$1.25
your homegrown newspaper September 24, 2025
Vol. 22, No. 3
50 years pg. 5
JOYCE LOBECK PHOTOS
Author visit pg. 7
A bear cub sits in a Red Delicious apple tree in the St. Ignatius area in 2024. Right: Carter Clinkenbeard, wildlife biologist with CSKT Natural Resources, operates an apple grinder in preparation for making cider during the Ronan Harvest Festival.
Cider pressing event reduces bear attractants in Mission Valley By Joyce Lobeck for the Valley Journal
Harvest festival pg. 8
RONAN — People lined up with boxes of apples and left with jugs of tangy, semi-sweet, freshly pressed apple cider. The cider making was a big attraction at the
Ronan Harvest Festival held Sept. 20, with the apple pressing provided by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Wildlife Program. “This is a good way to use those extra apples,” said Carter Clinkenbeard, wildlife biologist with the CSKT Natural Resourc-
es, as he presided over the three presses. This has been an unusual year for bear activity in the Mission Valley, “with less human interaction,” he said. He attributed this to a bountiful crop of wild fruit such as huckleberries, service berries, gooseberries, wild
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raspberries, currants, elderberries, chokecherries and other fruit, so bears have had a good food source away from people’s orchards. But with fall approaching, the bears are making their presence known again with sightings, piles of scat, fruit stripped off
trees and broken fruit tree branches. And people are reminded that they need to take steps to avoid conflict with the animals. Bears love fruit for helping them fatten up for winter hibernation, see page 2