Customer Reviews

Black Bear: North America's Bear

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Awsome photos. Very informative text. I learned a whole bunch about these bears I didn't know before. Kids researching black bears could not find a better book to begin with.

Three species of black bear inhabit North America, but the American black bear is the only one found in only in North America. Author Stephen R. Swinburne journeys with wildlife biologists to study the black bear, visiting those who work with them and discussing their history and habitats. Color photos and an engaging text make Swinburne's Black Bear a true winner for any school or community library Wildlife collection for your readers.

Put very simply - bears are cool. Bears in a zoo, however, are very boring. I've never seen a bear in captivity do anything but roll up and sleep, so we're basically left staring at a big ball of fur. Steven Swinburne takes a much more interesting approach, venturing out to locate active bears to photograph and study. We'll have to content with living vicariously through his travels because I like to keep a safe distance between myself and animals this large and toothy.

I like that the four chapters in the book all offer different types of information on black bears. Contrary to other non-fiction animal books, this one includes some first hand accounts of the author's adventures, instead of just giving us the straight facts to memorize. Of course, all the chapters include some terrific bear photographs. Combine those with Stephen's interesting stories and you have a terrific book about bears.

The first chapter is a personal recounting of the his first chance to cuddle with some live bear cubs. Chapter two gives us a bit of a history lesson on how bears graduated from wild animals to tourist attraction in Yellowstone National Park. In the third chapter, the author visits Ben Kilham, a man who has been helping to raise abandoned bear cubs since 1993. The final chapter finishes up the book with some great tips on the signs to look for to know if bears have been around.

If you have an interest in these fascinating animals, definitely give this one a shot. This book pulls double duty by being informative and interesting. You learn the bare facts and get some great personal stories from the author - the best of both worlds.

Black Bear: North America's Bear....Not worth 10.00 ....Wow barely 30 pages.......nice pictures...but how crazy it's more a childrens book I will be sending to the public library!~

Is a bear dangerous to a human or vice versa?

After the lecture you learned for sure that the black bear deserves our respect and that it is not the cuddly toy he seems to be. But for sure he is not as dangerous to us humans as we are to him.

For a basic information and some good photos on the smalles of the species, get this book.

The Smoky Mountains in North Carolina and Tennessee are full of black bears. When I brought my young sons to Cherokee many years ago, we were able to take pictures of the black bears as they turned over garbage cans to obtain food, and we were not in any danger -- as long as we didn't get too close. But times have changed. For one thing, the place is brimming over with these bears and they have become aggressive.

Here's the story of Cubby, a little black bear who had no chance to survive: Such was the case of Cubby, a tame black bear living in a private game farm in Minnesota. Cubby had no cause to not trust the man who purchased him for $4,650; after all, he was not a dangerous, wild black bear and had never hurt anyone. He must have been a beautiful, trusting creature who never had a chance. He was put in a fenced-in area and his new owner killed him in cold blood. That poor bear had nowhere to run and had no idea he was bought for blood sport of an evil monster; he didn't make it off the farm where he had lived.

When black bears in the Smokies are killed, it is only after they have killed a human. This year, an innocent bear met her fate after a mother bear was protecting her two young cubs and killed a child. Eventually, the culprit was found and met her fate at the hands of man. Once they have tasted a human's blood, it is thought that they will kill again. But young Cubby had not hurt anyone -- never had a chance. Nor did he have a chance in hell when this demon bought him as a video showing what a good hunter he supposedly is. It was staged! There is evidence of the kill. The video was edited to make it look like he had killed the bear out in the wild. Well, that is a federal crime and so he must go to court to plead his case. In the meantime, he will be the main attraction ('headliners, they're called) at the biggest celebration in this town on Sept. 2 & 3. He had the bear's beautiful pelt (fur) sent to him in Tennessee. Perhaps he will have it around his shoulders when he is allowed to appear before a mass of youngsters who will look up to him. I have consistently vocally opposed being called a hillbilly, but this town is definitely crass and ignorant to allow that criminal to come to this event. I asked a local news columnist to write about it and suggest a boycott, but he was told by a colleague at Metro Pulse to let it be. Such is life in a backward town where killing is commonplace. But killing an innocent bear who never had a chance will make this town as sinful as New Orleans and perhaps we will suffer the same fate as they. God does not look down kindly on Soddom and Gormarrha towns, and this one definitely is on the track of that kind of living. The whole downtown is composed of bars and drinkers out on the sidewalks. It is bad and getting worse.

Minnesota may have different wild life rules than we do in Tennessee, but the bears in the Smokies were always protected and fines (sometimes jail for those who killed one) were high even if you hid one with your car. They were a protective species, as were the Canadian geese. Neither are safe here anymore and meet the fate of young Cubby. A mother bear protecting her cubs is only natural instinct as we humans would do the same if our children were endangered in any way. But to kill her and both of her babies is unconsciencable (it's inhuman). When the little girl was killed by the bear who had attacked her grandmother who was doing what the mother bear did, try to protect her grandchildren, the wrong bear was killed. That's a dirty shame. We now kill the bears and the geese, pigeons also in Knoxville where they have brought in falcons, vultures, and other predators to rid the town and the church on Cumberland and Locust from the mess the pigeons make. One woman who works in the church office told me I could not longer feed the pigeons as one of them scared her little girl. When I was young, there were a multitude of pigeons in the Greyhound Bus Station and I thought they were fantastic and marvelous, a joy to behold. But, then, I did not have a mother to get scared that one of them might poop on her little girl. It is against nature to rid the town of these beautiful birds. They've already killed or scared off the beautiful birds I fed and took pictures of in Krutch Park. The rich yuppies who have taken over the downtown are behind this, and the rich mayor just goes along with the crowd. Putting up noise makers, artificial owls, and now large birds to rid the town of the beautiful fowl. The predators are ugly and loud. How will they eradicate them when they take over the skies -- they have to poop, too.