The bear basics

When we went camping we experienced something new. We were told that Limekiln Lake was a "Class A campground" for bears. Therefore, every site came equipped with a "bear locker" to store all of our food in.

Normally we keep food and anything else we don't want animals getting into locked up in our car. But this time we had specific instructions to use this locker and not our car.

As a result, Kris was a little nervous about running into a bear during the trip--particularly during a late night run to the bathroom. We never saw a bear in our campground, but one did cross the road in front of us during our drive home.

Anyway, maybe it's just as well we didn't spot this story before our trip:

DEC officers shoot, kill agressive black bear

SARANAC LAKE, N.Y. (AP) - A team of state environmental conservation officers and wildlife experts shot and killed a black bear that had shown aggressive behavior toward people hiking in Adirondack High Peaks region.

The Department of Environmental Conservation say the bear killed early Monday morning was a male who was more than 20 years old and weighed about 350 pounds.

DEC officials say the officers shot the bear when it entered a camp site looking for food. The agency says it was the same bear that had entered lean-tos where people were staying on three different occasions last month.

In one incident, a man lured the bear away from his son after the animal had cornered his son in a lean-to. In another incident, campers had to hit the bear with their hiking sticks when it became aggressive.

(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)