The Bears Go Swimming!

August 21, 2015 11:27 AM

A family of bears descends upon a human family's pool in New Jersey. Ok, long time listener...first time poster. Please be kind. This is an eleven minute video of a bear family swimming in an above-ground pool. While the video is great...it is really the audio of the human family, filming from a second floor bedroom,that really makes this special.
posted by shibori (112 comments total)

Ok, long time listener...first time poster. Please be kind. This is an eleven minute video of a bear family swimming in an above-ground pool.

You're going to be fine, trust me.
posted by ryanshepard at 11:33 AM on August 21, 2015 [66 favorites]

Oh wow, I almost just posted this, with a different video. Those kids are getting a tough lesson in sharing their toys with other younguns.
posted by Countess Elena at 11:34 AM on August 21, 2015 [5 favorites]

go down the slide

go down the slide

go down the slide



It went down the slide!
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 11:38 AM on August 21, 2015 [33 favorites]

Please Don't Ursinate in Pool!
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:42 AM on August 21, 2015 [98 favorites]

This is way better than cat videos! And I wondered about so many cubs, but Wikipedia says they can have as many as 6, although 2 or 3 is most common.
posted by TedW at 11:45 AM on August 21, 2015 [5 favorites]

Oh god that kid is so pissed about somebody else using her stuff. Doesn't matter that it's a bear. She just doesn't want to share.
posted by uncleozzy at 11:46 AM on August 21, 2015 [33 favorites]

Metafilter: He took my floatie.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:47 AM on August 21, 2015 [19 favorites]

WTF happened at the end? Was that bear pulling an electric appliance into the water?!
posted by You Should See the Other Guy at 11:48 AM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

Okay, I see in the second video that the appliance is in the pool and the bear is still living.
posted by You Should See the Other Guy at 11:49 AM on August 21, 2015 [6 favorites]

Well, six of them are now slightly less dirty.
posted by Devils Rancher at 11:51 AM on August 21, 2015 [50 favorites]

I'm glad the mother bear didn't die. That would have been traumatic.

Very primal, ancient-seeming responses from the kids:
I WISH THE BEARS WERE IN SOMEONE ELSE'S YARD
I WANT THE BEARS TO GO AWAY
BAD MOMMY BEAR
OH NOES MY STUFF

Very grown-human-type responses from the parents:
They're going to poke holes in it.
This is a hazard of having a pool in this area.
Let them play, they're enjoying themselves.
Oh, that was expensive.
Okay that's enough, you're going to electrocute yourself now.
posted by bleep at 11:52 AM on August 21, 2015 [28 favorites]

That's an impressively sturdy little pool. If I were the manufacturer, I'd be on the phone to the family and working out a marketing deal for the video.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:54 AM on August 21, 2015 [63 favorites]

I do enjoy how the pool water gets progressively filthier as time goes on.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 11:55 AM on August 21, 2015 [11 favorites]

"Mama bear's got the hose."

Sounds like a euphemism for something, I just don't know what.
posted by theatro at 11:55 AM on August 21, 2015 [18 favorites]

I have never wanted a baby bear more than right now.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 11:57 AM on August 21, 2015 [7 favorites]

Wow.

I watched this with my four-year-old hanging over my shoulder, narrating at the top of his lungs in my ear the entire time, "MOMMY THAT BEAR HAS THE FLOATIE!"

He is in total accord with the children in the video.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:59 AM on August 21, 2015 [36 favorites]

I would probably arrange a photo shoot for my new baby bear.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:59 AM on August 21, 2015 [7 favorites]

I also thought it was cute how in the yard, the baby bears were like "Oh okay we're swimming now, mommy? Okay. .... I'm done swimming now I want to fight." Meanwhile up in the house the kids were like "Oh okay we're laughing now, mommy? I will laugh. ... I'm done laughing now I want to cry."
posted by bleep at 12:02 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Oh, look, a new one!

Reasons why I live in the city.
---------------------------------

1) Rapid transit to airport and many bars and restaurants.
2) No yard work.
3) Complete lack of bears in pool.^*



* Or playoffs....
posted by eriko at 12:04 PM on August 21, 2015 [8 favorites]

So many lessons...

Bears love pools.
Those children hate sharing.
Dad is a downer.
Mom spends a lot of time trying to get everyone to just enjoy the awesomeness that is a bear family in your back yard.
THAT BEAR HAS A FLOATIE!
Seriously, the kids hate the very concept of sharing.
Poor Mom.
Wait. That bear has Mom's floatie!
FLOATIEEEE!

Damn. I thought as an only child I was bad at sharing. I would have happily shared my floatie with a bear. Although there would have been equal amounts of screaming as to why I wasn't allowed outside to play with all those bears.

Also, this is an audio lesson in emotional labor.
posted by teleri025 at 12:06 PM on August 21, 2015 [116 favorites]

The New Jersey accents really add the finishing touch to this.

"They're going to poke holes in the floor with their feet. Jesus."
posted by Nevin at 12:07 PM on August 21, 2015 [8 favorites]

Sadly, I'm intimately familiar with the kind of father-daughter interaction happening here:

NERDY, SORT-OF-INEFFECTUAL DAD: "Calm down - this is a hazard of owning a pool in this area."

DAUGHTER: BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!
posted by ryanshepard at 12:08 PM on August 21, 2015 [25 favorites]

Also, this is an audio lesson in emotional labor.

Yeah, but it'll be dad who will do the physical labor of cleaning the mess up :)
posted by Nevin at 12:08 PM on August 21, 2015 [1 favorite]

Yeah, but it'll be dad who will do the physical labor of cleaning the mess up :)
But at least the new pool will be exactly like the old one because "that's the only kind of pool your dad will buy."

Hah.
posted by teleri025 at 12:11 PM on August 21, 2015 [17 favorites]

Was that bear pulling an electric appliance into the water?!

Those little pool pumps are pretty thoroughly sealed. Of course the instructions tell you to switch them off when the pool is in use, but about the only way that bear could have ended up in electrical trouble is by tearing insulation off the cable.
posted by flabdablet at 12:14 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

Reasons why I live in the city:
3) Complete lack of bears in pool.*

Rats in the shitter though (YMMV). Say what you want about suburbia but I have neither (though we do get BIG ASSED RACCONS in the storm drains, so there's that).

All I could think about was one of those four or five bear survival facts, primary amongst them being "DO NOT GET NEAR MAMA BEAR WITH CUBS. DO NOT GET BETWEEN MAMA BEAR AND CUBS."
posted by Ogre Lawless at 12:15 PM on August 21, 2015

Sio42...in the video posted by Countess Elena above it shows that the bears are fine.
posted by shibori at 12:20 PM on August 21, 2015

Countess Elena linked the second nine minutes.

Edit: jinx!
posted by flabdablet at 12:20 PM on August 21, 2015

I bet "This needs more police, not just one." is what the one police thought too.
posted by Ashenmote at 12:20 PM on August 21, 2015 [5 favorites]

Ogre Lawless: Rats in the shitter

This was Harry Chapin's early draft of his most famous song.
posted by dr_dank at 12:20 PM on August 21, 2015 [53 favorites]

sio42, watch Countess Elena's link, it starts where this leaves off and continues until the bears walk off to someone else's yard.

yeah took too long sorry
posted by maggiemaggie at 12:21 PM on August 21, 2015

Rats in the shitter

Worst. Aerosmith. Song. Ever.
posted by Devils Rancher at 12:22 PM on August 21, 2015 [21 favorites]

No one had the heart to tell them Rockaway Sales is defunct.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 12:26 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

This bears repeating.
posted by eriko at 12:30 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

o god i don't have this kinda time
posted by allthinky at 12:31 PM on August 21, 2015

I'm impressed by both the sturdiness of the pool and of the bear mom. It can't be easy to get 5 cubs to August still fat and healthy. At least, I'm assuming healthy given how much energy they had to play.
posted by tavella at 12:35 PM on August 21, 2015 [9 favorites]

If these were my kids, they would have been thrown out in the backyard with the bears after the third or fourth complaint about the goddamn floaties.
posted by backseatpilot at 12:38 PM on August 21, 2015 [47 favorites]

Dad's a total buzzkill.
posted by Sophie1 at 12:41 PM on August 21, 2015 [10 favorites]

I really hope animal control doesn't take extreme measures. I feel a little worried for this bear family.
posted by mudpuppie at 12:41 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

God, Mama bear looks so tired.
posted by The Whelk at 12:42 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Hey shibori this is a GREAT first post!!
posted by pipoquinha at 12:43 PM on August 21, 2015 [27 favorites]

God, Mama bear looks so tired.

She should be. She just hauled five unruly kids down the pool and dad didn't lift a goddamned finger to help.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:52 PM on August 21, 2015 [22 favorites]

o god i don't have this kinda time


"Sometimes Comments on Threads Even Though He Didn't Finish The 1000 Word Article But Watched Twenty Minutes of Bears In Pool Footage Before He Felt He Could Comment": The MCMikeNamara Story
posted by MCMikeNamara at 12:57 PM on August 21, 2015 [56 favorites]

I want to know what happened next. Was the pool reusable? Are the floaties still floating?

How much do bear cubs weigh?
posted by jeather at 12:59 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

thanks, pipoquinha. I'm feeling the love.
posted by shibori at 1:02 PM on August 21, 2015 [4 favorites]

Mama Bear and Human Mom are total heroes. Made my day!
posted by cleroy at 1:04 PM on August 21, 2015 [10 favorites]

I can't be the only one who heard bear+pool+Jersey and thought of the Sopranos, right?
posted by Xavier Xavier at 1:10 PM on August 21, 2015 [4 favorites]

it's so weird they ended the video there. "And then, Gentle Reader, Bad Mama Bear and her Babies were all electrocuted to death, nature red in tooth and claw and raw voltage."
posted by angrycat at 1:12 PM on August 21, 2015 [8 favorites]

I'm hoping when "animal control" people finally showed up they looked exactly like the Child Catcher in Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang.
posted by lagomorphius at 1:16 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Yeah, I wonder if it was a limit of the device Human Mom was recording on or if she just has a natural flair for editing quite dramatically.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:17 PM on August 21, 2015

I kept having to turn off the sound.

Am I the only one?
posted by amtho at 1:19 PM on August 21, 2015 [7 favorites]

o god i don't have this kinda time

"Sometimes Comments on Threads Even Though He Didn't Finish The 1000 Word Article But Watched Twenty Minutes of Bears In Pool Footage Before He Felt He Could Comment": The MCMikeNamara Story

Time spent actually watching bear video: 0 minutes
Time spent reading comments: 3 minutes
Time spent laughing painfully over Harry Chapin's "Rats in the Shitter": 5 minutes, so far
posted by dlugoczaj at 1:21 PM on August 21, 2015 [9 favorites]

I kept having to turn off the sound.

Am I the only one?

No. I wish I could have a version of that with just the grumpy dad and the awestruck mom. The bratty-sounding* kids were just awful.

*I can't tell if these kids are just monsters, or if all kids of that age could be expected to act like that when being forced to share with nature.
posted by sparklemotion at 1:22 PM on August 21, 2015 [11 favorites]

[dad dad dad there are giraffes on the jungle gym]

This is a hazard of owning jungle gyms in this area.

[dad dad dad there are monkeys in the sandbox]

This is a hazard of owning sandboxes in this area.

[dad dad dad there are pterodactyls in the treehouse]

This is a hazard of owning treehouses in this area.

[dad dad dad there are chupacabras in the bouncy castle]

This is a hazard of owning bouncy castles in this area

[dad dad dad Ygoman'tho, The Feaster From The Stars is on the trampoline]

This is a hazard of owning trampolines in this area.
posted by pretentious illiterate at 1:26 PM on August 21, 2015 [77 favorites]

I tried to find a clip of this song that WGN Morning News in Chicago always plays with bear videos, but I can't seem to locate it.

"Bears are awesome,
They're so awesome,
Man I love those bears."
posted by dnash at 1:28 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Second video, at 2:59, Mama Bear is _standing on the pool edge_ with all four paws. That is a _strong_ pool! Whoever said the pool company should be contacting these folks is right.

OR the pool company could just set up a pool in a conveniently-located forest and wait for spontaneous bear pool parties to happen all on their own.
posted by amtho at 1:28 PM on August 21, 2015 [11 favorites]

I do feel like the dad owes the pool an apology. In the second video posted, Mama Bear balanced on the edge of the pool for about 45 seconds and it didn't come down. It may never be clean again but that thing is solid.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:28 PM on August 21, 2015 [4 favorites]

[dad dad dad Ygoman'tho, The Feaster From The Stars has blessed the trampoline such that it embues jumpers with her wondrous power]

That trampoline is shot for the summer. We'll have to get a new on next year.
posted by sparklemotion at 1:28 PM on August 21, 2015 [9 favorites]

Okay amtho that has got to be the world's first bear pool related jinx ever, right?
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:30 PM on August 21, 2015 [6 favorites]

So about a month after my now ex-wife and I moved to the woods out in NJ, NJ Fish and Wildlife showed up at the door. Turns out that our driveway was the closest to a bear's den out in the woods behind the house, and they wanted to know if they could stage their journey to the den to get mama's vitals and tag the kids, and in exchange we could go along and keep the cubs warm.

They darted mom and then started to weigh her, check her collar to make sure it was loose enough, etcetc, and we were each handed a cub. The first thing they say is "don't let them near your face, their claws are large and well developed." What they don't tell you is that 1) a bear that is not much larger than a traditional stuffed teddy bear is quite strong enough to do whatever it wants, fuck you very much and 2) their claws are GIGANTIC and they know how to use them. I had a cub by the scruff of his neck down by my stomach. He looked up at me, yawned, then reached up to put one claw on each of my shoulders and just pulled himself up like I wasn't trying to keep him from doing that with all my strength. The good news is that it merely wanted to snuggle into my neck to pass out and start snoring.

That being said, I'm amazed that that pool wasn't instantly shredded into ribbons, and I have a new respect for PVC, bc that mama bear was neither small nor light.
posted by nevercalm at 1:31 PM on August 21, 2015 [135 favorites]

It can't be easy to get 5 cubs to August still fat and healthy.

YEAH that was my first thought too and now I am reading about TINY BABY BEARS and a litter of 5 is somewhat unusual.
posted by poffin boffin at 1:32 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

TIL New Jersey is a magical place.
posted by sparklemotion at 1:33 PM on August 21, 2015 [17 favorites]

nevercalm, I am jealous of your baby bear snuggling!
posted by tavella at 1:34 PM on August 21, 2015 [6 favorites]

I kept having to turn off the sound.

Am I the only one?

As soon as I heard the first shrill piercing kiddie squeal I turned the sound off.
posted by poffin boffin at 1:34 PM on August 21, 2015 [5 favorites]

I kind of hoped this post was somehow related to my favorite bear video.
posted by popaopee at 1:37 PM on August 21, 2015

pretentious illiterate that is the hardest I've laughed at a comment in a long time.
posted by maggiemaggie at 1:41 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

How many views do they need before they can afford a new pool, floaties, swing set and other toys?

Also, the same for the bears. They need to get something out of this.
posted by asok at 1:53 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

. . . their claws are GIGANTIC and they know how to use them.

Adult grizzly claw with human head for scale.
posted by ryanshepard at 2:05 PM on August 21, 2015 [6 favorites]

these are north american black bears though, which i think might be somewhat smaller? their ears are definitely more adorable.
posted by poffin boffin at 2:08 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

We just banned a pair of golden doodles in the yard because they were misbehaving. Well, things could be worse I guess....

Oh and awesome first post. Hehe.
posted by Namlit at 2:14 PM on August 21, 2015 [1 favorite]

It kinda seems like mama bear just wants some "me time" in the pool and all the kids & floaties keep interrupting.
posted by crepesofwrath at 2:21 PM on August 21, 2015 [13 favorites]

at least she's got the excuse of being a confused tiny child. when 60 year old white men start shrieking about brown invaders taking their stuff it is much less understandable.
posted by poffin boffin at 2:23 PM on August 21, 2015 [37 favorites]

TIL New Jersey is a magical place.

I have to admit I laughed out loud at that one.
posted by backseatpilot at 2:25 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

spontaneous bear pool parties

Usually held as private functions.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 2:30 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

Five cubs? Good job Mom. You deserve a soak.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 2:43 PM on August 21, 2015 [6 favorites]

Is it far from Rockaway Beach?
posted by dougzilla at 3:17 PM on August 21, 2015

OH MY GOD THAT ENDING
posted by ghostbikes at 3:56 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

Fucking Sophie. That kid is no fun.
posted by Squeak Attack at 3:58 PM on August 21, 2015 [1 favorite]

Great excuse to keep the in-laws from visiting: "Sorry, you can't come over to use the pool -- it's full of bears."
posted by benito.strauss at 4:06 PM on August 21, 2015 [20 favorites]

Those kids have been watching too much Caillou. ALL THE WHINING.

yes i am a parent and whining was strictly NOT allowed in this family, so much so that my now-teenaged kids get annoyed when they hear small children whining.

I love those bears.
posted by cooker girl at 4:38 PM on August 21, 2015 [12 favorites]

I can't believe they didn't throw the kid into the pool. Our daughter was eaten by bears is a pretty good story and no more whining.
posted by doctor_negative at 5:18 PM on August 21, 2015 [19 favorites]

Yeah, and the moment an infant asks its mama for milk cows should blow up the Earth!

That's what we're doing now, right?
posted by JHarris at 5:29 PM on August 21, 2015

Is it far from Rockaway Beach?

About 1.5 hours, depending on traffic.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 5:51 PM on August 21, 2015

The ratio of bears to kids is 3:1. There hasn't been a party like this since 1981! Come to my party - let the games begin. We've even got floaties if you can't swim!
posted by ChuraChura at 6:11 PM on August 21, 2015

(bears look cute - in their swimming suits!)
posted by ChuraChura at 6:12 PM on August 21, 2015

If you go down to the pool today
You're sure of a big surprise
If you go down to the pool today
You'd better go in disguise

For every bear that ever there was
Will gather there for certain because
Today's the day the teddy bears go swimming

Swimming time for teddy bears
The little teddy bears are having a lovely time today
Watch them catch them unawares
And see them take the floaties out to play

See them gaily swing and snout
They leave their dirt about
They never have any cares
posted by jeather at 6:41 PM on August 21, 2015 [22 favorites]

I can report that Inside Edition was all over this and conducted an interview with the family tonight. Fear not: The bears are fine, the floaties are trashed, the pool is dirty and has lots of claw marks one the floor, the little girl is still pretty pissed. And I'm sure either Inside Edition or the pool manufacturer are hooking the family up with a new pool after this viral goodness.
posted by TwoStride at 6:57 PM on August 21, 2015 [9 favorites]

I love these moms. I love the bear mom, and I love the person mom. They seem like on some other planet, they could share a couple glasses of wine, kick back, talk about momhood: sheesh.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 7:22 PM on August 21, 2015 [86 favorites]

Damn, bears are dirty.

You have no idea, so I'm going to share two of my "living with bears" anecdotes to give you some clue..

I live in a community on one of the islands of Southeast Alaska. Bears are a part of life here. I have a friend, W., who was renting a house that was at the mouth of a major salmon stream and during the summer months (when the stream is full of fish) bears were an everyday presence.

One year, as the summer was ending and the salmon runs were petering out, W.'s son D. borrowed his SUV and, when he returned it, made the mistake of leaving the tail end of a roll of wintergreen-flavored "Breath Savers" mints in the center console. Now bears are curious, powerfully food driven, and often-times ingenious creatures with an incredible sense of smell. The following morning W. discovered that during the night a bear had figured out how to lift the handle and open the door to his vehicle, had climbed in and explored thoroughly, eaten the Breath Savers, and then exited the same way it got in.

To fully understand what a disaster this was, you have to realize that the bear, at this point in the season, has been feeding at the mouth of the stream for weeks, wallowing every day through mud and decomposing fish to get to the remaining fish in the streams. It left such a stench of oily, rotting salmon in the upholstery that the insurance company decided to just total the car.

We couldn't really blame the bear, though. After several months of eating nothing but salmon, you'd be pretty desperate for a Breath Saver, too.
posted by Nerd of the North at 7:24 PM on August 21, 2015 [174 favorites]

OK, second bear anecdote, this one happened to me. Some of my cousins came from down south for a visit, and so we took them out to a remote USFS cabin that we rented. We had a great time, and came back at the end of the weekend. The terrain in my neighborhood is quite steep and my house, like many houses in this area, is at the top of quite a lot of stairs, but I have neighbors who live uphill who let me carry stuff from the road *down* through their yard rather than tote it up the stairs.

We were doing that with the first load of our weekend gear, and as we came to the back corner of the house, discovered that there was an unusual thing on the deck that hadn't been there when we had left. It was long and narrow and it stretched along the deck from the back corner of the house to the middle, then down a full flight of stairs to the lower level of the deck, then about five more feet from the bottom of the stairs, and ended in a pile of bear scat. As we were examining it, another neighbor, who's an amateur naturalist and had been tracking signs of the progress of the bear through the neighborhood, came up and said hello. He, too, took a look at the mystery item and asked "Is that what I think it is?"

"I don't know," I said. "What do you think it is? I have an idea but it's kind of disgusting.."

"I think that bear crapped out a 50-foot tapeworm on your starting on your deck, continued down your stairs, and finished on your lower deck."

"Yep," I said, "I'm pretty sure that's what happened."

Mostly I was just glad my guests and I weren't there at the time because that bear can't have been in a very good mood..

--

Bonus bear story, since you got me started.. We had some new neighbors who rented the house next door, after moving to town from Kentucky. There are some stray cats who live in our neighborhood and the new neighbors, who are animal lovers, wanted to make sure they were fed but not go as far as adopting them, so they began putting cat food out on their front steps to feed the strays. I and the other neighbors cautioned them that this was a bad idea and would attract bears, but they thought we were joking -- you could practically *see* them thinking "Oh, you Alaskans with your tall tales.. I'm not going to fall for that one.."

Within about a week we sent them this picture, in which a bear is standing on their front stoop, craning its neck to look in the kitchen windows and checking out their three overweight, very sausage-like dachshunds.
posted by Nerd of the North at 7:25 PM on August 21, 2015 [92 favorites]

Also, the northeast has been brutal this week. Just unbearable. Ha HA! Super hot, really humid, unrelenting during the day. At night it's okay but the days have been really hard to take. Being a mom with kids would be really hard. I had my daughter seven years ago in early July: you know what sucks? Being a new parent in the wet hot heat of summer. This must have been an incredible treat for both of these families.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 7:25 PM on August 21, 2015 [1 favorite]

Damn, bears are dirty.

You have no idea,

Well, they do shit in the woods.
posted by TwoStride at 7:48 PM on August 21, 2015 [4 favorites]

At the same house I mentioned earlier, the whole neighborhood was basically a road ringing a lot of completely wild undeveloped land. Tons and tons of wildlife, and lots of people feeding them, despite being warned.

One neighbor was feeding birds. Bear love bird seed...one decided that the shed the seed was being kept in was inconvenient, so it lifted the entire shed and then dropped it, climbed into the destroyed out building and made off with the booty.

Another neighbor was particularly dense and was feeding the bears...well, they went away and there was no food, so a bear broke down the door and destroyed the kitchen in the course of emptying it...
posted by nevercalm at 8:03 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

I want a loop of that 11 minute video playing steadily on my tv screen like a Christmas Yule log video, but with bears and a swimming pool.
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 8:12 PM on August 21, 2015 [7 favorites]

I love the dark tonal shift that happens around 9 minutes in, without any orchestral cues.
posted by Auden at 8:31 PM on August 21, 2015 [4 favorites]

I can't be the only one who heard bear+pool+Jersey and thought of the Sopranos, right?
posted by Xavier Xavier at 1:10 PM on August 21 [1 favorite +] [!]

No, and the end was just as dramatic as the cut to black at the end of the Sopranos, me yelling at the screen What! What happened??!!

(Nice job shibori, ya done good!)
posted by HotToddy at 8:43 PM on August 21, 2015 [2 favorites]

Well, they do shit in the woods.

Though not exclusively, as is made clear in my second anecdote.
posted by Nerd of the North at 9:06 PM on August 21, 2015 [12 favorites]

And I'm sure either Inside Edition or the pool manufacturer are hooking the family up with a new pool after this viral goodness.

It ain't gonna be Inside Edition, that's for sure.
posted by Camofrog at 9:26 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Father was so annoying. I emailed the videos to a bunch of people with the advice to hit mute.
posted by mlis at 10:40 PM on August 21, 2015

I loved this! It was nice to hear the Mom enjoying the moment. Thanks for posting it!
posted by SarahElizaP at 11:13 PM on August 21, 2015 [3 favorites]

Yeah, she seemed to just take the destruction of the toys and pool as the price for an enjoyable 20 minutes of watching bears. It's just stuff, after all. I've had a similar pool and they're pretty cheap for something so sturdy it can handle a grown bear standing on the side.
posted by harriet vane at 2:50 AM on August 22, 2015 [1 favorite]

I saw some edited clips of this yesterday, didn't realize that there was sound. The whining is really annoying, but the mom is awesome.
posted by bunderful at 8:22 AM on August 22, 2015

Payback for Goldielocks' home invasion.
posted by bendybendy at 10:30 AM on August 22, 2015 [3 favorites]

nerd of the north please feel free to tell like 100 more hilarrible bear stories
posted by poffin boffin at 6:40 PM on August 22, 2015 [17 favorites]

Great excuse to keep the in-laws from visiting: "Sorry, you can't come over to use the pool -- it's full of bears."

Personally, I'd call them up as say "Boy howdy, is it a scorcher today, huh? Wanna come by and use the pool? Yeah, don't go to the front door. Just come around back. Ok. See you then."

*hangs up*

*gets an idea*

*calls back*

"Oh, hey, mind bringing some salmon steaks with you?"
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:16 AM on August 23, 2015 [2 favorites]

Great first post.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 4:22 PM on August 23, 2015 [1 favorite]

They ought to be more careful
They're setting a bad example
They say animals don't worry
They're living on nuts and berries
posted by oakroom at 6:08 AM on August 24, 2015 [2 favorites]

As a mother of 3 young children, I definitely thought that there was an empathetic connection between the human mom and the bear mom. I think one of the reasons the human mom was so calm and patient is because, as a parent herself, she could totally sympathize with the bear mom's attempt to find SOMETHING to entertain her cubs for a brief while, so she could have a little bit of free time. So what if they are destroying the pool in the process? It's worth it for 20 minutes of peace. I once let my kids pour all the condiments from the fridge into a big bowl, stir it up, and paint the sidewalk with it. We had no ketchup for dinner that night and probably wasted about $12 of food, but that is a small price to pay for the 40 minutes of quiet time it bought me. The whole time I was watching I was thinking, "Wow, five cubs. That bear mom must be tired." I'll bet the human mom in the video thought the same thing, as HER cub stood next to her and whined about floaties the whole time. Moms got to stick together, no matter what species they are.

This was a great post! I had a lot of fun watching it and reading the comments.
posted by staggering termagant at 6:25 AM on August 24, 2015 [15 favorites]

Watching bear mom kick the kids out of the pool made me think she's just looking for FIVE MINUTES PEACE.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 3:05 PM on August 25, 2015

Man, those Cornell students just think they own everything.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 12:45 PM on August 26, 2015

I think that the undercurrent here is hidden connection between the narrating mom and the momma bear. She empathizes with the momma bear, because she IS the momma bear.
posted by cacofonie at 2:05 PM on August 27, 2015 [3 favorites]

I love how each new thing mama bear encounters has a response that is sort of, "Okay, now what the hell is THIS thing?! Jesus, humans make weird stuff."
posted by BigHeartedGuy at 10:26 PM on September 1, 2015 [1 favorite]