Bear swats Sparta toddler

Daily Record ^ | May 21, 2003 | Rob Jennings

[ZULU]

SPARTA - A black bear swatted a 2-year-old boy outside his family's home Tuesday afternoon, police said.

Mark Tregidgo suffered a bump to the head but was otherwise uninjured in the 1:19 p.m. incident, Police Sgt. Russell Smith said.

The 150-pound, 4-year-old female bruin was shot and killed by police shortly afterward, Smith said. The frightening incident, although extremely rare, is expected to strengthen calls for a statewide bear hunt.

[ZULU]

Nuts. Absolutely nuts. This is why people like Lautenberg and Corzine get elected in Jersey. The residents there are just nuts!

[BellStar]

"Mark Tregidgo was frightened for some time after the incident, but had calmed down by the evening.

"He was terrified," his mother said. "He kept smacking his head, going, 'bear bear bear."

2 year old knows he is/was in danger. Mom is cluless. Sad! Still is with this mom.

[Conspiracy Guy]

Those dang swatting bears again. This most be addressed. Sarcasm Off.

[Fintan]

A black bear swatted a 2-year-old boy outside his family's home Tuesday afternoon, police said.
 

I'm confused...was it the bear's family home or the boy's?

[Puppage]

MORE BEAR CONTROL!!

[whipitgood]

I'm not surprised the bear swatted him. Those two-year-olds can be SO annoying!!! His mother probably TOLD him to leave the bear ALONE. Even bears can only take so much!
I have a friend who lives in an area where 'bad bears' are released into the wild after capture and transport. He defines a 'bad bear' as any bear he can see!

[ChicagoRepublican]

We need a BEAR patrol!

[Conspiracy Guy]

Right! What makes these bears think they can just do whatever they please? John Kerry is introducing a bill that will ban bears from all public places unless confined to a cage. Kerry says we non-bears have put up with this bear arrogance for long enough. He is also recommending that bear taxes be raised to pay for all the harm they are doing to the environment.

[Grut]

...the bear went into a neighbor's yard and relieved itself....

Well, that answers that question!

[ZinGirl]

"I'm upset about it. I'm devastated," Tregidgo said.

"I think my son should just grin and bear it", she continued.

[csvset]

Mark Tregidgo, 2, suffered a head bump when a black bear took a swat at him in his family's front yard in Sparta Tuesday. Pictured with him are his mom and dad, Amy and Django, and sister, Crystal. Dawn Benko / Daily Record

[hopespringseternal]

The frightening incident, although extremely rare, is expected to strengthen calls for a statewide bear hunt.

Oh, I don't know how they can be that rare since I hear about bear attacks all the time in the news.

But Tregidgo, an animal lover with five cats and a dog, had sympathetic words for the dead bear.

Yeah, she's a democrat alright.

[netmilsmom]

It was a freakin bear!!!
If anything that large came near one of my kids, I'd shoot it too.
And the two year old just walked out of the house? What was that about?

[11B3]

If you can see a bear, you can shoot it. Dead bears are good bears to anyone who spends any amount of time in the woods. Just shoot, shovel, and shut up about it - permit my @ss, and "in season with a tag" my a$$. Why leave a predator alive for the next person to be attacked? (Unless there's some DemonRats on the trail behind you, then you just want to wound the bear for them. hehehehe)

[Consort]

...and was it a picture of the bear's family?

[Area51]

"But Tregidgo, an animal lover with five cats and a dog, had sympathetic words for the dead bear.

"It did not strike my son as an attack strike," Tregidgo said. "It was more like, 'What are you - are you a toy?'"

So if mom was that secure in the bear's actions why did they call the authoritites to have it dealt with. Let the kid play with the big teddy Bear. Hell, grab a toy and play tug of war or wrestle with it Maa. Grab a steak out of the fridge and see if you can get it to do tricks like stand on its two hind legs.

Fregging MAROONS!

[ZULU]

These people are dangerous wackos - read the follow-up in today's paper. Perfect examples of why New Jersey continues to give the nation Chrissie Whitmans, Imamu Barakas, and Frank Lautenbergs.

[Coleus]

A bear attack in Alaska

The following pictures are of a guy who works for the Forest Service in Alaska. He was out deer hunting. A large world record Grizzly charged him from about 50 yards away. The guy unloaded a 7mm Mag Semi-auto into the bear and it dropped a few feet from him. The monster was still alive so he reloaded and capped it in the head. It was over one thousand six hundred pounds, 12'6" high at the shoulder,14' to the top of his head. It's the largest grizzly bear ever recorded in the world. Of course, the game department did not let him keep it. It will be mounted and put on display at the Anchorage airport (to remind tourist's of the risks involved when in the wild).

Think about it. You would be level with the bears belly button when he stood, he would look you in the eye when walking! This bear on its hind legs could walk up to the average single story house and look over the roof at eye level.

The bear had killed 2 other people. His last meal was the poor fellowon a nature hike. The Forest Service found his 38-caliber emptied. He shot6-times and hit the grizzly 4(they found seven 7mm slugs and four 38 caliber slugs in him) but obviously only wounded him since it was estimated to be 3 days prior to the bears death by the Forest Service man.

[nutmeg]

OMG... Wow, what a story... and those pictures!

Well, my bear story isn't as interesting as your Bear Attack in Alaska story in #18... We live in a fairly rural area in northern Connecticut. A black bear walked right by the windows I'm facing now back in March 2001. I was sitting here at the computer - surfing FR (what else?) - at about 2AM, and the bear just walked by me. It was black, with a brown snout, around 200lbs. Most of our neighbors have seen the same bear, or have seen the destruction it has left behind.

"Our" bear made a return visit last July. I had a suet cake for birds hanging from a heavy L-shaped wrought-iron hook mounted about 7-8 ft high outside. Also on that hook was a bird feeder filled with birdseed. In the morning we first noticed birdseed all over the deck (birds, squirrels and chipmunks were having a feast!). Then - we couldn't believe it - the heavy wrought iron hook was bent down and twisted in a shape that no human could've made. The suet cake and container was gone, and the bear's paw prints were all over the side of our light-colored house. Days later, I found the empty suet cake container at the edge of the woods.

I like gardening, but now I jump at the slightest sound in the woods around our house!

[nutmeg]

PING from Bear Country!

[KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle]

"He was terrified," his mother said. "He kept smacking his head, going, 'bear bear bear."

Sadly, this makes two-year-old Mark the brains of the family. :)

[america-rules]

My family lives in the next town over (About 6 Miles) and this is what happens when New York pushes the liberals out.

They're building houses 100 yards from bear dens and then apply their liberal ways. No hunting, no camp fires, no this and no that etc.. I was there Thanksgiving and a Black bear walked 3 feet from the back door looking for food.

These idiots don't even allow plastic yard bags for leaves anymore - they have to be paper !

[null and void]

YIKES!

[null and void]

ping...

[ZULU]

You are correct.

These urbanites, nourished on Walt Disney, anti-gun propaganda and the PETA loons, move out of an area which their wacko political ideas and equally wacko politicians have made unlivable, and then proceed to repeat the same idiotic errors where they move to.

Read "Gangs of New York". In the 1800's and early 1900's New York City was far more violent than any cowtown out west. There were pitched battles with the cops, with civilians and between gangster clubs. The cops couldn't stop it because the Democratic Tammany Hall politicians NEEDED and USED these thugs at the voting
booths, and got them released as quickly as they were arrested. THEN, when they finally realized things had gotten out of hand about 1911, they enacted the idiotic Sullivan Law which disarmed both law-abiding citizens and thugs. But it was only when the crooked politicians stopped freeing arrested hoodlums that things got under control.

The same kind of mindless liberal Democratic anti-gun, anti-hunting philosophy pervades urban areas today.

[null and void]

Sadly, this makes two-year-old Mark the brains of the family. :)

Reasonable. He's the only one who has had some sense knocked into him...

[FreeMe2]

This email tale, circulating constantly in one form or another since November 2001, seems to grow taller year by year. Ironically, the first two snapshots — the ones showing the hunter posing next to the carcass of an incredibly large bear — are authentic. We know where and when they were taken, and by whom. The origin of the third photo purporting to show the remains of the behemoth's last victim is unknown. It was attached to the already-circulating email by an anonymous prankster in late 2002. In real life, the big grizzly measured 10' 6" from nose to tail and weighed in at an estimated 1,000 to 1,200 pounds — unusually large for the vicinity, says the USDA Forest Service, but not quite a world record, nor even an Alaskan record. It was killed on October 14, 2001 by U.S. Air Force Airman Theodore Winnen on Hinchinbrook Island, Prince William Sound. The photos were taken by his hunting partner, Staff Sgt. James Urban. Both were stationed at the nearby Eielson Air Force Base at the time. Though the bear was within 10 yards of the hunters' position and moving towards them when he fired the first shot, Winnen says, it did not charge them, contrary to what the email claims. "I don't know if the wind was in our favor or what," he told the Anchorage Daily News. "We were dressed in camouflage. He might not have seen us." Winnen's weapon was a 338-caliber Winchester Magnum, not a 7mm semi-automatic as alleged. The first bullet pierced the bear's brain but left it standing; five more in the chest finally brought it down. Was the bear a man-eater, as claimed in the email? No, says the Forest Service, there is no evidence of that. When asked by the Anchorage Daily News to comment on the horrific image of what appears to be a partially-eaten human victim, spokesman Ray Massey admitted he hadn't even looked at it. "I didn't want to see a photo of the body," he said. "I know it's bogus."

[eyespysomething]

GOOD GIGGILY WIGGILY! THAT SIR IS ONE BIG OL' BEAR!

[hobbes1]

"It did not strike my son as an attack strike," Tregidgo said. "It was more like, 'What are you - are you a toy?'"

Yes, with a paw strong enough to break the kids neck, in...play...sheesh.

[Coleus]

http://www.snopes.com/photos/bearhunt.asp

[agrace]

Tregidgo said she pleaded for the bear's life, to no avail.

WHAT????!!!! Serve him on toast!!!

[lavaroise]

"I'm upset about it. I'm devastated," Tregidgo said. "It didn't harm my son," she said of the dead bear. "It was just curious." She said she appreciated the quick police response. "I just wish it could've gone a different way," she said.

And we wonder why we have a crime problem in our society.

The bear stepped out of the line and then began to know that kids are not dangerous and can be killed or abused. It is that simple, and they have to be killed once they know.