Yesterday I was sharing about our squirrel issue. Today it seems as if we have a bear issue. Twelve years at Downeast Thunder Farm and we’ve never had a bear “problem”. We know they’re on the property because we’ve seen signs – footprints, scat, and our neighbor once caught one on candid camera.

This morning as I headed out the door, I noticed my bird feeder on the ground. I stood and stared at it a moment, not quite processing what I was seeing.

Then I realized that, the steel pole that was fastened to the 4×4 post for extra stability, was bent at the base – the feeder hanging inches off the ground. The bracket for my garden flag is pulled loose, the flag itself ripped, my new flowers toppled over.

I noticed the new pole I just purchase on Saturday that held my glass feeder was pulled over as well. My beautiful carpet of purple phlox mashed to the ground.

As my mind started to process things, it was the destroyed flowers that finally had me admitting that we’d likely had a bear visit.

I raced inside to tell Paul. We looked out the kitchen window, sipping our coffee, surveying the yard for more damage, grateful that the ducks and chickens were untouched. Then Paul spied the muddy prints on the big feeder pole.

Thinking back, around 9 pm last night we heard a crash. The washing machine was running, so I thought it was out of balance and maybe something fell off the top. However, when I checked it out, everything looked as it should. And Gidget was a pistol last night, barking like crazy and generally being a little terror. This morning, I finally understood what I didn’t put together last night – the bear was outside getting into mischief.

I used to think that it was having a dog that kept us off the bear radar. We’ve had Gidget for 8 months. Maybe we need a bigger dog?