Long time friend Doug Johnson and I went into the Cohutta Wilderness again .....
We walked in the old logging road to a mound of dirt I knew could be used as a tripod for a morning pic right where Doug and I usually split up. I kid you not, as I was setting up the camera, just moments before this pic, a bear came out of a tree not 30 yards from us.
Here's another pic of Doug on a pretty mountain slope...
Here's a really big white oak...take note of the 'strange bark pattern'....that's what a tree looks like when bears climb it year after year.
Pattern and fresh claw marks farther up...
Bears take the path of least resistance....here's the same tree and the 'divide'. This tree has an uphill lean, and the bears alway climb this easy side, notice how the bark patterns change as the left side has been smoothed out over the years....