A black bear spotted Thursday morning in a tree outside First Presbyterian Church in downtown Spartanburg has been removed and the scene is clear.
About three hours passed between the first sighting and the removal of the bear from the tree.
A crowd quickly formed outside the church on the corner of East Main Street and Chestnut Street to watch the excitement of the morning.
The Spartanburg City Police Department, Spartanburg Animal Services and the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources were at the scene.
Greg Lucas, a spokesman for SCDNR, said a field survey was conducted and the bear, a 3- to 4-year-old male weighing between 200 and 250 pounds, suffered no injuries.
Lucas said the bear will be released on National Forest Services land in the state of South Carolina.
“The bear seems to be fine. They said there were no visible injuries, they checked all the joints and major bones and everything seemed fine,” Lucas said.
“Tell me I don’t see a bear in that tree?”
A Spartanburg-based wildlife lover who preferred not to give his name told the Spartanburg-Herald Journal he spotted the bear birding at 10:25 a.m. and reported the sighting to SCDNR.
“I waved down (an officer) … I said, ‘Tell me I don’t see a bear in that tree?’ And she said, “Lord, you see a bear in that tree. And her jaw dropped,’” the man said.
While waiting for SCDNR, Major Art Littlejohn of the police advised the crowd to leave the area in case the bear needed an escape route.
Around 12:45 p.m., officers began expanding the perimeter of the crime scene, moving people further away
The Spartanburg Fire Department arrived at the scene around 1 p.m. when officers began closing down portions of East Main Street beginning at Oakland Ave.
A DNR employee fired a tranquilizer dart at the bear at around 12:50 p.m. About 30 minutes later, the bear fell after firefighters used a ladder truck to lift personnel to the bear and push it off the tree.
SCDNR, fire brigade and police transported the bear away and the scene was quickly cleared.
More:Bears sighted in Spartanburg, Boiling Springs. Here’s what to do if you encounter a bear.
Lee Raines, the manager of First Presbyterian Church’s facilities, speculated that the bear had been in the tree all night before.
“He was probably up there all night, was there all day and no one saw him,” Raines said. “If a bear that size had been walking around town during the day, people would probably have been getting phone calls all morning.”
Lucas did not know how much tranquilizer was used on the bear.
A male adult black bear can grow from 50 to 75 inches tall and 130 to over 600 pounds. The International Association for Bear Research and Management says size is highly dependent on the quality of the food available.
Black bears are rarely aggressive towards humans.
This is an evolving story, check back for updates.
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