Grizz Stories

[eddielasvegas]

Not to pile on but I can confirm as well. At the time of the incident, I had a facility contractor who worked for me that was good friends with the lodge owner and unfortunate victim. I got to see the whole camera roll on his phone. More graphic than anything I can describe. And the size of the bear…oh god, that bear is what nightmares are made of.

No offense taken in the least and sometimes I deserve the pile on.

Just not in this case as I should have said in my post that I meant no offense to the poster or that I was calling anyone a liar, it's just with my IT propeller head brain (and really only able to work with a zero or one), I could not fathom how a person could survive with injuries like that.

Now that I know the story as fact, the human body and docs are amazing.


Eddie

 

[OregonSteeler]

Came across this video and thought of this thread....

 

[walk2112]

Prior to going to bed that evening, we took mini mag lights and taped them to the bottom front of our barrels so we could turn them on, and still be able to see our crosshairs and exactly what we were aiming at. At sometime, shortly after midnight, as the rain was beating down, I heard/felt a bear brush against the side of my little 2 person mountaineering tent that Dan and I were now sleeping in. I yelled out through camp that the bears were back, and people started gearing up and getting out of their tents. Five, of the now 9 people in camp, piled out of our tents, and collectively huddled underneath of a tarp in the pouring rain. In the process of us all gearing up and getting out of our tents, the bears moved out and away from camp and could not be seen once we were outside and under the tarp. It only took a few minutes later, and the bears were back, so we all lined up and started firing, driving them back out of camp again, then we went back and huddled underneath the tarp to discuss what we would do if they came back. Their camp leader suggested that if the bears came back, we would just continue to drive them out and try not to hit any of them. I was opposed to that idea, and suggested that when the bears came back, we would all line up, with nobody getting out in front, and we would all fire at the same time. Within a few minutes the bears were back in camp, so we ended up going out into the rain, and when we were all within about 10 yards or so of them, flash lights on, I said fire, and everybody opened up. When the firing had stopped, the larger of the two bears (sow), was dead, but her 3 year old cub was still thrashing about, so I went up and shot it in the head at point blank.
That was pretty much the end of the excitement, and we all quickly dispersed back into our tents to try and sleep through the rest of the night.
When we got up the next morning at daybreak, we immediately started going to work on skinning out the bears, to turn over to the state troopers. Within about two hours of cleaning them, our pilot flew in and landed at camp. He immediately got out with his camera, and started taking photographs of both the bears, in relation to where they were to our tents and in our camp. One of the guys from their camp, who didn’t want to get out of his tent the previous night, asked Dan and I if it would be okay for him to fly out with us, because he was pretty much done with the whole scene. We didn’t have a problem with that, as there was plenty of room in the beaver for another person and his gear, so he ended up flying back to Kodiak with us. When we arrived back in Kodiak, he was insistent about paying for that leg of our flight, which we accepted, and inturn bought him dinner and beer at Henry’s.

And that’s my best bear encounter story.

A few pictures from that hunt.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Great example of due diligence in trying every feasible option prior to DLP. Guessing both bears likely would have continued on doing that type of 'meat gathering' forever, sows teaching cubs along the way. Great story, thanks for sharing.

 

[BeastOfTheTrees]

Thread Resurrection, just in time for season.

 

[BuckSmasher]

Some of these stories are just nuts. Wow.

My three scariest Grizz stories. They may not seem scary to read as I was never attacked but were spooky to live.

In 2009 after a successful black bear hunt south of the Holitna River in AK, while we were packing everything up to the ridge where the airplane could pick us up we saw a pair of sub-adult grizz (we guessed three year old sisters) on a ridge a mile or so from camp. After an hour or so packing and not paying to close attention to them they had come to investigate. I saw them about 300 yards up the hill, about 150 yards from our stuff, which we were also 150 yards from. My young guide had ignorantly packed our rifles up there already. I was pretty upset as he didn't even ask me about grabbing my rifle and I had assumed he wouldn't grab it. He said not to worry, grabbed to rolled up sleeping pads, started slapping them together and running towards our stuff, the bears ran off a little ways and he grabbed our rifles which I kept on my shoulder until leaving in the plane. The bears never really left and we took off right over their heads.


In 2014 hunting SW MT I was sitting a prime wallow during archery elk season where a creek left a timbered north facing slope and entered a field that was getting fed on heavily by the elk. Just about sundown I hear a crashing coming through the brush, off the the elk trail but still figuring it was an elk I put my release on the loop and got ready to draw. A HUGE grizz came down to the creek about 30 yards to my right. I dropped my bow and immediately and subconsciously drew my pistol, stood up, and yelled, "go away bear!" He/she looked at me lazily for a few seconds, turned on its heels and did a slow walking 180 right back to where it came from. I did end up sitting there that evening and came to full draw on spike that came in at 20 yards but I was in a brow tine unit.

2016, same area in SW MT. Me and my buddy are set up on a chain of wallows in an area of thick trees interspersed with marshy meadows. We sit 100 or so yards from each other and occasionally cow calling hoping for a bugle or to lure something in. About 30 min in I hear something sounds like an elk just in the trees 20 yards to my left but it never come into an opening so I can see it. Seconds later I hear something coming from my right, where my buddy is and see him coming up to me with eyes as big as saucers asking if i saw the enormous grizz that was beelining it straight to me. He was sure I was gonna get mauled. I never saw it. We backed outta there.

Overall we hunted that area for 5 or 6 years before MT tags became too hard to get as non-res and i moved to ID. Never went more than a couple of days without someone in our group seeing Grizz. Most sightings were at a distance but every now and again something spooky. I remember waking up one morning and finding big grizz tracks just behind camp was disturbing.

 

[Dogone]

We had a number of mobile seismic camps on the Beaufort sea. A cook walked out of the kitchen and a polar bear hidden under the trailer killed him. Took an hour to scare him away from the body. Next week every camp got a .350 Remington. The one with the vent rib. The other polar bear incident we just flew an Eskimo out to camp and he shot it from a bombardier.
Not grizzly stories but may be interesting.

 

[BeastOfTheTrees]

We had a number of mobile seismic camps on the Beaufort sea. A cook walked out of the kitchen and a polar bear hidden under the trailer killed him. Took an hour to scare him away from the body. Next week every camp got a .350 Remington. The one with the vent rib. The other polar bear incident we just flew an Eskimo out to camp and he shot it from a bombardier.
Not grizzly stories but may be interesting.

Polar bears are scarier

 

[Greyinggrayling]

Another story:

Late October 2023 on Kodiak island on a lake. My husband and I drew party brown bear tags. We, and a good friend who came with us to deer hunt, had camp set up on a lake.
A few days in, we started seeing seals in the lake since it wasn’t far upstream from the ocean. It was fun watching the seals chase what was left of the salmon.
Later at night, about 9pm or so, we were hearing noises out on the water. We were excited to see the seals again, so we exited the kitchen tent and shined a light out over the water. We couldn’t locate any seals, but could still hear a bleating type call. Eventually we located a small pair of eyes across the water on the bank. Maybe a fawn?
It started coming around the lake, walking and calling. Small shape, small eyes.
Finally it got close enough we could see a baby bear.
Oh how cute! This year’s cub, about the size of a cocker span..oh f..k!!!
It hit us all at the same time…where the f is MOM???
The cub kept coming toward camp, calling the entire time. Our friend grabbed his rifle and when the cub got closer, he fired some warning shots at its feet. It stopped advancing, but kept circling the camp, crying.
We soon all had our rifles ready and were on perimeter watch, waiting for momma bear to come charging into camp to kill us all. Seemed like hours, but it really wasn’t. We were just so tired. Eventually the sound faded and we relaxed, retiring to our tents for the night.
I put in earplugs and passed out. Our friend, who is a former marine, could not sleep and kept watch while in his tent. He reported that later he heard the baby bear again behind our camp a ways, and then heard what he could only assume was momma calling back. We were in a triangle with the two bears. He listened as the two sounds seemed to converge, then they moved off upstream somewhere.
Three lessons:
1. It’s nice having a Marine with you when hunting bear on Kodiak, especially one that served in Afghanistan.
2. If you didn’t bring a cocker spaniel with you to camp, it’s likely not a cocker spaniel.
3, Baby bears are not cute.