[at-l] Bear attacks...not surprising

[athummingbird@tds.net (Linda Benschop)]

What a terrible tragedy but not all the big a surprise to us.  There are too
many folks out there who just do not know or care about bear bagging.  We
have complained several times to the Forest Service folks since our personal
bear episode a couple of months back   The biggest problem is the Outdoor
Therapeutic schools who are totally uneducated about the outdoors as are
their leaders.

I am surprised that there has not been a tragedy here in Georgia.  There
have been reports of black bears here coming right up to the Outdoor groups
at Low Gap.

We spent a couple of nights at Vogel State Park last month.  In the area
where we hung our hammocks several campers came up to us to tell us about
all the bears that were coming right into their campsites.  Many of them
thought it was cute.  The trash cans were not bear proof but were (and still
are) metal cans with regular covers.  All night long we heard bears getting
into the trash.  I went and looked at the cans when it got light and saw
large tooth marks on the cans.  I was told that some of the cans had been
carried into the woods by the bears.  We spoke to the people in the office
and they just shrugged it off, did nothing.  We will not go back there to
camp again.

Recently someone here wrote about a bear attack out West when the bear
attacked.  This was about leaving steak wrappers etc.

People are inviting these bears to attack.  More education is needed.   The
bears are only doing what is natural and they are being "invited" to attack.
There will be more tragedies unless the people are better educated.   What
can we do to prevent more tragedies?  How can we educate these Outdoor
Schools, parks etc?

Hummingbird