grizzly bear surprise attack

Damn. Momma bear doing exactly what she should. I hope they rescued the cubs.

My ultimate backpacking fear.

These stories just break my heart every time.

When in grizzly country:

I believe in a large canister of bear spray – for my left hand.

For my right hand I believe in my TAURUS Tracker .44 magnum. Period.

So, Eric, where exactly would you plan to place your first shot on a griz? You would likely only have one chance before the bear turns you into hamburger. Keep in mind that a griz forehead is very thick, and its heart is in an unusual place and fairly well protected.

<p style=”text-align: left;”>I don’t think a grizzly skull is particularly thick. Any of the bigger pistols we talk about will punch through 8 to 17 pieces of plywood (I’ve tested it). That should go through any bear skull.</p>
The bigger problem is aiming wrong and having the bullet graze the top of the bear’s head  without a solid hit. Or miss entirely. I’ve sent thousands of rounds down range and I would really not want to try stopping a bear with a handgun.

There is a reason bear spray works well, anyone can “aim” it. But if you don’t mind the weight the pistol +spray strategy is not bad.

A few thoughts:

Brain shots are tricky.  In bears, it’s not really because you can’t reach the brain with the bullet – you can, easily – but because the brain case is unexpectedly low, rearward and narrow when viewed from the front.  Bears also have a very irritating habit: they move their heads around a lot – true of all things with both heads and necks – and although they tend to stay focused during a charge, they move fast and low, and that makes a moderately-difficult shot much harder.  This is why the vast majority of people are better served with an area-effect bear spray that doesn’t require you to be able to hit a target the size of a mango that’s bouncing towards you at 40 MPH: it simply gives most people a better chance of stopping the bear, or at least rendering it temporarily less capable of doing harm than would be the case with an attempted shot to the central nervous system.

For those thinking about a heart shot: good luck.  Yes, any sufficiently-large, deep-penetrating solid that’s shot from almost any angle will take out the heart, lungs or the big arteries connecting everything, but there’s usually a rather uncomfortable time delay between those shots landing and the bear expiring.  Several seconds, in some cases; that’s more than enough time for a bear to acquire you and begin a thoughtful remodeling of your existence.

Other shots are easier to land, but simply unethical; they are, however, extremely easy to accidentally achieve during a crisis.  If one is having to weigh human life against bear life, then yes: do whatever is necessary to preserve human life, even if ethics must be temporarily discarded…but by carrying bear spray, that ethical choice can hopefully be prevented, and the life of the animal spared.

All this being said: if one wishes to back up bear spray with a sidearm, then do so, by all means.  That is a right that we all possess, whether or not we choose to employ it.

I don’t know what the totals would look like, but it seems like most of the bear attacks in Alaska are on hunters, not hikers, especially brown bear attacks. There are a lot of people out there backpacking and hiking, as well as hunting. I’ve only rarely heard about hikers being attacked up here. Hunters seem to get attacked every other year or so, sometimes several in a year.

I don’t know what the totals would look like, but it seems like most of the bear attacks in Alaska are on hunters, not hikers, especially brown bear attacks. There are a lot of people out there backpacking and hiking, as well as hunting. I’ve only rarely heard about hikers being attacked up here. Hunters seem to get attacked every other year or so, sometimes several in a year.

That’s not surprising to me.  Hunters and fishermen are actively seeking engagement with animals that bears also consider to be prey, while hikers aren’t particularly concerned with doing so.  Logically, it seems like hikers would have fewer problems.  Hunters also make efforts to be quiet, and hikers don’t; that has a lot to do with it as well, I’m sure.

Hunters also make efforts to be quiet, and hikers don’t; that has a lot to do with it as well, I’m sure.

^This.

>”most of the bear attacks in Alaska are on hunters”

Yup.  Hunters are doing everything “wrong” – they are off-trail, on game paths, being quiet, heading upwind.  In a party of one or two.

Yes hunters have more to worry about. I’ve had lots of bear encounters hunting. Relatively few while hiking and the hiking encounters were on solo trips (single quiet person again).

Its been said again and again but the big thing is don’t be dumb and don’t surprise a bear. Beyond that carry whatever you feel good with, you probably won’t need it.

Funny bears get a lot of press but honestly I think I’d take bears over snakes down south. At least bears can’t hide in my boot or my bed (I saw both).

That’s what an Olympic National Park ranger said, bear attacks are mostly just on hunters (although still rare)

Sometimes after the hunter shoots the bear

(But the numbers are so small it’s hard to draw any statistically valid conclusions)

Anyone else see “The Revenant”?

In Montana even worse than quietly stalking in search of game, (if one is lucky enough to harvest something), the processing of said game.  Grizzlies have learned to key in on rifle shots.

I got to work the early rifle season just north of Yellowstone a couple of times over the years, every trip we issued duplicate tags to hunters who were run off their kill by a grizzly.

You most definitely want to be on your toes processing a game animal in grizzly country.  And if it’s going to multiple trips out, get that meat hung out well away from the kill site and in a location that lets you completely avoid travel anywhere near it.

Ah, yes. We call them “dinner bell bears.” We had these guys come visit us immediately upon the rifle shot where we had taken an elk. Happily the family came directly to us and could not figure out where the carcass was (we hadn’t reached it yet and the wind gave her no indication of its location). We got the elk cut up and left before she showed up again. With such brazen (and often probably successful) behavior by mom, no wonder the cubs were ready to burst at the seams.

Wow…those are some FAT bearlets!

And also, when looking at them moving in, it drives home the point of exactly why the brain shot is so hard to execute in a moment of duress: when they saunter, the head is constantly shifting a little from side to side, if not swiveling all around to check out the area and popping up and down as they stop…but when they start trotting, the head just goes all over the place.  I do choose to carry a sidearm in certain areas, but I’d be reaching for the extra-big-ass can of bear spray in that situation.

Some trivia:

In terms of the objective risk of the human-critter interaction causing death, honey bees are the most dangerous animals in North America since they cause more deaths than mountain lions, bears, sharks, gators, snakes etc.

Yeah, I fought off a honey bee once and lived to tell the tale. I’m a bad dude.

Yeah, I fought off a honey bee once and lived to tell the tale. I’m a bad dude.

Try a few thousand at once, because they decided they didn’t like the smell of your shampoo and conditioner!

Well, many years ago while working trail in the PNW we were stuck on a mile or so long section where bears had torn up a series of hornets nests. It was also black fly season.My job was cutting brush back three feet to either side of the trail. I’d be slapping flies and then suddenly slapping hornets. Yes, it’s very unsettling to put it mildly–as in, you tear off down the trail as fast as you’ve ever moved over and over again.

One of several nice things about going for caribou on Adak is that, yes, a rifle shot is a dinner bell, but only for bald eagles.  There are no land predators on the island (hence the booming caribou population and no bag limit for residents).

Stephen Herrero’s book notes the state of Alaska attempts to collect  information and record every single bear attack that occurs in the state and has been doing so for decades or scores of years.  The single most effective way to survive a bear attack based on this record is pepper spray. I’ve thrown a few 9mm rounds down the range as well but not thousands! Still enough to know that stopping a grizz charging at @ 35 mph with a pistol is the definition of chancy.

Maybe an Ithaca mag 10 with 2 rounds of 00 and a slug and still think you’d have better odds with pepper spray. Not exactly light weight gear either.

Seems like the difference is that use of a firearm is picking a fight that you might lose even if you manage to kill the bear. Pepper spray otoh just changes the bear’s mind about the necessity of messing with you. The skunk defense.

Smith lake is only @ 2 miles from the Ski slopes at Whitefish and @ 5 from the golf course. Practically in the suburbs of Whitefish. Wonder if the deer was hit by a vehicle?

The hunting guide killed in Wyoming near SE Yellowstone a couple years back was returning with his client to the site of a kill made the previous evening.