Comments on: Sightings

By: Dave

Dave — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 01:40:05 +0000

Inasmuch as they’re omnivores and habitat generalists, yes. And they have somewhat similar social structures, too. Both of which tend to imply a simialr sort of intellgence, which I think observations may bear out.

By: David Harmon

David Harmon — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 22:43:37 +0000

We’re getting nice flowers down in VA too, though lately they’re dodging raindrops — several sorts of bluets and blue flower-spikes are being supplemented with yellows in the lawns and meadows, while blue is joining the pink and white in the trees.

Someone on another forum commented that raccoons are basically miniature bears (ignoring actual lineage, they were talking about attitude and habits). What do you think?

By: Dave

Dave — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:22:12 +0000

That's what they call 'em. It's a color morph more common among the western population of black bears than here in the east. According to the Defenders of Wildlife black bear fact sheet,

Black bear fur is usually a uniform color except for a brown muzzle and light markings that sometimes appear on their chests. Eastern populations are usually black in color while western populations often show brown, cinnamon, and blond coloration in addition to black. Black bears with white-bluish fur are known as Kermode (glacier) bears and these unique color phases are only found in coastal British Columbia, Canada.

By: rr

rr — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:15:29 +0000

AAaaaaw. Such furry cuteness. I just want to give them all a big husy wugsy. (Ok, I was joking.) But, seriously, “cinnamon” bear? that apellation just adds spice to the sweetness :-)

By: Dave

Dave — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 02:36:58 +0000

O.K., yes, that seems to have worked! (I’m commenting here via another browser that doesn’t know I’m the site admin.)

By: Dave

Dave — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 02:35:25 +0000

O.K., I think I found the problem: this theme wasn’t coded to insert cookies for URLs, for some reason. Whether I’ve now succeeded in fixing that remains to be seen…

By: leslee

leslee — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 01:51:13 +0000

Yeah, your comment form remembers name and email, but not website. So you have to copy and paste in your blog name (or type it in, which I can never remember).

By: Dave

Dave — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 23:54:39 +0000

Yeah. But I don’t think it’s wariness toward humans. The bear family made an appearance in the corner of the field just now while my brother’s family was here and let us all watch as they hung out and grubbed for fifteen minutes or more. They seem about as wary as the local deer — which is to say, not much.

By: MB

MB — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 23:48:27 +0000

Fun to see a cinnamon bear. They look like they got startled by something, the way they all left so quickly together — or else Mom said, “C’mon, time to go!”

By: Dave

Dave — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 23:35:16 +0000

Thanks, Beth. I remembered from past years your special fondness for hepaticas. I hope you have the time to go looking for them this year.

Incidentally, I notice that a lot of commenters aren’t linking to their blogs. Is there a problem with the comment form not remembering your data, or something? If so, it may be an issue with a plugin I’ve installed, one that’s supposed to remove the default “no follow” tags and give commenters search-engine credit for the links they leave.