When two Newfoundland men stopped their truck for a picture of a bear cub, they didn’t expect it to be so cooperative.
Brad Perry and his father spotted the cub while travelling along the highway near La Scie, on Newfoundland’s Baie Verte Peninsula. When Perry’s father slowed the vehicle to a stop for a picture, the bear circled the truck and headed to the passenger’s side where Perry sat with his camera.
“I put the window down, and before I had a chance to do anything, up jumped the bear,” he told CBC Radio’s Central Morning Show. “It was kind of startling actually.”
Despite the bear’s age, you can see in Perry’s photos that it’s already sporting some seriously sharp claws.
Luckily, after a quick peek inside the men’s truck, the cub moved on.
Since their close encounter with the bear, Perry said there’s been rumours of an orphaned cub wandering the area. He’s also heard that some people have been feeding it, which might be one reason it got so close in the first place.
“I guess he’s been acquiring the taste of our food,” said Perry, who did not offer the bear anything and understands why you should never feed a wild animal.
“That’s basically a death sentence for the bear as far as I’m concerned,” he said.
Not only can feeding animals make them dependant on artificial food sources and increase their risk of being hit by a vehicle, it can also cause them to lose their natural fear of humans and become more aggressive.
Perry says he’ll be keeping his eye out for the cub in the future, but he won’t be getting this close again. Having a cub climb up on the door of your truck is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and he plans to keep it that way.
“It’s a wild animal. It might be cute but it could still be dangerous.”
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