Children playing in forest run into sleeping bear

print this

While playing in a forest, three children ran into a sleeping bear in a cave on the island of Palva in the Velkua Islands in the Turku Archipelago on Saturday afternoon.
      12-year-old Valtteri and 9-year-old Fanni from Velkua, together with their 11-year-old cousin Eemil from the city of Nokia were playing on a hilltop in the woods near the Palva primary school.
     
The hilltop includes a "giant's kettle" pothole and several caves that the children were examining.
      Valtteri was about to enter a cave under a rock when one of the children told him to "look into the cave first before entering".
      Valtteri looked in and saw what looked like a hairy lump, much like a bear’s behind. The other children peeked in as well, and confirmed that it really was a brown bear’s rear end.
     
Two other openings that were 20-30 centimetre in diameter also led into the cave. Valtteri pushed his head through one of them to make sure that it really was a bear.
      This latest inspection verified the authenticity of the find: yes, it was a sleeping bear. The bear’s head was only about half a metre from Valtteri’s face, while he peered in.
      After this the children picked up their backpacks and quietly left the scene. From home Valtteri called his father Ville Kuusinen and told about the bear in the cave.
     
Ville Kuusinen contacted the police on Sunday and asked what should be done. The police quickly convened ten men from the local hunting society and two police officers. Valtteri guided the men to the right location. The bear was no longer in the cave, but some bear vomit was discovered on the cave floor, where the animal had been stretched out.
      The idea would have been to wake up the beast and chase it away from the vicinity of the school. The Palva school head teacher was notified of what had happened, so that he could then warn other children from going into the forest.
      According to Ville Kuusinen the hunting posse made a considerable amount of noise while arriving on the scene. The men parked their cars only a hundred metres away from the cave. The bear must have been scared away by the racket.
      The place where the bear decided to take a nap is about a kilometre from the closest permanently populated areas. There are also some summer cottages and roads nearby.
     
A year ago a bear caused havoc in the Turku Archipelago on the Houtskari and Iniö islands by killing sheep. Presumably the same bear also appeared in Brändö and Åva in the Åland Islands, where it also killed and ate sheep.
      In the autumn, bears usually move around seeking food before retiring to their winter dens for winter sleep. A bear usually avoids contact with humans to the best of its ability.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Swimmer bear kills sheep in Åland Islands (4.10.2006)

Helsingin Sanomat