Watch Your Six!

[grfox92]

The big difference seems to be that when there is a bad encounter with a black bear the bear seems intent on making a meal out of a person. The grizz/bown bear attacks usually are food or space related but not (generally) about making the human a meal.

Agreed.

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[z987k]

Timely Hunting Season Reminder.

This picture was recently sent to me by a lifelong buddy:

In his words:

My son shot a moose in a spot with shoulder high brush and thick alders. We felt because of the number of bears, an hour until dark, we needed a dedicated bear watch. We made the trip back home, got the pre-loaded MRU2 ( moose recovery unit 2 ) and collected the other LEH group hunt member. I got my slug gun, and a box of Brenneke slugs. We grabbed some very bright spot lights and headed back out.

An hour of chainsaw work in the dark got us to within 75 yards. Then with my son shining a bright light over my shoulder I advanced through the brush towards the moose with a round in and the safety off, shotgun up and ready. We could literally only see 6 feet ahead in most places. We had tied a thin rope with a reflective strand in it to the antler and tossed it up into the alders above the downed animal. This was a great marker as we could locate it from 50 yards back in the pitch black as the relective rope was tangled in the alders branches several feet above the top of the brush. With no bear found at the site we chainsawed our way the last 75 yards and dragged it out to a place where we had at least some hope of spotting a prowling bear.

It is quick business when you are set up for moose recovery so we weren’t in the little clearing long. 45 minutes perhaps at the most. I scanned about when I could, the bear watch scanned most of the time, and just before we were ready to start loading the moose my son took a picture of me working on cutting the critter in half and our bear watch in the background. Look straight off his left shoulder at the pair of eyes caught by the camera flash. We never even knew it was there. And for reference that brush it’s in is almost to your elbows.

My thoughts:

Spooky as hell. That bear was big. He was less than 15 yards from the crew.
He was analyzing the situation to determine if the risk was worth the prize.
In this case, with 3 men involved, he thankfully chose to not gamble.

If he had been alone, or perhaps even with just two of you, he may well have made a different choice.

ALWAYS watch your six!

Cheers

The two "eyes" in the photo are in front of the bush.
It's not an animal. It's an artifact of light. A reflection of the headlamps on the camera lens or something like that.

 

[Megalodon]

The two "eyes" in the photo are in front of the bush.
It's not an animal. It's an artifact of light. A reflection of the headlamps on the camera lens or something like that.

This was my immediate thought also, just didn't want to be the one to rain on the parade...

 

[grfox92]

This was my immediate thought also, just didn't want to be the one to rain on the parade...

I also thought I saw this picture years ago on the interweb.

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[pods8 (Rugged Stitching)]

The big difference seems to be that when there is a bad encounter with a black bear the bear seems intent on making a meal out of a person. The grizz/bown bear attacks usually are food or space related but not (generally) about making the human a meal.

While correct, once I am dead I don't particularly care if it was hungy or angry...

 

[LaHunter]

I think I’d get a new bear watcher guy

I agree. Gun slung over shoulder. In the photo, he looks like a spectator.

 

[Colorado Cowboy]

I sure as hell wouldn't want this one get pissed off at me......

 

[Mr. October]

While correct, once I am dead I don't particularly care if it was hungy or angry...

If dead, it's probably academic. I guess the point is it does make sense that the advice in a black bear attack is not to "play dead" and hope they go away because they probably won't.

 

[Marbles]

If dead, it's probably academic. I guess the point is it does make sense that the advice in a black bear attack is not to "play dead" and hope they go away because they probably won't.

Yeah, I'm not playing dead regardless.

The theory sounds good, but has zero reliable evidence for it and while generally the NPS has decent animal information, this is a case were it looks like they and everyone else don't have a solid evidence base to stand on. Browns will shred boats and in one case I know hundreds of feet of water line just because a person pissed them off. In one case a guy played dead and the bear continued attacking until it happened to bite his can of bear spray.