11 Students and Teachers Injured After Grizzly Bear Charges School Group 🐻

As we continue to slowly inch towards the Thanksgiving weekend, let’s all take a minute to grab a coffee or whiskey (no judgement) and get into what this beautiful Tuesday has to offer.

Here's what's worth reading about so far this week:

TERRIFYING
11 STUDENTS AND TEACHERS INJURED AFTER GRIZZLY BEAR CHARGES SCHOOL GROUP ON TRAIL

A peaceful school outing turned into a nightmare last Thursday when an adult grizzly sow with two cubs charged a group of 20 fourth- and fifth-grade students and their teachers from Acwsalcta School, an Indigenous-run institution in the Nuxalk Nation community of Bella Coola, British Columbia. The unprovoked attack, which unfolded along a riverside trail just minutes from town, left 11 people injured – four of them critically or seriously – and has reignited a fierce province-wide debate over British Columbia’s 2017 ban on grizzly bear hunting.

What began as a land-based learning outing was shattered in an instant when the grizzly sow exploded from the thick underbrush without warning, charging directly into the group in a rare and aggressive display. Eyewitness accounts describe a scene of pandemonium that caused children to scream in terror and scatter as the 400-pound bear barreled through the crowd of students. The sow, undeterred by the group's noise or proximity, targeted multiple individuals in a frenzy that officials later called "exceedingly rare" for its scale and lack of provocation.

According to reports, the teachers' response was nothing short of extraordinary, blending split-second bravery with the bear-awareness training ingrained in the community. Armed with two cans of bear spray and bear bangers they unleashed a barrage…

🐺 Remote Camera Captures Wolf “Fishing” With Crab Trap Line in British Columbia. And keeping things on the Canadian west coast, researchers in British Columbia have captured footage of a female wolf employing what appears to be tool use to raid a crab trap. As part of an effort to eradicate invasive European green crabs, scientists had set submerged traps in deep coastal waters, only to find them mysteriously dragged ashore with bait stripped clean. Remote cameras revealed the culprit: the wolf swimming out to the buoy, seizing the line in her jaws, hauling the entire rig to the beach, and then methodically chewing through the netting to snag the prize inside. Lead researcher Kyle Artelle, an environmental biologist with the State University of New York, couldn't contain his awe: "I couldn't believe my eyes when we opened up that camera." He described the sequence as a "carefully choreographed" display of smarts, where the wolf intuitively linked the float to food below and adapted on the fly—behaviors honed, perhaps, by the area's isolation, which gave her ample low-risk time for trial-and-error learning.

Published in Ecology and Evolution, the footage marks the inaugural documented case of potential tool use in wild wolves, setting it apart from their usual pounce-and-chase predation. Co-author Paul Paquet, a geography professor at the University of Victoria, called it "really intelligent, really incredible, sophisticated behavior," though experts caution it's more opportunistic ingenuity than the deliberate crafting seen in chimps wielding sticks for termites. With wolves' razor-sharp adaptability already legendary, this coastal heist hints at untapped cunning that could rewrite field guides, even if it's just one clever wolf turning a fishing line into her personal snack bar.

Watch the video footage here.

🤦 Chattanooga Man Allegedly Steals Hunting Clothes, Then Uses Them to Illegally Bag a Deer. In a story that sounds like it was scripted for some kind of a bargain-bin wildlife heist movie, 39-year-old Chattanooga resident Jackson Conner, who was fresh off a October 28 bust for swiping $119.82 worth of camo hunting gear from Walmart and then bolting from cops like a deer, is now facing charges for allegedly poaching one.

Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency officers got the tip-off anonymously on November 22 and showed up at Conner's home to find a (figurative) smoking gun by ways of a deer pelt that was still soft to the touch, and a skinned and gutted carcass missing chunks of meat. Conner's partner spilled the beans, stating that he'd shot the doe, while later Conner tried the classic "I picked it off the side of the road" defense. But with two deer-hunting rifles on site, zero valid license in his name and a semi-circular hole that looked an awful lot like it was caused by a high-speed projectile, authorities weren't buying it. He's now staring down charges for hunting without a license, illegal wildlife possession (twice over), and two counts of carrying a firearm with intent to go armed. His court date is set for December 1.

🥊 When the rut leaves the woods and enters the lake. Watch as these two bucks take their fight into the street lake and duke it out all while trying not to drown.

And just went you think it’s over, they jump right back in…

Oh, and one more thing…