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Ken,
Isn't Libby the town with the vermiculite/asbestos problem? I hope you didn't play in that stuff when you were a kid.
The bears I have seen generally want to stay away from humans and that includes the grizzly and 2 cubs we saw when we were very near the Arctic Circle in '06. But when they're hungry, especially in early Fall or just after waking up, and if they are acclimated to humans, that's another story. The places people camp are full of food, toothpaste and shampoo, and the bears that are attracted to such a wonderful opportunity. Those are the bears to be scared of and we do have bear spray.
Another bear story: In 1959, I was at Yosemite with my parents and there are the bears at the dumpsters. Maybe 30 tourists are getting out of their cars to look at them and my father and I do the same armed with cameras. My mother is smart enough to stay inside. Some people get about 10 feet away from the bears. The bears are having such a good time with the garbage, they ignore everyone. But, what if someone angers a bear?—tourists are pretty dumb at times. We take some photos from about 20 feet away and then look at each other and say at the same time: "what the hell are we doing here?" We got back in the car and drove away. We did not hear of anyone eaten. This used to go on all the time in western national parks until the Park Service stopped it some years later.
Gene
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