Two motherless bear cubs captured in Nevada City last week are now at the Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care.

The California Department of Fish and Game delivered them to LTWC after the agency received a call and found the mother dead from an unknown cause and then trapped the cubs.

“I didn’t notice any trauma or a shot and scavengers had already gotten to her so it would be very difficult to determine the cause of death,” said Marc Kenyon, environmental scientist with the department’s black bear, wild pig and mountain lion program.

The bear cubs were transported Friday to LTWC, where they are being treated for body lice before they can be placed with three other bear cubs the sanctuary was already caring for.

“They were loaded with ticks and foxtails in their ears,” said Cheryl Millham who operates LWTC with her husband Tom.

Dr. Kevin Willitts, who owns Alpine Animal Hospital, treated the cubs, who weighed 25 pounds and 27 pounds, said Milham.

The cubs will stay at LTWC until the winter, when they will be placed into hibernation, tranquilized and transported to a den prepared by Fish and Game.

Two of the cubs already at LTWC are from a case in North San Juan, north of Grass Valley, in which a man was found trying to sell them after killing their mother. The third cub was found in Hoopa, near Eureka.

Two other cubs were recently captured in Alpine Meadows when Fish and Game put down their mother after she broke into a house there. Because the cubs entered the home, too, Fish and Game is holding them while looking for a permanent home for them in a zoo or wildlife sanctuary rather than re-releasing them into the wild.

 — Lake Tahoe News staff report