Bear attack update: Little dog’s heroism creates big ripple effect

The most ferocious Bear in the state stands less than a foot tall and weighs no more than 17 pounds.

It isn’t the black bear that mauled Melinda LeBarron outside her rural Montgomery home — that, according to several accounts, sliced into Melinda’s scalp while batting her around before grabbing her by the leg and dragging her nearly 90 yards across the street and into a nearby patch of woods.

The most ferocious Bear, instead, is the 3-year-old Pekingese-Chihuahua mix — named Bear — that confronted the black bear attacking her beloved owner. According to several family sources, the little dog intervened long enough for Melinda to break free and crawl to safety on her front porch.

Meanwhile, Bear (the dog) sustained her own critical injuries. She was later rushed to the Susquehanna Trail Animal Hospital’s Emergency Center with — according to Melinda’s daughter-in-law Cheyenne LeBarron — a fractured sternum, punctured lung and numerous deep lacerations.

The most serious issue, according to veterinarian Tristan Wilhelm, was Bear’s severe blood loss.

“She had lost so much blood; it reached the point where she almost needed a transfusion,” he said. “The loss of blood and the bleeding into her lungs were extremely concerning. Fortunately, her body kicked back in just in time and she didn’t require major intervention.”

Slowly, Bear started to recover, wrapped in bandages and requiring an IV with high doses of antibiotics to ward off potential infections. Despite the limitations, Bear’s hospital stay ended a week after the attack and she was able to go home to rest.

Dr. Wilhelm was impressed with what he saw Friday afternoon when Bear came in for a check-up, but did say that Bear still has a lot of recovery to do.

“She is doing surprisingly well. After such extensive wounds to her chest cavity, she is lucky that she is doing so well now,” he said, adding that Bear’s attitude has been especially impressive throughout such an arduous recovery process.

“She is just an awesome dog — just this little 17-pound thing that people just chuckle thinking of her being able to stand up to a bear and surviving. A lot of her wounds were severe and painful, and yet she has been a real sport. A lot of dogs with painful wounds like this would be tired of us poking and prodding, but she is not. I just went out to see her, petted her and she was wagging her tail.”

Eighteen-year-old Autumn Duck, the niece of Melinda, owned Bear as a puppy and ultimately gave her to her aunt a year ago because she couldn’t keep her and because Melinda already had a special connection with the little dog.

“She’d constantly be spoiling her — buying her special foods and things like that and fancy collars,” Duck said. “And Bear was such a little diva. When I had her, she used to sleep in my bed. I would get the covers the way I wanted them and she would move them all around until it was perfect for her. Then I would take them back and we would do that for a while until I’d finally give up because she was very persistent.”

That persistence may have been what helped her save Melinda from the bear and helped the small dog through its own recovery.

“The family is really crediting Bear with saving her owner’s life, and we immediately felt invested in getting Bear healthy again,” Wilhelm said. “Our staff really worked well together as a team, and Bear really responded well.”

The animal hospital has been doing all it can to make sure the family doesn’t have excessive medical bills for Bear, allowing the family to focus on Melinda’s recovery process. As of Friday afternoon, a spokesman at Geisinger said that Melinda is still in critical condition. She has endured a variety of surgeries and has a long road to recovery.

There are also still more questions than answers as to what happened that night. Why did the bear attack so intensely? What exactly did Bear (the dog) do to help free her owner? The state game commission is attempting to trap the bear and educating people in that neighborhood — and across the state — about the true nature of bears and the importance of not leaving out garbage or other things that would inadvertently lure in bears for a snack.

Few situations bring together the outdoors realm as much as this situation. As time moves on — despite the lingering questions — it is hard to ignore the heroes that have emerged from the situation.

Obviously, Bear deserves her moment in the limelight, and so do Dr. Wilhelm and his team. They applied for a special grant through the Last Chance Fund of the Pennsylvania Veterinary Foundation and were awarded $1,000 toward Bear’s expenses. It is a fund they have given to in the past, and now were able to access it for the LeBarron family’s needs.

The other hero in this situation is the community as a whole, which has rallied around Bear and the LeBarrons in miraculous ways.

“All the support is amazing, and that’s just what we’ve seen at the animal hospital,” said Wilhelm. “This community is caring and invested. People are making donations — we’ve even seen donations come in from out of state. It has been an amazing thing to be a part of — this is why we do what we do. It has all just been so inspiring.”

Not bad for a little dog with a big name and a bigger heart.