Colorado Black Bear Trashes Car in Search of Treats
OutdoorHub Reporters 10.13.14
If you live in bear territory, it might be worth your while to lock your vehicles. Bears are intelligent creatures and they can easily figure out how to open an unlocked car door—especially if there is food on the line. Residents of Castle Pine, Colorado awoke at 3 a.m. on the morning of October 6 to the sounds of a black bear trashing a car. The large animal had entered the vehicle for a doggy bag of tasty leftovers, but then found itself trapped inside the car.
“Our bears are really smart,” Jennifer Churchill, a public information officer for Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW), told KDVR. “If the door’s not locked and it’s one of those lift-latch doors they can get in there.”
The bear caused an estimated $15,000 worth of damage to the vehicle before police officers and CPW employees arrived on the scene. Deputies from the Douglass County Sheriff’s Office managed to snap a photo of the confused-looking bear before it was released.
“Bear unharmed, car was not!” the sheriff’s office posted to Twitter.
Bear encounters this time of the year are not uncommon. As the days tick down to their winter hibernation, bears are looking to chow down on surplus calories before they take the season off. This means that some bruins may be getting bolder in their search for food.
