Would-be farmer bears with nature

Written by Joe Pisani
Tuesday, 28 September 2010 23:00

During my commute into Manhattan, I often fantasize about my next life as a “gentleman farmer,” growing fruits and vegetables, tooling around on my tractor, making home brew, shoveling manure (well, maybe not that) and living off the land. These are the things Baby Boomers daydream about when their 401(k)s are on life support.

To nurture this fantasy, I’ve planted 70 blueberry bushes in New Hampshire to the dismay of my family, who fear my next agricultural adventure will be a pig pen or chicken coop.

Every year, I’ve had a bountiful crop, except this summer when week after week I’ve wondered, where have all the blueberries gone? The lawn man? The neighbor? The birds?

I got my answer when I stepped outside one morning and came face to face with the culprit — a black bear standing on his hind legs and shoveling berries into his mouth like some drunk on a bar stool stuffing his piehole with peanuts.

When he spotted me, he seemed as embarrassed as someone who got caught picking his nose in a traffic jam.

My family started screaming at me to get the #%@#*! back in the house before he decided he wanted a meat course. Instead, I grabbed my camera for a Kodak moment, thinking, “The guys at work will get a kick out of this!”

“Get in the house, YOU MORON!” someone screamed. It had to be my wife, who was mortified because I was running around in my boxer shorts. She’s very image conscious: What would the neighbors think if they saw a bear chasing me half-naked down Route 3?

“Just one picture!”

Meanwhile, my daughter ran for the BB gun, which made me wonder whether she was planning to shoot me, her foot or the bear, which had a confused look on his face that seemed to say, “What is this MORON doing?”

Once I got some good shots, I started singing “Twist and Shout.” It was the only thing I could think of to scare him away, and in no time, he waddled back into the woods but not before trampling two bushes.

He must have spread the word because a few days later, a mother and three cubs were scrounging around the yard. Bears love blueberries so much they’ll walk miles for a crop.

A fellow at the dump told me I need a hound dog to keep them away; however, a friend who has a winery in Litchfield County and lost 4,000 pounds of grapes to a seven-foot black bear had a better solution.

He put three radios in his vineyard that constantly play talk-radio, including Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. The bear hasn’t returned, which leads me to believe they must be Democrats.

There have been bear sightings from Greenwich to Ridgefield and Ansonia, but it’s nothing like the problem at Lake Tahoe, where the bear population has doubled, and they’re breaking into houses. According to reports, they’ve learned how to turn doorknobs and open windows. Next thing you know, they’ll be stealing credit cards and raiding liquor cabinets.

Joe Pisani can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

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