Why the fascination with bear defense?

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I think I would rather wrestle the bear. LOL
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I second that opinion. Shooting my 4" .500 S&W plays enough havoc on my wrist bones. That monstrosity would need to come with a "Terminator" cyborg to shoot it!
 
Sorry, read the article again my friend. It stated deadly AND related predatory attempts.
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Read the article. You are still taking it out of context and stating that it indicates things that it does not indicate. You are grossly oversensationalizing a form of attack that is not very common, the predatory attack. The article does not state that most attacks are by predatory males. Your quote nicely makes this point...

In particular, the common belief that surprising a mother bear with cubs is the most dangerous kind of black bear encounter is inaccurate. Instead, lone male black bears hunting people as a potential source of food are a greater cause of deadly maulings and related predatory attempts. The study also found that fatal attacks do not typically involve bears that are familiar with humans, although some fatal attacks did.
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Nowhere in the article does it identify predatory attacks as being the most common form of attack. Nowhere in the article does it state that most attacks are by predatory males.

The article is identifying the extremely rare predatory attacks as being mostly by males. Basically, it is saying that females are less apt to attack a human for the purposes of consumption than is a male. The article is only addressing the issue of predatory attacks and is not addressing non-predatory attacks which are much more common. It is that simple.

Actually, the majority of black bear attacks recently is predatory black bear males.
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This statement of yours also sensationalizes the notion of immediacy when you call describe the attacks as occurring recently. The article does not address the issue of recency in any significant manner other than noting that the study spans the a range of time from 1900 to 2009 and that the attacks have increased with human population growth.

HOWEVER, and this is a huge however, you seem to be completely overlooking the opening paragraph which explicitly states....
Fatal encounters with black bears have been exceedingly rare during the last century, but appear to be mainly the result of predatory male bears targeting humans in their wilderness home ranges, according to a new study led by the world's leading expert on bear attacks.
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Here is a nice video of Herrerro discussing this very work that came out in 2011. Gosh, the number of deaths is up...to about 2 a year since 1960. So your recent attacks are in the last 50 years. Also pay attention to the fact that he says his study ONLY involved attacks involving deaths of people. Those are the only data stated.

In the video, note that Herrerro does not indicate that the most attacks of black bears are predatory or by males. He is only stating that predatory attacks are mostly by males. In fact, he refers to the species as largely benign and considered to be a lovely and safe species to be around at least in comparison to many other species that kill humans much more commonly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7yoIheOrTc

There is no reason to overstate what is actually being said.
 
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Black bears are generally pussy cats. I see them often here in Minnesota and they always seem to be running away from me. I've killed several with a long bow and never had one go more than 50 yards, had one drop and roll and die right at the bait.. No doubt, they die easier than whitetails.

I'm way more jumpy about snakes than I am black bears. LOL.
 
In fact, he refers to the species as largely benign and considered to be a lovely and safe species to be around at least in comparison to many other species that kill humans much more commonly.
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That statement right there is probably the best and truest statement I have read on all these "bear defense" threads. Brown bear are a completely different realm of study but Black Bear are fairly docile and skiddish when it comes to human contact. Of course there are instances when attacks can be easier to provoke, such as breeding season with a charged up male or a sow with young cubs in tow but, over all, they are a very easy species to be around in the woods and are FAR more likely to be far away from you before you ever know they are in the area. Like ANY wild animal, there will be encounters but the absolute best defense around Black Bear is to use a little common sense when in their territory.
 
DNS, Whatever man, don't you have anything better to do than nitpicking? Wow.

In any case, predatory black males are an issue. Live with it and recognize it ain't just a peeved momma bear you have to worry about. Your issues, well, glad you think that, but I really don't feel like disputing a relatively simple comment. Wow.
 
A444, I know you are trying to be helpful, but it is not helpful when you misrerpresent information. You stated and restated incorrectly information about bear behavior. Given that you were trying to be helpful, I would think that you would welcome the correction with information that is appropriately accurate.

So you call it nitpicking when the information you present is flat out wrong and somebody notices? I would think that you, of all people, would have the greatest interest in putting for accurate information about bears, bear behavior, and bear attacks instead mischaracterizing black bear behavior in a manner that villifies them. It is interesting that you cited Hererro's work and Hererro has the complete opposite impression of black bears than you appear to have.

Here is another study that might be of interest. This one from Yellowstone documented 35 injuries and 3 deaths in 25 years. It specifically notes that 97% of the injured hikers were injured in surprise encounters of females with young.
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3873148?uid=3739920&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=56133621123
 
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Fair enough DNS,

If that is what you wish.

I DID NOT misrepresent anything. The latest studies show that predatory black bear males is by far the largest percentage of offending bears in looking retrospectively back at attacks. That is a recent finding. That IS what the Herrerro study showed. Very simple and correct summation of the article.

You originally took issue with my summation which actually was not a summation. It was my recollection and I later submitted a post about that article. Please don't quote me out of context my friend. Predatory black male attacks is what the research has consistently shown "recently."

Once again, let's look back at my statements:

1)
April 27, 2012 04:14 PM
Alaska444 Actually, the majority of black bear attacks recently is predatory black bear males. They approach and stalk silently and come in deliberately according to several reports. Even bear spray is only a temporary deterrent to them and after exhausting your bear spray, you had better have some lethal means to protect yourself. That is just one more reason why bear spray may not be your best defense against bears, especially predatory black bears.
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You have misinterpreted my statement above as meaning every attack in the last 2-3 years or whatever "recently" means to you, when instead, I was simply noting from memory that predatory black bear attacks are the majority found in studies "recently." I DID NOT quote any study in my initial statement from memory. My second statement dealt with finding that specific study 12 minutes later:

2)
April 27, 2012 04:26 PM
Alaska444

In an article published in the Journal of Wildlife Management, University of Calgary professor emeritus Dr. Stephen Herrero, University of Calgary graduate Andrew Higgins, and colleagues from the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife and Brigham Young University analyzed the circumstances of all recorded deaths inflicted by non-captive black bears in North America between 1900 and 2009. The study found that 63 people were killed in 59 incidents in Canada, Alaska and the lower 48 states. The researchers determined that the majority (88%) of fatal attacks involved a bear exhibiting predatory behaviour, and 92% of the predatory bears were males. The authors suggest male black bears have evolved some different behaviours than females.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0511074807.htm
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In a prior study, Herrero noted that a significant number of black bears initially driven off by pepper spray during an act of aggression stayed in the area and returned. Once again, black bears need a bit of lead persuasion in those instances. That is a specific case where pepper spray is NOT the best defense.
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Nowhere did I specifically make any reference to fatal or nonfatal attacks. You are indeed misquoting, misrepresenting my statements and are taking them out of context. Please stop, life is too short to have to respond to your incessant and at times contradictory allegations.

Lastly, you misquoted the article you listed. It was not 97% of the attacks from female bears with young, it was 68% involving females with young of the 97% "surprise attacks." In addition, this study does not in the one page preview state which species of bear we are talking about.

I am talking about predatory BLACK BEARS. I am under the impression that the majority of attacks in Yellowstone are grizzly. Completely different population than I am talking about.

Ninety-seven percent of the hikers injured by bears reported surprise encounters as the cause of the attack, and 68% of these incidents involved female bears with young. Most hikers that were injured (61%) reacted to encounters with bears by running or attempting to climb trees. Most (80%) hikers that resisted during bear attacks were severely injured. Backcountry injuries occurred both in forested habitat (68%) and nonforested areas (32%). Visitor and employee education on precautions to take when hiking in bear habitat may be the most useful tool in further decreasing bear-inflicted human injuries within Yellowstone National Park.
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So, yes, you are nitpicking and you are not yourself very careful with your facts.

I will not respond to any more of your absurd allegations on my simple statements above. Like I said, life is too short to waste my time arguing about nonsensical issues that I am sorry set you off so much. There are much better issues to fall on your sword my friend, this is not one of them.

Have fun ripping this apart, I will not respond.
 
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I don't worry to much about being attacked by a black bearbut I do respect them. However Trad Archer I disagree about them being easier to kill than a whitetail. I have seen them soak up a lot of lead and keep on going.
 
I don't worry to much about being attacked by a black bearbut I do respect them. However Trad Archer I disagree about them being easier to kill than a whitetail. I have seen them soak up a lot of lead and keep on going.
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I've had them drop like a stone from a lung shot and the same shot on pretty close to the same size animal run for an eternity. It all depends on the animal. Same with deer. They all react differently. The only way to guarantee a "drop right there" is a CNS.
 
jon86 said:
Since bears are so widespread, they become a convienient excuse for the wife when you buy that super-ultra-mongo-magnum whatever to 'protect me from any bears when I'm out (insert anything one does outdoors here)'.
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I tried this. I apparently wasn't convincing enough. :(
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It doesn't work on my wife either. Our wives must be smarter than the average bear. Yuk yuk.
 
I DID NOT misrepresent anything. The latest studies show that predatory black bear males is by far the largest percentage of offending bears in looking retrospectively back at attacks. That is a recent finding. That IS what the Herrerro study showed. Very simple and correct summation of the article.
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Once again, let's look back at my statements:

Actually, the majority of black bear attacks recently is predatory black bear males.
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Yep, I noted that exact statement. The statement is false as Hererro did not say that the majority of black bear attacks were by predatory males. He was describing serious injury and fatal black bear attacks. In fact, he doesn't have the data to determine if that if the majority of the attacks are or are not by predatory males. You see, as he has noted in various publications, while data on people killed has been kept since 1900, nobody has kept data on the number of people suffering minor injuries except for a 20 year (1960-1980) parks study. Notice that the article does not mention anything about attacks resulting in minor injuries.

If you read the paper and missed this critical point, then it would appear to you that the majority of recent black bear attacks were by predatory males. You would also come away with the notion that black bear attacks always result in serious injuries or are fatal.

The same problem was described in this BC study from 1960-1997. The only minor injury data they could obtain was from 1986-1993 and those data were not presented in the paper. The only data discussed were serious injuries and fatalities caused by black bears.
http://www.bearbiology.com/fileadmin/tpl/Downloads/URSUS/Vol_11/Herrero_Higgins_Vol_11.pdf

Here, instead of arguing about what Herrero said or didn't say, let's just listen to what he stated about his own study.
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Well from Hererro's article abstract and own YT description of his study, not once did he state that the majority of recent black bear attacks were by predatory males. He did specifically state that the data he was discussing were only those incidents resulting in human serious injuries or deaths by black bears and the black bears causing the deaths are primarily male.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jwmg.72/abstract

As for the studies showing this, what studies? You only cited the science news article that described Hererro's paper.

I am talking about predatory BLACK BEARS. I am under the impression that the majority of attacks in Yellowstone are grizzly. Completely different population than I am talking about.
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Fair enough, but this should suffice...
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en...PsLN_17O_9Pxik#v=onepage&q=black bear&f=false
Out of more than 500 black bear induced injuries to people in the study, 90% were minor injuries. These data were collected during a 20 year time period (1960-1980. From 1900 to 1980, there were only 35 seriously injured folks of which 23 died.

Minor injuries are not hallmarks of predatory black bears.

Folks here did make a neat observation...
http://www.bear.org/website/bear-pa...humans/119-how-dangerous-are-black-bears.html
They noted that offensive attacks by black bears were predatory and are oftn fatal. This are in the minority, however. Defensive attacks by black bears occur more often and generally result in minor injuries and not death. The same sentiment is offered here...
http://mingomorvin.com/bui/wildlifearticles/?p=167
 
My personal belief as to why bear defense seems to get the most attention is because a bear is considered a "hard target": something that is very hard to stop in comparison to, say, a single dog or even a mountain lion. The logic goes that if whatever you're using can stop a bear, it can stop just about anything else you'll likely encounter. As a result, the bear is the "gold standard" for defense.
 
I guess it was maybe twenty years back that an article with comments from wildlife biologists claimed that black bears were more likely than Alaskan Biggies to attack people as a food source. Overall, the Biggies made more false charges as a territorial defense. I don't recall any differentiation between male and female; it might have been mentioned, but I just don't remember.

But the thread subject has to do with the psychology of worries about bear attacks, not which bear does what.

I go back to my earlier post, and add that bears are pretty much the only dangerous game in North America. Sure, cougars are dangerous, but much fewer in number and are rarely seen--which gets to the "Out of sight, out of mind" thing. More people see bears, more frequently.
 
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Quote:
I DID NOT misrepresent anything. The latest studies show that predatory black bear males is by far the largest percentage of offending bears in looking retrospectively back at attacks. That is a recent finding. That IS what the Herrerro study showed. Very simple and correct summation of the article.
Quote:
Once again, let's look back at my statements:

Actually, the majority of black bear attacks recently is predatory black bear males.
Yep, I noted that exact statement. The statement is false as Hererro did not say that the majority of black bear attacks were by predatory males. He was describing serious injury and fatal black bear attacks. In fact, he doesn't have the data to determine if that if the majority of the attacks are or are not by predatory males. You see, as he has noted in various publications, while data on people killed has been kept since 1900, nobody has kept data on the number of people suffering minor injuries except for a 20 year (1960-1980) parks study. Notice that the article does not mention anything about attacks resulting in minor injuries.

If you read the paper and missed this critical point, then it would appear to you that the majority of recent black bear attacks were by predatory males. You would also come away with the notion that black bear attacks always result in serious injuries or are fatal.

The same problem was described in this BC study from 1960-1997. The only minor injury data they could obtain was from 1986-1993 and those data were not presented in the paper. The only data discussed were serious injuries and fatalities caused by black bears.
http://www.bearbiology.com/fileadmin...ins_Vol_11.pdf

Quote:
Here, instead of arguing about what Herrero said or didn't say, let's just listen to what he stated about his own study.
Well from Hererro's article abstract and own YT description of his study, not once did he state that the majority of recent black bear attacks were by predatory males. He did specifically state that the data he was discussing were only those incidents resulting in human serious injuries or deaths by black bears and the black bears causing the deaths are primarily male.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...mg.72/abstract

As for the studies showing this, what studies? You only cited the science news article that described Hererro's paper.

Quote:
I am talking about predatory BLACK BEARS. I am under the impression that the majority of attacks in Yellowstone are grizzly. Completely different population than I am talking about.
Fair enough, but this should suffice...
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&...20bear&f=false
Out of more than 500 black bear induced injuries to people in the study, 90% were minor injuries. These data were collected during a 20 year time period (1960-1980. From 1900 to 1980, there were only 35 seriously injured folks of which 23 died.

Minor injuries are not hallmarks of predatory black bears.

Folks here did make a neat observation...
http://www.bear.org/website/bear-pag...ack-bears.html
They noted that offensive attacks by black bears were predatory and are oftn fatal. This are in the minority, however. Defensive attacks by black bears occur more often and generally result in minor injuries and not death. The same sentiment is offered here...
http://mingomorvin.com/bui/wildlifearticles/?p=167
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Wow, talk about making a mountain out of a mole hill. Like I said earlier, I will no longer respond to your absurd allegations. :what::banghead::eek::confused::uhoh::what:

Interesting how you go on and on about a statement from my memory, clarified in the next statement yet you fail to address the innacuracies of your own statements I pointed out. Go figure.
 
My grandparents farmed 1500 apple trees in the mountains south of Charlottesville and my great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents did it before them. (Had a relative partially scalped near King's Mountain back during the war, but that didn't involve a bear.)

Plenty of black bears in Blue Ridge and in the orchard, but nobody ever heard of a bear stalking a human. We were raised to fear a momma bear with a cub or two. "Don't get between them and if you do, run to the side."

There was that one incident with the hunted bear trying to come down the logging trail while my father, uncle and grandfather were headed up, but that was just the bear trying to get away from some hunters. That's the story about how hard it is to kill a male black bear with bird shot even if you have 3 shotguns at contact range.

Maybe the researchers lived someplace else with a different strain of black bear. Maybe they misread the reports they searched.

Lots of bear hunters in my family, but none ever heard of a bear stalking a man. Raiding foodstuffs at a camp doesn't count as stalking a man even if there's a man in camp at the time.

John
 
My guess would be that the "scientists" that did the "predatory" study were mistaking "predatory" for "territorial". You get in a mating male's territory, they will have a tendency to aggressively remove you from that territory. It's been pretty much proven that, with the exception of a very few animals, humans taste like crap to other animals. It is a very rare instance that we are hunted for food. 99% of the time it is either a surprise encounter or a territorial encounter with a mating aggressive male that will spur an attack. I don't put much stock in what a bunch of egg heads put together in a paper. Most of them wouldn't know true outdoor nature if it smacked them in the head. They crunch a bunch of numbers from supposed accounts and state what they come up with as fact. I'll take the word of a grizzled old man that's lived in the outdoors over ANY egg head. The mountains of Tennessee where I was raised has (or had) a very good population of black bear yet there were very little "attacks" in Tennessee. Wonder why? Because those of us raised in those mountains had a little common sense and listened to our Dads and Granddads when teaching us how to avoid those encounters.
 
Zombies are fake and no one wants to be bear poop.
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That too.
Living in South Texas no you do not see bears out on your patio on a daily basis, we do however have black bears, mtn. lion's... so it does give some of us a good excuse to get get really big guns. I do not believe bears just go around trying to find the next person to be dinner but if I am walking around in hill country or West Texas, I got a big gun just for my own piece of mind. Bears are really cool animals, and I have a very healthy respect for them.:)
 
Ain't it about time to close this tread. Same stuff hashed to death. Do what you want to do. Most are going to anyhow.
 
I remember a story in the American Rifleman or somesuch many decades ago.
A fellow back east was out hiking with his dog and a black bear wanted to eat him. All he had was a 3" pocket folder and his dog sure rope a doped that bear pretty good. It seems there was a three way fight for quite some time with the hiker (an elderly gentleman) stabbing the bear many, many times.
When the hiker finally stabbed and then pushed the knife so that handle and all was inserted, did he finally kill it.
 
"why ? "

Because most people are enamored with the belief that they could do it if they had to, if only the perfect gun or cartridge for it existed.

From what we actually " DO " know, from personal recollections, published studies, and anecdotal evidence- is that the perfect weapon for bear would be a 6 shot 2" 12 ga snubbie- loaded with 3.5" magnum shells each containing a 1 oz slug, 3 pieces of 00 buck, 3 180gr HP rifle bullets, and 1/2 ounce of high concentration OC "bear mace" - the grip of said pistol containing an auto-lockon mechanism capable of engaging a bouncing tennis ball moving somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 MPH, which if failing to score a kill shot within 5 rounds automatically encapsulates the firers hand in shear-proof metal armor. This would allow the fatal final shot to be dispatched directly into the offending creatures mouth without severing the firers' hand at the wrist in the attempt.

I know, I want one too :D

I also strongly suspect some of it has an undercurrent of "If it could stop a big powerful bear, it could stop anything else" Which is ironically both as true and false as you personally believe it to be.
 
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