DENVER -- Officers tranquilized a bear in a southwest Denver neighborhood on Tuesday afternoon, according to 7NEWS.

A small crowd gathered around 4 p.m. in the Lakehurst neighborhood near Kipling and Saratoga to watch officials carry the sedated 80-pound, 2- to 3-year-old black bear out from a Kline Street resident's back yard and into a cage, 7NEWS reported. The animal had been sleeping when it was found, and authorities monitored it until wildlife officers arrived to fire tranquilizer darts.

Earlier, the bear was seen wandering along a fence in two back yards in the 4800 block of South Kline as well as in the 10,000 block of West Leyton Place, officials said.

The bear was finally cornered and successfully tranquilized shortly before 4 p.m., according to 7NEWS. Wildlife officials reported that the bear was not tagged, indicating that the bear has not previously been caught in the area. The bear will be released back into the wild.

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Bears that are caught with previous tags are destroyed, according to Division of Wildlife policy.

"This bear probably came down on Bear Creek -- that's my guess -- looking for food and other things like that," Shaun Deeney, district wildlife manager, said.

"(Bears) find a wealth of food here -- bird feeders, dog food, cat food -- all those things that smell good," he said.

"What happens is, they get within the city limits, they become disoriented and confused. You see a lot of security fences here, a lot of traffic, a lot of people, so that bear doesn't know how to get out. Typically we give it a few days to see if it can find its way out on its own. This bear we got reports on the last several days, so finally we had to act on it today," he said.

Two schools were locked down while officers searched for the animal.

While the bear hunt was under way, parents of Peiffer Elementary School students were asked to come to the school and sign their children out, officials said. The school was also locked down last week for several hours while officials looked for a bear.

After authorities said that the bear had been tranquilized, Peiffer administrators said that they had accounted for all of the school's students and were escorting students onto buses for afternoon dismissal. Students who normally walk home were held at the school until confirmation was received that the bear was subdued, school officials said.

The Grant Ranch School was also in lockdown mode during the bear hunt, according to Denver Public Schools. Grant Ranch is a brand new kindergarten through eighth-grade school located at 5400 S. Jay Circle. Tuesday was only the second day of classes ever at the school, according to 7NEWS.

Denver Police officers, Jefferson County deputies and a Denver police helicopter were all involved in locating and tranquilizing the yearling bear, police said. Younger, smaller bears are often forced out of larger bears' territory, officials said.

Wildlife experts say that when several frosts destroyed the berries that bears rely on for food, it forced many bears out of the high country and into neighborhoods.

"People need to know to keep their trash up. Don't leave dog food and cat food out on the porches at night. Keep their horse grain contained in barns. Anything that's edible, bears will eat," Jerry Brinker of the Divison of Wildlife said.

Close Encounter After School

There was another encounter with a bear on Monday. Doron Levary, 16, was on his way home from school Monday afternoon when he was surprised by a large furry visitor.

His house was the last stop of the day for his school bus. When the bus pulled up to his driveway in Douglas County's Happy Canyon, Levary looked out and exclaimed:

"Holy crap, there's a bear!"

At first, the bus driver thought that the bear was a dog.

"First (the bear) was in the garage, and I was like, 'What a neat dog,' and then the bear turned around and started walking out of the garage, and I was like, 'That's not a dog -- that's a bear,' and I shut the (bus) door real quick," school bus driver Alan Hickson said.

Levary called his mom on a cell phone to tell her what was going on. His dad pulled up in his truck, and drove his son from the driveway to the garage to make sure he was okay.

Eventually, the bear wandered off, the family said.

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