This was published 5 years ago
Russian pilots start crowdfunding campaign to feed Mansur, abandoned bear cub
Mansur as a bear cub.Credit: Mansurbear/Instagram
It all started over three years ago in an airfield north of Moscow, Russia.
A group of pilots who were restoring vintage planes spotted a furry bundle in the distance; what they found was a tiny, abandoned bear cub.
Adopted by the pilots, the cub was named Mansur, which means "a bear" in Altai, a Turkic language.
But as Mansur started to grow, the airfield and its facilities proved too small, so he was moved to a bigger enclosure in a decommissioned airbase in Oreshkovo; it's here that his fame started to spread.
An Instagram account (11k followers and counting) and now a live YouTube channel have followed.
But as Mansur piled on the weight, his daily food requirements increased, so much so that a crowdfunding campaign has been launched to help feed the bear.
The group behind it estimate it will need over 30,000 roubles ($639) monthly for food, staff costs, and maintenance of his special enclosure.
Yelena Inozharskaya from the crowdfunding company DonationAlerts told the BBC the appeal was a first for the firm.
"Usually our clients blog about playing computer games, cooking, drawing, dancing or travelling. It's hard to find anything that hasn't been streamed yet, but we're ready to help a bear earn some money."
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