A St. Louis Cardinals pitching prospect was bowhunting from a treestand in Wisconsin when out of left field a bear bit him in the back.
Dalton Roach, a 25-year-old who plays for the Double-A Springfield Cardinals, told the Eau Claire Leader-Telegram it was the first time he had ever seen a bear on the family-owned land he’s hunted many times.
Roach told the paper he was in a treestand about 20 feet off the ground and grabbed his cellphone to record the sighting (see below). At first the bear was just moseying around, but when he got about 20 yards away, he turned and went directly under Roach’s tree. When he heard scratching, he realized the bear was climbing the tree. Roach said suddenly the bear was right behind him and he could feel his breath on his back.
“Then I feel a paw on my lap. He just kind of left the paw sitting there, so it’s not like I wanted to make a big move and make him squeeze,” he told the paper.
Roach said when he felt the gear on his back tighten he realized the bear was biting him. He knew he had to do something to free himself. He had always heard bears are more scared of people than the other way around. Roach spun around to face the bear he believed to be about 250 to 300 pounds, made himself look as big as he could, and began yelling. He had a safety harness on, so he wouldn’t fall out of the tree. Roach said the bear backed down. After a while the bear walked off in the opposite direction of his vehicle, so he headed for his truck.
“I think I still had so much adrenaline pumping that there wasn’t tons of pain going on, and I could tell there wasn’t a lot of blood dripping,” Roach told the Telegram-Leader.
He had the wound inspected at a hospital. The staff cleaned the bite, gave him antibiotics and a tetanus shot. He also got his first of what will be 22 injections of the rabies vaccine.
Roach says he is not afraid to get back out into the woods and go hunting again as he knowns what happened to him is a very rare situation. He is thankful the bear was not more aggressive and he was able to go home to his family and continue his baseball career.
