A Florida woman named Kristen Savage escaped death and saved her dog from a bear attack. After running out of options, Savage decided to throw a bag of cookies at the animal. This, for some reason, worked, allowing her and her pet to escape.
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According to WESH, Savage was walking her dog, Ringo, right in front of her house on Friday, April 25, at around 8 p.m. All of a sudden, a black bear approached her and pretended to attack Ringo.
"The bear snuck up behind me, went around my leg, and started biting at my dog," Savage told the outlet. "I was hanging [Ringo] like a piñata basically in the air, but every time I put my dog down on the ground, she would go after him again."
According to Savage, the bear, at one brief point, had Ringo in its mouth. Desperate, she continued to attempt to keep him away from the animal. However, the struggle eventually led to her falling down. Panic ensued, and, while on the ground, she then resolved to "get big" in an attempt to scare off the black bear.
Savage started waving her hands after standing up, accompanied by loud screams. While the bear backed off initially, the animal sprinted back at them after she stopped for a brief moment.
"At one point, I thought, 'We aren't going to get out of this,' because there is no one here to help me," Savage said.
Bag Of Cookies
Running out of options, Kristen Savage remembered that she had a bag of cookies with her. Reportedly, her mother had recently gifted them to her. Determined to save hers and Ringo's lives, and although she feels bad about it, Savage smacked the black bear in the face with the bag of cookies. Then, she threw it at the animal.
"I threw the bag at her, and she stopped for a minute, and she sniffed the cookies. As soon as she was distracted by the cookies, I ran!" Savage told Fox 35.
Savage and Ringo managed to escape death. Ringo was uninjured, and Savage only suffered minor scrapes on her leg due to the fall. Turns out the bear that attacked Savage is a pretty well-known bear in the Sylvan Lake Reserve neighborhood, where she lives. Moreover, Savage even had some photos on her phone of the black bear cuddling her cubs. For that same reason, she has no bad feelings toward the animal.
"I don't put blame on the bear. I'm sure she was just as scared as I was," Savage told WKMG. "As a mom I would do whatever I could to protect my babies, and I'm sure she was doing the same."
That being said, she has learned quite a valuable lesson following the attack.
"I think it's an important lesson to always have something on you that can scare them away, like an air horn or a spray," Savage added. "And just pay attention to your surroundings
The Florida Fish and Wildlife and Conservation Commission (FWC) recommends scaring bears away "by yelling, banging pots and pans, using an air horn, or anything else that makes a lot of noise."
