I Can Bearly Stand It
Bear Hill Wildlife Management Area, Bozrah
September 23, 2018
This page will be (rightfully) lost to history, but for the sake of it… I “completed” Bozrah at Bear Hill WMA. Yes, my favorite town to pick on, Bozrah. The town I’ve come to love over the last twelve years of writing CTMQ. Good ol’ Bozrah.
Lamentations and maudlin reminisces are for another page. For this page is just about Bear Hill WMA. I just learned that Connecticut has 105 WMA’s, which is bonkers to me. You, too, can learn much more about the federal and state wildlife management (read: Hunting) program here.
According to that page, Bear Hill is a handicapped accessible hunting area. Hm. If they are talking wheelchairs, I’d strongly suggest an off-road model. Now, I don’t hike and highlight all 105 WMA’s, but I do “poke my head in” so to speak and if there are feasible trails, I’ll check them out.
Bear Hill is pheasant hunting land, so that means wide unmowed and natural fields. (It’s also tick country, FYI.) I saw no game, but there were ton of wildflowers in bloom in September. I walked along a trail for a while, turned around, walked into another field for a while…
There’s a lot of milkweed here too, which is great for monarch butterflies. In fact, I saw a bunch of them enjoying the wildflowers more than I was. So that was nice. Monarch’s feed on milkweed as caterpillars, so it all makes sense.
Hiking Bear Hill WMA doesn’t really make sense, unless you factor in the fact that we’re in Bozrah and when trying to “do everything” in a town that involves so very few things, you tend to do everything.
Heck, you even notice the truck parked next to you is such a huge “Duck Dynasty” fan that he has outfitted his interior with handsome “Duck Dynasty” seat covers. And you waver for a moment on whether or not you should take a picture. On the one hand, what’s more Bozrah than some guy with “Duck Dynasty” seat covers? On the other… what’s wrong with “Duck Dynasty” seat covers?
Eh. I couldn’t help myself.
State Parks, Reserves, Preserves, Forests, and wMA’s
I live in Bozrah, been here 29 years. It’s quiet and we like it that way. I can walk straight out my back door and go for over a mile before I see another house/road. Bear Hill is a STATE WMA. As you pointed out, there are 105 of them in this STATE. Why pick on Bozrah, and go there if you knew it was a hunting area? That’s like going to a chicken barbecue and but expecting a steak. Bozrah is a town with about 2400 folks from ALL walks of life. I work in Hartford and get there in 35 mins and the grocery stores are only 10-12 minutes away. My wife and are going hiking, in Bozrah, right now, with the dog. I won’t tell you where. I don’t think we want to invite you back.
List of other CT towns this site has lightly poked fun at since 2006:
Andover
Ansonia
Ashford
Avon
Barkhamsted
Beacon Falls
Berlin
Bethany
Bethel
Bethlehem
Bloomfield
Bolton
Branford
Bridgeport
Bridgewater
Bristol
Brookfield
Brooklyn
Burlington
Canaan
Canterbury
Canton
Chaplin
Cheshire
Chester
Clinton
Colchester
Colebrook
Columbia
Cornwall
Coventry
Cromwell
Danbury
Darien
Deep River
Derby
Durham
East Granby
East Haddam
East Hampton
East Hartford
East Haven
East Lyme
East Windsor
Eastford
Easton
Ellington
Enfield
Essex
Fairfield
Farmington
Franklin
Glastonbury
Goshen
Granby
Greenwich
Griswold
Groton
Guilford
Haddam
Hamden
Hampton
Hartford
Hartland
Harwinton
Hebron
Kent
Killingly
Killingworth
Lebanon
Ledyard
Lisbon
Litchfield
Lyme
Madison
Manchester
Mansfield
Marlborough
Meriden
Middlebury
Middlefield
Middletown
Milford
Monroe
Montville
Morris
Naugatuck
New Britain
New Canaan
New Fairfield
New Hartford
New Haven
New London
New Milford
Newington
Newtown
Norfolk
North Branford
North Canaan
North Haven
North Stonington
Norwalk
Norwich
Old Lyme
Old Saybrook
Orange
Oxford
Plainfield
Plainville
Plymouth
Pomfret
Portland
Preston
Prospect
Putnam
Redding
Ridgefield
Rocky Hill
Roxbury
Salem
Salisbury
Scotland
Seymour
Sharon
Shelton
Sherman
Simsbury
Somers
South Windsor
Southbury
Southington
Sprague
Stafford
Stamford
Sterling
Stonington
Stratford
Suffield
Thomaston
Thompson
Tolland
Torrington
Trumbull
Union
Vernon
Voluntown
Wallingford
Warren
Washington
Waterbury
Waterford
Watertown
West Hartford
West Haven
Westbrook
Weston
Westport
Wethersfield
Willington
Wilton
Winchester
Windham
Windsor
Windsor Locks
Wolcott
Woodbridge
Woodbury
Woodstock
Dear Mark,
Lighten up, Francis
Sincerely,
People Who Can Take A Joke
I think Pittman-Robertson funds pay for a lot of those WMAs. It would be nice if ATV savages used that as a model to buy properties for ATV use.
The best story I heard about Bozrah was when there were public hearings about building the air separation plant in town, someone voiced concern about using up all the air in town.