Neighbors reported seeing the bear Wednesday evening and called the Division of Wildlife.

"A lot of excitement," said Shellani Jensen. "My husband said, 'You need to get inside we have a bear in our tree, and I was like, 'No, we don't.'"

But they did. The bruin picked their backyard to ride out the storm, while neighbors, police and wildlife officials watched.

"He stayed up there for about two hours," said Jensen. "They didn't want to tranquilize him or upset him."

Eventually, the bear climbed the fence and walked away.

"The really strange thing is we had a dog we had to put down a couple of weeks ago, and his name was Bear," said Jensen. We told our kids that it was his spirit."

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