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Camping, Bushcraft & Survival

This Japanese Boy’s Parents Punished Him By Leaving Him In A Bear-Filled Forest For A Week

They kicked the seven year-old out of the car because he was throwing stones

Seven year old Yamato Tanooka before he went missing. Photo: Nippon TV Japan

A Japanese boy who went missing a forest inhabited by bears has been found alive after roaming for six days. He was left there by his parents as a punishment after misbehaving.

Yamato Tanooka, aged seven, was found by the Japanese military in a hut on one of their exercise areas. He had been missing since last Saturday.

Yamato’s parents originally told the police that he had wandered off while they were hiking and looking for wild vegetables in the forest in Hokkaido.

“I thought that what I was doing was for his own good, but I realise now that I went too far”

Later they admitted that they’d actually kicked Yamato out of the car on a mountain road as a punishment for throwing rocks at people and cars, according to The Guardian.

“The first thing I did was apologise to him for causing such an awful memory for him,” his father Takayuki Tanooka told reporters.

“Our behaviour as parents went too far, and that’s something I’m extremely regretful about. I thought that what I was doing was for his own good, but, yes, I realise now that I went too far.”

The mattress shown on TV that Yamato slept on. Photo: TV Asahi

Luckily Yamato was unscathed – he slept in the military hut on a mattress and after a check-up by the doctor, was found in good health. He didn’t have any food but there was a water tap outside the hut.

A search party of more than 180 people have been looking for Yamato since Wednesday.

Takayuki Tanooka, Yamato’s father (left), and Yamato himself (right). Photo: TV screen grab

This isn’t the first time there has been public uproar about parent’s frustration with their kids. Back in 2014, there was outrage when a video leaked on the internet of a frustrated dad kicking his six year-old son down a skate ramp.

Lesson to us all: no matter how irritated you get with your kids, don’t kick them out of the car and leave them to fend in a Japanese forest full of bears for six days. That’s just not cool.

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