Who needs an alarm clock? Just have a friendly bear wake you up.
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That sure did it for Peter Rizzuto. The Colorado man, 77, was taking an afternoon nap out on his deck he was stirred by a bear nibbling on his ankle, he told The Aspen Times.
“I thought it was a German shepherd,” he told the paper. “I started petting it and saying ‘nice doggy.’ It then took my ankle but didn’t break the skin. Then I saw and looked down at his feet, and I see these big claws with really beautiful nails, and at this time I realize he’s a bear.”
The bear didn’t take any free samples, thankfully.
“He sort of backed up and looked at me, and I looked at him,” Rizzuto said.
He went inside and the bear backed off. He hasn’t reported the incident to state officials, but a spokesman for Colorado Parks and Wildlife said there’s cause for alarm if bears are getting so up close and personal.
“Black bears typically shy away from humans,” Mike Porras said. “There is a comical aspect to it, but that incident could have gotten very ugly very quickly. When a bear is close to a human and has an ankle in its jaws, I would think that is something our officers would find concerning.”
Rizzuto, too. For his part, he said he’s going to take his naps inside from now on.