Ive read somewhere that a snub nose on a string around your neck is the ticket when around dangerous game if you miss with your primary weapon when the animal takes you to the ground you stick it to his ribs or chin and start pulling the triger.

Must have been some pretty thick forest to not be able to see a bear of that size. Glad to hear he is OK though!!

PECOS 45 -"N E - With all due respect, I think if he had a powerful pistol on his hip, he would have been killed for sure. The Bear might have die as a result of pistols shots...but not until he had killed the hunter."

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Pecos 45, I stongly disagree with your statement. I personally know one hunter who was charged by a large Black bear in central Calif., and was able to kill the bear with his S&W 57 .41 Magnum revolver, WHILE the bear was tearing on him. He told me that all he really remembers after the bear hit him and was top of him was his revolver going "click, click, click..." on empty chambers after he had fired six into the bear. The backs of his upper arms look like someone hit him repeatedly with hay hooks, and there are large scars on his right calf where the bear also took notice. But he's alive and still hunting because he used his revolver on the bear. And he still carries that .41 Magnum while hunting.



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LAWDOG GARY -"I have talked to two different hunters that were carrying handguns when attacked and in each case the bear would attack the hand that went for the handgun. People seem to think that a bear will ignore a moving hand that is going for another weapon."

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I'd certainly like to know the stories of those two hunters who had bears charge them, but the bears attacked the handguns, first. I doubt very, very seriously that a bear has some humanistic knowledge of what a handgun, or long gun, for that matter, is. If a bear happens to hit first the outstretched hand holding a weapon, that is because that is the object nearest to the charging bear.



As for NOT shooting a bear gnawing on me, 'cause I MIGHT piss him off, it seems to me that the bear is ALREADY pissed off, and the most important thing is to fight back with whatever weapon is available at the moment, handgun, knife, rock, stick, whatever. With me, were I unable to use my rifle, it would be either my .41 Magnum, or my .45 Colt, with my heavy handloads.



According to real experts and those who live among the bears-- Blacks, Grizzlies, Browns, Polars-- they are EXTREMELY unpredictable, and trying to predict any given bear's behavior is often an excercize in dangerous futility.

("Alaska Bear Tales," by Larry Kaniut; "The Outdoor Life Bear Book," edited by Chet Fish; "Hunters of the Great North," by Viljalmur Stefansson.)



It'll be a cold day in Hell when I allow a bear to mangle me, while I have a revolver, yet won't use it on the bear, all the while hoping Mr. Bear will not mangle me tooooo badly, 'cause I was nice enough not to shoot him and kill him.



With all due apologies to the great playwright, Tennessee Williams ("A Streetcar Named Desire"), I have NEVER depended on the kindness of strange bears for my well being.



I shall continue carrying my handgun out in the bear woods. Others have the right to NOT carry, if they so choose.



FWIW. L.W.

Leanwolf,

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I'd certainly like to know the stories of those two hunters who had bears charge them, but the bears attacked the handguns, first. I doubt very, very seriously that a bear has some humanistic knowledge of what a handgun, or long gun, for that matter, is.

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Where did I ever say the bear went for the weapon? Read what I said again. "and in each case the bear would attack the hand that went for the handgun." The bears went for the moving part of their body.

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It'll be a cold day in Hell when I allow a bear to mangle me, while I have a revolver

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If the bear lets you get a hold of it. Lawdog