BW, I guess we osted at the same time...

Great minds, thinking alike, at the same time...

I wouldn't think twice about shooting a bear that threatened my dog or any piece of my property for that matter.

notice how people that don't live in bear country just don't get it.
take care gp

Gotta stick up for my friend Brian (BW). I've spent a lot of time in Sitka, have a lot of friends there, and know a little about what happened last week. For those of you who haven't spent time there, rethink the context. This is a town of about 8,000 people on an island in SE Alaska that has one of the highest concentrations of brown bears in the world. Maybe Chichigof and Admiralty are higher, but not many other places. Mostly these bears gorge on salmon, berries, and other readily available natural foods, and pretty much leave people and pets alone. (Not much livestock in SE AK.) Occasionally, one decides to adopt another lifestyle. This particular bear was three years old, and weighed between 350 and 400 lbs -- small for this country, actually. This is your basic subadult male bear looking for a life. Once he had determined that he could hang out in town and eat dogs, garbage, birdfeeders and whatever else was handy, he was doomed. Sooner or later, something bad was going to happen. The officers involved have been through this drill before -- it happens often enough that the results are pretty predictable. Once a bear starts down the conflict and confrontation path, it will be killed. In this case, unfortunate though it may be, it was the right thing to do.

To summarize: This bear was not killed because it whacked someone's dog. It was killed because it was a demonstrated threat to people in Sitka.

OK guys its was "only" a dog...but what happens if the next time the dog is a little quicker of the mark, (or the owner a bit slower) and the dog races back its owner with Yoggi in full pursuit???? What happens if its the kids which are walking the dog? I suspect that a large dose of common sense was used in dealing with this issue by the people on the ground....BTW, are any of the locals up in arms about how this has been dealt with????

All you guys in favor of killing the bear, you all have one thing in common, FACTS! Yep, it isn't irrational hysteria as some that don't have a clue would have you believe. It is an almost 99% certainty that this bear would have traveled the path of least resistance from then on, as was suggested many times already. Most bears, Browns included, will avoid humans at all costs, and that is almost a 99% certanty as well... we call those FACTS. This is what we base our intelligent and informed decisions upon too. Trust me, if this bear didn't need to get killed, he would have been spared.... seriously, just trust me on that one. They don't dispatch a bear if it don't warrant it!

I, on the other hand, would empty my clip in the bastard if it even looked crosseyed at my dog, attacked him or killed him, no bones about it, that bear is one dead $uckin bear! Wright me a ticket, take my rifle, do what you have to... that bear is dead meat! Give me a jury trial, I'll take my chances!

Related note last fall a 415 lb black bear killed a very expensive dairy goat $5000 range the bear was live trapped tagged and moved. Just the couple of days ago the same bear entered the same barn and killed the goat's replacement. Once they learn a easy way they keep coming back. Iam surprised that the dogs owner wasn't armed and would have taken care of the matter himself.

What I was saying when you live where there are Bear(Brown /Griz/Black ) You have to except the possibility that you may become dinner!! It's the law of nature. Get stupid in there home and you pay the price. The only other way to go about it is like it was stated before -you'll have to kill all the bears!!! You either live with them or you kill then all no two ways about it!!! So if your some dumb a$$ that thinks you can walk through Bear country with your head up you anal orfice then you get eaten-been going on for million of years!! Survival of the fittest

What I was saying when you live where there are Bear(Brown /Griz/Black ) You have to except the possibility that you may become dinner!! It's the law of nature. Get stupid in there home and you pay the price. The only other way to go about it is like it was stated before -you'll have to kill all the bears!!! You either live with them or you kill then all no two ways about it!!! So if your some dumb a$$ that thinks you can walk through Bear country with your head up you anal orfice then you get eaten-been going on for million of years!! Survival of the fittest

--------------------
Gunnut45/454-One shot! One Kill

I understand your point exactly, it applies to more encounters than you can even believe too.

If you don't prepare for the worst, you might find yourself in a BAD SPOT someday if your in bear country... it can and does happen all the time.

Take for instance, the guy that was gutting his deer on Kodiak Island when he set his gun TOO FAR AWAY FROM HIM, a bear came out of the brush and wanted his deer, hell, the dinner bell "shot" just rang a few minutes earlier! He was lucky enough to kill the bear with his BUCK KNIFE! He was almost a "thinned part of the heard" too!

Hikers without guns, people in their back yards just taking nature for grant it, the list goes on and on...

Here's the problem though, we know that by dispatching certain animals that exibit certain behaviors will keep the problem from spiraling out of control to the point that "many" animals need to be dispatched to keep them from teaching the rest more unacceptable behaviors.

The number of bears killed to maintain this basically peacefull coexistence is really very, very few. If we ever let it get out of control by being stupid about it, it would be only much worse in the end... not better. Thank God, we as humans aren't stupid enough to let that happen... "survival of the fittest" say I and many others that see the results of letting the problem go, it's well documanted what happens when you do, just do the research.

Killing all the bears is not the answer, everyone knows you can't stop all attacks unless you did just that, all we can do is minimize them from KNOWLEDGE LEARNED about their behavior, something I wish people would put their efforts into instead of proving just how much they HAVE NOT.

Minimizing and maintaining them to the level they have is quite an accomplishment, and astonishing if you ask me. Let up on the diligent management of them for a while and see what happens though

Take care.

This has not made the national news yet, but it appears that on Monday, a couple of young fellows hunting for sheds by Caribou Island on Tustemena Lake (here on the Kenai)were roughed up by momma brownie. It was reported that a cub or cubs may have been involved. One of the fellows made it up a tree high enough and the other was drug out of another tree. More details are sketchy; however, it sounds like neither had a firearm...neither died...one had a fair amount of injuries...the bears are still running around. This is not a really remote place to get to; anyone with a boat can be there in an hour or less. Many inexperienced (bear wise)people go here camping as this part of the lake is rather safe to navigate (other than the hidden gravel shoals.) The rest of this huge body of water is home to incliment weather that can at times appear in minutes! More on this human/bear conflict as facts come in.
best,
bhtr

"It's the law of nature. Get stupid in there home and you pay the price. The only other way to go about it is like it was stated before -you'll have to kill all the bears!!! You either live with them or you kill then all no two ways about it!!! So if your some dumb a$$ that thinks you can walk through Bear country with your head up you anal orfice then you get eaten-been going on for million of years!! Survival of the fittest"

I bet you don't live in an urban area, do you? This sounds like an excellent management tool for gang bangers and drug dealers that have taken over parts of the city. Or do you turn it over to them? After all, they may not hurt you. Or then, they might.

Of course, I don't know about that, I live in bear country...

)

This is a more factual update on the young fellows described above. The event happened over the weekend. They are both 17 years old. There may have been a couple of other fellows in the area. They were hunting for black bear and were indeed armed. They both were in treestands; the one mauled was climbing down from his stand, turned around and found a brown bear huffing and charging him. He threw up his rifle and fired one shot; the bear crumpled at his feet. Relief of deciding this encounter lasted only a second. This bear was a two year old of just under 6' and around 200 lbs. He turned to the sound of another angry bear and headed up the 10' to the safety of his stand. The sow stood up and grabbed his leg and yarded him out of the tree. Once on the ground, she proceded to pounce up and down on him. The rest of the info given by a friend of the young boys stated that the other lad fired a shot that caused the sow to leave the former...the boy got up...the sow came back twice...the victim emptied his 44 mag into the sow...the other boy arrived on the scene and shot the sow twice with his rifle...the sow walked (ran?) away and will probably have died by now...the boy had any number of staples to close up his scalp...had a crushed elbow and broken wrist...and had perhaps as many as 80 puncture wounds to his body, which vary in size. The young man was released from the hospital and in good spirits. It was also reported that a statement closing the fall brown bear season is to be forthcoming. I'm not sure of the numbers, but have heard of at least 8 brown bear that have been killed here in defense of life and property.

Waksupi,
I would call the area I live in quite unique as there are close to 40,000 people that live within a 40 mile circle of me. I live in a small town of 5,000, with another 15,000 that live within 10 miles. Not urban (perhaps) by your definition, but decidedly not rural either. The unique part has to do with the wildlife that is just minutes away, if not closer. I live less than two blocks away from our closest highschool and middle school, 4 from the post office and our borough administration office (you might say county seat?) I have moose walking in my yard at least once a week and caribou venture by this month not a mile from my desk. I watched two brown bears take down a caribou last year at the end of the local airstrip's fence. Two days ago, I walked into my black bear hunting stand and walked into a large fellow that would go 8-8 1/2'. He saw how ugly I was and must have know I was carrying the 416 because he chose to vacate rather than argue.That was less than 7 miles as the crow flies from where I'm typing this now. Most of the people that live here are gun owners and many concealed carry permit holders as well. Not too large of a drug problem here...most criminals recognize this and give the place a wide berth...for the most part anyway.
best,
bhtr

ps. I also live in bear country!

[ 05-14-2003, 10:30: Message edited by: bearhunt'r ]

Bearhunter,
I've floated down the Kasiloff from the put in to go up to Tustamina lake "once". Around the first couple corners where a hairpin turn on the river is, well, we met a hungry grizz. Only the second time with a real close call. He was a young one and was bounching down the bank toward us as we back paddled to the sand bank opposite him. I had a Glock 26 9mm! Ha! We flipped the canoe on it's side and started blowing whistles we had on us just for this reason. He turned at the last second and hit the bushes, he just didn't know what to think about those whistles and freaked out and turned away. Thank God we had them!!!!! My Glock was looking like a toy about then! I knew then, I'd never be back without a real freakin gun!

My friend was rustled in his tent, twice, on an island on the lake there, told me he'd never go back without a shotgun... ever again.

Tustamina is big bear country over there boy!

In a tree stand, I assume they were baiting black bear. Grizz eat out of those barrels too, the hair they leave gives them away. You'll never hear them walk up either, even if it's so quiet you could hear a PIN DROP! They are dead silent!

When you're around bait, you've got to have your wits about you... sow and cubs just make it much worse. Shoot a cub, mama's going to be pissed!!

It's more likely they shot that grizz over bait, which is illegal for grizz, and went down to check it out and mama got one of them while they weren't paying attention. Just a guess, but I figure the sow is likely the first to woof and charge, not a cub. Sounds fishy to me.

Brent,
The story hit the ADN, and by now you've read it. It was a "righteous" hunt and no bait was evident...it was raining and the young feller bit was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. My two reports suggested Caribou Island; however, it turns out that they went from there to (aptly named) Bear Creek area. It was just last year or two that two Bou hunters were hit by momma with 2 cubs. If a person travels Bear Creek they should NEVER let their guard down. It is heavily infested and, IMHO, holds all 200-300 of the brown bear that F&G estimates that the Kenai hold! (This said with tongue in cheek!)
best,
bhtr

Sorry, should have read the entire thread!

[ 05-14-2003, 23:29: Message edited by: m1rage ]

Never read the story, and hardly ever the ADN anyway. The tree stand is why I assumed the bait station, most guys around here don't use a stand unless it's over bait, you might wait a year before one walks under you! Hunting down there may be a little different though, maybe they were overlooking a large area from up high is all.

Had a moose give birth to a single calf right in the back yard last year, that was pretty cool. They don't waste much time before getting up and wobbling and then walking either! The kids loved it.

My neibors, they shot three black bears one morning right in the yard while I was at work. The first was a sow, two minutes later a boar came over to investigate and was popped too. They went in to get some coffie, when another big boar came down to investigate! The guys son shot that one. All right in the yard!

The biggest one my grandfather has gotten was down the road a couple miles, he shot it right between his garage and the house! That was the third one he got since he's lived there in 1951.

Here's one for you, he went out one morning in 1955 I think, the dogs were all barking up a storm, he thought it was a moose or bear messing with them. You'd never guess what it was! It was a big ass freaking cougar! No BS either, it stopped at the base of the mountain where the dogs were chained up. It was looking for dinner is what he said. It turned around and went back up the mountain about 15 seconds after he spotted him in the middle of all the dog houses.

That's the only report of a cougar this far up here I've ever heard about.

Guys,

Mark(BHTR) is right when he says the Tustumena area is loaded with Brownies. I was fishing in Bear Creek season before last and bears were everywhere. We saw a couple of monsters on the creek fishing for reds. Since the floods here on the Anchor this last Oct.-Nov. the river's gravel bars are easy to walk and two weeks ago I found a huge brownie track a ways from the cabin. Looks like there will be no season here on the K Peninsula again this coming season due to the road kill and DLPs. With tourist season upon us, the count will surely increase.

Joe

Ovis,
Do you know John and Linda Phillips? They own Sea Bear Charters out of Homer?

Brent,

Yes, I do. Good people, honest charter.
Goin' fishing? Halibut and Kings are everywhere.

Joe

Ovis,
They're my Aunt and Uncle.
I didn't make it down fishin last year with them but, the year before we went out and pulled in 100 halibut(catch and release), a few were skates, lords and cod but, 80% were 20-50 pound halibut. We fished the most beautifull day, water was glass. Reeling in fish all day long, two or three on at the same time. After noon we started keeping the bigger thirty-fourty pounders, my son caught the two biggest at 50. We went down for his 12th birthday, he loved it.

John knows his fishin boys! Always has too!

bearstalker,
I got your PM. One back at ya. That's great stuff!

"Shame to kill a bear..."

Live around wolves and the relatively small grizzly with us for a while and you may change your collective tune.

Well said muledeer. In Montana we've had similar things happen here, except it was with cougars and bears and kids have been killed by these animals. Here a year or two ago one got into my dads yard and the fish and game people trapped her and her two cubs and hauled them to the bitterroots. One way or the other a wild animal in a populated area spells trouble and has to be dealt with one way or the other. In this case I feel it was right.