Wild animals like Arcadia’s quarantine-breaking bear have been making the most of lockdown, choosing to ignore stay-at-home orders for a once-in-a-lifetime chance to explore emptied-out city streets.
But while most are happy simply to take in the sights and explore untapped food sources, some sociable creatures are taking the opportunity to network with humans whose skill sets may be of assistance further down the line.
Certainly, a young bear who rambled into downtown Danbury, Connecticut, and chose to chillax by the city’s fire station was glad when his recent acquaintances managed to rescue him from a tree later that night.
The intrepid animal, later named “Dan Beary” by Mayor Mark Boughton, was first spotted at the back of the station by a firefighter performing routine cleaning and equipment checks on Monday morning.
Colleagues thought the firefighter was making it up until they went to take a look for themselves.
“Beary” seemed thoroughly content and “didn’t have any plans to leave,” the Danbury Fire Department said in a Facebook post Tuesday.
The bear left during the day but returned that night, Mayor Boughton reported in a news conference yesterday evening.
However, in striving to live the city high life once more, the wayfaring animal only succeeded in getting stuck up a tree.
Luckily, his firefighting friends were on hand to rescue him, along with a team from the Connecticut State Environmental Conservation Police, who helped relocate the ursine adventurer.
The healthy bear weighed 135 pounds and was around 15 months old, according to an estimate by a biologist from the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP).
After being sedated, tagged and chipped, he was taken to another location in the state and released back into the wild.
Boughton praised the joint efforts of DEEP and the Danbury Fire Department in a tweet, noting that the foolhardy climber was “barely hanging on” when they arrived.