PLAINVILLE, Conn. — A Plainville family that got a little closer to a bear than they wanted to.
Vincent Dashukewich and his girlfriend were hanging out in their backyard with their dog when the pup, who they describe as very calm and friendly to everything started growling.
“You could tell she was a little on edge and that's when my girlfriend started looking around and found the massive black bear under our deck." said Dashukewich.
Once he got his dog back inside, Dashukewich decided to get a closer look, "I look and there's a huge black bear just staring right at me"
“I hadn't seen it beforehand but from how my dogs reacted going outside in the yard, I think the bear had been around a week or two before we noticed it."
Dashukewich said he wanted to share video of the bear with family and friends but since his sister uploaded it to TikTok, more than 15 million others have enjoyed watching updates on who he has dubbed "Marty the Bear."
"We have about 10-20 cases every year when bears den underneath someone's deck or porch,” said Jason Hawley, a DEEP Wildlife Biologist. “Probably a lot more that we don't even know about because the homeowner never discovers the bear underneath their deck.”
If you're in a similar situation, Hawley suggests calling DEEP to report the incident, but he says it's best to let nature take its course.
"It's best to just leave it there," Hawley said. "They're not there to bother anyone, they're just there because that's what bears do in the wintertime of year when there's not a lot of food available to them. So, they essentially take a 5-month nap and unfortunately, decks and porches are a great place for them because the foundations tend to give off some heat so the bears can burn less calories and stay warm."
Hawley recommends not disturbing the bears and keeping your pets and little ones away from them, especially if it's a female bear with her cubs.
Hawley says female bears in Connecticut tend to have their cubs the last week of December or the first week of January.
If you're uncomfortable with the bear staying on your property, you can make noise to annoy it and get it to run away, but Hawley says you must act fast to board up the spot, so it doesn't return.
However, if it's after the new year and there's a higher probability of the mother having her cubs, it's best to leave them undisturbed.
"If you try to push that bear out of there and she has cubs there, she's really not going to want to leave," Hawley said. "She's going to want to stay there and then if you do get her to leave, she's going to keep trying to come back and get her cubs, or she might just leave and abandon her cubs."
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