Bear freed from plastic lid wrapped around its neck for 2 years, DNR said

Montmorency County, Mich. (WNEM/Gray News) – Wildlife biologists removed a plastic lid wrapped around the neck of a young black bear for two years.

The bear was first spotted in 2023, according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. A biologist at the department’s Atlanta field office saw trail photos of the then-cub with a lid stuck around its neck.

The male bear would occasionally appear on other trail cameras over the course of the next 2 years, but would disappear after a day or so, DNR reported.

A resident in late May spotted the bear on trail camera photos and alerted DNR.

State biologists set up a baited enclosure trap, with the landowner’s permission, and safely caught the bear on June 2. Once the bear was put under anesthesia, they removed the lid from its neck and collected body measurement data.

The bear weighed about 110 pounds, which is standard for a growing 2-year-old black bear, according to DNR. It has significant scarring and an abscess on its neck. However, DNR said the bear seemed healthy.

The bear was released back onto the property once the anesthesia wore off.

The lid is similar to those that fit a 55-gallon drum used by hunters to bait bears, according to DNR. They’re also used by landowners to store materials that attract bears, like chicken feed.

Authorities don’t know where or how the bear got its head stuck in the 5-inch hole in the lid.

Despite bear baiting being legal in Michigan, bait containers can only be used on private land and may only have holes that are 1 inch or less in diameter, or 22 inches or greater in diameter.

“Container openings of a certain size can result in bears and other wildlife getting their heads or other body parts stuck in them, leading to injury or death,” Cody Norton, the DNR’s bear, furbearer and small game specialist, said. “It’s important to remember that the opening diameter is more important than the size of the container.”

Trapping, chemical immobilization and data-collecting efforts provided DNR with training and information that can aid future research and bear-management strategies, Norton added.

Michigan is home to about 13,000 black bears – 1,700 of them in the northern Lower Peninsula.

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