A bear was seen on Thursday, June 11, in the Jefferson County portion of Eureka.
Mark Albright, who lives on Hoene Ridge Estates Drive off Hwy. W, said he saw the bear in his backyard at about 4 p.m. He said the bear was eating out of bird feeders he has set up about 50 feet from his backdoor.
“Where I sit in the house, I look right out the window at the bird feeders, so I can watch the birds,” he said. “The feeders had just been filled a couple of hours before, and I looked out and at first I thought it was a reflection from the glass. Then I was like, ‘holy cow, it’s a bear.’ I couldn’t believe it.”
Albright said he went onto his backyard deck to take pictures of the bear.
“He was very nonchalant and could care less that I was there,” he said.
Albright said after taking a few pictures he yelled at the bear to leave. He said the bear came down from his hind legs, looked at him and then stepped over a 4-foot retaining wall and walked into a wooded area.
“He would stop every once in a while and look at me,” Albright said.
Albright said the bear was bigger than it appears in his pictures.
“There is a pan under the bird feeders, and it is 6 feet off the ground,” he said. “The bear is every bit as tall as that.”
Albright said he has lived at the home on Hoene Ridge Estates Drive for eight years and this was the first time he saw a bear.
“I have seen everything from armadillos to snakes to opossums to racoons, but I have never seen a bear,” he said.