DEC police officer uses hoodie to save bear cubs stranded near Upstate NY railroad tracks
DEC police rescued two motherless bear cubs near railroad tracks in Pawling, NY, by wrapping them in a hoodie. The cubs were taken to wildlife rehabilitators and determined to be in good condition.
by Admin
May 18, 2023
Two motherless bear cubs became stranded recently near the tracks of the Metro-North Railroad in the Dutches County town of Pawling.
A New York State Department of Environmental Conservation police officer (ECO) found the cubs huddled together in some bushes and wrapped them in a hoodie before handing the baby bear pair over to wildlife rehabilitators from Friends of the Feathered and Furry Wildlife Center.
The cubs were determined to be in good condition and are expected to recover.
On March 27, an ECO arrived at the scene of a single engine airplane crash in the Suffolk County town of Mattiluck and found fuel leaking from the plane’s wings. DEC Spills responders later cleaned up the contaminated soil and no environmental impacts were reported from the spill. The pilot sustained no injuries in the crash.
During the overnight hours of March 26-27, ECOs conducted a fish compliance detail on the Hudson River in Westchester County during the closed striped bass season. Officers encountered quite a few violations, with anglers hiding striped bass in rocks, under leaves, and even inside a potato chip bag. ECOs caught anglers on one boat who were bowfishing carp and catfish. Bowfishing season is only open from May 15 to Sept. 30 for carp and is never legal for catching catfish. By the end of the detail, ECOs issued 38 tickets, all pending in multiple courts throughout Westchester County.
DEC Division of Law Enforcement (DLE) investigators recently ticketed a Suffolk County resident for possessing a six-foot-long reticulated python. Investigators were acting on a tip called in after ECOs found a dead 14-foot python on the side of the road last February in Medford. Turns out the two snakes had two different owners, however. It’s illegal to possess pythons in New York without a special permit.
An injured northern saw-whet owl was spotted recently in the main stairwell of the Howard Beach Train Station, in Queens, New York. Saw-whets live in New York City year-round and are one of the most common owls across North America. A Port Authority wildlife specialist worked with ECOs to get the injured bird safely into a crate and transported to a local wildlife rehabilitator.
An ECO recently found a large entertainment stand dumped on the roadside in a swampy area of Kings Bay Wildlife Management Area, on Lake Champlain. Acting on a hunch, the ECO searched Facebook Marketplace and found a listing for the same entertainment stand (free) in the nearby village of Rouses. The ECO paid the owner of the furniture a visit and ticketed them for unlawful disposal of solid waste and depositing trash/litter on a WMA.
