Less than a week after a bear was spotted near a Worcester school, a black bear and two cubs were seen in a Worcester neighborhood on Sunday, multiple reports said.
While Matt Dejohn and his family ate breakfast, the family noticed movement from their driveway, according to WCVB-TV.
“I saw two cubs and then all of a sudden I saw the mama bear come behind my wife’s car and we just couldn’t believe it,” Dejohn told the news station. “It was massive.”
Surveillance video from the home caught the bears on camera, WHDH reported. The adult bear appeared to be tagged. The bear also wore a collar, Dejohn told WCVB-TV.
The bears were outside the home for hours, eating acorns, destroying the family’s birdfeeder and digging through their garbage, WCVB-TV wrote.
“We see fox, deer, any kind of wildlife, but not this, it was just wild,” Dejohn told WHDH.
A bear was previously spotted near Norrback Avenue School on Tuesday, Oct. 8. The school notified parents and families to pick up their children if they were planning to walk home, Worcester Public Schools Daniel O’Brien said to MassLive.
The black bear population has increased since the 1970s, according to the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife. The population within the state is estimated to be more than 4,500 bears, “growing and expanding eastward,” according to MassWildlife.
“Black bears live and breed in Worcester County, northern Middlesex County, and west to the Berkshires. Bears, mostly young males and some breeding females, are living in other eastern Massachusetts communities along Route 495,” the department’s website read. ”Dispersing young bears and wandering males often find themselves east of Route 495.”
