Hi everyone,
I thought I would show you some pretty grainy photos of a rather exciting encounter! Several times a week I walk through a large meadow about a mile from my house to the edge of the vast forests of the Vrancea. I have been doing this same trip for months viewing mainly deer, buzzard, Hoopoe and occasionally wild boar. I sit at the top of a ridge looking down to the lower part of the meadow at about 400 metres. Our camera does not have much zoom capability so apologies for the poor quality. On this particular evening I had to take a double take as to what I was looking at through my binoculars. A full on Carpathian brown bear heading our way, so as you can imagine we didn't hang around for long!
Brown Bear by trackranger, on Flickr
Brown Bear on Bear Ridge by trackranger, on Flickr
The meadow is about 6 kms long and is used by the villagers as grazing land. There are no fences here so each herdsman/shepherd stay with their animals all day. They also have dogs with them too to protect their flocks as we have a high number of wolves and bears in close proximity to the village. The following link shows nomadic style shepherds on the same land, but they have now moved on with their flock to fresh grazing. The grass is now approximately two foot long and full of flowers and plants.
http://www.trackranger.com/2010/10/walking-with-shepherds.html
This next link will also show you the same meadow, but on the ridge where I go several times a week to view wildlife. http://www.trackranger.com/2010/06/bear-ridge.html There are an estimated 150 bears in the area, and many say the population is growing. There have been several confrontations between villagers and bears and I have interviewed 9 men that have been attacked. The story is usually the same, on their own at night looking for their cow or horse that did not return home after grazing. The bears also come into the village in Autumn to scrump for apples and pears from garden trees to lay down fat before the winter hibernation.
I am not sure how many wolves are in our particular area, but there are a lot. My area is frequented by a large 70+ kg male wolf. I have never seen him but one of the local rangers has several times. I have photographed his tracks and hope to catch up with him sometime soon!
The wolves rarely venture near to the village, but we had a very cold spell this last winter where temps dropped to -25oC. One of the villagers caught a pack of wolves consuming his Alsation that was on a chain!
Best wishes!
Paul
I thought I would show you some pretty grainy photos of a rather exciting encounter! Several times a week I walk through a large meadow about a mile from my house to the edge of the vast forests of the Vrancea. I have been doing this same trip for months viewing mainly deer, buzzard, Hoopoe and occasionally wild boar. I sit at the top of a ridge looking down to the lower part of the meadow at about 400 metres. Our camera does not have much zoom capability so apologies for the poor quality. On this particular evening I had to take a double take as to what I was looking at through my binoculars. A full on Carpathian brown bear heading our way, so as you can imagine we didn't hang around for long!
Brown Bear by trackranger, on Flickr
Brown Bear on Bear Ridge by trackranger, on Flickr
The meadow is about 6 kms long and is used by the villagers as grazing land. There are no fences here so each herdsman/shepherd stay with their animals all day. They also have dogs with them too to protect their flocks as we have a high number of wolves and bears in close proximity to the village. The following link shows nomadic style shepherds on the same land, but they have now moved on with their flock to fresh grazing. The grass is now approximately two foot long and full of flowers and plants.
http://www.trackranger.com/2010/10/walking-with-shepherds.html
This next link will also show you the same meadow, but on the ridge where I go several times a week to view wildlife. http://www.trackranger.com/2010/06/bear-ridge.html There are an estimated 150 bears in the area, and many say the population is growing. There have been several confrontations between villagers and bears and I have interviewed 9 men that have been attacked. The story is usually the same, on their own at night looking for their cow or horse that did not return home after grazing. The bears also come into the village in Autumn to scrump for apples and pears from garden trees to lay down fat before the winter hibernation.
I am not sure how many wolves are in our particular area, but there are a lot. My area is frequented by a large 70+ kg male wolf. I have never seen him but one of the local rangers has several times. I have photographed his tracks and hope to catch up with him sometime soon!
The wolves rarely venture near to the village, but we had a very cold spell this last winter where temps dropped to -25oC. One of the villagers caught a pack of wolves consuming his Alsation that was on a chain!
Best wishes!
Paul
Last edited:
