An elderly couple in the town of Shizukuishi, Iwate Prefecture, discovered a bear in their kitchen on Monday evening after hearing a noise, local police said. The animal had opened the refrigerator, scattered food across the floor, and left through a back door; footprints indicated it had also rummaged through a rubbish bin outside. No one was injured in the incident.

The intrusion is the latest in a series that has seen at least 14 break-ins at five locations in Shizukuishi over the past fortnight, according to prefectural officials. Some properties have been targeted repeatedly, leading authorities to suspect a single bear may be responsible. “It’s unusual for a bear to break into the same place multiple times,” said Shiho Chida, a bear specialist with the Iwate prefectural nature division. “It’s possible this is the same animal, so we want to capture it as soon as possible.”

The incidents come amid a sharp rise in bear encounters across Japan. The environment ministry has confirmed that at least five people have been killed by bears since 1 April, all in the northern Tohoku region, following a record 13 fatal attacks nationwide in the previous fiscal year. In June, a bear roaming the city of Utsunomiya, north of Tokyo, forced mass school closures and took four days to trap; earlier, an animal described by local media as “extremely intelligent” attacked four people at two factories in Fukushima Prefecture.

Scientists attribute the increase to a growing bear population, the depopulation of rural areas, and fluctuations in the availability of natural food sources such as acorns. In Shizukuishi, authorities have deployed box traps, installed electric fences around repeatedly targeted homes, and dispatched patrols to warn residents. As of Tuesday, the bear remained at large.