have our feeders strung between two trees on clothesline attached to a winch on a post. Bears have come and hung out underneath the feeders. One even decided to climb up onto our deck to see if he/she could reach the feeders from there.

Bears!
 

They have an excellent sense of smell. I believe they can small bird seed from 1/4 mile away. Yikes. We had this HUGE bear climb up our front porch about 18 months ago to get to the bird feeder. Scared me half to death.