A 10-year-old boy in Connecticut was hospitalized after a black bear attacked him in the backyard of his grandfather’s home Sunday, local media reported this week.
The bear was euthanized after the attack in Morris, a town of around 2,200 northwest of Waterbury, around 11 a.m., a spokesperson for the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection told NBC Connecticut.
The department did not respond to a request for details about the attack by NBC News on Monday night.
The boy’s grandfather and a neighbor who ran to help tried to fight off the bear, hitting it with a pipe, according to NBC Connecticut. The boy’s injuries were not life-threatening, officials told the station.
The black bear population in Connecticut was almost destroyed or removed by the mid-1800s, according to the environmental protection department.
But they made a rebound. The state had a resident population of the bears by the 1980s, and their numbers continue to grow, the department says on its website. There are an estimated 1,000 to 1,200 bears in the state, according to the department.
