Horses recovering from bear attack in East Brookfield

Horses recovering from bear attack in East Brookfield

Michele Perry, right, examines the wound on her injured horse, Justin, with her daughter, Brooke, near where the attack occurred. (T&G Staff/CHRISTINE PETERSON)

 By Kim Ring TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

EAST BROOKFIELD — The bloody gashes on the necks of two Appaloosa horses weren't an accident, Michele Perry says.

"They were attacked by something, and we think it was a bear," she said as both horses rested Sunday in small paddocks, with stitches closing the wounds on their necks.

Brooke Perry, 14, discovered the injuries Friday evening as she was putting the horses in for the night.

"I was rubbing his neck and I felt something sticky," she said. "I was like, 'What did you roll in?' "

Then she looked at her hand and saw blood.

Ozzy, 19, and Justin, 20, had both suffered wounds that looked as though someone "has used a machete on them," Michele said.

She called her veterinarian, who rushed to the barn on Podunk Road and sedated the horses so their wounds could be cleaned and sutured. Some of the injuries were left open with the hope they would heal if Michele can keep them clean.

The larger paddock where the horses were kept on Friday showed signs of the attack. Horse hair — brown and white — lay in small patches; in one area there was blood. There were also signs that the horses had stamped their hooves. Inside a run-in shelter, there were tracks in the sand that a state Environmental Police officer examined.

"He said it was a bear," Michele said, though initially she had thought something like a mountain lion might have been the culprit.

Bear attacks on farm animals aren't unheard of, though they are somewhat unusual.

In October 2013, a Gilbertville family lost their 100-pound sheep and a slightly smaller goat to two separate attacks. Police said at the time they believed a bear was responsible.



 

Appaloosa Ozzy, at left, nuzzles Justin, with Michele Perry in the middle. Both horses were attacked Friday. (T&G Staff/CHRISTINE PETERSON)

The same year, a few miles away from the recent incident, a man living on Adams Road in East Brookfield shot and killed a bear that he said was acting aggressively as it headed toward a litter of puppies on his property. That bear weighed about 275 pounds.

Black bears are the only type of bear found in Massachusetts, and males can be as large as 600 pounds, with large females topping out at about 400 pounds, according to the state Department Fisheries and Wildlife.

Bear hunting is allowed in some areas of Massachusetts in the fall, and bears causing damage to livestock can be killed at any time.

But Michele said she's not ready to go after the bear, she's just hoping it won't come back and that perhaps the horses put up a fight impressive enough to dissuade it from returning

"I think Ozzy would have fought," Michele said. "He doesn't like anything in his paddock so he may have gone after it ... I'm not ready to call everybody in the neighborhood and say, 'Go hunting in my woods.' How would I know they got the right one?"

Bears are omnivorous, eating both meat and vegetation. They have been known to visit bird feeders and they might be attracted to carcasses that allow them the opportunity to feed.

Michele said the bears visit her neighbors' bird feeders and she doesn't mind that at all. She's installed game cameras and is keeping a close watch on her horses, allowing those that weren't hurt to run in a larger paddock where they might have a better chance of getting away from a bear.

"I'm nervous," she said. "I saw them all staring in the same direction (toward the river) and I was wondering what they were looking at.

"Then I saw a boat, thank God."

Contact Kim Ring at kim.ring@telegram.com.