Meet Mr. T-Shirt: The 400-Pound Bear Who is a Local Celebrity in this Tahoe Town

View this post on Instagram

DISCLAIMER: Sgt. Dellinger took this photo from a safe distance in his patrol car, away from the direct path of the bear. This is “Mr. T-shirt”. He’s a local around the King’s Beach area, who got his name because of a large white patch on his chest. Mr. T-shirt weighs a smothering 400 pounds! Our deputies were called out to King’s Beach a few days ago, where they found tourists had him cornered against a fence as they took pictures of him. He is normally a docile bear, but chances were pretty good he could have become agitated and attacked. Yes, bears are cute and fluffy, but they have INSTINCTS. You know the saying “don’t poke the bear” 🐻😳

A post shared by Placer County Sheriff’s Office (@placer_sheriff) on Jul 17, 2019 at 3:39pm PDT

The Placer County Sheriff was recently called out to a scene in King’s Beach and they arrived to find a usual suspect. Crowds of tourists were surrounding and taking photos of the perpetrator, so deputies were forced to disperse the crowd and give him room.

The usual suspect was Mr. T-Shirt, a 400-pound bear who received his name from the white patch on his chest. He is known to King’s Beach locals to be harmless, and to the naked eye he looks quite cuddly, but the sheriff’s department wanted to remind the public that he could be very dangerous if prompted.

“He is normally a docile bear, but chances were pretty good he could have become agitated and attacked,” the sheriff’s department wrote on social media. “Yes, bears are cute and fluffy, but they have INSTINCTS. You know the saying ‘don’t poke the bear’.”

Mr. T-Shirt looks similar to Truckee’s local bear celebrity, Bubba, who is known to slowly move throughout neighborhoods looking for grub and napping on lawns.

Bears are becoming notorious throughout the Tahoe area for breaking into houses in order to get ahold of some tasty human food. These Bear Burglars of Lake Tahoe are growing increasingly common. Including this recent clip of a brazen bear burglar in Tahoe:

Keep your distance with these bears! You’ll never know when they might snap.