07a14d0ec10407346c7e931ab51e9c00.jpg

EAST WINDSOR: Brazen bruin makes surprise visit to Exit 8

By Doug Carman, Staff Writer
   EAST WINDSOR — One black bear and one tree caused hours of traffic delays along the New Jersey Turnpike and drew an international media circus as firefighters and wildlife officials worked to bring him down April 15.
   Responders safely sedated and removed the 297-pound bear after he climbed about 40 feet up a tree near Exit 8, Hightstown Engine Company No. 1 Deputy Chief Scott Jenkins said. The male bear, about 3 years old, was then safely released at the Assunpink Wildlife Management Area near Roosevelt.
   ”I’ve been in the service for 19 years and this is the first and probably the last time this will ever happen,” Mr. Jenkins said of the call.
   Mr. Jenkins said the Hightstown firefighters came to assist the New Jersey State Police at about 10 a.m. near Exit 8, where numerous drivers rubbernecked to see the black bear as he stayed about 20 feet up one of the trees. Mr. Jenkins said he and the firefighters there quickly determined they needed a platform rather than a ladder to remove the bear from the tree. They requested a bucket truck from Cranbury to help.
   Mr. Jenkins said a state Department of Environmental Protection biologist came to the tree with a tranquilizer gun after he and the firefighters set up a safety net, in case the bear was to fall out of the tree. Then, the biologist shot the bear in its buttocks with a dart.
   The dosage apparently wasn’t enough.
   ”After they hit him with that dart he climbed up further,” Mr. Jenkins said. He said the bear scrambled up and was now about 40 feet above the ground.
   The biologist shot the bear in his buttocks for a second time. The bear wedged himself between a few branches and then lost consciousness. Four men including the biologist had to use chain saws to cut away some of the branches in order to get a hold of the sleeping bear and maneuver him onto the platform.
   To Mr. Jenkins, the media coverage of the bear rescue was almost as hard to believe as the bear’s presence itself. News stories reached television stations in both New York and Philadelphia, while newspapers carried the story across the country and as far as BBC-Canada. Even conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh mentioned the bear on his website.
   ”I didn’t even know that the freakin’ helicopters were up there until we got the bucket down,” Mr. Jenkins said.
   As amusing as the incident might have been to the news media and spectators, it could have become tragic if the bear had chosen to run across the road, Mr. Jenkins said.
   ”It’s not just the bear’s life that we saved,” he said.
   DEP spokesman Lawrence Hajna said the majority of black bears in the state, about 3,400, live in the rural woodlands of New Jersey’s Northwest region. Black bears are not common in the rest of New Jersey, but they have been spotted occasionally in every county. The Turnpike corridor, including East Windsor, lies between those woodlands and the pine forests of Ocean and Monmouth counties, and the black bear is known to sometimes migrate between the two.
   Still, Mr. Hajna couldn’t recall a previous report of a bear getting that close to any portion of the New Jersey Turnpike.
   During the spring, he added, bears are coming out of hibernation and looking for food, so residents should keep their garbage cans secured and not feed the bears.
   ”In East Windsor where you’re not commonly going to see bears, the bear is more likely going to be afraid of you than you of him,” Mr. Hajna said. “Give him some respect, give him some distance and let him run his course.”