Bears, oh my!

[marta]

Last week at Mountain Creek from 8-8:30 am, there were 4 bears, Momma and three grown cubs, lazing around and playing on the slopes while slowly making their way across 4 trails to the woods. So pretty and peaceful to see nature in action out there in the early am.

Who's seen what kind of wildlife out there on the trails while skiing?
(aside from chipmunks and squirrels...)

 

[Kimmyt]

I ran into (not literally) a little weasel in his winter coat when I was in the trees of Blue Sky Basin at Vail last time...

Not as exciting as your bears, but it cheered me up to see the little guy!

 

[ski diva]

One day a couple years ago there was a porcupine up in a tree beside the lift at Okemo. He stayed there all day; it was fun to look at him as we rode past.

I also saw a mink at Okemo once, and some turkeys, too. And once at Steamboat I saw a fox run across a trail.

No bears, though, but lots of chipmunks!

 

[Jilly]

We get deer and all those little rodents. There is supposed to be a bear on Le Griffe. Griffe is French for claw, so who knows, except there are claw marks on some of the trees. Many years ago there was a porcupine in a tree too. It was there off and on, all winter, just off the LT chair.

 

[Gina23]

We have a fox living in our neighborhood, we have named her Frieda. She roams around at night, making my cat a nervous wreck sitting in the window staring at her licking her chops. My cat (7 lbs.) thinks she can take her, but I remind her often that she cannot. "Get back in bed, kittah!" Anyway, I live right by a huge lake (Sloan's for you locals) and when it froze all of the neighborhood foxes would sit out on the frozen lake just waiting for some unfortunate dog to attack. I never saw anything bad, but of course no one was dumb enough to let them off their leashes either.

 

[altagirl]

coyotes, porcupines, ermine, squirrels, deer... and plenty of mountain goats, but they're not really at the ski area, more on the rocks on way back to the house.


While mountain biking we see a lot of moose, elk, deer, grouse (had a few fly right into me last year), bear, snakes, various rodents... OH - and while all of the above has been in Utah, when I lived in Alabama, I ran across tons of armadillos and saw the occasional alligator from the trail.

 

[persee]

I never see any wildlife while skiing - maybe its just because it's not quiet enough when we're out.

However in our neighborhood we have lots of wildlife. We have a unique skunk wiht a very wide white stripe who I've nicknamed "stripey", and then there's the red fox who I only catch glimpses of so he hasn't been named. We also have bunbun and friends as well as some deer. I'm sure we've got raccoons too, but never seen them. Obviously grey squirrels, chipmunks, red squirrels. We also had a bat making his summers rest spot the vent on the back of our garage - he was named "buddy" the bat. Sometimes he had "friend" with him. I really didn't mind them one bit. Kept down our mosquito population!

 

[dburdenbates]

While we were in Steamboat a couple of weeks ago, my sons saw a Mama bear and two cubs from the ski lift. They were just at the side of a trail that was strangely empty. The Patrol had to be called to scare them off to another area where fewer people were skiing. The boys were in ski school so I wasn't with them and I didn't see them. :(

As far as the neighborhood goes, a turkey was walking across the front yards of the homes on our street last week. It was an odd sighting. Our backyard backs up to a golf course, so we see roadrunners (beep beep), deer, coyotes and our favorite Texas rodent, armadillos. And one afternoon we came home to find a parrot sitting in our side yard bush. It was obviously someone's pet, but pretty cool, nonetheless.

 

[Squaw]

right now parts of Squaw (No. California) are roped off with big BEARS signs...first year I've ever seen this. I also cyncially have wondered if it is just a good excuse to manage less of the mountain.:p

But Spring has come much earlier. My husband skied right by a bear a few weeks ago, so the signs make sense.
Jen

 

[marta]

We didn't close the trails, but we grabbed the megaphone (what were we going to say, can I see your pass please??) and followed them. Eventually one patroller simply clicked her poles together over her head and they kept moving. The only folks "afraid" of the bears were beginners, when the bears crossed the green run, perhaps because they didn't think they could out ski them? I went back and found some tracks in the snow later, cool.

I've also seen porcupines out there. Some deer tracks, but no deer. And the smell of an offended skunk.