{Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} Re: Catoctin Mountain Black Bear

That's awesome. Now you can one up the guy with an Alaska bear story. They're a little more rare around here. 

On Tuesday, May 3, 2016 at 12:15:34 AM UTC-4, Andrew Sarcinello wrote:

I had a pretty close run in with a bear on a Catoctin Mountain trout stream on Sunday afternoon. I always guessed a few were around up there but I had never seen any hard evidence.

Imagine how i felt looking up while walking the bank and out of the corner of my eye seeing a black shape moving down the opposite bank in my direction! I took a quick glance around and did not see any cubs and my nerves calmed a bit. The bear stopped on a rock across from me, looking into the water. I don't know if the bear had seen me before then or not as I was moving slowly and quietly. After a couple seconds it looked up at me, so I yelled once and it turned and ran up the hill and didn't look back.

The entire encounter probably lasted 10-15 seconds but it was one of the coolest moments I have had streamside. The bear was no more than 30 feet away when I scared it off. I had never seen one from outside of my car before.  Once the adrenaline wore off I kept fishing and did not see it again.

Really don't think the bear posed any threat but I know a bunch of you guys fish up that way so wanted to share. Just be aware of your surroundings when fishing up there.  Before that encounter, the thought of running into a bear in that area never crossed my mind. I was always totally focused on the fishing, and between that and the noise of the water, a bear could have walked right up behind me and I would have had no clue.

In hindsight I should have taken a pic or two, but in the moment that bear was too close for comfort. Was probably about 3 ft high at the shoulders or a little less, not scary big but not an animal to mess with either!

--
http://www.tpfr.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tidal-potomac-fly-rodders+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to tidal-potomac-fly-rodders@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tidal-potomac-fly-rodders/1760f59a-56a6-4a87-8cdf-5d37da6f36d8%40googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.