Growing up in Arkansas, I remember working in my Grandma's garden late one afternoon, bent over a long row, sweating. Suddenly, a couple rows over, in an amazed, hushed voice, Grandma tells us kids to keep still and be quiet, and to look down at the tree line. A mere 30 yards away, down a small slope from the garden, lumbered a mama sow bear and her baby cubs. She walked right along the trees, then as we watched she stood, sniffed, looked our direction, dropped back down and moved her babies along.
I'm guessing I was 12 or 13 at the time, this was the first bear I'd seen in the Ozarks, alive and in the wild. It was special. I don't know why I didn't feel fear. We have black bears. After camping a week in the Smokies in my early twenties and attending the Ranger's slideshow on "Bear Aware", I know what they can do to a car, and a human.
This bear was photographed by a friend near his food plot last month in Texas county, Missouri, I think; he's set up a camera to shoot what deer are in the area for this season. We live in southern Missouri now, and this is a big sign that they're getting more and more common again.
But I'll just take this sign that the wild will hopefully never fully leave my cozy Ozarks.
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