Cat, Bear or Seagull?

Mr Pooh: lives in Shoreham by Sea, on the Sussex coast (in England), which is just a stones throw from where I used to live in Engalnd, okay a very long stobnes throw, but close enough.

He's a seagull. Or maybe he's a cat. Or maybe, given his nickname, he's actually a bear.

Whatever he 'thinks' he is, Pooh the seagull is a family pet.

He has been part of the Grimwood family from Shoreham-by-Sea ever since he arrived unexpectedly as a baby.

Pooh didn't even arrive conventionally by exiting an egg.

In fact the Grimwoods found him in their fireplace one day.

"We heard a rustle in the lounge when we were watching telly and we suddenly thought 'Ooh - what's that?" said June Grimwood.

"We reached into the chimney and pulled out this young chick."
He was just a baby gull at the time, albeit an ash-covered baby after falling down the chimney.

"We put him back on the roof, but it was a bit of a windy day and he fell back off."

Instead of getting into a flap, June and Steve Grimwood calmly nursed him and fed him cat food.

He ate it alongside some unlikely companions - the family cats.

"He slept in the cats' basket, mingled in amongst the cats and was happy as Larry,"

Then, one day, Pooh flew the nest.

But he still returns for six months every year. In fact, in a sense, he's still at home with Mum and Dad, because he and his partner nest on their roof.

Pooh comes in for meals three times a day, with the cats Mitzi, Gus and Henry.

"He feeds out of the cat bowls, he comes indoors and takes the cats' biscuits out of their feeder. I think he does believe that he is actually a cat," said Mrs Grimwood.

"I wouldn't say he's mixed up. He's just very clever. He knows where to go for a good B&B (Bed and Breakfast)is by the seaside every year."

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

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Bear comes to a sticky end

It seems it's not only the American Police force that has a taste for sticky cakes and buns.

A hunter in the American state of Pennsylvania has been fined nearly $7,000 for luring a bear to a sticky end with a trail of donuts.

Charles Olsen enticed the large black bear into his gun sights with pastries and illegally shot it, police said.

Mr Olsen attracted the attention of the Game Commission when his truck, laden with sugary treats, was spotted on a road a week before bear season.
The "pastry poacher" was found guilty of violating several game laws.

Mr Olsen was arrested last November when he attempted to register the bear, which weighed 707 lbs (a third of a ton), the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported.
It would have been the biggest trophy claimed during the state's three-day bear hunting season had it been killed legally, the newspaper said.

The 39-year-old, of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, was rumbled when a Game Commission wildlife conservation officer spotted his truck loaded with pastries from a local shop and traced the license number.

The officer, Cory Bentzoni said: "Being that we were so close to bear season, seeing that person drive by with an unusual amount of pastries was like watching an individual go down a row of parked vehicles testing each handle to see if it would open.

"Something just didn't seem right," he was quoted as saying.
Mr Olsen could also lose his hunting and trapping privileges for at least three years after Thursday's hearing, it is reported.

Barry Eva (Storyheart)

My Blogs:
Book Information and Things UK - Across the Pond
Book and a Chat Radio Show Guests - A Book and a Chat
Funny, Weird Or Just Interesting News From Around the World - Laugh I Thought My Trousers Would Never dry