Critter Count Part the Second

Bears. Our ursine friends are alive and well and foraging the shoreline in select locations on the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Problem is, the trees grow all the way down to the high water line, so you can’t see any of them unless you venture from the boat by dinghy onto their turf. As if.

OK; we did. Once. Dateline: July 13, 2007. Bunsby Islands, Checleset Bay. West anchorage. This is a good place because (1) this is the last and best wilderness area in all of Vancouver Island, and I wouldn’t lie to you; (2) there’s lots and lots of rocky, ocean-exposed and/or protected shorelines to explore all over the place; (3) there’s fishing potential in the channels by large boat or by dinghy (and yes, we got skunked - again); and (4) in the west anchorage there is a tidal flat that contains the remains of an old Native fish weir -- you know, from back in the days when the salmon were so plentiful you could walk on their backs an never touch water? Yeah - you can see the narrow, shallow place in the tidal flat that those crazy First Nations folks enhanced to form a fish pen, in which to trap-n-nab fish at will when the tide went out.

Difficulty: black bears patrol the little rocky islands hereabouts. Some of you may ask, MS, that’s silly; how could bears get to a little rocky island so far from more extensive tracts of land?

Dude? They swim. Like wolves and cougars swim. Seen it.

So there we are: snug little anchorage, sun shining, us basking in the glow of a successful passage around the ominous Solander Island, the Pacific Ocean surf pounding the rocks a few reefs away, Ancient Fish Weir Of Mystery mere yards away from the Fox. We inflate our red two-person kayak…and pause.

“Dude. What’s that black thing moving around on shore?”

“I dunno. Get the binocs.”

“Bear. Little guy though.”

“What’s that behind him?”

“Bigger bear.”

“You really want to see this fish weir thing?”

“Meh - let’s wait ‘til the next low tide. And then make a lot of noise.”

(Which your intrepid travelers eventually did. And it was great. No humans or bears were harmed in the making of this adventure.)

Dateline: July 31, 2007. Rainy Bay Cove, Barkley Sound. Nicely sheltered little cove, good holding, nearby sport fishing lodge (Sunshine Bay Resort, FYI, Google it) and 14 float cabins for rent. Sport fishers come here year after year - it’s that cool a place. 2007 was the second time we anchored here, and it was quite the nostalgia trip to see it again - this time, in better weather. This is another of those places where the trees come down right to the edge of the salt water’s high tide, and you can’t see past the first few trees into the forest. Your only clues to onshore critter activity are snapping branches and thuds. Rainy Bay Cove has a semi-resident female (I so dislike the word “sow”) black bear we‘d seen in 2004:

“Hey, Babe. Bear on the shoreline sniffing around. Little guy though - yearling.”

“Dude. Look at what’s behind him. Bigger bear.”

“Look at what’s behind HIM. Little fluffy baby bear.”

“So the big guy’s not a guy. Hi, Mom.”

“Wow. She has two kids.”

“No wonder everybody tells you to be careful in the woods. She’s got two kids, they’re all over the place, and if you hike anywhere near them she takes YOUR head off. Glad I’m on the boat, man.”

“How far out do bears swim?”

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