‘I was hysterical.’ Latest black bear sighting in a Charlotte neighborhood upsets mom
A 13-year-old Charlotte girl calmly shot video of a black bear traipsing through her family’s University area backyard Sunday as her mom acknowledged going “hysterical.”
The sighting was the second of a young black bear in the Charlotte area since Friday night, when a woman said she and her husband spotted one while driving along Prairie Rose Lane in Huntersville’s StoneGate Farms neighborhood, The Charlotte Observer previously reported.
Ferah Syed told the Observer that her daughter, Czara, took video when she spotted the bear in their University area backyard at about noon Sunday. Czara was in her second-floor bedroom in the Lexington neighborhood when she saw the bear and got out her phone.
Czara’s dad, Wajahat Syed, took photos of the bear, also from the second floor of their home
Ferah Syed wasn’t so calm, she said.
She was having a cup of tea on the first floor when she was startled by the bear entering one end of their backyard on Tavernay Parkway, she said.
She watched as the bear walked to the other end of the yard to a tree, before apparently heading onto other streets in their subdivision.
“Oh my God, a bear!” Ferah Syed told the Observer of her reaction when the animal entered their yard. “I couldn’t believe it. I was hysterical.”
She yelled and yelled to her daughter and husband upstairs.
“Why are you yelling?” she said her daughter responded, as Czara came downstairs with her phone and showed her the video.
Czara later acknowledged to her mom that she was shaking out of nervousness as she filmed the bear, but was calm enough to keep the camera on the animal. Czara thought it was “surreal” seeing the bear, her mom said.
The sighting was unexpected, especially because no woods are nearby, Ferah Syed said.
A neighbor called 311 to notify the city of the bear, and a notice was sent through their homeowners’ association to watch out for the animal, Ferah Syed said.
Whether the same bear visited Prairie Rose Lane and Tavernay Parkway 13 miles to the southeast is unknown, although that distance is nothing for a bear.
Her message to Charlotte residents: “Be careful,” Ferah Syed said. “Keep an eye on your kids.”
Bear population rising
Bears are common in the N.C. mountains and the state’s coastal areas “but rarely live in the heavily populated Piedmont,” according to NCWildlife.org, the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission website.
The bear population is rising, however, and “in many areas of the state, humans and bears increasingly are coming into contact,” according to the state site.
On their “CoExist With Bears” page, state wildlife officials advise covering your trash cans and not leaving any food exposed that could tempt bears to approach your home. And never approach one, officials warn.
