‘Lucky one to get close’: Marion police officer describes encounter with black bear
Marion Police Sgt. Jason Watts was on a routine patrol on the north side of town when he saw a couple of motorists pulled over last week.
He stopped to see if they needed help. They told Watts they were fine.
They were just trying to get another glimpse of “the bear.”
Sightings of a black bear had already been reported in the Marion area and nearby Pope County so Watts decided to drive to a gravel road just off Interstate 57 near a Love’s Travel Stop and a water tower.
Watts said he “was just trying to make sure (the bear) didn’t decide to take off towards the Love’s truck stop.”
“I thought maybe if I was between it and the truck stop, it wouldn’t go over there and cause a panic because it’s OK if it’s on the edge of town, I don’t really want it to be in the middle of town.”
Sure enough, Watts said the bear “came bopping out beside the water tower and came about 40 yards from me and I was like, well I’ll just stand here and might as well take a picture of it so I snapped a few videos.”
It was 9:50 a.m. on July 19 when the bear took off running near Watts. It galloped across a field, crossed a gravel road in front of Watts, took a last look at the officer and then ducked into some heavy brush.
“Once it saw me, it knew it wasn’t going to go in my direction,” Watts said.
Watts noted that black bears are not aggressive as long as you don’t get close to them. If it had been a grizzly or polar bear, he said he would have hopped into his patrol car.
After Watts saw the bear, other sightings were reported in Jackson County and then in Brewer, Missouri, on Wednesday afternoon.
Several other residents have posted bear photos and videos to social media. The sightings have prompted hundreds of comments on social media.
“I think I just happened to be the lucky one to get close to it and so I shared the video around,” Watts said.
A wildlife official from Kentucky believes the bear seen in southern Illinois this month entered the state by crossing the Ohio River from Kentucky. There were a series of bear sightings reported in western Kentucky in late June and early July but those reports ceased after Illinois residents began reporting bear sightings, according to John Hast, the bear and elk program coordinator for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources.
Hast said black bears are excellent swimmers and he believes the bear seen Wednesday in Brewer, Missouri, could be the one that left Kentucky, traversed southern Illinois and then swam across the Mississippi River.
Officer’s previous bear sighting
This wasn’t the first time Watts had seen a black bear.
He recalled a trip to West Virginia when he spotted a female bear with two cubs crossing a road. Watts’ wife was driving the 10-passenger church van they were in and Watts yelled, “Deer!” to make sure she saw the bears.
He said that “deer” yell came from his Midwest upbringing where it’s common to see deer crossing in front of vehicles.
West Virginia has about 13,000 black bears while Illinois doesn’t have an established population. However, Kentucky has about 1,500 and Missouri about 900.
In the Lower 48 states, there are about 4 million black bears, according to Hast.
Before the bear sightings in southern Illinois this month, there was one reported in Randolph County last year and in 2021, residents reported sightings in Clinton, Monroe, Washington and Franklin counties.
“I tell people to kind of enjoy it if you’re lucky enough to see one,” Hast told the News-Democrat. “Especially when you’re in western Kentucky or southern Illinois, man, that might be a once in a lifetime thing.”
