dealing with bear

Alaska woman says she punched bear to save her dog
By Yereth Rosen | Reuters

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A 22-year-old Alaska woman said on Wednesday she punched a black bear in the face to save her small dog from being carried off and possibly eaten.
Juneau resident Brooke Collins said she hit the bear Sunday night to save the life of her dachshund, Fudge. She said she discovered the bear crouched down, clutching Fudge in its paws and biting the back of the dog's neck.

"It had her kind of like when they eat salmon," Collins said Wednesday. "I was freaking out. I was screaming at it. My dog was screaming. I ran up to it ... I just punched it right in the snout and it let go."

Collins said her boyfriend then scared the bear away. "I think it was more startled than anything," she said.

Collins, a hairdresser who has lived in Juneau most of her life, said she is accustomed to bears and knows how to take precautions around them.

She also knew about this particular bear before Sunday's attack because it has been hanging around the neighborhood.

In this case, however, Fudge darted out the door before anyone checked the vicinity, she said.
The dog, an older female, was not seriously hurt in the attack, but Collins said she is tending to the animal's wounds and keeping her inside for now. Collins said she is also taking other precautions with her second dog.

Black bears frequently roam the downtown section of Alaska's capital city, which rests against a steep mountain slope and is surrounded by a dense rain forest.

Bear encounters are on the rise this year, despite efforts by local residents to lock away garbage and remove items that might attract the animals, said Neil Barton, a Juneau-based biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

"This year, I think, is a lot worse than last year. I would attribute that to lack of a berry crop," Barten said.

Production of berries around Juneau has been poor this summer, removing a key food source from the bears' diets.

"If they are not available, the bears look for other sources of food," he said.
Bears and dogs sometimes snarl at each other, but actual attacks on dogs are unusual, he said.
Collins said her dog Fudge has chased bears but never been attacked before.

The black bear she punched returned Tuesday, she said, because it was a trash pick-up day.
(Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Jerry Norton)


<wild animals are always unpredictable
what stops one could just piss off the next>

 

I noticed that no one smacked a Grizzly or Coastal Brown Bear (same species only much better fed) in the snout to save their little doggy. . There is a humorous question/answer about how do you tell the difference between a grizzly and a black bear when a black bear quite commonly might be a cinnamon colored or brown, same color as a grizzly.
.
Answer is simple, just kick it in the rear end. A black bear supposedly will run off.
.
A grizzly, well, you can't run fast enough to stop what is about to happen to you.

 

Black Bear scat contains remains of berries, and animal fur.

Grizzly Bear scat contains hiker's bells and smells faintly of pepper......

 

Oh now that's just wrong!
Smells like pepper huh?
Bells in the scat?
Sad, truly sad is what that is!
Hee hee....( I can laugh, I'm nowhere near one right now!)

 

I use firecrackers on Black Bears and it works right well.

Feral cats used to sit on my front porch; a fishing line "trip wire" going to a mouse trap which launched a ping pong ball cured the problem.

 

That old saw about climbing a tree to get away from a bear is iffy at best: A black bear can go up a tree faster than a human can run on level ground.

It isn't climbing the tree that may save you, it's getting waaaaay out on a springy branch where the bear can't join you for lunch.

On the subject of bears, I get a bad case of read-rage whenever I see an article about some poor unfortunate that got eaten by a bear after they tried the old play-dead-and-hope-it-goes-away trick.

Boy, if there was ever a worse tactic for dealing with a hungry bear, I have yet to hear about it.

Bears eat carrion, you know? Even fresh carrion.

Sometimes bears attack from ambush. There's not much in the way of prevention you can do for that, other than paying attention to your surroundings and sticking to open ground as much as possible.

I read a case a while back where a couple was openly tracked and stalked by a bear for about an hour. Apparently the bear was zeroing in on the woman, who happened to be having her period at the time.

(That's not a good time to go hiking in bear country, BTW.)

The knew the bear was following them, tracking them, and the bear knew they knew. He took his sweet time.

Eventually, when the bear got really close--within fifty yards of so--the guy got the great idea that he should go for help, leaving his sweetie to lie down on the ground and play dead.

The bear killed her while her gutless companion made his getaway.

I agree that bear spray is good to have, as is a firearm. So is a squirtgun loaded with straight ammonia, if nothing else.

BUT--not everyone is going to be prepared when bear trouble finds them.

If you have sufficient warning, and just a little time, there is another strategy that will both run off the bear and summon help immediately in most cases.

Start a forest fire.

A big one. Don't be shy about it. Set the world on fire and stand on the far side of it as it burns.

I know: Smokey the Bear won't like it. It's not politically correct. It's not environmentally friendly. It will cause Global Warming and drown all the penguins. It may also get you heavily fined and/or tossed into jail.

Big deal. Compared to losing your life--and maybe letting your companion(s)/family member(s) die at the same time, a forest fire and all its material consequences are utterly trivial.

If you carry a railroad flare, you can fire a forest in a real hurry. And you may not actually have to.

If the bear gets a good whiff of the sulfurous smoke that railroad flares put out, he may decide to beat feet before his most important survival asset (his sense of smell) is damaged or destroyed.

If so, Smokey the Bear will still love you. You won't have to fire the underbrush after all...

And you'll still be alive.

 

I read a case a while back where a couple was openly tracked and stalked by a bear for about an hour. Apparently the bear was zeroing in on the woman, who happened to be having her period at the time.

(That's not a good time to go hiking in bear country, BTW.)

The knew the bear was following them, tracking them, and the bear knew they knew. He took his sweet time.

Eventually, when the bear got really close--within fifty yards of so--the guy got the great idea that he should go for help, leaving his sweetie to lie down on the ground and play dead.

The bear killed her while her gutless companion made his getaway.


^^^^...This could of very well been planned...
Due to a constant onslaught of P.M.S.
Just say'n.....

 

I use the deadly "Red Ryder" for 'cat scat duty'. Works very well, and doesn't harm the kitties - shots are about thirty to fifty yards.
Not much good on a bear though........

Here in Florida, they just took the Black Bear off the 'endangered species' list. We are hoping to soon add them to the hunting list. The critters have lost all fear of man. That must change! They are getting too bold, getting too close to people, and making a real nuisance and danger of themselves.

 

As my 'cat scat duty' officer retired a few years ago, sniffle ; the air rifles and pistols which remain are way too potent to sting. Which leaves me popping rocks, making small stones jump, dropping twigs as options.. Some of the aerial gymnastics by cats are fun to watch. lol

Nope, not much good at all; however you can raise the ante if needed.
Western NC is black bear country and we are surrounded by game lands seeing them is normal. There's also a park where the idiots will feed the bears adjoining the game lands. We both carry when we hike or when going outside to throw firecrackers.

A couple of years ago there was a big boar hanging around too close to the house until firecrackers etc got to him. My female Pitt run off a small one.

I'd bet Florida is the same as here; after being fed by "man" they have lost fear of "man." People who do or would feed the bears are also the same people who get very upset when people shoot them.

 

. or just commenting on the obvious who are oblivious?

Too many people don't apply any common sense with a smidgen of education.

 

Tikka: there is nothing common about common sense, or common courtesy.
As to the obviously oblivious? Check out some Grizzly scat, they are in there. These are the idiots that try and feed wild bears to make friends with them, because they "love nature". I want to tell these clueless bleeding hearts that nature loves them raw with a side of screams! Then I remember these are likely some of the first folks who will, sadly, perish when TSHTF because of their complete and total ineptitude and feel a whole heap better.

 

Falcon15
True, some French philosopher said "There is nothing more uncommon than common sense" and there are probably quite a few more variations of that theme.

 

Yes, that would have been Voltaire. There are indeed a plethora of variations on that very theme, you are correct.

 

My favorite saying attributed to Voltaire is......

"I have never made but one prayer to God, and that was to make my enemies ridiculous. And He granted it."

 

My scat smells like nigiri sushi and pineapple:0) That woman who punched me in the nose was very good looking.... that's the only only reason why I dropped the dog and didn't eat her :0)