Guns aren’t best defense against an angry bear, study finds (Valdez: sales, beaches)

[hogfamily]

….told me that the best bear defense is a .22 caliber handgun, tennis shoes, and a hiking partner.



Make sure you wear the tennis shoes and when confronted with a bear shoot your hiking partner in the knee and RUN!

[wildchild_to]

I would just kick his azz.


guy fighting bear - YouTube

[wildchild_to]

Originally Posted by starlite9

Well the best defense for a charging bear is a hiking partner with really heavy hiking boots you can outrun.

Otherwise I prefer my 12 gauge with slug, double 00 Buckshot, slug in a six shot tube. Only had to use it once in self defense and it worked very well. Have used pepper spray, but a charging bear will knock you into next week before that makes a differance. In the bear is just courious, then a shot of the pepper spray can be pretty effective, but so is a warning shot over the bears head in most cases.

A charging bear can cover 40 feet faster than you can ever imagine, the inertia of a charging bear is a lot more than a can of bear spray can inflict. A large caliber slug may not stop him in his tracks, but it can certainly change his trajectory! I carry a .44 mag, but that is more for the noise factor than stopping a brae dead in its tracks, although it will kill a charging bear, it may not be as immediate as you might wish!

But by far the best defense is being aware of bears in the area and letting them know you're in the area as well! Some supprises aren't always that much fun!

The Brenneke Black Magic Magnum Slugs, are nice but 1-3/8 oz OUCH they kick a little, Muzzle Energy 3014 ft. lbs.

[LittleJazzyP]

Originally Posted by hogfamily

.....Park Ranger told me that the way you can recognize bear scat is that it smells like pepper and has little bells in it.

OMG, sick, but oh, so funny! xD

[Dakster]

Originally Posted by hogfamily

….told me that the best bear defense is a .22 caliber handgun, tennis shoes, and a hiking partner.



Make sure you wear the tennis shoes and when confronted with a bear shoot your hiking partner in the knee and RUN!

Remind me NOT to go hiking with you...

[hogfamily]

The following is from an Alaska outdoors forum:

From the study it states that handguns had an 84% success rate. From one of Tom Smiths prior reports bear spray was calculated to have a 90% success rate.

In the recent study long arms success rate was 76%. With a difference of 76% and 84% the authors state that there is no stasticical difference between using a long arm or handgun.

Alrighty then, if a 8% variation between long arms and handguns is not stasticically significant then a 6% difference between handguns and bear spray is also not stastically significant.

What is really interesting is that the data set does not include AK DLP data since 2001 due to changes in privacy laws preventing access to the files. Since 2001 the data only includes media articles. A decades worth of data is not included in the study unless it was reported in the media. The study even admits that the media primarily focuses on bear attacks that result in injuries which skews the data set. They cause an eye brow to raise when they discuss the missing DLP data since it will increase the number of dead bears which is a bad thing.

The study is a good case for how to process data from small data sets and how to determine what piece of data matters to the outcome. As for how it quantifies "rifle" "handgun" "bear spray" vs injury it falls short of reflecting the current state of things, but does provide a good base line. In the end it only matters what you are comfortable with and are willing to use.

[hogfamily]

From the same forum:

I don't believe they looked at all the Data...
I was attacked by a grizzly in 2006, harvested him, tagged him (season was still open), and got a really nice rug as well as the meat offen the carcusss..
Took him at VERY close range with a handgun while trying to take a crap in the woods! First shot at arms length.

I wonder how many bear encounters were listed in the study that got legally tagged instead of DLP?

[intelfan11315]

Originally Posted by hogfamily

….told me that the best bear defense is a .22 caliber handgun, tennis shoes, and a hiking partner.



Make sure you wear the tennis shoes and when confronted with a bear shoot your hiking partner in the knee and RUN!

Ok, that's horrible but it made me laugh hahah.

You better hope to god that your hiking partner doesn't survive or you're going to have some splainin' to do.

[RayinAK]

Originally Posted by hogfamily

From the same forum:

I don't believe they looked at all the Data...
I was attacked by a grizzly in 2006, harvested him, tagged him (season was still open), and got a really nice rug as well as the meat offen the carcusss..
Took him at VERY close range with a handgun while trying to take a crap in the woods! First shot at arms length.

I wonder how many bear encounters were listed in the study that got legally tagged instead of DLP?

Tom Smith is quite good at collecting data. He used to have a really good website about bear/human encounters in Alaska for the past 100 years, but maybe he pulled off the Internet months ago. Anyway, when it comes to the outdoors in Alaska, I rely on me and my gun regardless of what the "experts" and their studies say.

By the way, I am certain that Tom Smith would be interested on your bear experience. He is quite a nice fellow who makes great efforts to collect any data he can from people, newspaper stories, F&G, etc.

[hogfamily]

The post from the Alaska outdoor forum were not mine they are others experience / opinion. Sorry for the confusion.