Where they are much hunted,bear become purely nocturnal;but in the wilder forests I have seen them abroad at all hours,though they do not much relish the intense heat of noon.They are rather comical animals to watch feeding and going about the ordinary business of their lives.Once I spent half an hour lying at the edge of a wood and looking at a black bear some three hundred yards off across an open glade.It was in good stalking country,but the wind was unfavorable and I waited for it to shift--waited too long as it proved,for something frightened the beast and he made off before I could get a shot at him.When I first saw him he was shuffling along and rooting in the ground,so that he looked like a great pig.Then he began to turn over the stones and logs to hunt for insects,small reptiles,and the like.A moderate-sized stone he would turn over with a single clap of his paw,and then plunge his nose down into the hollow to gobble up the small creatures beneath while still dazed by the light.The big logs and rocks he would tug and worry at with both paws;once,over-exerting his clumsy strength,he lost his grip and rolled clean on his back.Under some of the logs he evidently found mice and chipmunks;then,as soon as the log was overturned,he would be seen jumping about with grotesque agility,and making quick dabs here and there,as the little,scurrying rodent turned and twisted,until at last he put his paw on it and scooped it up into his mouth.Sometimes,probably when he smelt the mice underneath,he would cautiously turn the log over with one paw,holding the other lifted and ready to strike.Now and then he would halt and sniff the air in every direction,and it was after one of these halts that he suddenly shuffled off into the woods.
Black bears generally feed on berries,nuts,insects,carrion,and the like;but at times they take to killing very large animals.In fact,they are curiously irregular in their food.They will kill deer if they can get at them;but generally the deer are too quick.Sheep and hogs are their favorite prey,especially the latter,for bears seem to have a special relish for pork.Twice I have known a black bear kill cattle.Once the victim was a bull which had got mired,and which the bear deliberately proceeded to eat alive,heedless of the bellows of the unfortunate beast.On the other occasion,a cow was surprised and slain among some bushes at the edge of a remote pasture.In the spring,soon after the long winter sleep,they are very hungry,and are especially apt to attack large beasts at this time;although during the very first days of their appearance,when they are just breaking their fast,they eat rather sparingly,and by preference the tender shoots of green grass and other herbs,or frogs and crayfish;it is not for a week or two that they seem to be overcome by lean,ravenous hunger.They will even attack and master that formidable fighter the moose,springing at it from an ambush as it passes--for a bull moose would surely be an overmatch for one of them if fronted fairly in the open.An old hunter,whom I could trust,told me that he had seen in the snow in early spring the place where a bear had sprung at two moose,which were trotting together;he missed his spring,and the moose got off,their strides after they settled down into their pace being tremendous,and showing how thoroughly they were frightened.Another time he saw a bear chase a moose into a lake,where it waded out a little distance,and then turned to bay,bidding defiance to his pursuer,the latter not daring to approach in the water.I have been told--but cannot vouch for it--that instances have been known where the bear,maddened by hunger,has gone in on a moose thus standing at bay,only to be beaten down under the water by the terrible fore-hoofs of the quarry,and to yield its life in the contest.A lumberman told me that he once saw a moose,evidently much startled,trot through a swamp,and immediately afterwards a bear came up following the tracks.He almost ran into the man,and was evidently not in a good temper,for he growled and blustered,and two or three times made feints of charging,before he finally concluded to go off.
Bears will occasionally visit hunters'or lumberman's camps,in the absence of the owners,and play sad havoc with all that therein is,devouring everything eatable,especially if sweet,and trampling into a dirty mess whatever they do not eat.The black bear does not average much more than a third the size of the grisly;but,like all its kind,it varies greatly in weight.The largest I myself ever saw weighed was in Maine,and tipped the scale at 346pounds;but I have a perfectly authentic record of one in Maine that weighed 397,and my friend,Dr.
Hart Merriam,tells me that he has seen several in the Adirondacks that when killed weighed about 350.
I have myself shot but one or two black bears,and these were obtained under circumstances of no special interest,as I merely stumbled on them while after other game,and killed them before they had a chance either to run or show fight.
