A male bear that had grown accustomed to eating human food was tracked and put down on Tuesday by wildlife management officials after it was caught on camera ransacking a Colorado Springs home for six hours.
Homeowner Chris O’Dubhraic was sleeping during the nighttime invasion which was captured on his home security cameras.
The 375-pound bear broke into the home through a window that had been damaged in a recent storm and no longer locked.
It was seen in O’Dubhraic’s kitchen, standing on its hind legs, prying the refrigerator door open and going to town on its contents. It then moves on to the pantry and kitchen drawers. O’Dubrhaic said the bear even tore out the kitchen trash compactor.
O’Dubhraic told the Colorado Springs Gazette that his kitchen had been stocked with groceries after a recent trip to Costco. But since the environmental engineer is a vegetarian, the bear was out of luck if it had a craving for meat.
Footage from around the house shows that the bear wandered through all the rooms with open doors, including two bedrooms. O’Dubhraic was sound asleep behind a closed door.
That “catastrophic” damages to O’Dubhraic’s home are estimated to be in the thousands.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesperson Bill Vogrin said that they believe this bear was the same one that had trapped O’Dubhraic’s neighbour in her car last month as it made itself comfortable in her garage.
In previous encounters, the bear had been spotted eating ice cream and M&Ms that it had swiped from another home.
“This bear was so fat from eating human food it couldn’t climb a tree,” Vogrin told the Gazette. “So it made a bed under a tree.”
Authorities had set up traps with human food after initial encounters with the bear, but the creature managed to avoid them.
“Our biologist believes it had learned the cues of the sound of a garage door opening,” said Vogrin. “It had learned that the sound of a garage door opening meant dinner.”
“This was a smart bear, a dangerous bear, so it was only a matter of time before someone got hurt. We’re lucky it didn’t happen last night,” he said.
Vogrin added that according to interviews with neighbours, the bear had been spotted rummaging through trash cans up to four years ago. He believes the home invasion and subsequent euthanizing of the bear could have been avoided if they were alerted of the bear’s behaviour back then.
“We could have scared it back in the woods and taught it that humans are to be feared and homes avoided,” he said. “Instead it learned humans are not to be feared and homes are a source of food.”