Fish & Game says it has killed bear that charged Center Harbor woman on deck at her house

CENTER HARBOR — The black bear believed to have injured a local woman on her home deck this week has been killed, the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department reported today.

The bear was a large adult male that exhibited extremely aggressive behavior. It was shot by a N.H. Fish and Game Conservation Officer Wednesday night at approximately 9 p.m., near the location of several recent incidents involving bears, people and pets.

The bear was located and shot in the same neighborhood in which 55-year-old Jacqueline Berghorn was injured by a black bear outside her home, receiving non-life-threatening injuries, on Sunday, May 22.

"This is something that we as wildlife protectors do not relish. Ultimately, it came down to protecting the public," said Col. Martin Garabedian, Chief of N.H. Fish and Game Law Enforcement.

"Our Department is being put into a situation that is totally preventable. We have no doubt that this bear became a problem because it became habituated to finding food at human dwellings and had completely lost its fear of people."

Garabedian emphasized that everyone in New Hampshire needs to understand and follow the basics of avoiding bear-human conflicts: never intentionally feed bears; take down your birdfeeders from April to December; keep your grill clean; and remove bear attractants such as unsecured trash and dog food from your yard.

Previous residents of the neighborhood where the aggressive bear was killed had a history of feeding bears, according to authorities.