A Montana Visitor...

What would you do if someone broke into your house, ate your food, spilled your trash, and then relieved themselves in the middle of your living room floor before leaving? Call the cops, I'm sure - as would I.

Well, this very thing happened to my inlaws a couple of weeks ago, and they called the appropriate authorities - although in this case, it was the Fish and Wildlife officer, not the local sheriff. The story goes like this: while they were out for an afternoon, they left a kitchen window open to help cool the house down. The bear (probably a 2 year-old cub they saw on their property the day before) tore through the screen on the window and climbed through.

Once inside he started by devouring a tub of Red Vine licorice from Costco, then moved on to the large container of White Chocolate coffee syrup (spilling it all over the floor). Once he finished with that, he moved on to the trash, dumping it and spreading it's aromatic contents all over the floor.

All evidence points to the fact that at this point either the syrup or the licorice started to disagree with his stomach, and he didn't make it much farther than the living room before his eating binge caught up with him... the picture tells the tale.

Thankfully, by the time they arrived home the bear had vacated the premises the same way he entered, and they haven't seen him since (although they've paid more attention to the open windows). Quite a story, to say the least!

Do you have any interesting stories of wildlife visitors?

Comments

[Melanie]

Hmmm... glad I didn't have to clean that up. It didn't look very pleasant.

My daughter's inlaws in AZ found a scorpion in their house and they turned it into a pet. My daughter turns everything into a pet. Now she has 7 waterdogs that were slated to be bait that a friend gave her.

I guess she comes by in honestly. When I was a kid we brought a gopher home from WY. I had forgotten, but somehow this dialogue jogged my memory. We even got it past one of those checkpoints for food/critters from out of state.

And we brought back 10 horned toads and and anole back from Texas when I was 10 or 11. I caught the anole in my grandma's back yard and it bit me. LOL

I used to see racoons in our yard. I think that is the creature that must have been taking apples from our tree, taking one bite and throwing them down. My neighber relocates them, though.

--Melanie

[Jeremy]

Great suggestion, Amy! I've passed it on - I look forward to reading it at Christmas!

[Amy]

Your inlaws should check out the picture book Deep In the Woods by Brinton Turkle. It's a reversal of the traditional Goldilocks tale. It would make a great coffee table book for 'em!

[Jeremy]

Yikes! Great story, Kat - I end up providing the same service for my wife. I'm hoping that once we have kids that motherly instinct will kick in and she'll be able to dispose of them herself... :)

Relocating squirrels, Holly? You're very kind, to say the least. My grandfather is a farmer up in Canada and they have a HUGE gopher problem - they're eating up his fields like crazy. So far they've shot over 4,000 gophers - and they just keep coming! There's got to be a similarity between gophers and rabbits somewhere... :)

[Holly]

I've been trapping squirrels in the backyard this summer and "relocating" them to a nicer part of the area (far, far away from my backyard and near a lake!) Luckily they stay outside, but they sure wreak havoc on my birdfeeders!

[Carla]

No crazy wild animal stories here (by Travis AFB, CA). Just Californians and ants by the trillions.

[Kat]

That's CRAZY!

Um...we had a scorpion in our house a couple months ago. My daughter was sitting in the living room and she looked over a few feet and said, look mama! an ant!

"Hello 'ant', meet the bottom of my shoe."