Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

I didnt know they had bamboo in Ecuador. I learned something new.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

I'm beginning to wonder if they don't have it everywhere but the polar caps :ha: !
BTW, I'm new at this 'forum' stuff and have only been in Bananas.org since May 7 this year. What is 'my Work in progress tropical corner' & how do ya find it?

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Conejo, if you really want the mindbender, we have our own bears that eat it, too.

Thank you, National Geo! They never look this nice when you come face to face with 'em in the wild...


This eats bamboo!

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Come on fess up lorax, is that your pet? Looks kind of like a sun bear but I don't think trhey care for the tropics much. Does look to be something you'd have around the house though!

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

I think it's smiling :) ! Luv that haircut!

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Bob, I'd never keep a bear as a pet. I'm still getting used to the concept of "bears that won't eat me" truth be known - being from Northern Canada, I've got a healthy respect for "bears that will eat me" - ie Grizzlies, Blacks, Cinnamons, and Polars. The concept of a bear the size of a large German Shepherd dog, that subsists on Bamboo, is very odd to me.

I was honest when I said that was a National Geographic photo; Andean Spectacled Bears (Tremarctos ornatus) are in fairly sever danger of extinction, and I'm lucky that they range in the same forests as I do, which means that occasionally I see them. They're very shy; I'm more likely to meet Ocelots or Jaguars in the forest than I am Spectacled Bears.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

For some reason reminded me of this

Woman, 65, Saves Husband, 70, from Mountain Lion Attack - Associated Content

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

LOL! Big cats here are much more scared of you than the other way on. In the case of Jaguars, because they are capable of eating me, I just freeze and let them go their merry way. Normally, this means that they stand and look at me for a while, then pass by. I won't say it's not scary, because it is, but it's also pretty cool. Smaller big cats, like the Ocelots, are always above you in the trees, and they run away pretty fast.

Puma, on the other hand, scare the living crap out of me. I've encountered them a couple of times in my travels, and I always get the feeling that what we have is an uneasy detente, and if I didn't have that big stick I might be dinner.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Beth sometimes I loose track of the fact that you're originally from a place where bears are true omnivores..........meaning we're on the menu occaisionally. I of all should have remembered that. Stay away from the jaguars too please..... and keep the big stick.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

As I said before, Jaguars and cats of that family don't bother me much. It's Pumas (Mountain Lions, Catamounts, Cougars, whatever you want to call cats that answer to Puma concolor) that give me the heebidy-jeebidies.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

:lurk: Heebidy-Jeebidies...!? LOL !! Luv it!!!!!!

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

In our mountains they learnt to eat even what we toss out often wandering into mountain cities and causing havocs. It's not rare to see a "family" of 20 to 30 bears wandering on an empty promenade in a mountain city.
Yep. And try to hunt them down or scare them.

Once I was in a park close to the Carpathian highest peeks in here and I saw 2 policemen standing over 2 dead police fighting horses (you know those, 2 to 3m high, like a small truck, fatter, strong, aggressive...) that our mountain police uses. They were massacred by a single bear in about 2 minutes. Lovely.

No kitty (sorry lorax :D ) can beat that ... :D

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

BTW, after much study of European bear species, I Definitely would Not try to scare one away... or even get anywhere near one :). Didn't realize how vicious bears, over there, were :eek: !

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Jack, that was my exact point when I said "I'd never keep a bear as a pet."

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

We have lots of mountain lions here and a fair number of bears in the nearby mountains. Cougars don't scare me at all...and bears don't unless they are close..

Cats are more scared of us than the other way around. But, it often seems that bears fear nothing.

black bear..which are quite small compared to other north american species can easily kill deer and even elk.
Cougars are natural deer killing machines, and will often kill 1 per day..when they have kittens. I have also seem cougars decimate wild horse herds.

I have walk upon both cougars and black bears without incident. They have all slowly left, as I watched them.
.........................
now totally off on topic..Michael, I love your thread..very informative.

aaron

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

It is different in here, 'cause we've been literally living with the bears for centuries, they were coming to our villages and taking whatever trash we had stucked next to our houses. That's actually why I wouldn't like to live in the mountain region.
It's impossible to outrun them, outmanouvre them, they can climb trees better than you (even though many of them go above 200kg ~ 440 pounds), they swim faster and you wouldn't want to meet them when they are hungry and annoyed from hot weather (May to september).
The real problem is, that tourists usually pick all the blueberries, strawberries and other forest fruit and the bears have been forced for about 100 years to specialize in rather carnivorous life style.
Fish, other animals, sheep, wolves!, lambs, deers, whatever the forests and mountains offer.
They also learnt something unheard off anywhere out of Europe: They learnt to live in communities and organize themselves for food gathering.

Yet some people in mountain regions have bears as their pets. ;) :D It's a symbiosis based on food suppling and I don't dare to guess, what would happen, if the supplier (man) would stop supplying the bear community he holds (nature).
I guess it's nature:mankind 1:0 again. :D

I just wonder, Beth, those bears of yours, do they have sleeping periods like ours (when it is too hot in Ecuador)? Or are they active whole year long?

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Bears here are active year-round, and more so in the wet season when they're less likely to overheat. The last time I came across a bear in the dry season, it was swimming in a stream I had to cross, presumably to cool off. Litters happen in the wet season as well, since food is much more plentiful when it's raining.

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Do they feed primarily on bamboo (herbivores) or are they also a little bit carnivorous?
If they had to choose a bamboo or a fish. What would be their choice? :D

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Jack - If I should visit Slovakia, I will bring a truckload of berries for the bears! Better them than me.

Browndrake - About as off-on topic as usual, in fact, unusually on-topic this time :). Thanx for the vote of Confidence :) !

Whew...! :) Glad we got the bamboo-/-fish thing settled! Actually, I would've said the Milky Way Midnight :).

Re: A guide to Bamboo
 

Jack - bamboo, no contest.