A bear that wandered into Newmarket was captured this evening after leading police on a daylong chase through urban parkland. “He’s on his way up north,” a York Regional Police spokesman said this evening.
Police and Ministry of Natural Resources workers cornered the wandering black bear in a tree in this afternoon.
It was tranquillized and lowered out of the tree, then loaded on a truck to be taken to more bear-friendly territory than downtown Newmarket.
Police said they didn’t know where Ministry of Natural Resources workers planned to take the bear for release back into the wild.
The bear was spotted wandering through this town of 72,000 by residents this morning.
Police originally believed they were dealing with a black bear cub. But they said the animal turned out to be an adult black bear, two-metres tall when standing on two legs.
Heavily armed officers, backed up by a police helicopter, tracked the bear through the area until it climbed a tree.
“We don’t know how he got here,” the police spokesman said. “Maybe he snuck in under cover of darkness following some raccoons.”
On the same day officials were busy tracking a bear on the loose in Newmarket, a deer crashed through the front window of Boomerang Home Fitness, a store in the east end of Toronto.
“The deer was here in the parking lot,” said concerned local Robert Ward. “As we drove up the deer jumped right through the glass window, which is a quarter-inch glass, and went right into the store.”
The animal leaped through the glass on Bermondsey Road around 11am, triggering the shop’s alarm and police were called.
Toronto Zoo officials suggested that it is not uncommon for deer to roam into busy neighbourhoods, but that the decision to jump through the glass was uncharacteristic of the animal. Veterinarians on site hypothesized that an oncoming car may have frightened the deer.
The use of a tranquilizer gun was necessary to get the deer out of the store via stretcher, at which point the animal was taken to the Toronto Zoo for further examination.
“The concern is that he’s been running around in there for some time,” said Chris Dutton, a zoo worker.
“Although his injuries may be fairly superficial, just the trauma that he does to himself and the muscles there can have a pretty bad effect on him.”
Indeed, for all the alarm and nervousness that it caused locals and onlookers, it appears that the glass-breaking beast, likely got the worst of it.
Of course the animal is expected to pull through, but veterinarians caring for the deer at the Toronto Zoo, admit that should certain more severe injuries be sustained, it will have to be put down.
