A family that had to evacuate their house due to the Los Angeles fires returned to find a very large, furry surprise waiting for them.
According to KABC, Sam Arbid and his family discovered that a 525-pound bear had taken up residence in a crawl space underneath their home.
The animal was actually already a fixture of the Arbids’ Altadena neighborhood and had been named Beary by residents. While perhaps not the most creative name, Beary was creative in using the Arbid home as shelter as he waited out the flames of the Eaton Fire.
Bear or no bear, the Arbids were just happy that their home had survived the devastation. Still, they called in the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, which got Beary to safely leave his hideout and relocated him to a nearby forest.
“He was actually a pretty mellow wild animal,” Arbid says. “But we want to be able to use our front yard.”