• Tuesday-What'sUP June 20 - 12:41 pm

Today's photo from Robert C. Wetton, answers that age old question of, "Why did the bear cross the lake?" It's obvious isn't it? To get to the other side and use the awaiting jet ski, of course! In all actuality, Mr. Bear swam across from the Point Mills side of the lake, over to the Bootjack side. RCW says he was glad he didn't come ashore on their beach. I'm betting if he was headed that way, RCW wouldn't have been hanging around there with a camera!

AWESOME!!

It's always exciting when you see a bear, especially if they can't see you.

Picking blueberries, to use for morning pancakes, in the Paradise area around Betsy Lake in the late summer of 1983 I came in close proximity to a bear when he was on one side of an enormous blueberry bush growing out of an old stump, and I was on the other side. Me picking and him munching. When we both came around to the same side to continue picking! I screamed and he yelled (something)! I ran one way and climbed up a tree and he ran in the other direction. I could hear him moving around the bush like he was thrashing around. But then I realized it was the blood rushing in my ears and he was long gone...... I climbed down picked up my berries and never entered the bush again with out my walking stick. And that my friends is my only bear story. oh yeah.. I didn't get a picture.

What a great day to start the Pasty web with: a swimming bear and an encounter with one.

In the late forties my Mom and I were delivering milk up on Linwood hill by the train tracks. She parked the truck and we walked up the hill to deliver some milk on the way back to the truck while crossing over the bridge a huge black bear popped up in front of us. I was about five and she was in her thirties both of us made a beeline to the truck. I was in front of her thinking I was really fast, but now I realize that she was protecting me by going slower. The bear took off the other way but we didn't know that till we were in the truck with the doors locked. Mom wouldn't deliver milk there anymore and my brother Fred or my dad had to. Another time a bear raided the chicken coop behind our house, or maybe it was just a big dog, but in my mind it is a huge black bear.

Are you sure that's a bear and not the "Pointe Mills Monster", that little known cousin to old Nessie there in Scotland???

California has dolphins and Bootjack and the UP have swimming bears. Gald I wasn't on the beach when he came ashore!!!!

Black bears are on the move right now, I think. My wife and I
were in Grand Rapids this weekend, and we read about a black
bear found dead in a ditch in Ada. Ada is a pretty rural town
just east of Grand Rapids -- not so rural in some areas, of
course, considering it is the world headquarters of the giant
Amway Corp. A bear down there is big news, but I guess a bear
seen anywhere near where we live is big news, eh?

When we lived in Texas, we had to be careful of water moccasins (a very poisonous & aggressive snake that lives in water). So now I see we have to watch out for black bears in the Portage?

Bears do swim. There was one near Seattle that wanted to go somewhere, & he swam a full two miles, in an area that they had not seen bears before!

Speaking of the Portage, my son finally showed me some pictures that he took of the water ski show, that was part of the Bridge Fest this past weekend. If you missed it, it was a good show!

My advice is for anyone in bear country wheather it be hunting, picking berries or just walking in the woods. Always take a partner with you that you can run faster than.
After returning from a successful grizzly bear hunt with bow and arrow in Alaska, a friend of mine told me he selected an elderly guy that smoked a couple of packs a day for his guide.
For obvious reasons.

Oooh! Bears! I used to have nightmares about bears. Our neighbors up the road had to have the DNR live trap a bear that killed one of their calves. I saw the calf afterward...gruesome! I did see two cute little cubs up a tree at Victoria once. I was in my car driving by and stayed that way since Mom was probably very nearby. I give them all the space they want.

Bears of the black persuasion are usually as afraid of you as you are of them. Just maintain a healthy respect for them and avoid when cubs are in the vicinity. That being said, this is a great picture of a powerful swimmer right down the shore from my in-laws place. Wish I was there instead of at work today. Love the UP, so much like my childhood home on the Iron Range of Minnesota.

I was chased by a mother bear when I was around 9 years old. I got between her and her cub. I
ran 1/4 of a mile in no time flat. I had nightmares for 35 years........My stomach just
flips when I even see a picture of a bear....

I have pictures of one swimming in Eagle Harbor a few years ago. I have seen them swimming a few times from the air too.It seems to me it is always in June. My guess is they are trying to escape the blackflies.

I like watching bears from a distance. We saw a cub in the Porkies during an overnight hiking trip when I was a kid. Got pictures but stayed clear. That night our backpacks were tossed all over the campsite by a bear. The food was tied up on a tree branch but thats what they were looking for. That was when my uncle gave us an important bear lesson. he said not to run and climb a tree, why? Because a black bear will climb the tree and eat you and a grizzly will just knock it down and eat you.

Sidnaw down on perch lake is were I had all my fun with bear.Of corse that was in the 70's and I was a teenager and had no sense ;) Great picture's Robert

Theresa, your story about the blueberries and a bear reminded me of an an old award winning children's picture book called "Blueberries for Sal" by Robert McCloskey! Delightful story about bears, moms and "cubs" and of course, blueberries. Thanks for the bear Pics Robert.

I remember seeing a mama bear and two cubs cross what I think is Gas Plant Road up on the tracks when I was a kid. I was visiting the Van Evras and biking down Cemetary Rd...just happened to look up the road and see the three bears wander across. I was about 8 or so, so I didn't pay attention to street names but I know it was in that area.
I had a few more run-ins with black bears while backpacking in Philmont Scout Ranch in NM. One followed us down the trail for about 1/4 mile before it got bored with us and wandered into the woods. You learn very quickly to respect their space, that's for sure.

we saw the EXACT thing happen when a bear swam from GRAND ISLAND over to the shoreline near the campground in Munising last summer. pretty cool. ... no wait, pretty COLD>