HART’S LOCATION, N.H. (AP) – A Massachusetts woman suffered head, neck and back injuries Sunday while hiking in Crawford Notch State Park.

Karen Renzi, 44, of Westwood, Mass., was taken to Memorial Hospital in North Conway, where she was later treated and released.

Fish and Game Sgt. Jim Juneau said Renzi lost consciousness briefly after being hit by a volleyball-sized rock dislodged by someone hiking ahead of her.

Man says bear drawn to biodiesel

WINSTED, Conn. (AP) – A Winsted man believes the sweet smell of the vegetable oil he uses to fuel his car attracted a bear who damaged the vehicle trying to get at the biodiesel.

Larry Joy, a 53-year-old electrician, said the bear shattered a window on his 1981 Volkswagen Rabbit, tipped the plastic fuel tank on its side and gnawed on car hoses about two weeks ago. He said the evidence included muddy paw prints around the broken window and a pool of cooking oil on the rear floorboard.

“I knew what it was after,” Joy told The Sunday Republican of Waterbury. “I think it’s cool that bears do whatever they want.”

Joy uses a combination of diesel and vegetable oil left over from restaurant fry vats to power his car. He says it gets 44 miles per gallon.

The car needs to be started using regular diesel because vegetable oil is too thick for the engine to handle. When a gauge indicates the engine coolant is at 90 degrees, it is warm enough to thin the biodiesel and Joy can flip a switch to change fuel tanks.

When the coolant hits about 150 degrees, Joy said there is a sweet smell.

“My neighbor said it smells like cheeseburgers,” he said.

Chicken off hook in roadway caper

RIDGECREST, Calif. (AP) – A chicken that got a ticket for crossing the road has clawed his way out of it.

The $54 citation for impeding traffic was dismissed Friday after Linc and Helena Moore’s attorney argued that the fowl was domesticated and could not be charged as livestock. State law restricts livestock on highways, but not domestic animals.

The chicken was ticketed March 26 for impeding traffic after it wandered onto a road in Johannesburg, a rural mining community southeast of Ridgecrest.

The Moores said they got the ticket because they were among several people who complained that deputies have done little to curb noisy off-road vehicle riders.

“For the last two and a half years, no one has been able to stop the kids riding their bikes in the middle of the road or the neighbors’ dogs running around our neighborhood,” Linc Moore said. “But when our chicken escaped and crossed the road once it became a huge issue.”

Sheriff’s officials said the ticket had nothing to do with the Moores’ complaints.

Jet Ski rider dies when craft crashes

MASSAPEQUA, N.Y. (AP) – A 34-year-old North Babylon man was killed when his Jet Ski crashed into the anchor line of a sailboat in Great South Bay, police said.

John Wilson was riding his Jet Ski to Lindenhurst from Freeport when the accident occurred around 5:15 p.m. Saturday, Nassau County police said. The Jet Ski hit the anchor line of a sailboat that had run aground near Squaw Island.

The sailboat belongs to Paul Harding, of Massapequa Park, police said. Harding was below deck and was not injured.

Abandoned seal rescued in N.Y.

RIVERHEAD, N.Y. (AP) – An abandoned 3-day-old harbor seal pup has been rescued by biologists off Long Island and is being reared by hand.

Lifeguards at the Smith Point County Park Beach alerted biologists from the Riverhead Foundation for Marine Research and Preservation that the seal was struggling in the surf about 1:30 p.m. Saturday. The biologists rescued the pup – which was about 2 feet long, weighed about 20 pounds and still had its umbilical cord attached – and took it to the marine mammal hospital at the Atlantis Marine World Aquarium, the foundation said Sunday in a press release.

The pup was malnourished and dehydrated, the foundation said.

“The body condition of this pup strongly supports an abandonment scenario,” rescue program director Kim Durham said.

The seal will be hand reared by foundation staff for the next month, and then fish will be introduced into its diet, Durham said. Complete care for the seal should take at least three months.

Harbor seals generally migrate north to Massachusetts and Maine to give birth during late May and early June. This harbor seal pupping on Long Island’s southern shore could be a sign of the seals seeking New York’s shorelines as birthing and rearing sites, the Riverhead foundation said.

The nonprofit Riverhead Foundation for Marine Research and Preservation administers a marine mammal and sea turtle rehabilitation program.

AP-ES-05-29-05 2040EDT