A 78-year-old man fought off a grizzly with his walking stick after the bear attacked his son in the woods north of Grande Cache over the weekend.

The two men were in the wilder-ness near Prairie Creek on Saturday afternoon looking for moose antlers to make into art when they ran into a bear cub trying to climb a tree.

"When I saw that cub I thought: We gotta get out of there," said local artist James Wanyandie. "The next thing I look, that bear was coming straight at me."

James fired one shot from his rifle as the bear attacked. The bullet may have hit the bear, but didn't stop it.

Tom Wanyandie, 78, watched the grizzly toss his son around by his arm "like a rag doll" and pin him to the ground.

"I see my dad. I see him running at the bear. He was swearing at it," James said.

Armed only with a walking stick, the older man took the bear on.

"He had the presence of mind to shove his walking stick down the bear's throat," said friend Bazil Leonard.

With the grizzly's attention focused on his father, James struggled, his arm broken, trying to reload his rifle. But the gun wouldn't work.

"Tom tackled the bear with his walking stick, and beat it on the head and the nose, and yelled at it, and it backed off," Leonard said.

© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

Good for these guys surviving this attack, these seem to be getting more common, not mentioning the Alta Gov't thinks there are less than 500 bears in the province!!

,,. Good on them for their tenacity and not giving up . . Too bad you guys can,t pack pistols .... My pat answer fits in right here .....


Just Kill them Bears !!