Residents of Saratoga can rest a little easier at night. The bear that Wyoming Game and Fish Warden Biff Burton had been trying to trap was found in alive bear trap at 5:45 a.m. Monday.
The bear, a 4-year-old bore, was not the cute, little “roly-poly” bear Burton thought it would be, he said.
Before the bear’s capture, Burton had thought the bear was a 2-year-old cub looking for its own place, but upon capture, Burton realized the bear was a bigger threat.
“He would have had no problem defending his food source,” Burton said, which makes him more of a risk factor.
After moving the live trap around the Saratoga Inn subdivision, Burton tried a different technique. He moved the trap to a more remote area at the south end of the subdivision and used a dead beaver as bait.
“(Beaver) has been a good bait for me in the past, and with a combination of the new location and the bait, we were able to lure him in,” Burton said.
The bear has been euthanized.
“It’s sad,” Burton said. “We devote our careers to saving animals.” The Game and Fish collects population data from every bear to help them understand them more.
Burton said the bear was too much of a risk to relocate. “He would never avoid humans again.”
Bears are seeking out food sources, Burton said. The bears are trying eat one year of food in six months, so they seek the food that uses the least amount of energy, like tipping over trash cans.
Burton said he thanked the Saratoga residents for their patience during the two weeks it took to catch the bear. He said residents following through on his requests like securing their trash helped capture the bear.
Burton said people should not become complacent with the capture of this bear. There have been reports of another bear in the area.
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