Some stories are hard to make sense of—and this is one of them. Last week, a California Department of Fish & Wildlife (CDFW) officer required a police escort to avoid an “agitated crowd” after hazing a black bear that broke into a house and turned on a gas stove.
The wild situation took place in South Lake Tahoe, California. It's a part of the Golden State with increasing reports of bear-human conflicts—including the state’s first fatal black bear attack when a bruin mauled a woman inside her own home in 2024.
The most recent incident took place on Thursday, August 21 and involved a female black bear, known as “Bear 753,” and her cub. The sow—called “Bounce” by some locals—has a history of at least 12 home invasions, according to a CDFW Facebook post.
As reported by the Tahoe Daily Tribune, the bear broke into another home that morning, perhaps through an unsecured window. It then turned on a gas stovetop and started a small fire in the kitchen. A CDFW technician used an air horn and a paintball gun to haze the bear and her cub into a nearby tree so the property manager could secure the building, according to reports.
As the technician was hazing the bear, a crowd gathered. It was prompted, CDFW said, by a social media post put out by an organization called “BEAR League." A pro-bear NGO, Bear League asked its followers to gather outside the house and “act as a respectful witness.” The group incorrectly believed that CDFW planned to shoot the bear in broad daylight in the middle of the neighborhood.
“CDFW had no intentions of shooting or tranquilizing either bear on Thursday morning, Aug. 21, when they climbed up a tree on Butler Avenue,” wrote an agency spokesperson. But a crowd of people gathered at the scene anyway and quickly began harassing the CDFW technician, the agency stated. According to reporting by SFGate, “the crowd shouted at the technician, calling her a bear killer, telling her to leave Lake Tahoe and get a different job.”
When CDFW scientist Alexia Ronning received a call from the technician working the scene, she told the employee call 911. Then "the Bear League just swarmed,” Ronning said.
Ultimately, the CDFW official “required a police escort to escape a large and agitated crowd, misled by inaccurate online posts.” The agency said it will continue to monitor Bear 753 as its behavior could pose a threat to public safety. And if hazing efforts continue to fail, officials could end up euthanizing it.
Experts often warn that naming and anthropomorphizing wildlife can detract from proper wildlife management. They also note the importance of securing trash and food to prevent bears from becoming habituated to humans, like Bear 753.
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“Those who interfere with CDFW public safety and wildlife management operations often cause more harm than good to both wildlife and people,” explained a CDFW spokesperson. “The most effective way to help bears remain wild is to remove all access to unnatural food sources and avoid interactions."
