From Staff Reports
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The three bears that had roamed the streets of Chatsworth for more than a week were captured Wednesday evening and later euthanized, officials said.
The bears, a mother and her two cubs, were tranquilized by the state Department of Natural Resources at Seventh Avenue and Cohutta Street.
Chuck Waters, northwest Georgia game management supervisor for the Department of Natural Resources, said all three bears were placed under anesthesia before being put down late Wednesday.
Waters said these bears had grown so accustomed to humans they had no intention of leaving the area and would likely just return to areas where they could get food put out by humans if they were relocated again.
A tag found in the mother bear’s ear showed she had already been relocated from Big Canoe earlier in the year to somewhere in the Cohutta Wilderness, Waters said.
He said he didn’t know the mother bear’s exact release location, but it’s not uncommon for bears to travel many miles.
The bears had been in the area of Seventh Avenue since about 1 p.m. Officers had the area blocked off to the public for several hours on Wednesday as the mother bear and her cubs were on the move.
The bears had been spotted at various spots around town since Sept. 24, including the recreation department, Chatsworth Elementary School, Fort Street and Sixth Avenue.
“Heck, I don’t like it either,” Waters said. “It’s not something we look forward to doing, and thank goodness we don’t have to do it very often. But in a situation where ... we’re looking after public safety as well, and we take a bear we’ve already tried to relocate and it doesn’t take ... it’s just not prudent to turn a bear like that loose. We hate to have to make those kinds of judgments, but what else should we have done? There’s just not many options when you get to that point.”
Waters said people should be extra vigilant about not putting out any kind of food — cat food, dog food, people food, even bird feed — when there are problems with bears coming around because the presence of food will attract them. Over time, bears grow less afraid of being around people and can become a danger, he said. Black bears are not normally aggressive, but they’re big and strong with sharp claws and teeth, he said, and they can damage property and hurt people by exhibiting normal behavior if they don’t remain in the wild.
