Resident of Montana town near Yellowstone recalls close encounter with grizzly

Most people don’t have to worry about encountering a grizzly bear unless they are traveling in the woods.

For folks who live in the mountain communities surrounding bear strongholds like Yellowstone National Park and the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, however, bears in backyards, walking down the street or even breaking into sheds and garages heightens vigilance, or at least it should.

Residents of the greater Gardiner area, near the North Entrance of Yellowstone, were reminded of that the past few weeks as a 15-year-old male grizzly seeking food raided garbage cans, businesses and even homes.

Last week, employees of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks finally located the bruin in the Yellowstone River north of Gardiner after failed attempts to trap the critter. The bear was shot and residents breathed a sigh of relief that the nightly raids might end.

“The bear died because we, the public, trained it to be that way,” said Chester Evitt, a 59-year-old Navy veteran who lives along the banks of the Yellowstone River. “You could be talking to my wife instead of me if this story had gone a different route.”

‘The Mother’

Evitt was up late watching the Jennifer Lopez movie “The Mother” on Tuesday, July 16. Lopez plays an assassin protecting her daughter who she abandoned at birth in hopes of shielding the girl from dangerous former colleagues. When the girl is kidnapped, Lopez goes into full mama bear mode.

“I’m a killer, but I’m also a mother,” Lopez said in the movie. “I will die protecting her.”

Evitt had his feet propped up in his recliner watching the flick when, around 11:27 p.m., his nearby front door slammed open with a loud bang. The Gardiner grizzly had come knocking.

“The bear decided it wanted to come in,” Evitt recalled. “The foot of my recliner to the door is 5 feet,” so the big bruin was immediately close.

Grizzly bears

In nearby Yellowstone National Park, adult male grizzlies can grow up to 700 pounds, measuring 3.5-feet at the shoulder. When standing on their hind legs, the animals can loom 8-feet tall. Grizzlies can live 15 to 30 years if they avoid humans, their leading cause of death.

In most cases, bears avoid humans. Tracking collars have shown some bears living incredibly close to people without anyone the wiser, and human-bear encounters are often in situations where a mama is protecting its cubs.

This may have happened on July 18 near Glacier National Park — another grizzly stronghold — when a Columbia Falls man picking huckleberries encountered a bear. The female attacked. The man fired his pistol. The bear died, but not before injuring the 72-year-old.

Based on initial examinations, the Gardiner grizzly had no physical limitations that may have led it to seek out human food sources, like poor health or worn, painful teeth. It appears to have grown into a local menace, with its destructive raids, simply because some people didn’t secure their trash, coolers or grills. The old adage, “A fed bear is a dead bear,” often proves true.

Evitt’s wife, Mary Dee, is quite the cook. Smells emanating from the home after she prepared a Mexican meal with fried onions, peppers and refried beans may have attracted the grizzly to come knocking. A black bear’s sense of smell is reportedly seven times stronger than a bloodhound’s.

“My house smells like a restaurant,” Evitt said.

Surprise bear

After the bear knocked open the front door, Evitt’s first thought was a “meth head on fentanyl” was breaking in. Then he saw the grizzly and yelled: “Bear! House!”

Next to his recliner Evitt keeps a loaded Model 1911 Colt .45 semiautomatic pistol loaded with 220-grain hollow point bullets. As the owner of Momma Bear’s Armory, the gun shop in Gardiner, Evitt knows the bullets are not meant to stop a big bear.

Quickly, he grabbed the pistol and fired several times over the bear’s head.

“I discharged my weapon in pure fear and self-defense,” Evitt said.

The grizzly was so close that he clearly saw its claws, teeth and could smell its breath.

“I can’t say how many shots I fired,” he added. “We’re still finding brass.”

Brass refers to the shell casing, made of brass, that is ejected after a shot is fired. Colt 1911s hold seven bullets. Evitt said he’s unsure if it was fully loaded, but afterward he found he had two rounds left, one in the chamber ready to fire and one more in the magazine.

Evitt said he purposely tried not to hit the bear out of concern that if he killed it, he might face jail or a hefty fine. Grizzly bears are protected as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. People — often hunters — who kill grizzlies in self-defense are not charged following investigations to determine the situation.

The shakes

The door banging open followed in two seconds by the shooting alerted Evitt’s wife and dogs. She emerged from the bedroom with a shotgun ready to pepper the bear but never fired, he said. Although the bear retreated at the loud sound of the shots, it halted about 10 yards outside the door looking back at Evitt before ambling off.

“That bear had no fear of me until I fired,” Evitt said.

Immediately after shooting at the bear, Evitt called 911 to report the incident, but his rental home in the narrow valley doesn’t get great cellphone service. His phone kept cutting out and he had to redial.

As Evitt was calling for backup, the bear went on to raid four other houses in the Maiden Basin neighborhood, about 4 miles north of Gardiner, Evitt said. As the Park County Sheriff’s deputy interviewed Evitt, he received calls from other homeowners regarding the bear.

“Everyone involved, from the state to the feds, the 911 operator, all were as professional as possible,” Evitt praised.

With his adrenaline pumping at full strength, Evitt said it took about three hours for him to stop shaking. He texted one officer seven times. After law enforcement left, he propped a chair against the door to hold it closed and stood guard until sunrise with his shotgun loaded with deer slugs, large hunks of lead ammunition more suited to killing a bear.

“I’ve never been that close to a grizzly, and I never want to be that close to one again,” he said.

At 6 a.m., he opened the door and scanned the driveway for the bear to ensure his wife could get to her car and leave for work. Around 6:30 a.m., the bear came back.

It wouldn’t be until Thursday, July 18, that a Fish, Wildlife & Parks warden and bear management specialist were able to finally locate the bear in the nearby Yellowstone River and shoot it, the agency reported in a news release.

High stress

The impact of the encounter was still vivid and impactful for Evitt three days later. On the way home from the hospital for a checkup, after finding out doctors may have to amputate his left thumb, Evitt had to pull off the highway at a rest stop as a “severe panic attack” gripped his body.

“It’s all adding up,” he said. “I haven’t been able to come down and relax.”

Living in a small town, everyone has heard the news, or some altered version of it.

“The stories that went around about that poor bear, you could make a movie out of it,” Evitt said.

“I’ve had people come up and tell me, ‘I heard you killed the bear,’” he added. “Absolutely not.”

Oddly, the Evitts had just returned from a vacation in Alaska where they were excited to watch brown bears — the larger version of a grizzly — feeding on salmon at a fish ladder. One of their first stops after returning to Gardiner was at a nearby coffee kiosk the bear had damaged in a raid. The couple’s suitcases were still sitting next to the door on that fretful Tuesday night when the bear broke in.

Despite his close encounter with the massive creature, Evitt said it was a beautiful bear. His wife had seen it when driving to work, standing up on its hind legs in a field for a better view. In the four years the couple has lived in the area, Evitt said they’ve always been careful, taking the necessary precautions to avoid feeding a bear.

In addition to keeping garbage and coolers locked away, state bear managers advocate picking fruit trees, securing barbecue grills and removing bird feeders. Traditionally, such tactics are stressed in the fall and spring. In the fall, bears enter a phase called hyperphagia when they are constantly eating to gain weight for the scarce times of winter. In the spring, bears newly emerged from hibernation and hungry may be less cautious about securing a meal.

As human presence — through recreation and residences — have continued to encroach on bear habitat, other precautions have become necessary. Chicken coops, hobby farms and stored grain for horses are a common concern. On occasion, a grizzly may kill livestock. Electric fences and the removal of dead animals has helped keep bears away, but not every neighbor is as careful as the next.

“Please stress that the bear died because of the stupidity of so many people not taking care of their trash around here,” Evitt said.