Wow! I hope your husband heals quickly Sibhusky. Good to know about the delay a holster can cause, thanks for sharing that.
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Bear Mauling and other Bear Stories
- Thread starter Tricia
- Start date
Yep, even the best sharpshooter isn't likely to be able to get the right angle to kill a bear with a 50 cal if the bear is right on top of them. You need a good 5-10 feet and the time to aim and fire right between the eyes of the grizzly. Anything else, any shot or shots hardly phase a full grown grizzly. They're like 8 feet tall, you can't get a good angle for a lethal shot looking straight up at them. You can, however, blast them up the nose and in the mouth with concentrated ghost peppers. A gun is only a good option if you have a little distance and time to get your shots before they are actually on top of you.
Best wishes to your loved ones for a complete and speedy recovery.
Fishing guide in Alaska carried a taser he claimed would scare away a bear with the noise that it made on test. Huge sidearm he was wearing made more sense to me but I was not the local living with this danger. Black bears in Vermont only attack my apple tree and compost pile.
Not to mention: if you do get the quality shot at short range and drop the bear, the bear who's momentum is carrying it right at you at a very high speed, where do you think its going to fall??? I'm really not being anti-gun here, but it is a complex situation. None of these options are better than getting lucky and avoiding the bear.
I suspect the failed bear spray may have been too old? The stuff does lose its effectiveness. You can also accidentally hit yourself with it, but you'd probably rather recover from that than a mauling . . .
The guy a few weeks back was attacked a second time as he was running back to his truck. He saw that bear coming from a long way off and couldn't do anything about it. It was unafraid of humans and all he did was aggravate it more by spraying it. Spray is better than nothing but every hunting guide I've met (I know a few) will carry lethal force. None of them are walking around with bear spray. In sibhusky's husband's case, for a casual hiker, the spray probably saved her husband's life and is far better than having nothing and is more realistic to carry for most folks than a big firearm. It is complex scenario but to say spray is better than a gun is just what those companies that sell that spray want you to believe. Sorry to start a debate here.
I'm pretty sure I'd rather have my daughter hit by a misfire of spray than a bullet as the gun holder's arm gets smacked by the bear, covering six feet in (someone do the math for me) under a second.
From an article about that other attack
"He stayed on the ground and reached under his chest to grab the pistol he was unable to grab earlier. But the pistol – like the beast that nearly killed him – was gone.
The pistol was actually five feet away, Orr wrote, knocked aside during the ferocious attack."
So, useless.
This whole encounter lasted less than a minute. The bear came out of the bushes, no warning. Very dense vegetation there. They'd been talking. We've never seen bears back there in thirteen years.
There was an incident down in Yellowstone this week as well: http://www.bozemandailychronicle.co...cle_a12adf2e-f1cd-58e8-b12e-d98cba74d0eb.html
From an article about that other attack
"He stayed on the ground and reached under his chest to grab the pistol he was unable to grab earlier. But the pistol – like the beast that nearly killed him – was gone.
The pistol was actually five feet away, Orr wrote, knocked aside during the ferocious attack."
So, useless.
This whole encounter lasted less than a minute. The bear came out of the bushes, no warning. Very dense vegetation there. They'd been talking. We've never seen bears back there in thirteen years.
There was an incident down in Yellowstone this week as well: http://www.bozemandailychronicle.co...cle_a12adf2e-f1cd-58e8-b12e-d98cba74d0eb.html
Last edited:
Gosh 
- Joined
- Nov 23, 2015
- Posts
- 834
So sorry to hear that, so glad it wasn't worse, and sending you my best.
Ignore the gun dude. They did the right thing.
University of Calgary bear expert Steve Herrero was involved in two separate studies that looked at the effectiveness of bear spray and firearms in bear attacks. The bottom line: Ninety-eight percent of those who used bear spray walked away from their encounter unharmed, and none of the people or bears involved died. With firearms, 56 percent of the users were subsequently injured,
Ignore the gun dude. They did the right thing.
University of Calgary bear expert Steve Herrero was involved in two separate studies that looked at the effectiveness of bear spray and firearms in bear attacks. The bottom line: Ninety-eight percent of those who used bear spray walked away from their encounter unharmed, and none of the people or bears involved died. With firearms, 56 percent of the users were subsequently injured,
All of our love and best thoughts to you and your family Sib, thinking of you today.
Newfy. Was this study on all bears or specifically grizzlies? Normally black bears will just turn tail without any deterrents
In my post #15 links, you'll see they mostly talk grizzlies and Alaska brown bears (BIG grizzly).
Thread Starter
TS
@Sibhusky - did you post the follow up article? I didn't see this one until this morning, for some reason
http://flatheadbeacon.com/2016/10/25/haskill-basin-closure-lifted-bear-attack/
http://flatheadbeacon.com/2016/10/25/haskill-basin-closure-lifted-bear-attack/
- Joined
- Nov 23, 2015
- Posts
- 834
Pretty good article:
http://missoulian.com/news/state-an...cle_b0d338b6-7638-11e1-b809-0019bb2963f4.html
What I like is that the research involved several hundred bear experts, not a few stories from hunting guides.
When we biked near Sibhuskie's home (through a place called "Grizzly Basin", my wife modified a bike bottle into a quick draw bear spray holder, and practiced every day getting it out fast. We have not been charged by a bear but a nasty dog came at her once and she was off the bike in a flash, spray can ready. The dog was saved by its owner.
Again, hoping for a speedy recovery up there. Some of you might remember, our friend Sibhusky was attacked by an enraged tree a few years ago and had some tough injuries to overcome.