Grizzly bear defense with 9mm?

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When in the woods in bear country never go alone. Have a buddy you can out run with you. You do not need to out run the bear just your buddy.

Oh back to the topic shoot your buddy in the leg with the 9mm to make sure you can out run him. :D See the 9mm is perfect for stoping a Grizzly from attacking you :neener:
 
I think equine peristalsis has been working overtime here. I wonder how many of the above posters have even seen a grizzly, and how many have actually lived and worked with them? I grew up in Yellowstone and worked in Glacier National park.

The best way to stop a grizzly with a 9mm? Slather it with bacon grease and peanut butter and dangle it in his face from a long stick as you attempt to run.
 
but davey crocket killed him a bear, when he was only three.

Personally I don't see why a Grizzly would need a 9mm
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the Grizzley didn't need the 9mm, he just took it from the last guy.


seriously though, this whole "handgun for bears" thing that comes up every month (or twice a week) is silly. even in Alaska, bear attacks are less common than moose attacks. I don't think you need to pick a gun specifically for bear defence. my advice is to take a gun that works against humans, which are the most likely to give you trouble.

Bears are big, with a slow metabolism. a grizz bear's heart beats about once every 8 seconds. They are also very fast. 30mph fast. Even if you had a .50BMG derringer or the "roger rabbit" revolver or whatever and completely destroyed a bear's heart, it could still cover 40 yards and play pinata with you for a while before it becomes incapacitated. you aren't going to stop a bear charge, even with a rifle, unless you break bones, preferrably spine or pelvis.

yes, people hunt bears with handguns. but in a hunt is an offensive operation: hunter shoots the bear, it runs away (or tries to), hunter tracks it to where it died. the main point is that the bear didn't initiate the attack, it's caught by surprise. in a defensive situation, If the bear attacks, it has the advantage because it has already decided not to run away. however, any wound or loud noise might be enough to change it's mind and convince it to run away. and if it didn't attack, well in that case you don't need to defend, eh?

In they unlikely event that you are attacked by a bear, whatever gun you have with you will be fine. I've never heard a (credible) story of someone that shot a bear with a handgun* and was mauled anyway. The gun you have with you, the one that you will carry, is the right one for bear (or any other kind of) defense.

(although i am sure we'll see 100 posts about someone's uncle's friend, etc. and how you just have to carry a 5 or 6 pound handgun like a Raging Bull or Deasert Eagle .50 and so on)

* (but I know of one case of a hunter hiting a bear twice with his .280 rifle and being killed anyway)


oh, and I suggest you wear rubber underwear too, because you are more likely to get struck by lightning. be prepared for any possibility, right?

p.s. what's the best handgun for defense against walrus?
 
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I've been hiking around some 800+ pound black bears in Washington state. I believe in the church of the 44mag. Goes with me anywhere that the department of fish and game says critters over 200 pounds exist (lions, bears, moose, elk, chupacabras, whatever). Otherwise, a .357mag comes with me.
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Now the real question is......

Whats the best caliber for Chupacabras?:D

Ive seen some black bears that are pretty big in my area also,North Idaho, and I to believe in the 44mag or even better the 45colt+p
 
I think it would work if the bear believed in the barter system. Example: "here mister gigantic animal you can have this 9mm pistol if you don't eat me. Please."
 
Last week my first sergeant shot a cow he was going to butcher with a 40 cal. He was three feet from it, shot him square in the forehead and the bullet bounced off and landed in a puddle of water nearby. The cow ran about 75 yards and stumbled around, and then got dropped by a 308. I don't have any idea how the skull thickness of a grizzley and a cow compare and I'd be willing to bet the 40 round was a standard load, don't know for sure. So go ahead and pack around a 9mm, just don't shoot him in the head, or at least any cows!
 
Honestly though we are running out of bears and other large predators and your chance of being attacked by one or having problems are less than your chance of running into to the ever overpopulating homo saipen who tries to rob you in the middle of nowhere.
 
azredhawk44 said:
I've been hiking around some 800+ pound black bears in Washington state. I believe in the church of the 44mag. Goes with me anywhere that the department of fish and game says critters over 200 pounds exist (lions, bears, moose, elk, chupacabras, whatever). Otherwise, a .357mag comes with me.
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Over 800lbs? That's bigger than any known black bear ever recorded in history. I live in Washington, and we even have a facility on my university built to maintain and study black bears containing a population of about a dozen. I've seen another dozen or so in the wild. I've never seen a black bear more than 400 lbs, and that was a bloated, captive specimen. The wild ones I've seen averaged 150-200lbs, not much bigger than an average man. But if you know where there are these historic, record crushing black bears roaming in my state, please give me their location before the next hunting season! I'd love to get my name in the record books. :D
 
Grizz and Blackies

Cheeseybacon,

Tell your friend that the 9mm works just fine for any grizzlies he'll run into in Pennsylvania. :neener:

Razorburn,

Check some hunting sites, I think the biggest blackie killed in PA is over 800 pounds, if not for sure it was over 700 pounds. Someone I work with just had a friend kill a 550-pound blackie on their farmland in Virginia, corn-fed blackies can get really big!

Michael
 
--9x19 FMJ will most certainly penetrate a bear's skull. Bear's heads are not made of steel. The legends about bullets being "deflected" off bear skull arise from hunters who shoot the hump on top of a brown bear's head thinking it's the skull. In reality of course it's just huge jaw muscles, skin and fat.

--9x19 FMJ has stopped a charging brownie sow. Several years back on a nearby river one fisherman shot the sow with his 9mm sidearm and managed to hit her square in the shoulder joint, shattering it in and stopping her. His friend then picked up his shotgun and finished her. IIRC, that same friend had responded to the sow initially by *THROWING* the shotgun at her, which always makes me smile.

That said, I'd take a .357 with 180 or 200 grain hardcasts as a backup bear gun over a 9mm with 140 FMJ's. But I'd take either over a pointed stick.

But speaking of pointy things vs. bears. This story:

If you're a real man you don't even need a 9mm...

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2006/07/22/bear.html
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.. is nothing. Gene Moe stopped a starving KODIAK SOW with his hunting knife.

http://www.outdoorlife.com/outdoor/adventure/article/0,19912,1117013,00.html

He remains The Man.

There's also a story in one of Larry's books about an Anchorage lawyer who got in a protracted fist fight with a large black bear, getting really torn up in the process. IIRC he managed to escape by swimming off into a lake.
 
Grizzly with a 9mm? Very bad odds. A neighbor of mine shot a large black bear that was fighting with his (huge) husky. It took 3 shots from a 300 Winchester Magnum before it went down. Add a few hundred to over a thousand pounds to this in a grizzly bear and you have virtually no chance.
 
Bears or Drug Dealers?

Here in AZ, while out in the 'wilderness', I'd be more concerned about running into a marijuana plantation and some drug dealers rather than a bear. In the last year some hikers have stumbled across a couple drug farms. Not sure if I'd rather run into one of them or a bear. Obviously the big danger with drug farms is that they usually come with armed guards...
 
Can we sticky the "file off the front sight" anecdote? Honestly, no offense to anyone, but when this topic comes up (every other day) someone always has to post it. :banghead:
 
Check some hunting sites, I think the biggest blackie killed in PA is over 800 pounds, if not for sure it was over 700 pounds. Someone I work with just had a friend kill a 550-pound blackie on their farmland in Virginia, corn-fed blackies can get really big!

Michael
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I checked before posting. I generally check facts before posting anything. The world record is 802lbs, in Wisconsin, in the 1800's. Blackies that big haven't been seen for over 100 years. If he's seeing black bear that're over 800lbs while hiking in Washington as he says, those are beyond world record black bears. The average black bear in North America is estimated to be about 300lbs. with huge variance due to sexual dipmorphism and region. In some places, like MN, there are adult bears only weighing in at 100lbs. http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/snapshots/mammals/blackbear.html
Or other places, where they vary from 125-500lbs, or 200-600.
Most places list them with a median of 300 or so http://www.dfg.ca.gov/hunting/bear/biology.html
 
Let me start off by saying the only Grizzly I ever saw was stuffed in the Museum of Natural History.

Skeeter Skelton wrote a column about "beware of the man who owns only one gun...because he's probably very good with it". He relates how a freind moved from Texas to homestead in Alaska. The only gun he had was a S&W Military and Police in 32-20. Skeeter went to visit him after he lived there a few years and noticed he had a Grizzly rug on the floor. Skeeter never asked him but he knew the only gun the guy had was his 32-20.

Kill a Grizzly with a 9 MM? I think more impportant than load selection would be a lot of luck.
 
A nine will work..kick him in the testicles then when he bends down shoot him in the eye
 
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