Message from Cold Hollow Cider Mill owner Paul Brown, July 25

July 31, 2020  |  By Paul Brown

The bear trap set behind the dumpsters at Cold Hollow Cider Mill is open and ready for a bear to wander inside. The warden used cider doughnuts soaked in bacon grease to lure the bear. Fish & Wildlife photo.

To our local friends (including the bears):

Please know we very much appreciate your concern for local bears. We want to assure you that no bear was killed or intentionally mistreated on our property, nor would we condone that. 

But after exhausting every other option over the last four weeks, we had no choice but to have two particularly troublesome bears humanely trapped and removed from our property by, and at the advice of, the local game warden. 

We were told one bear was released in Moretown. An unknown person in Waterbury Center, we're sad to report, killed a second bear - illegally. The warden trapped a third bear on an adjacent property, which we’re hoping was released as well.

We've been here over 20 years and have not had any issues with the bears before. But the warden informed us that it's been a very unusual year. Due to normal late food sources being unavailable, 95% of all calls this year have been bear-related. In addition, during the Covid emergency, lots of traveling visitors have disposed of unsorted trash in our trash cans and dumpsters. 

We only contacted the game warden as a last resort after the bears began acting aggressively toward our customers and employees. By this time, we had already re-secured our dumpsters, began bringing our composting bins inside every evening, requested a bear-proof dumpster from Myer’s (we we’re told they don’t carry them anymore due to too many hand and finger injuries to their customers and employees), hung open bleach containers inside the dumpster as a deterrent, and secured the dumpsters with straps, plywood, 2” x 12’s, and finally, metal grating (which worked). 

Unfortunately, the bears were still not leaving and, in fact, were beginning to get too close for comfort to people and vehicles; one even attacked an occupied car. Another attacked and shook a camper (Cold Hollow offers Harvest Host camping). 

After four weeks of taking advice from the game warden, he recommended trapping as our best option. He made the decision to have the bears, to our understanding, humanely trapped (we own no traps). It was his call, not ours, and we had to respect that. 

We’re a locally owned, family run, environmentally conscious business and we appreciate – and very much share - your concern for the local bears. After all, we’re all neighbors – our customers, the game warden, the bears, and all other wildlife.