Unbearable News

We regret to inform our readers that Franska has be transformed from a "conservation scheme" into what is sometimes called truck-tenderized cutlets. (Less refined people call it "roadkill".)

A Slovenian bear whose introduction into the French Pyrenees as part of a controversial conservation scheme infuriated local farmers has died in a car accident.

The bear, named Franska, was killed near the shrine of Lourdes in a dawn collision with a car on a mountain motorway.

The animal was one of five bears, four female and one male, let loose in the mountains in south-west France last year to boost the native bear population, which had dwindled to around 18 from several hundred over the past century.

Franska was wildly unpopular with the farmers in the area. It seems that Franska had a real sweet tooth for the local sheep. This dispute has been raging ever since the Slovenian bear arrived.

Last month more than 100 farmers dumped the carcasses of seven sheep they claimed had been killed by the animal outside the local government offices.

There was further controversy when it emerged that Franska, who was supposed to be six years old, was closer to 17 and possibly too old to reproduce.

According to witnesses, the bear was hit by a vehicle and thrown into the path of a second. She was the second of the five Slovenian bears to die of unnatural causes. The first fell from a cliff a year ago.

Now this leads us to suspect several things. First, the local sheep were extremely unhappy with the bear. Slovenian brown bears have a disconcerting habit of dropping on their prey from a height. So, did the first bear fall, or was he butted over the cliff by an angry ram? Secondly why hasn't the first car that supposedly hit Franska been found? Is anyone looking for a ram? And we don't mean a Dodge.

This leads us right into our next item. A bear has been captured in Fort Collins, Colorado right near an elementary school. The bear was hiding in a tree attempting to look like a walnut and waiting for school kids to walk under the tree.

CBS4) FORT COLLINS, Colo. A bear found napping in a tree in Fort Collins was tranquilized and returned to the foothills Wednesday afternoon.

The bear was found in a tree near Putnam Elementary School.

A large crowd gathered to see the wildlife before wildlife officers decided to knock the bear out and slowly lower it from the tree for everyone's safety.

Experts said the bear probably wandered into the city in search of food.

We told you bears like to drop on their victims from a height, didn't we?