July 14th, 2020 – BEAR INSIDE OUR HOME!!!

July 14, 2020

Captain’s Log: City to GrittyI started with cleaning our family pictures. Because of all the things that needed my attention—that was the one thing that mattered to me the most. I then moved to the front of the fridge, the floor and the sink. Scrubbing off paw prints, mud, egg yokes and food. I turned on the diffuser and air purifier to work on detoxing the air and removing the wild animal/bear smell from our tiny space. Then, started on our countertops, scrubbing, sanitizing and making everything like new again. It was a lot of work. The kids stayed in the truck with the kittens watching a movie (probably the best day of their lives, haha, to get to do that!) and Todd worked on cleaning up the outside, checking propane lines and talking to parks and wildlife about our invasion/attack. This was the scariest off-grid day for us both. This was the day we had a bear inside our home.After investigating and showing everything to the park ranger, it was determined he somehow squeezed himself, all 300+ pounds of himself, through our small RV kitchen window. We left it cracked to help with the summer heat—but that crack was all he needed to push the window all the way open, push in the screen, turn on the kitchen sink in the process (only minor flooding), unlatch the fridge, and eat everything along with cause destruction all over our tiny home. Even though it was a bear, (as opposed to a human invader), I felt immense invasion of privacy and angry and scared at the same time that something was in my home, destroying it, and posing a huge threat to Mountain Kitty and my kitten squad and I wasn’t there to help. When I walked up to the front door, I could hear loud meows from Mountain Kitty—trying to warn me that something was not right inside. He was so scared!! And ran outside the moment I opened the door. When I walked inside for the first time, I was horrified. At first I was not sure at all that a bear was inside our home. I did not think it was possible—so the thought wasn’t even on my mind. I saw the window open so was thinking of much smaller animal attacks or maybe an Old Stage shooter that was upset about our attempts to prevent illegal shooting may have come up to pull a prank or something. I mean, how else would the kitchen sink be running water + flooding, the propane fridge unplugged and other usual things??But then…. I saw the bear outside and knew it was all him—he somehow got all 300 + lbs of himself through a small RV window.It was then I was reminded yet again—we were not here first. The bears were here first. The mountain lions, bobcats, chipmunks and hawks—all here first. And we are the unusual ones disrupting the system out here…. a system where we are not at the top of the food chain.I yelled at the bear, told him “BAD!!!!!! GET AWAY!!” and he slowly started to walk down the mountain. I grabbed all the cats and started putting them in the truck with the kids. I kept going back and forth until I found all the kittens (two hiding under the bed somehow—we have an under bed dresser so must have been complicated getting through all that) and when the final kitten was retrieved…. I got back in the truck just in time to watch him walk back in front of us…. up the dirt ledge and sit down and stare at us. He almost seemed to be smiling.After several moments of just sitting there, he got up and starting walking up towards the National Forest. It was about that time that Todd got home, loaded up his shotgun and started patrolling where I saw him last. But bears can move quickly—we did not see him again.After that was our first call to parks and wildlife and our first bear trap we’ve ever seen. They came out pretty quickly, helped set up a huge trap with bait and dropped off rubber buck bullets for our shot gun if he does try to come back into our home. It’s illegal to kill a bear, but perfectly legal if he tries to invade or come in after shooting it with rubber bullets and those do not stop or deter him.We have the bear trap for one week—so we are hoping he comes back. The park ranger told us this was a very dangerous situation because now that the bear has discovered breaking into RV’s with such a huge reward—he will keep doing it. He will try to come back. And a bear that size could break our glass windows or even “rip our front door off the hinges” if it was really motivated to do so. So once this bear is captured, it will need to be euthanized. Which parks and wildlife will all handle. The ranger told us that bear looked very healthy and older—with greying hairs on the muzzle. So, though the thought of him being euthanized is tragic—what’s more tragic is him coming back and harming us or other campers in the area. Our off-grid journey has shown and taught us so much. Yesterday was a day we will all never forget.

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