- - Altadena bear saga reportedly continues. Is it the same one?

Paris Barraza, USA TODAY January 13, 2026 at 7:04 PM

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The saga with bears in Altadena has reportedly continued, coming after a widely reported over-500-pound bear had been living beneath a man’s home for more than a month.

KTLA reported that another Altadena home has a “new resident” — also a bear — citing images that the residents of the home provided to them. It comes after officials with the nonprofit BEAR League said they had helped remove a male bear that had been living under the house of another Southern California homeowner.

That bear, estimated at over 500 pounds, had caused “extensive damage to the home’s heating ducts” and “barely fit into the crawlspace,” BEAR League officials said on Jan. 8.

In a GoFundMe post, Altadena homeowner Ken Johnson said that the bear had been living underneath his house for over a month and it had caused tens of thousands of dollars in damage.

Officials with BEAR League were successful in getting the bear to crawl out and leave and said they’d provided electric mats to prevent another visit by the bear so that Johnson could have time to make repairs and secure the crawlspace.

Is it the same bear that was underneath Altadena home?

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife was not able to confirm whether this bear is the same involved with the other crawlspace incident, spokesperson Cort Klopping told the USA TODAY Network. They haven’t gotten an official report on this, Klopping said — the reporting party had reached out to a different entity, and there’d been some confusion that has ultimately resulted in CDFW officials not having an official report.

Reporting an incident with wildlife with the CDFW, in which the wildlife isn’t causing an immediate threat, will kick off the process for officials to assess the situation to see what the best response is, Klopping said.

A Southern California resident received an unexpected surprise last week when he discovered a 500-pound bear living beneath his home, according to local reports.

When asked about whether there has been an uptick in bear activity since the Eaton Fire, Klopping said there wasn’t a difference in any reported bear sightings from before the fire and after.

It's not the first time a bear has been “evicted” from a Southern California residence. In 2024, a black bear was “evicted” from an abandoned home in neighboring Sierra Madre.

Among the recommendations to prevent bear interactions, according to the CDFW, includes securing crawl spaces, installing electric mats, removing bird feeders from your yard, and remembering to clean your barbecue grills.

Paris Barraza is a reporter covering Los Angeles and Southern California for the USA TODAY Network. Reach her at [email protected].

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Is the Altadena bear back at it? Here's what we know

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