Bear raids Silver City

When Dan Shoup moved to Silver City from Chicago a little over a year ago, he expected to watch the Bears on television, not find one in his front yard.

A young black bear visited the Comstock town about 9:30 p.m. Wednesday night.

"He made his first appearance a couple of houses down," Shoup said. "My neighbor said he looked out the window and saw something staring back at him."

Shoup said he was watching another neighbor's home when he saw something that he thought looked like a big dog go by.

"I got a flashlight and was looking in between some buildings when I saw something that looked like a big dog or something," Shoup said. "I shined the flashlight on it and suddenly it stood up and it was 5 1/2 feet tall. I said to myself, 'Whoa, this isn't the place to be.'"

Shoup said he didn't know that his neighbor had called the deputies until he looked up the hill.

"I figured whatever it was they were looking for, I found it," he said. "I realized, 'that ain't no raccoon.'"

Shoup said the bear shambled off to the neighbors looking for food.

"He got into the neighbors' garbage can, opened it up like he knew right what he was doing. When he got done, he sat down in the ravine and scratched himself for a while."

Shoup said the sheriff's office called in animal control specialists and tranquilized the bear.

"They set up a perimeter around him and when he got tired of us looking at him he took off up the hill," Shoup said. "When they tranquilized him, he ran back to the house where he was first spotted. That's where he went down."

The bear was 3 years old and weighed an estimated 200 pounds.

"I helped carry him," Soup said. "He didn't look as big laying down as he was standing up. He was brown with a white stomach."

Shoup said that once he encountered the bear, he realized it had been hanging around prior to Wednesday night.

"I saw its rear end the other night," he said. "I thought it was a small horse."

In the past few weeks, more bears have been spotted farther from the Sierra.

A bear raided a Carson City laundry last week and bears have been spotted in Dayton and as far east as Nixon, according to state wildlife officials.