Additional information is being released in connection with a fatal bear attack which happened near Yellowstone Park on Wednesday morning.

State wildlife officials say that two people were injured and one person was killed in separate bear attacks that occurred at the Soda Butte Campground.

Park County Sheriff’s Department dispatch records show that a Park County Sheriff’s deputy and a Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks game warden were dispatched to the area at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday and Investigators found a man dead at the campground about two hours later.

Two other people, a male and a female, were reportedly bitten and later treated at a hospital in Cody, Wyoming. The identities of the victims have not been released.

FWP officials, in cooperation with the Gallatin National Forest, the National Park Service and the Park County Sherriff’s Office spent much of the day at the site collecting forensic evidence of the attacks.

Officials from the agencies plan to hold a community meeting at the Cooke City Chamber of Commerce on Thursday at 5:30 p.m. to discuss the incident.

“The camp sites are being combed for evidence,” said FWP spokesman Ron Aasheim “We’re not certain if it was one bear or more than one, and we haven’t determined if it was a grizzly or black bear. We’ve extracted DNA samples from evidence found on site. This will help us identify the bear or bears involved, once captured.”

Officials say that tents were ripped or damaged during the attacks but no food was found in the tent of the dead man or in the tents of the two injured victims. “Everyone appeared to have followed all food storage regulations,” Aasheim said.

The Soda Butte Campground, the nearby Chief Joseph and Colter campgrounds, also in the Gallatin National Forest, are closed.

“This is not typical bear behavior. It’s odd. It’s not normal,” Aasheim said.

FWP officials have set a number of traps in anticipation of the animal’s return on Wednesday night.

via KPAX – Missoula, Montana – News, Weather, Sports – - KPAX Home Missoula News, Missoula Weather, Missoula Sports, Montana News, Montana Weather, Montana Sports | Separate bear attacks blamed for fatality, injuries.

Authorities continue piecing together details about an overnight bear attack near Cooke City that killed one person and injured two others.

MT FWP officials say that it appears the victims were attacked separately and were not camped in the same location of the Soda Butte Campground.

The attacks are believed to have occurred sometime between midnight and 2:00 a.m., and authorities believe that only one bear is responsible for the attacks.

Aasheim says the man who died had been dragged from his tent and was found at the western edge of the campground.

A woman suffered severe lacerations from bites on her arms, while another man was bitten on his calf. Both are being treated for their injures at a Cody, Wyoming hospital. Their injuries are not life threatening. Officials say the man was able to drive himself to Cody, while the woman was transported by ambulance.

Authorities have not yet released the names of the people involved.

Wildlife officials are investigating a deadly bear attack in the Cooke City area that left one man dead and two people injured.

The incident happened at the Soda Butte Campground late Tuesday night or into early Wednesday morning.

The name of the man who was killed has not yet been released.

Ron Aasheim of MT Fish, Wildlife & Parks says that another man was bitten on the leg and taken to a hospital in Cody, Wyoming, and a woman suffered injuries to her arms. Their conditions are not yet known.

FWP spokeswoman Andrea Jones has confirmed one attack and says there might have been multiple attacks; FWP officials and the Park County Sheriff’s Office are at the site of the attack and investigating what happened.

A Cooke City resident who chose to remain anonymous informed Montana’s News Station early Wednesday morning that there were two separate attacks, both causing severe injuries.  The source says there may have been a third attack.

We will have more information as it becomes available.

via KXLH | Helena, Montana – News, Weather, Sports | UPDATED: Bear attack kills one, injures two at Cooke City campground.

Isle of Palms, SC — A teenager is recovering from a shark attack in the waters off South Carolina.

Alex Stamm, 16, went to the Isle of Palms on vacation from Indiana. He said he was in waist-deep water when he felt something biting his leg.

“At first, I was kind of like bewildered, like what was going on. And then I saw the bite itself and I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s definitely a shark bite,’” Stamm described.

He has more than 40 stitches on his right leg.

Stamm said he believes his past shark tales are catching up to him. Last year he was in a bicycle crash and told people he was bit by a shark to sound cooler.

The state Department of Natural Resources says on average, there are four to five shark bites a year in South Carolina.

Last week, a 10-year-old boy from Pennsylvania was bitten by what an expert calls a shark at Myrtle Beach. In North Carolina waters, two 13-year-old girls have had stitches after bites at Wrightsville Beach and Topsail Island.

To avoid any problems, experts say you should not wear flashy jewelry in the water, especially around your ankles, and it’s best to avoid areas where people are fishing.

via Teen Bitten By Shark Off SC Coastdigtriad.com | Triad, NC | National and World News Article.

After someone was bitten by what is believed to be a shark off Jacksonville’s coast for the second time in six weeks, lifeguards and surfers are blaming it on more people in the water, not more sharks.

Clayton Schulz, a 20-year-old pitcher for the University of North Florida Ospreys, was surfing about 4:30 p.m. Friday when something snatched and shook his left foot.

He didn’t see what bit him, but Schulz said he could feel teeth and believed it was a shark. He was in stable condition this week at Shands Jacksonville hospital, where he got about 300 stitches to close the wounds.

“He’s doing well,” his father, Peter Schulz, said on Monday. He said he expects his son will be released from the hospital this week. Doctors have said they expect a nearly full recovery.

The attack is at least the second bite injury reported in Jacksonville Beach since June 10, when a woman was bitten in waist-deep water a few feet from shore. She was treated for a minor wound, which was described as an outline of a small mouth with teeth.

Officials aren’t sure it was a shark that bit Schulz. Barracudas, bluefish and stingrays can also bite, said Capt. Thomas Wright of Jacksonville Beach Ocean Rescue. Before June 10, it had been about four years since a shark attack was reported in Jacksonville Beach.

“It’s kind of unusual to have two bites that close together,” Wright said.

Likely, it’s because of the number of people in the water, he said.

There have been no official reports of shark bites in the Ponte Vedra Beach area. The last reported shark bite occurred there last year in the Vilano Beach area, said Jeremy Robshaw, spokesman for St. Johns County Fire Rescue.

Swimmers and surfers must use their judgment about entering the water. Beaches lifeguards post purple warning flags for dangerous marine life. But that’s usually when scores of jellyfish arrive and dozens of stings are reported, not when sharks are swimming around.

Sharks are always out there, Wright said.

“That’s where the sharks live,” he said. “You’re in their house. If you’re concerned about that, you shouldn’t be out there.”

When Schulz was bitten, a waist-to-chest-high swell had brought out more surfers than usual, said Mitch Kaufmann, director of the North Florida district of the Eastern Surfing Association. When the surf is decent, few places between Jacksonville Beach and Atlantic Beach aren’t crowded, increasing the chance of a shark attack, he said.

“Shark attacks are still so rare that you really don’t need to worry about it,” Kaufmann said. “You do need to be aware of sharks and keep your eye out, but there are more people in the water than ever, it seems like.”

Sharks are so common that some bites aren’t even reported, said Tim Ellis, a Ponte Vedra Beach resident and member of the First Coast Wavemasters Society.

In June, Matt Searcy, another surfer in his 20s, was attacked in the Ponte Vedra Beach area and received 30 stitches, but that received no media attention, Ellis said.

He was dismayed by the severity of Schulz’s wound. “That’s a major deal when it requires 300 stitches,” Ellis said. “Anytime you have a shark attack, people who don’t regularly go in the ocean hear about it and it makes them fearful.”

Jim Dunlop, who owns Mystic Surfboards custom board manufacturing in Jacksonville Beach, said he’s had plenty of brushes with sharks along the First Coast over the decades.

He has seen shark fins in the water, one that measured 8 feet from the dorsal to the tail fin, meaning the shark could have been up to 12 feet long.

“I’ve seen big sharks. They’re here,” Dunlop said. “You look at the beach any weekend with all the people wading around, I’m surprised there’s not more [attacks.]”

Kaufmann predicted the latest attack won’t harm enthusiasm for surfing.

On Saturday, the day after Schulz’s attack, 150 youths showed up for the Super Grom Clinic on the south side of the fishing pier to learn how to surf.

via More people in ocean in Jacksonville Beach area means greater shark attack risk, lifeguards and surfers say | jacksonville.com.

CONCORD, Calif. (CBS/AP) A California man was arrested Thursday afternoon on suspicion of felony child endangerment and possession of mischievous animals after three of his pit bulls attacked and killed his step grandson.

The 2-year-old victim, Jacob Busbee, was at home Thursday morning with his grandmother, uncle, and 4-year-old brother, when he walked into the garage and was attacked by the family dogs, reports CBS affiliate KPIX. The boy died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.

Authorities say that the three dogs involved, as well as the family’s two other dogs, were all euthanized hours after the boy’s attack.

The Step-grandfather, Steven Hayashi, 52, was being held on $250,000 bail.

via Pit Bull Owner Arrested for Fatal Dog Attack on 2-Year-Old Step-Grandson – Crimesider – CBS News.

Charleston, S.C. – A Hamilton County teen is recovering after his summer vacation started with a shark attack.

Alex Stamm, 16, has 40 stitches and quite a survival story from his trip to Isle of Palms, South Carolina, near Charleston. He and his friend’s family had originally planned to vacation in Florida, but because of the Gulf oil spill, went to South Carolina instead.

On his first day at the beach, the Westfield junior was attacked by a shark.

“We were, like, tossing the football around. It didn’t bump into me. It just bit me straight on. I yelled,” Stamm said. “My first reaction, I tried to hit it with my right hand and I saw the tail swim away. I just told my friend Christian to get out of the water and we all ran out. At first, I was kind of like bewildered, like what was going on and I saw the bite itself and I said, ‘That’s definitely a shark bite’.”

Alex believes it was a sandbar shark, about four feet long, that left its mark on his leg. Right after the attack, his friend’s family jumped into action.

“My friend’s mom, she’s a nurse, and she saw all the blood. Blood was gushing out of my leg. She got me on my back so I didn’t go into shock,” he said.

As Alex was loaded into an ambulance, his mom, hundreds of miles away in Indiana, got a phone call.

“He did tell my best friend when they were in the ambulance, be gentle with my mother. She’s going to freak,” Susan Stamm said. “So they were just very nonchalant. ‘Susan, it was a beautiful day. We had a little glitch. Alex got bit by a shark. He’s going to need a few stitches.’ Forty stitches. That’s not a few. It was 40 stitches.”

Alex spent more than six hours at the hospital. He’s now on pain medications and antibiotics, but Susan says he’s in good spirits and plans to finish his vacation.

As a mom, though, Susan says being so far away from her son is tough.

“It was one millimeter away from his artery. That was hard. Last night, not being there, I couldn’t sleep last night just wondering how this was all going to pan out,” she said.

Now that she knows he’s going to be okay, Susan can find some humor in what happened. She says it seems Alex’s shark tales from the past are coming back to bite him now.

After a bike accident in Carmel last year, he told friends he got hurt wrestling a shark.

“Then this year he really did wrestle with a shark. He had to hit it to get it off his leg! I think he needs to be careful what he says,” Stamm said.

And maybe, she says, where he swims.

“They were supposed to go deep sea fishing, but I think this was close enough,” she said.

via Hamilton Co. teen bitten by shark in South Carolina – 13 WTHR.

JACKSONVILLE — A 20-year-old baseball player from the University of North Florida is recovering with a foot wound after being bitten by a shark.

Clayton Shulz of Stuart says the shark grabbed his foot before letting go.

Shulz needed 400 stitches on his foot Sunday night.

via Man gets 400 stitches after shark attack near Jacksonville | floridatoday.com | FLORIDA TODAY.

MIDDLEBOROUGH, Mass. (WPRI) – A man made an unusual discovery in a Middleborough river last week.

He says he fished a two-foot long alligator from the Nemansket River Friday.

The man took the reptile to the Massachusetts State Police barracks in Middleborough.

It was held there until Massachusetts Environmental Police could come to pick it up.

Police are not sure where the alligator came from.

It is illegal to keep them as pets in Massachusetts.

via Alligator fished from Mass. river | WPRI.com.

STUART, Fla. – A Stuart man is recovering after being bitten by a shark in Jacksonville.

“The shark grabbed me and shook his head a little bit, and I think he kind of realized that he was biting the wrong thing, so he let go,” said Clayton Shulz.

The 20-year-old needed 400 stitches to repair the injury to his foot.

Shulz is a baseball player at the University of North Florida. He still has several more surgeries and months of rehab ahead of him.

via Stuart man survives shark attack in Jacksonville.

Shocked Dan Muldowney was left in agony, bleeding and feeling dizzy for ten days after the attack.

The 4ft creature sank its fangs into his bare shin while he was bodyboarding on holiday with his family – leaving a double puncture wound.

It also bit him on the thigh but failed to penetrate his knee-length wetsuit.

Dan, 27, who believes he was the victim of a tropical species normally found in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, said: “I felt something like a clump of seaweed against my leg, then a bang.

“When I looked in front of me I saw a snake with a black head shaped like a cobra – I clearly remember seeing its wide neck. No sooner had I seen it than it was gone.”

The attack at the popular resort of Newquay came just weeks after a fisherman saw a sea snake swimming at Whitsands in south-east Cornwall.

Dan, a surveyor, was enjoying a break with girlfriend Kenize Akhtar and their four children when he was bitten.

At the time he was in chest-deep surf trying out a new wetsuit he had just bought.

To begin with he thought he had hit his leg on a sharp rock and seen a huge eel.

But his wound began bleeding heavily and within ten minutes he was out of breath.

The following day blood started oozing from his mouth and he felt so unwell he was on the verge of collapse.

Then lumps like bubbles appeared on his leg and his fingertips began to tingle.

He consulted a GP, who was baffled by his symptoms, before a second doctor sent him to hospital where he was given allergy tablets.

By the time he returned home to Oldham, Gtr Manchester, he had headaches and twitching muscles.

Dan said: “My nerves were an absolute mess. I was irritable and unable to cope. Some days I just stayed in bed.”

Hospital tests failed to show anything conclusive but 12 days after his ordeal Dan started to recover.

After doing research he is sure he was attacked by a yellow-bellied sea snake. The creature’s venom, used to kill fish, is ten times more lethal than an Egyptian cobra’s.

Dan dismissed suggestions that he might have been bitten by an adder which had fallen off cliffs into the water.

He said: “There is a report of a Chinese man attacked by a sea snake who took 77 hours to die and his symptoms were the same as mine. I just want to warn other people.”

Experts said British coastal waters were too cold for sea snakes to occur naturally but that Dan might have been bitten by one which was DUMPED.

A Marine Conservation Society spokeswoman said: “If someone had kept a sea snake and let it go, potentially it could survive.”

via Tourist believes he was bitten by a tropical sea snake off the coast of Cornwall | The Sun |News.