Milwaukee City Wire

The search is on in Juneau County for an injured black bear recently spied hobbling around the area.

NBC15.com reports volunteers from Help Asheville Bears (HAB) recently arrived in New Libson to search for the bear and help remove a small game trap from its right front paw.

News reports about the bear began surfacing earlier this month when residents recorded a video of the bear hobbling around in their backyard.

“We had seen the same thing happen in North Carolina last year -- almost a year ago to date -- and the bear ended up losing its paw after a few weeks,” said Alex Williams, a volunteer with HAB. “So, we knew how important it was to find the bear quickly before it lost its paw.”

Williams and his brother Jody arrived in town earlier this month and immediately began their search around the area where the bear has been spotted searching for food and going after bird feeders.

“Our concern has always been from the beginning to get help for the bear,” said Ian Judd, the man who filmed the bear. “Seeing the bear with the trap on is heartbreaking.”

The type of trap the bear stepped on is called a conibear trap and is designed to catch small animals such as raccoons. While the type of trap seen in the video is legal, the act of trapping bears is illegal in Wisconsin.

“Currently in Wisconsin, we don’t have any trapping season open this time of year. However, state law does allow landowners to trap and remove nuisance animals that are on their land, year-round,” said Kris Johansen with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.

While Johansen said he suspects the bear inadvertently stepped on the trap, he quickly adds “no one wants to see an animal that is in distress like that.”

Soon after the bear was filmed, the USDA Wildlife Service put a live bear trap on Judd’s property in hopes of being able to catch the bear and safely tranquilize it so it can be safely set free.

In addition, the Williams brothers positioned 10 trail cameras around Judd’s seven-acre property in hopes of monitoring the bear’s movement. They also dumped gallons of maple syrup, molasses and other sugary sweets around the area, hoping to entice the bear to return to the property and enter the live bear trap.

“The outpouring of sympathy for the bear has been quite enormous. It just shows there are people out there that care, people are still concerned for animals,” Williams said. “Even if we can’t save the limb and it’s chewing it off right now and it’s too late, we can’t stop until we document what happened to this bear from beginning to end. The story is too important.”

Along with helping bears, Williams insists HAB’s goal is to “document their injuries and missing limbs to try to get this cruelty stopped.”

He added if the trap is not removed in a reasonable amount of time, the bear will eventually chew his own paw off to set himself free.