3 black bears showed up near NC woman’s home. Her dog wanted to play with them.
A Huntersville woman said she whisked her doodle inside after three black bears showed up in woods near their home and her friendly dog wanted to play with them.
“My jaw just dropped,” Karen Barnett told The Charlotte Observer on Saturday.
Her 18-month-old doodle, Ziggy, woke her up just after sunrise last Sunday, she said.
“The next thing I knew, he ran to the fence wagging his tail,” she said.
That was unusual, Barnett said, because “we don’t have visitors in the backyard.”
Barnett went outside, looked out at the woods and saw something black just 25 yards away, she said. “My thought was, that’s a pretty large cat,” she said. “Then I saw one behind it, and a third that began to climb a tree. It was a baby (bear)” climbing the tree, she said.
The baby bear looked at Ziggy, who was “happily wagging his tail” at the bear, she said.
The bear that may have been the baby bear’s momma “appeared to be giving the baby instructions” before the yearling climbed the tree, stared at Ziggy and just as quickly climbed back down, Barnett said.
All three then casually “trotted off,” never to be seen again, she said.
“They were on the move,” Barnett said. “They were interested in Ziggy. They had their eye on him.”
Ziggy is black except for his white whiskers and feet. “Maybe he thought they were ancestors,” she quipped.
Bear sighting posted on Nextdoor
Barnett posted the bear sighting on Nextdoor the next day.
“Yes, one was a large papa size, one a momma size and one a baby size,” she posted, anticipating wisecrack references on social media to the fairy tale “Goldilocks and the Three Bears.”
“While cute from my gated yard, when one climbed a large tree and eyed my doodle who only wanted to friend it, I thought nature time best be over,“ she posted.
She wished she’d gotten pictures of the bears before they disappeared, she posted. She said she posted about the bears to alert others.
“Just a heads up for families with children and or pets on walks or in unfenced yards near woods,” she wrote.
Her neighbors were grateful.
“Thank you for letting us know!” a woman responded. “I would never think that there would be bear(s) right here!!!”
“It’s probably a mama and 2 yearlings,” another woman posted. “They’ll keep moving unless provoked.”
Barnett lives in the Bellington neighborhood off Huntersville-Concord Road.
Others on Nextdoor made light of the bears, unable to resist bringing up the fairy tale.
“Was Goldilocks with them???” a Cornelius woman asked.
“I looked for her but she must have been sleeping back in their bed!” the woman who spotted the bears replied.
Barnett told the Observer she was “really excited” to see the bears.
“I was quiet” during the encounter, she said. “They were quiet.”
“Don’t freak out”
Black bears are more likely to pass through the Charlotte area in June, sometimes in May, but it’s not unheard of for a Mecklenburg resident to see a bear this time of the year, according to Sampson Parker Jr., the only state Wildlife Resources Commission enforcement officer based in Mecklenburg County.
No one in the area has reported a bear sighting to state wildlife officers this year, Parker said. Neither has anyone contacted the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department Animal Care & Control Division about a sighting, spokeswoman Melissa Knicely said.
“Don’t freak out,” Parker advised homeowners who see bears near their homes. “I wouldn’t say they are harmless, but they’re not aggressive.”
A bear climbs a tree “as a safety measure for the bear,” he said. “It’s self-protection.”
Bears are just passing through the region on their way elsewhere, he said.
“Unfortunately, there’s not enough land for them (away from humans) as they pass through,” Parker said.
N.C. wildlife officers typically don’t respond to such a sighting unless a bear is being a nuisance, such as rummaging through trash cans and refusing to leave, he said.
Past black bear sightings
Bears have a history of traipsing through the Charlotte area.
On June 30, 2020, for instance, a black bear camped out in a tree in the front yard of a home in Mooresville — about 30 minutes north of Charlotte, McClatchy News reported at the time, citing a Facebook post.
On May 31, 2020, a 13-year-old Charlotte girl calmly shot video of a black bear traipsing through her family’s University-area backyard as her mom acknowledged going “hysterical,” the Observer reported at the time.
That same weekend, a woman said she and her husband spotted one while driving along Prairie Rose Lane in Huntersville’s StoneGate Farms neighborhood.
If you encounter a bear
Black bear attacks on humans “are rare,” as the bears “are seldom aggressive,” according to BearWise.org, which the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission links to on its black bear site.
Stay still if you see a bear before the animal spots you, BearWise advises.
Admire the bear, then walk quietly away, according to the site.
If a bear sees you, never run, BearWise urges. Instead, “back away slowly in the opposite direction and wait for the bear to leave,” according to the site.
Keep your dog leashed during walks, according to BearWise.
This story was originally published April 2, 2022 at 11:09 AM.