A black bear that wandered into a Lower Michigan residential neighborhood on Tuesday was safely tranquilized and relocated, officials said.
Police, firefighters and Michigan Department of Natural Resources personnel responded to the area of Francher and Mosher streets in Mt. Pleasant, north of the Central Michigan University campus, Tuesday morning.
The city’s public safety department shared a photo of the animal sitting on a tree branch.
DNR said the 150-pound male bear was situated directly above a white, picket fence.
With a crowd of residents watching, the animal was tranquilized with a dart rifle and fell about 18 feet onto a pole vault pad provided by Mount Pleasant High School, DNR said. The bear was then tagged and relocated to a swamp in northern Michigan, officials said. Neither the bear nor any humans were injured.
“Sometimes bears wander in and out of developed areas, but this one was so far inside the city limits that we thought it best to intervene and take the bear out of this situation in a safe manner,” Mark Boersen, a DNR wildlife biologist who participated in the effort, said in a statement. “Eventually, he would come down out of the tree, probably at night, but removal is the safest situation for people and their pets and the bear. Everything worked out well.”
The bear is believed to have wandered into town from the Chippewa River corridor, about a mile and a half west of the Mt. Pleasant neighborhood.
The sighting marks the second time a black bear has been seen in a populated area in Lower Michigan over the past several weeks. On May 11, a bear was photographed on a trail camera just north of Carleton in Monroe County.
The following day, that same bear was captured on video at a home at the border of Rockwood and Flat Rock, in Wayne County, a DNR official said. That sighting may be the further southeast in Michigan that a confirmed sighting has taken place, said DNR wildlife biologist Zach Cooley.
DNR estimates there are some 2,100 black bears in Lower Michigan, mostly in the northern areas. In the spring and summer, they leave their dens in search of food, water and mates.
Over the past two decades, the species has been venturing farther south and west into Lower Michigan, DNR has said.
“In a general sense, you may encounter a bear anywhere in the Lower Peninsula,” Boersen said. “Obviously they’re less likely as you go south. But people in the Lower Peninsula should not assume that they would never have a bear come in their yard.”
To discourage bears from wandering onto residential property, the state encourages Michiganians to:
Black bears generally prefer to avoid people, state officials said, but may defend themselves if they’re surprised or feel threatened.
If someone encounters a black bear, they shouldn’t play dead, DNR advises. Instead, stand your ground and make yourself look bigger by raising your arms or standing on a rock or other elevated surface. Yell at the bear loudly and try to provide a clear, unobstructed escape route for the animal.
mreinhart@detroitnews.com
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Black bear in Mt. Pleasant tree tranquilized, relocated: DNR
Reporting by Max Reinhart, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
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