Yvonne Dickson said everyone asks her if the photos of the black bear standing up at a bird feeder on her Buxton deck is a man in a bear suit. But Dickson said the bear, which she believes was a young adult bear, was very real.
“This one was savvy,” Dickson said. “I opened the screen door to the deck and told him to shoo. I told him, ‘Get out of there.’ And he sort of looked at me and turned around and went down and sat on the grass. So I went out on the deck and told him to get out and called 911 to report it and a policeman did come out later. And then about 5 minutes later he was back on the deck. I had to go through the whole thing again.”
It was not the first time Dickson, who is in her 80s and has lived in Maine since 1957, has seen bears in her backyard. She said one came on her family’s deck six years ago and destroyed every feeder. Although Dickson didn’t get a look at the bear that time. She said she enjoyed seeing one up close this spring.
“It’s an experience I’d like to relive,” she said.
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