Sorry for the delay on the thread updates but as you are all aware Fort McMurray is in a state of Emergency. When this fire started I was living and working in Anzac which was the south Emergency meeting point for fort McMurray when they were Evacuated. We saw our little hamlet of a few hundred people welcome 8000 Fort McMurray people who either lost their homes or where in jeopardy of losing them, you could see the panic and desperation on these people which was so heart breaking.
Tuesdays Evening is when people started coming and I have to say its amazing how the community came together to provide the basic needs not only at the Rec center which became the base camp but also people opened their homes to family, friends and strangers to reduce the stress on the center and give people a little more comfort.
People continued to flow in Wednesday and you could see that the 8000 people where there. Gas station, restaurant, grocery store and liquor store had massive lineups, there where people and cars everywhere. Also with the people coming in came massive truck loads of food, water, clothes, Gas, toys, toiletries, cots, blankets, you name it, it was coming in by the truck loads!!! Just amazing to see how fast the response to the needs where coming in.
As trucks where emptying their goods they where filling up with people to take them south where families got split up and ended up in other towns and cities. By wednesday afternoon Anzac turned from safe haven to mediatory Evacuation as well and now the whole community with the 8000 Evacuees had to be relocated as the fire took a drastic change of direction and was heading right for us all.
I packed up the family and we headed south to our home down near Edmonton. On the way down HWY 63/881 there were people who came up the HWY from the south cities with truck loads of fuel, water, and food. They were stationed almost every 20km just incase people needed fuel and to help the hundreds that where already left stranded along both HWY's as a result of running out of gas while fleeing the fire.
This was truly something out of a movie and nothing you could ever imagine having to deal with but I can honestly say the hospitality, reaching hand, courage and love I seen from thousands of people was like heaven came down to earth and an army of angles where released to help everyone. I have never been more proud to be a human being and my faith has been restored into humanity 100%
Now that I am home I have some time to update the latest on the bear baiting up until the fire. After this update I am not sure when ill be able to continue as my bait is up near the fire. As of right now we have no idea when we can go back to our Anzac home and work.
So it was exciting to see that I had another bear in the bait and I was really hoping this bear would lure another bear into the site. I pour fryer grease all over the ground around the barrel and beaver cage in hopes the bears will walk in it and then take that scent out into the bush drawing other bears in. Although there really isnt any proof this works it should by theory and seems to do so.
I went back into my bait Monday And just a behind the scenes note I have a secret spot where i leave my trike so i can conveniently check my baits between home and work. I have done this for a few years never an issue. But now the spot is not a secret any more haha
Looks like a little bear found it and wanted to try out the seat. Thankfully the bear only needed one bite to realize this wasn't bait lol
After loading up the trike I headed into the bait site and when I got there I could not believe what i was seeing! The bait site was destroyed like its never been before. I have had bears mess things up but not to this extent in my experience any way.
As you can see the cage is still holding up pretty decent but the bear did find a week spot in the cage so ill go in with some wire next time and reinforce those spots.
As you could imagine I was super excited to get home and see what the heck happened here. The dreaming began once again of a true giant that might have visited my site and did all this destruction!!!
I got home and checked the trail camera 187 videos wooohoooo lets see lets see haha
Well not the giant i am waiting for but great to see things are heating up and I have another bear at the bait!! here is a little video of them playing around and interacting. Maybe female and male?? or two young males?
https://youtu.be/y6C8dMc69xY
Here is a another video of the bear trashing my barrel, which now has me thinking i need to add a second strap to the bottom which would prevent them from doing this next time. One strap has done the trick over the past 3 season but two will be much better
https://youtu.be/9O2hgkLzcXA
I fixed up the bait and freshened everything. Fixed the beaver cage and decided to move it higher up the tree to see what this might do. Got to love trying experiments its actually a lot of fun and very interesting to see how the bears react.
I got out of there monday and the fire and chaos started tuesday so this bait will be on hold. I do how ever have another bait near Bonnyville and if i find time ill check that bait and keep the updates coming, For now thanks for following and stay tuned.
***#2 Bear hunt adventure begins***
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