Colorado pair fights bears off with bat

When a mother bear and her two cubs entered the home of a Colorado couple earlier this week, they were able to fight them off with a baseball bat.

Jon Johnson and his girlfriend George Ann Field were watching TV in their home when they heard what they thought was a raccoon in the kitchen, Johnson told CNN. When he walked around the corner to scare it off, he came face-to-face with the mother bear, he said.

Security cameras show the mama bear sliding open a screen door and entering the home around 8:03 p.m. — apparently lured in by the shrimp, hamburgers and zucchini the couple made for dinner. The bears were gone by 8:05 p.m., but Johnson said the whole encounter felt like it lasted 10 minutes.

The bear hit Johnson on the nose, and he returned a strike to hers, he said.

“Figured if it’s tender on me it would be tender on her,” Johnson said.

She then scratched him on his face, arms and stomach, he said. Their scuffle gave Field time to approach with a bat. She hit the bear at least three times before the mama bear and her cubs left, Johnson said.

“You would have thought I was a Louisville slugger,” Field said.

“We worked as a team. I was the bait, she was the bat,” Johnson said.

On her way out, they said, the mama left a bear-sized headprint in the wall for them to remember her by.