Baby Bears Trashed, Film at 11
July 27, 2012 7:33 AM   Subscribe

Couple rescue trapped baby bears with a truck and a ladder. That's all.
posted by kinnakeet (46 comments total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
Saw this on the news last night. Pretty cool. I wonder if they went back for the ladder.
posted by cjorgensen at 7:34 AM on July 27, 2012


Anyone else misread the post and think for a second that adorable baby bears figured out how to use a ladder?
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 7:37 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]


They did figure out how to use a ladder. (huh?)
posted by lizjohn at 7:38 AM on July 27, 2012 [5 favorites]


I wonder if they went back for the ladder.

As long as that bear family hangs around the area, I'd leave the ladder there (or put it back after each time the dumpster is emptied) so the cubs can get out again on their next foray.

Man, that video doesn't look nearly as pants-wetting scary as it had to be to approach an uber-worried mother bear in anything less secure than a Sherman tank.
posted by FelliniBlank at 7:39 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]


If a baby bear can climb a tree, it can probably figure out how to climb a ladder.
posted by helicomatic at 7:41 AM on July 27, 2012


If all you have is a hammer ladder, then every problem looks like a nail dumpster.

Humans rock, from time to time.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 7:44 AM on July 27, 2012 [5 favorites]


I hope people will say "This mother is notorious in the neighborhood" about me in the distant future.
posted by nataliepo at 7:46 AM on July 27, 2012 [29 favorites]


When setting up the camera, they must have thought, "Either this will be an amazing video of adorable baby animals getting rescued or this will be an amazing video of my being mauled to death by a bear."
posted by Egg Shen at 7:51 AM on July 27, 2012 [10 favorites]


I like bear week on metafilter! MORE BEARS PLZ.
posted by elizardbits at 7:58 AM on July 27, 2012 [8 favorites]


I feel I should specify "fuzzy quadruped ursine mammals" and not "hirsute leather clad gentlemen," however.
posted by elizardbits at 7:59 AM on July 27, 2012 [23 favorites]


I know that after they pulled the truck away the cubs were crawling out, the momma bear was looking back and forth from the cubs to the humans because she was worried about her cubs and was tracking any potential danger from the humans but I like to think she was looking back and forth between the humans and her cubs and saying to her self, "I can't believe those humans did that for us. Thanks guys!"
posted by VTX at 8:05 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]


I think the news said that this has happened three times now. The video making the rounds is from the second incident. Gotta save the bears again, might as well get some video this time...
posted by zengargoyle at 8:05 AM on July 27, 2012


Er, I meant figure out how to rescue the couple with a ladder.

Never mind, I'll show myself out.
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 8:11 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


Next time the momma bear should just save time and go get the helpful humans right from the start.
posted by oddman at 8:13 AM on July 27, 2012


FelliniBlank: "I wonder if they went back for the ladder.

As long as that bear family hangs around the area, I'd leave the ladder there (or put it back after each time the dumpster is emptied) so the cubs can get out again on their next foray
"

I was going to say the same thing and have spent the last 20 minutes or so trying to find the picture taken from my vacation two weeks ago that would illustrate it. Bears love dumpsters apparently. There were no cubs involved in my instance, but my bear paid me no mind AT ALL since there was a dumpster to explore.

Man, that video doesn't look nearly as pants-wetting scary as it had to be to approach an uber-worried mother bear in anything less secure than a Sherman tank.

Yeah, cubs or not, bears are still, ya know, bears.

Despite the bear whose picture we snapped paying us no attention at the dumpster, when we went outside to look at the stars in the dark, knowing we'd seen a bear in that same spot gave this city mouse and his kin more than few false jumps. In fact, one of my favorite parts of the trip was when, as I sat on the enclosed porch reading one night, my much-more-outdoorsy brother-in-law went out to smoke and got startled by his own reflection in the glass from the door and its creaking as he opened it. Coupled with not knowing I was also on the porch, he shrieked like I'd never imagined he could. I promised I'd tell know one, but I'm glad that I have this way of semi-anonymously doing so because, even though you 'just had to be there' to fully appreciate it, it also proves that bears are the cutest fucking things that you should probably be absolutely terrified of.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:14 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


I feel I should specify "fuzzy quadruped ursine mammals" and not "hirsute leather clad gentlemen," however.

Nah. It's all good.
posted by endless_forms at 8:18 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]


This is exactly why they need to start teaching rope ladder construction in bear school.
posted by orme at 8:26 AM on July 27, 2012


They need the ursine equivalent of a TED on dumpsters.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 8:27 AM on July 27, 2012


I did this but with baby squirrels. Then a woman walking by ran off shrieking in terror. It turned out she had be badly scarred when she was a child by a baby squirrel who leapt out of a dumpster onto her. It was an experience I kept filed away in my "weird shit that has happened to me" folder. Until today.
posted by srboisvert at 8:28 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]


endless_forms: "I feel I should specify "fuzzy quadruped ursine mammals" and not "hirsute leather clad gentlemen," however.

Nah. It's all good.
"

Oddly, cutebears.comseems available -- so it could go with way. If I had about 50% more time and about 10% more interest, I'd actually snap it up and then alternate G to PG-13 pictures of cute bears of both types.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:30 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]


it also proves that bears are the cutest fucking things that you should probably be absolutely terrified of.


This is also true of the leather clad gentlemen.
posted by The Whelk at 8:35 AM on July 27, 2012 [9 favorites]


One is far less likely to tear your face off than the other if you decide to hug them drunkenly though.
posted by elizardbits at 8:38 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]


Yeah, my father did this once to rescue sad, crying baby raccoons (not these, but ones making similar sad noises). It was further proof that my dad is awesome.
posted by ChuraChura at 8:49 AM on July 27, 2012


Well? Which is it?
posted by cmoj at 8:50 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


you have to do the research yourself
posted by elizardbits at 8:52 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]


As seen on facebook a couple of days ago..Awesome.

Too bad the humans weren't smart enough to secure the garbage in the first place. Those bears will likely end up being destroyed someday since they now see humans and their waste as a food source. A fed bear is a dead bear.
posted by HyperBlue at 8:52 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]


Well? Which is it?

Experiment and report back!
posted by endless_forms at 8:53 AM on July 27, 2012


I feel I should specify "fuzzy quadruped ursine mammals" and not "hirsute leather clad gentlemen," however.

Another vote for this being unnecessarily reductionist. To be fair, those sorts of bears are less often trapped in dumpsters....
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:30 AM on July 27, 2012


It would be pretty adorable if a nervous but civic-minded couple in a pick-up truck threw their ladder into a dumpster to assist a bunch of drunken hairy leather dudes in escaping from an embarrassing post-bender predicament.
posted by elizardbits at 9:36 AM on July 27, 2012 [9 favorites]


> MORE BEARS PLZ.

With Finnish narration, but plenty of awesome bear footage, here is a bear video about weighing bears after a winter of hibernation. It was filmed in Kuusamo last spring when there was still snow on the ground. (The page says the flash video should be viewable from abroad, so I hope you have no trouble with it.)
posted by tykky at 10:01 AM on July 27, 2012


They need the ursine equivalent of a TED on dumpsters.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 10:27 AM on July 27 [+] [!]


Even though I grew up on the Gulf Coast and should know better, my first thought was a 20-minute talk with a slideshow by some notable bear explaining the hazards of dumpster-diving.
posted by fiercecupcake at 10:11 AM on July 27, 2012 [5 favorites]


Followed by a discussion panel on the dangers of HUNNY jars.
posted by elizardbits at 10:17 AM on July 27, 2012 [5 favorites]


I feel I should specify "fuzzy quadruped ursine mammals" and not "hirsute leather clad gentlemen," however.

Where is the Tumblr that combines these interests?

Come on, Internet. You have until noon.
posted by mykescipark at 10:34 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]


They need the ursine equivalent of a TED on dumpsters.

*inspiring music and swelling applause*

"Thank you, thank you. Trash. *pregnant pause* We love to eat it. It's produced by humans, and is known to contain high caloric value that can be invaluable in the yearly preparation for hibernation. *powerpoint slide of a discarded KFC big box meal* I come to you today not to suggest that we stop eating trash, for we are past that particular rubicon in bearhood, but rather that we become smarter about the trash that we eat. *powerpoint slide with a shrugging bear and a big question mark* But how? Literally tens of bears are lost each year to dumpster related accidents. *powerpoint slide of a dumpster with a big red NO over top of it* I believe I have an answer, fellow boars and sows... ladders. *the crowd goes crazy, loud roaring all around*
posted by codacorolla at 10:35 AM on July 27, 2012 [22 favorites]


Adorable animal bears and stuffs

The other requires looking at way too many naked photos of middle aged men with wedding rings prominently displayed.
posted by The Whelk at 10:51 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


I used to work at a summer camp in Lake Arrowhead, CA. We had a dumpster out back that all the kitchen garbage would be thrown into. There was a small black bear that would come around and raid this dumpster periodically, and in the process of getting a snack would throw trash all around the area that I, as the low man on the totem pole, was subsequently responsible for picking up. This made me very angry.

I would often see the bear actually in the dumpster, throwing the trash around in search of a meal. Being young and stupid, I decided that rather than trying to work out a solution to the problem by figuring out how to secure the dumpster properly, I would get myself a large and heavy stick. When I would see the bear in the dumpster, I would grab this stick and dash out the front door of the lodge screaming bloody murder and running directly at the bear. The bear would spaz out and take off into the woods, and I'd spend a few minutes picking up after it and grousing.

Judging from the size of the bear it must have been a juvenile, not a fully grown adult. Still it was certainly large enough to have turned around and gutted me if it had ever chosen to do so. I still get a little chill when I think of my dumb ass running pell mell at what could easily have been my end, only saved by the gentle nature of that particular bear and the general ease with which it could find food elsewhere in the area without being hassled by a hormonal teenager.

PSA - Don't chase bears, kids.
posted by Pecinpah at 11:03 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


We had this bear getting into our garbage cans that people were leaving unlocked and I, as condo president, had to clean up the mess in the morning. One night, I am baking cookies and I hear that damned bear banging the cans around. I instantly saw red and was SUPER PISSED. Enough that I immediately ran downstairs with the only weapons I had at hand, a cookie sheet and a spatula. I stationed myself about 10 yards away and waumped that spatula and cookie sheet together while I screamed all my pent up frustration at that asshole bear. He ran off. He must have figured that if that crazy bitch has all that confidence in her bakeware, she probably has a pistol in her pocket. I also busted both the cookie sheet and the spatula. Conveniently, there was a garbage can right there.
posted by Foam Pants at 11:45 AM on July 27, 2012 [12 favorites]


The main issue is that they just look SO HUGGABLE. If I lived in bear country I could clearly never drink again without legit fear of gruesome death by attempted hug.
posted by elizardbits at 12:16 PM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


Bears in dumpsters is one of the strangest things I've seen in some time. I have no idea how these bears got stuck inside these dumpsters, or why.

(well I do know why....there were noms inside)
posted by iconomy at 1:26 PM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]


Super Troopers scarred me for life when it comes to bears.
posted by Brocktoon at 2:01 PM on July 27, 2012


I don't quite understand how they got trapped. The bears had to climb up the side to get in, right? And on the inside, it's the same vertical wall to get out, only shorter because they're standing on top of trash. So if they could climb in, why couldn't they climb out without a ladder?
posted by chickenmagazine at 2:22 PM on July 27, 2012


I thought maybe either they dropped in from a tree limb above the dumpster, or climbed up their mom like kittens, or maybe the inside of the dumpster is slippery with dumpster goo?

or maybe they are just chubby clumsy little doofs
posted by elizardbits at 2:41 PM on July 27, 2012


It's barr season!

The demon that lives in the air, I totally get that - my brain made a leap sideways, and pictured cute cubs getting themselves into a scrape with a stolen fire truck.

I have spent too many years on the internet, my inner eye sees this kind of thing in MS Paint.
posted by Catch at 4:11 PM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]


And this happened in town this morning.

I've seen sows boost their cubs into a dumpster. I guess it's like a bear playpen.
posted by Foam Pants at 4:57 PM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]






« Older The Good Artist   |   Trying to drink wine while Hula-Hooping Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments