Family dog saves young boy from charging bear: 'DIDN'T GET ME'
· Toronto Sun
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Age ain’t nothing but a number for this dog.
Bella, an 11-year-old husky, may be considered a senior dog but she was as young and spry as could be when a young black bear appeared to charge at her human little brother.
Doorbell footage from Jeffrey Tazzara’s Connecticut home, licensed by Storyful and shared with Good Morning America , shows his son, Colton, standing in the driveway when the bear appears.
The boy had been playing in his front yard while his dad was in the garage loading the car when Tazzara heard a commotion.
“I heard Bella let out like a vicious bark and I hadn’t heard her bark like that before,” Tazzara told GMA on Wednesday’s show.
“By the time I turned around, it was Colton standing in front of me and the bear running in Colton’s direction,” recounted the distressed dad, whose son brushed it off, telling the show, “It didn’t get me because I ran fast inside.”
Meanwhile, as that was happening, Bella got between the boy and the bear, which was bitten by the dog, Tazzara claimed, before chasing the cub off the property and into the nearby woods.
Thankfully, neither Colton nor Bella were harmed in the close call.
A family dog became an instant hero after leaping between a 6-year-old boy and a charging black bear, successfully chasing the animal away.
— Good Morning America (@GMA) July 8, 2026
Sam Champion has more on the husky's brave save. pic.twitter.com/DKVH25IVzP
Meat treat
Tazzara said the bear is likely part of a litter that has been hanging around the area for the past year, rummaging through residents’ garbage because they “know there’s a free meal” in the unlocked bins.
Speaking of free meals, Bella will be rewarded with a T-bone at the family’s next steak night.
“She lives the life probably that most dogs wish they had,” he admitted, adding that the canine has . “never been on a leash in her life.”
He added, “She just, she does what she wants. She gets tons of treats.”
Well-deserved, it seems, but the Tazzara family may want to reconsider Bella’s leash-free life.
Living in Connecticut means living with bears
State officials with the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection have seen a rise in bear activity, a growing population of healthy black bears, as well as a troubling increase in conflicts with humans, their State of the Bears report found.
With more black bears popping up in more neighbourhoods, home break-ins, trash raids, and backyard encounters are becoming more common across the state.
The state experienced three bear attacks on humans, with the vast majority of the public’s bear-related issues stemming from trash and birdfeeders.
Perhaps more concerning for residents is that over the last six years, there have been 265 reports of bears entering homes as well as dozens of attempted entries that took place.
“Many of these incidents occurred when bears pushed through screen doors and windows,” the report stated, noting that in that time period, the home entries average to four break-ins per 100 bears each year.