Exclusive Interview: DNR Specialist Reveals Rescued Bear’s Perilous Situation

WANNASKA, MN (trfnews.i234.me) The Bear Project Coordinator for the DNR says a bear that was stuck in the ditch by a culvert near Wannaska, Minnesota was in trouble. The bear has been relocated to a new den in a wildlife reguge.
we have an update regarding this beer that was stuck in a ditch near wanaska for the past few days uh DNR uh bear expert says the bear was in a bit of trouble he was dug out today and moved to a safe place here’s DNR bear project coordinator Andy try yeah so I I got there this morning and uh it looked just like the pictures that I had seen a bear kind of stuck in some deep snow in the ditch and uh you know the thought had been that this was a bear that was had been in a culvert which is you know of course not unusual for Northwest Minnesota but um what what apparently had happened is that uh the warm temperatures we had over the weekend caused a little bit of melt in the ditches and had caused the Culvert to start running and so you know that bear being at large bear pushed his way to the other end of the Culvert because it was too small to turn around and essentially got stuck you know trying to dig themselves out from five feet of snow up on top of the the Culvert there and uh you know kind of got froze his leg kind of got stuck in amongst some snow and ice and he was just kind of stuck there and so uh then I got my um anesthetic drugs out of the truck and we loaded up a needle and um knocked him out and then started the digging process and it took about four five guys to to pull him out but um all that said and done he had no injuries to speak of all the um his limbs were warm and you know no worries about frostbite or anything like that he just was really exhausted from straining and so uh we put them in the back of our pickup truck and transported him to a local state game refuge and made an artificial Den for him and then let him wake up from the drugs and he’s as good as new okay all right so just to clear up a couple of things so this was a male yes and um and uh he and was he he was in a bit of trouble one leg was stuck I mean could that have been deadly form later on I don’t know wolves in that part of the area and part of the country and coyotes and whatever yeah I mean generally speaking you know he would he was just stuck and couldn’t move and you know I’ve I’ve not heard of coyotes messing with bears but uh you know if if a bear can’t defend himself from wolves it could have been an issue down the road um and so it’s it’s lucky you know we we heard about it from your listeners and others right away so we could jump on it and uh yeah it was a male it was about 400 pounds or so and about six or seven years old based on his teeth wear all right so we got a good ending to The Bear story here all right absolutely fabulous ending okay all right thanks for your time you bet Neil thanks