Providing some details on bears

There are bears in the woods — and they’re not that far away. Both Wisconsin, and Missouri have resident wild black bear populations.

Male black bears roam up to 100 miles from where they are born. If it hasn’t happened already, sooner or later bears are going to cross the Illinois state line. With cougars and wolves reportedly showing up on trail cams in Illinois, it seems inevitable that a black bear will get its picture taken before very long.

While it might be cool to watch a black bear amble down LaHarpe Crick — at a distance — I’m not looking forward to it. When they stand on their hind legs, full-grown black bears are between 5 and 6 feet tall and weigh up to 400 pounds.

Bears are not necessarily reclusive creatures. You may be just as likely to see a bear around your game pole or trying to open up your cooler as you are to catch one on a trail cam.

In Wisconsin, Missouri and just about everywhere else they call home, some bears quickly become a nuisance. In Missouri, bears are tearing up beekeepers’ hives to steal the honey. They are raiding chicken coops and forcing their way into vehicles to get at the groceries.

Bears have a highly developed sense of smell. When they catch a whiff of something appetizing, they are very creative about getting to it.

In Tobermory, Ontario, a young black bear broke into a bakery by tearing a hole in a screen, then sliding back a heavy garage door. When the baker stumbled down the stairs just after midnight to see what the ruckus was about, he came face to face with a bruin sitting on his freezer eating chocolate cookies. He chased the bear off before it could get in the refrigerator for the milk.

Campers in bear country must pay special attention to bear-proofing their campsites.

The BearVault 500, with its “super rugged transparent polycarbonate housing,” was invented for those who need to protect food and valuables from nuisance bears.

The device was tested in a California zoo. No zoo bear came close to opening it. Grizzly bears in Yellowstone went away talking to themselves, defeated by the BearVault 500.

Then, along came a little black bear in the Adirondacks in upstate New York. This bear cracked the code of the complicated locking system and opened the BearVault 500 in a New York minute. This is the same intricate locking system that has befuddled several campers who couldn’t open it with the instruction manual.

The engineer who invented the BearVault 500 says the break-in is the work of a genius bear, and there may be more of them out there. He’s gone back to the drawing board to redesign the locking system.

It seems original the BearVault 500 was only smarter than the average bear.