A crowd of locals viewing the encounter could see just that, as Wyant had just captured a yearling cub that had been concerning Hughesville residents that day. The bear was seen stuck in a tree. Community members witnessed the process of safely removing the bear from the tree and tagging the bear. Residents of Montoursville, Montgomery and South Williamsport have also spotted bears before and since Wyant caught that one.

Bears breed during the months of June and July. Mother bears will run out their male cubs in April and May since the year-old males can sometimes become predatory of their mothers leading them to become harmed by the dominant male in the area.

Wyant said that these bears are often referred to as transient cubs since they no longer have a home and will wander around.

While in hibernation, mother bears will give birth to their cubs. This will usually occur in the month of January. Pregnant females go into their dens by October.

A young black bear sits in a tree in downtown Hughesville recently. The yearling bear was stuck in the tree and had to be sedated to be safely removed by Pa. State game warden. DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

Wyant said that “we could harvest every bear walking around on the landscape in our hunting seasons and we will still have bears.”

The Pennsylvania Bear Program is designed to keep the core population of bears untouched during its hunting seasons. Only the surplus population of bears are hunted during the season. Pennsylvania only has black bears — brown bears’ and grizzlies’ habitats are found in the western U.S. and Canada.

“You will occasionally get bears that have the brown pelt on them. We seem to get an inordinate amount of them here in Lycoming County,” Wyant said.

Game Wardens will “mark” or tag bears that they have come into contact with in order to document previous encounters with bears. The tag in the ear does not equate to the number of times a bear has been captured in Pennsylvania.

“The very most that you could possibly see is two (tags) in one ear. One of them will be silver, and one of them will be red. A red tag is what we call a ‘do not eat tag,'” Wyant said.

Hughesville residents were treated to a rare sight and chance to get up close to a sedated young black bear in downtown Hughesville recently. The yearling bear was stuck in the tree and had to be sedated to be safely removed by Pa. State Game Wardens . DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

Red tags will signal to hunters to not eat the meat of the bear when they go to harvest it. This is required when a bear is anesthetized within 30 days of a hunting season.

“Our program is predicated off a system of knowledge called mark recapture.” Wyant said. “The recapture is either the bear being returned to nature in one of a few ways. It could be lawfully harvested by a hunter, struck by a vehicle, or sometimes, big male bears — we find they die of old age.”

If you are to encounter a bear, be sure to call the state Game Commission in order to safely have the bear removed.