Video: Bears Play in Upper Valley Backyard

Hanover native Jaimie Seaton had never seen bears in her hometown until Sunday morning — when a small family of black bears took over her backyard.

She was sitting outside with a cup of coffee when she “felt there was something walking to my right.” 

That something turned out to be a mother black bear and her cubs.

“Shocked and scared,” she quietly walked back inside and woke up everyone else in the house. They watched the bears and filmed for about a half-hour.

“They didn’t seem to notice us at all,” Seaton, who sometimes freelances articles for the Valley News and its publications, said in an interview today. “I had one foot inside just in case, (but) they weren’t bothered by us. They were very relaxed.”

The mother bear climbed back and forth over a fence between Seaton’s home and her neighbor’s, while the cubs played, taking special interest in a rope swing hanging from her tree. The sow also took a piece of trash out of a trash can on the road while sauntering away, Seaton said.

Experts are reporting that the region’s particularly hot, dry summer is affecting wildlife, notably bears, who are getting bolder in search of food or water because berry bushes are producing less food during the drought.

Watch part of the video shot by Seaton at the top of this page.