How to hunt brown bears

[Hoodoo]

One guy I know who lives in Alaska carries a 45-70 with full modern loads. According to him, first shot on a charging bear goes to the shoulder to slow him down.

 

[ChrisKavanaugh]

I was stationed for a year on Kodiak Alaska, home to the largest known brown bears and made numerous trips to the arctic stations with populations of Polar bears. I also spent a season in the Kenai penninsula among the mainland brownies and have lived among common black bears in California. I've met and talked to Douglas Peacock, perhaps one of the world's greatest observers of Grizzlys and the late Timothy Treadwell, easily the most incompetent. Best of all, I got to physically meet Bart the Bear and his humans the marvelous Seus family. I could bore you with ballistic arguments and anecdotal stories. Let me speak and think outside the ammo box. Possessing a firearm will subconsciously lower even the seasoned bear country visitor's prethinking a course of action of NON CONFLICT. Most nimrods who stomp off to the woods with some inate fear of old Ephraim are almost lookiing for a fight, with the bear the unfortunate loser. Worldwide documented deaths to bear attacks since 1900 can be counted in the hundreds at best. The bears run in the THOUSANDS. For many years the record polar bear was an individual shot by an Inuit armed with a .22. I also witnessed a postmortem on a rogue Kodiak Fish and Game had to destroy. The poor beast carried @ 14 bullets ranging from 200 grain .308 caliber to 300 grain .375 - all from sloppy hunters who took marginal shots and made non life threatening, but painfull and debilitating injuries. You carry a shotgun. How fast can you reload with a hypothetical bear load? At any threat range slugs or buckshot are preferred with the mentioned disabling shoulder shot. At close range you wait until at point blank and aim for the head. At that distance any charge will be compressed and lethal. Odds are YOU did something to get the animal's attention, which takes us back to being very savvy about your immediate surroundings. Bears, like the other alpha carnivores the Canids and that particularly nasty bipedal one are distinct by varying individual personalities, one of nature's genetic gifts to insure survival. Most bears are like people, they just want to be on their way. Very few are bloodthirsty killers. Personally I found Bart more gentile than countless other actors I have met. For many peoples bears are taboo to kill, walking upright and fellow hunters they were considered another equal tribe. It's no wonder the earliest diety of humanity was the shortfaced cavebear. You could always do what a Burnaby Canada acquaintance did after inadvertently coming between a sow and her cub. As she rose upright and slashedhis chest he punched her VIGOROUSLY in the nose and ended the misunderstanding. He was the onetime canadian middlewieght boxing champion The Mor-Gur has spoken

 

[pumbaa]

I think it was on here a while ago that i read about a pepper spray for bears . It puts the bear right off contact with humans , saving the bear and human life as it will try and avoid them in the future . Unfortunately i think it is illegal in a lot of countrys ,probabley because it is likely to be used on humans by muppets !
Pumbaa

 

[C_Claycomb]

http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?t=6973&page=1&pp=10

This seems to cover a fair bit

 

[Viking]

Why would a bear attack you???
There is many stories of people who encountered a bear and most times it ended bad is one of the following reasons.

1. You end up between mama bear and little bear, same thing can happen with and elk

2. You **** the bear off by shooting at it, the risk is that the bear is only wounded and suddenly the bear is dangerous to anyone walking in the woods. The police need to be called in and special bear hunters will have to come and hunt it down and we will have even fewer bears at the cost of my tax money.

Think before you ACT!!!

 

[Hoodoo]

I think there is a bit of confusion in this thread, due to the title and the first post. There is a difference between hunting bears (common and legal here in the colonies) and protecting yourself in the woods. The title of the thread sez "hunting" which is not the same as protecting yourself from bear attack. There are many ways to reduce the possibiltiy that you will end up as part of bear scat without resorting to killing a bear.

 

[Abbe Osram]

Why would a bear attack you???
There is many stories of people who encountered a bear and most times it ended bad is one of the following reasons.

1. You end up between mama bear and little bear, same thing can happen with and elk

2. You **** the bear off by shooting at it, the risk is that the bear is only wounded and suddenly the bear is dangerous to anyone walking in the woods. The police need to be called in and special bear hunters will have to come and hunt it down and we will have even fewer bears at the cost of my tax money.

Think before you ACT!!!

No mate that’s only half the truth.
I don’t know if you do some hunting but if you go out sneaking against the wind, having a dog scouting out the area you can get very fast into trouble. You don’t even have to wound a bear. In the last two years we got 15 heavy maulings where people got partly so wounded that they are unable to work anymore, and one person killed. In one case even a normal forest worker got attacked and defended himself with a chainsaw.

Your thoughts are all right if you go with a bunch of kids screaming and hollering into the woods berry picking. The noise will put off the bears because they don’t like to meet people. But the most trouble people have with bears is if they are hunting with dogs, and I mean not hunting bears, but moose and birds. You have another problem if you shoot a moose and don’t get it out of the forest before nightfall. The next morning when you want to pick up your game you can get a bear claiming that the moose is his and not yours anymore. Off course you can play dead, talk to the bear etc etc but I rather don’t put my faith in the friendliness of the bear. Bears are like people with a history and saying that they are kind and friendly is as unbalanced as saying humans are friendly and kind, it all depends what they went through in their life I would say.

We have so much bears now that they are coming into the villages eating rubbish. Still Humans are the most trouble; they even make a show out of it and flocking to the hundreds to see the bears eating away. They are not aware that they condition the animal to the human smell and teach him not to be afraid anymore. With their behavior they even teach the animal that the smell and nearness of humans means food.

I predict if the stupidity of the town people flocking around the bears that we soon have the same problem they had in the US in the 60 and 70th. If that comes true you too will have to hang you food in the trees, have your kitchen camp hundred meters away from camp etc etc.
As you know we are not doing it in Sweden yet.

cheers
Abbe

 

[leon-1]

I think the reason, that there has been a little misunderstanding in this thread is that Abbe is probably asking what he should do if faced with a Bear whilst out hunting, whereas the title is hunting brown bear.

The underlying response in most cases is that prevention is better than cure, now I have heard of people using "Bear Bells", but in Abbe's case this would not be very good if he is out hunting as pretty much all the wildlife in the area will have heard his approach a couple of miles away and will have done a runner.

Abbe what I would say is know the area you are hunting and know about bears in that area, think of it in terms of a military operation, gather as much intelligence about the area, the Flora and Fauna as you can, find out if bears are a problem in the area you are going to be in (also if it is seasonal or all year round).

Then take neccesary precautions, as someone said depending on legallity the use of Bear Spray (this is like pepper spray but throws a jet out about 30 feet for those that don't know and the RCMP carry it for dispersal of unlawfull gatherings as well as dispersing bears ), just make sure that you aren't going to get some of it if you use it, if it will stop a man it will stop a bear, thier sense of smell is a lot more sensative than ours and if the wind is in your favour he will probably shake his head put his paws over his nose and then do a runner from around 25 meters.

But as previously mentioned local intelligence is the major thing, along with knowing something about the bears in the area (what are thier habits, routines and more importantly numbers are).

You may have a chance encounter, a friend of mine had just canoed some rapids, came round a bend to find Mrs Yogi and Booboo fishing in the shallows right in front of him, he turned into a human waterwheel and shot between the two and off down stream. Someone else who saw it said the Bears looked quite bemused and then wandered off.

Yes thay are a large Carnivore, but not all meetings between them and man are confrontational and most times they will happily wander off if they have heard or smelt you as long as you are not wearing "Eau de MacDonalds" and people in the area haven't been feeding them (not likely as that would make them a nuisance to the local community).

 

[leon-1]

Sorry Abbe, I've been writing this one over a period of time whilst doing my luch, didn't see your post above

 

[Viking]

Abbe, I know about all the accident that happens and even about the guy who died. There has been a lot about on other forums, why it happens and so on, but shooting at a bear is not a good alternative.

Bears in villages has been a problem but now they have come up with good ideas on how to frighten the bear off with dogs and a kind of firecracker.

 

[arctic hobo]

I don't know much about this but I've seen a bear charge and I've seen the speed they go at It's like Olympic sprinters - a question of strength above all. Sprinters have huge muscles, like the bear.
This thread reminds me a little of a stat I read about cyclists. In cities, cyclists with helmets are actually more likely to die - because of the false security of wearing the helmet. Because a bike helmet will only protect you from a fall, not a car or lorry, they don't do much to help, and they give you a false sense of security. I'm sure you'd be careful Abbe, but seeing that bear is not something I'll ever forget, and it's all too easy for me to imagine a hunter going a bit too close to a bear because he thinks he's safe

Edit: if the bear goes for your dog, run and climb a tree or something. It might be sad to lose your dog, but it's probably better than shooting the bear, and angering it so it goes for you as well.

 

[gregorach]

... run and climb a tree or something ...

I was under the impression that bears are quite good at climbing trees.

 

[arctic hobo]

I was under the impression that bears are quite good at climbing trees.

Er, yes
What I meant was get out of the way really. If it's not after you it won't climb a tree to get you

 

[ronsos]

I think this thread shines an interesting light on to our attitudes to the wild and personnal safety

The old line 'nature red in tooth and claw ' has two sides,one a bear in the wild is a threat that has to be conquered or destroyed.Chris Kavanaughs post shows how difficult this is practicaly-morally its another story as you are in the bears territory.To be here is a huge priviledge which carries even larger responsabilties ie the acceptance that a bear can kill you.This acceptance also covers lighting strikes or anaphaltic shock after getting stung by a bee,both much more likely to happen in the USA than a bear mauling

The other side is the Treadwell type of ********that the bears are fubsy wubsy harmless loveable pals.This is just as disrespectfull and dangerous(to the bears mainly) as what rifle will drop a charging bear.I find this attitude just as repugnant as the hunting of these magnificent creatures the majority of whom are tolerant of people,with a minoritory of whom are killers.Not unlike people eh?

Why cant we accept risk and responsabilties without resorting to the above extremes?I speak as someone whos life ambition(apart from the one about Kim Basinger) is to see a grizzily in the wild.I know I will one day(see a bear, that is),so until then its books films and photos .I cant recomend Doug Peacocks book Grizzily Years highly enough (try www.herondance.co for an excellent interview with him).

sorry if Ive havered a bit ,apparently Kim finds it attractive.....

 

[Kane]

It might be sad to lose your dog, but it's probably better than shooting the bear

Not sure I'd agree with that.

Kane

 

[arctic hobo]

Not sure I'd agree with that.

Kane

Well, if you quote the whole sentence matey, you'd see what I really meant was that it's better a potential dog death than a potential you death, and a potential bear death. For example:
Scenario 1: Bear goes for dog, dog eventually gets away, bear gives up chase. Bear, dog, and human are all safe.
Scenario 2: Bear goes for dog, dog cops it, bear leaves human (who has scarpered) alone. Bear and human are safe.
But if we introduce guns:
Scenario 3: Bear goes for dog, bear is shot by human, bear survives, dog and human cop it, and if badly wounded, bear may die, and may well go on a bit of a rampage (although I don't profess to know much about bear behaviour).
Scenario 4: Bear goes for dog, bear gets dog, bear is shot by human, bear dies.Only the human survives.
Scenario 5: Bear goes for dog, human shoots bear, bear dies. Human and dog are safe.

So you see, of the "gun scenarios", only one of three is even remotely satisfactory, and in none of them do all three survive. As I said, I've seen a bear charge, admittedly from a distance, but I think you'd need to be extremely quick indeed to get out a gun (assuming it is loaded, even), take off safety, aim, and shoot at least one slug into the bear. Plus this means you're carrying a loaded gun in your bag which is hardly satisfactory.
And as I said before, I'm worried about the false sense of security it would give you. Most of the time it's totally subconscious - only in hindsight do you see that maybe you were straying a little on the wild side. But after a bear attack you won't have hindsight

 

[Abbe Osram]

The most sensible thing to do for a person who likes to have control over his life and situation is to carry bear spray with him while hunting birds and moose. It is 95 percent working even on the aggressive type of bears and it works great in a close combat situation while a rifle with a scope is a very bad choice. I even was considering getting Spray over the border but I checked what the charges would be if they get me with a spray. I would loose all my weapons and get my hunting license revoked for 5 years. I consider it not worth the effort to get the spray.

I checked with my neighbors and they take it very lightly, shoot him straight in the head even with a 12 gauge that should do it they say. I studied about Bears and Bear behavior and I am very balanced, about it. I like them and they are no killers but they are not the little furry friends the government and romantic animal activists would like to tell us. Because of the stupid laws here I can’t have spray and the only way to protect my dog and me is to have the right weapon and ammo with me.

Remember I am talking here about hunting moose and birds not bears. Why did I write hunting brown bears in the thread headline then? I simply wanted to avoid a discussion about all the different techniques to avoid conflicts with bears and how to behave in bear country, all that stuff I know and live by it, if I am not hunting. But going out for a hunt, sneaking against the wind, sending out the dog-etc etc is another matter. And with a government which forbids a sensible none violent solution to the problem I am forced to ask about the technical aspect of a very fast kill. But as the moderator told me; here is not the right place to talk about weapons and ammo, so I will have to check on a forum specialized in hunting and the like.

Sorry
Abbe

 

[Kane]

Well, if you quote the whole sentence matey, you'd see what I really meant was that it's better a potential dog death than a potential you death, and a potential bear death. For example:
Scenario 1: Bear goes for dog, dog eventually gets away, bear gives up chase. Bear, dog, and human are all safe.
Scenario 2: Bear goes for dog, dog cops it, bear leaves human (who has scarpered) alone. Bear and human are safe.
But if we introduce guns:
Scenario 3: Bear goes for dog, bear is shot by human, bear survives, dog and human cop it, and if badly wounded, bear may die, and may well go on a bit of a rampage (although I don't profess to know much about bear behaviour).
Scenario 4: Bear goes for dog, bear gets dog, bear is shot by human, bear dies.Only the human survives.
Scenario 5: Bear goes for dog, human shoots bear, bear dies. Human and dog are safe.

So you see, of the "gun scenarios", only one of three is even remotely satisfactory, and in none of them do all three survive. As I said, I've seen a bear charge, admittedly from a distance, but I think you'd need to be extremely quick indeed to get out a gun (assuming it is loaded, even), take off safety, aim, and shoot at least one slug into the bear. Plus this means you're carrying a loaded gun in your bag which is hardly satisfactory.
And as I said before, I'm worried about the false sense of security it would give you. Most of the time it's totally subconscious - only in hindsight do you see that maybe you were straying a little on the wild side. But after a bear attack you won't have hindsight

Calm down bonny lad, you weren't very explicit in the bear killing the dog AND the person and later getting shot by someone else. (edit) add Scenario 6 - same as scenario 2 only the bear, riled already by the dog, follows it's hunting nature and chases the fleeing human - result bear survives. Also I see any scenario where the human walks away as satisfactory. Sorry but assuming the human was behaving responsibly (big assumption I'd agree) I'd put the human life ahead of the bears. (end edit)

Kane

 

[ChrisKavanaugh]

O.K. A few real life encounters that you won't read from some outdoor magazine with a frothing at the mouth inspiration for Grendel on the cover. I'm out ptarmigan hunting with a Kodiak native and suddenly brownies are literally coming out of the woods everywhere and MOVING. They could care less about us, but my mentor became very alert and whispered we had to get out of there. We did, right along with the bears. We finally stopped in a meadow and exchanged shotguns for our rifles. This HUGE blonde male came into view doing what is called 'the gunslinger walk' a very exaggerated swagger that translates " I am John Wayne and in a real bad mood." He eventually moved off and what had to be at least 20 odd bears and two humans gave a collective sigh. There was a discernable truce among the lot of us. Later I'm on a helicopter searching for the local butcher who flew his cessna to outlying villages with processed meat. We spotted his plane nosed into a meadow along with scattered white parcells of meat. He had suffered a fatal heart attack and crashed. 3 very big male Brownies were enjoying the free meal. The crew didn't know what to do. Even a few low passes were ignored. We landed at a distance and I jumped out with a .375 Holland and Holland bolt rifle- standard brownie medicine and authorised substitute carry on flights instead of .22 Hornet./ .410 survival rifles! I started for the wreck firing one shot in the air and displaying the rifle. Bears are actively hunted on Kodiak and know what that noise and pointy thing means. They all moved off except for this HUGE male- and he had blonde hair. I had a date that evening with a stunning aleut-russian local ( and Alaska has a 1-10 ratio of women to men.) I was John Wayne and I was now in a bad mood.I sat down, took carefull aim and put a round a few inches from his nose. He looked up and I put a second round at his feet (you brits made a real nice cartridge there ) He got the message and moved off, dragging @ 12' of link sausage in final defiance. The crew followed with a stokes litter for the body. The flight chief produced a box of 17 remaining rounds and said, " uh Chris, you left without these." As a civilian working in Kenai we had to qualify with the .375 for safety. Our instructor got real mad when I rapid fired 3 rounds into the bullseye standing up. Later he learned from a visiting Kodiak warden I had encountered 'BeachBoy' my blond antagonist twice. He got so bad they tranquilised him for relocation. Unfortunately the drug wore off in flight and they landed wheels up and jumped out. WE never did quite figure out what did the most damage- the landing or BeachBoy smashing his way out of the fuselage. I became 'pointman' on our hikes in,and carried my rifle loaded, safety on with 2 rounds clutched in my fingers african double rifle style

 

[Spacemonkey]

So, umm, why did you move to California?