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Black bear busts secret Utah pot farm

Fri Sep 5, 2008 6:51 AM EDT
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Associated Press
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PANGUITCH — One Utah community is cheering a special bear — but don't call him Smokey. Investigators say a large black bear raided a clandestine marijuana growing operation so often that it chased the grower away.

"This bear is definitely law-enforcement minded," said Garfield County Sheriff Danny Perkins. "If I can find this bear I'm going to deputize him."

Deputies found food containers ripped apart and strewn everywhere, cans with bear teeth marks, claw marks and bear prints across the Garfield County camp on Tuesday.

Perkins said the operation on Boulder Mountain included 4,000 "starter" sacks of pot and 888 young plants.

"This particular bear apparently was not going to give up and basically chased these marijuana farmers away," Perkins said. "Our county is so tough on drugs that even the wildlife are getting in on the action."

© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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dungbeetlemania

Bad bear!

  • 2 votes
Reply#1 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 8:12 AM EDT
Ire

Serious munchies!

  • 1 vote
#1.1 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 11:38 PM EDT
Reply
WMK

So the Bear is a 'War on Drugs' favoring Republican?

That's some fine anthropomorphizin' and preachy prohibition thumping going on right there.

I suspect the Bear didn't know what the humans were up to and didn't care - the Bear was hungry and the Pot growers were idiots who never read/learned a thing about spending time in Bear country. Somewhere near the top of the list is keep your food & any smelly supplies that might be interpreted as food away from where the bear can get at it. Locking it in your car is dumb idea, unless you want to find your car pried open like a can of Tuna once the Bear decides to go after the food inside. Keeping the food anywhere on ground level - in anything besides a locked steel strongbox (bolted down to something VERY sturdy) is just asking for whatever surrounds the food to be ripped apart and thrown all over the place.

For someone who put so much effort into their illegal grow operation - they came up short on smarts in the 'be aware of your surroundings' department.

  • 4 votes
Reply#2 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 9:27 AM EDT
LunarTick

Yup. The bear was going after the pot, not because he "knew" it was bad, but because he liked the smell.

  • 2 votes
#2.1 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 10:06 AM EDT
WMK

The article doesn't say the bear touched the pot, it says:

Deputies found food containers ripped apart and strewn everywhere, cans with bear teeth marks, claw marks and bear prints across the Garfield County camp on Tuesday.

food containers & cans - not pot plants

The Bear tore apart the growers camp to get at the food they so stupidly stored where the Bear would smell it and go for it.

  • 2 votes
#2.2 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 11:42 AM EDT
Reply
Perry O

The bear probably got into the pot and developed a major case of the munchies.

  • 3 votes
Reply#3 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 10:23 AM EDT
Cancer1G

The bear was mad because they wouldn't share!!!

  • 1 vote
Reply#4 - Fri Sep 5, 2008 11:27 AM EDT
blinkin

This is a Duplicate story

Too bad we can't report AP articles

  • 2 votes
Reply#5 - Sat Sep 6, 2008 9:51 AM EDT
Krys-360973

888 young plants

I would hate to be the one counting the plants.....6 hundred and 52, 6 hundred and 53..."Steve, don't forget to bag the dope in separate bags"....6 hundred and, and, oh s#$t...1,2,3.....

  • 1 vote
Reply#6 - Sat Sep 6, 2008 8:14 PM EDT
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