A stock photo of a black bear.Photo: Getty
A California family was in for a surprise when they discovered a group of bears had unknowingly moved onto their property.
According to the nonprofitBEAR League, a family living in Lake Tahoe recently found out a mother bear, along with her three cubs and one adopted cub, had been hibernating in a crawl space under their home.
The family had been unaware the bears were underneath them, though they occasionally noticed “odd rumbling, snoring-like noises,” BEAR League said in a post to Facebook on Tuesday.
“When it came time to go to sleep for the winter [the mother bear] found a house with an unsecured crawl space opening and ushered all the kids inside and told them to Be Quiet and Go to Sleep,” they wrote. “It was a home where people lived and they thought they heard some odd rumbling, snoring-like noises but ignored it because it simply didn’t make sense… and the neighbors said they were imagining it because they didn’t hear anything.”
Then, on Tuesday, the mother bear emerged from the home to the surprise of the family, who immediately called the organization.
“Today the bear family awoke and prepared to exit and the people in the house could no longer deny there was probably a bear under the house,” BEAR League said. “So they called the BEAR League and we arrived immediately.”
“We un-invited Mama Bear, not yet aware there were four more bears under the house,” they added.
BEAR League said the mother bear had been spotted last year with three cubs, who were then around 9 months old. She eventually adopted an orphan cub that was around the same age.
“It was quite the scene to then watch the four yearling cubs emerge from the opening and join together on the other side of the fence to venture forth into 2022,” BEAR League said in their post.
RELATED VIDEO: Family Of Bears Explore South Lake Tahoe Neighborhood After Residents Evacuate Due To Caldor Fire
Earlier this year, DNA evidence confirmed a group of bears living in Lake Tahoe has been behind a number of break-ins in the community. Initially, the incidents were blamed on a single bear thought to be 500-lbs. and nicknamed “Hank the Tank.”
source: people.com
