Black bear activity in Colorado’s residential areas tends to spike in warmer months, when bears range farther in search of food — and Tuesday’s early-morning encounter was a reminder of how close that contact can get. Officers responded after a bear was spotted moving through backyards at 5 a.m. on June 17, 2026, waking residents in the process.
The encounter
The bear had been working its way through a residential area before officers caught up with it. It wasn’t there long. Officers relocated the animal — standard procedure in Colorado when a bear enters a populated area without injuring anyone or causing significant property damage.
Still, a bear threading through backyards before dawn is the kind of thing that gets neighbors out of bed fast. Colorado Parks and Wildlife has long warned that unsecured trash, bird feeders, and pet food left outside draw bears into yards; once a bear finds a food source near homes, it tends to return.
Whether this bear had visited the neighborhood before — or what prompted Tuesday’s pre-dawn roam — wasn’t clear from available information. The location within Colorado wasn’t specified, and no injuries were reported.
Reporting by Yahoo News. Read the original report.
