Free Republic

A mother elk and bear face off for the life of an elk calf. Screenshot: Shannon Seville/YouTube May 26 (UPI) -- A couple out observing nature in the Arizona mountains captured video of a mother elk kicking a bear in the face to rescue her calf. Shannon Seville of Flagstaff said she and her boyfriend, Joel Floyd, were cruising the Forest Service roads near the city in their new Toyota Land Cruiser earlier this week when they stopped to observe a bear. The video shows the bear menacing a crying creature concealed by a fallen branch, but is soon revealed...

A hunter in Northern Ontario, Canada got the scare of his life, and on his birthday no less, when a black bear charged and knocked him over on May 17, 2017. The man is a seasoned archery hunter and at the time was hunting on his land in Hearst, Ontario, Canada. The man stated to The Weather Network: ‘It is a true learning experience as to how unpredictable our wild black bears can be. I decided to share with everyone to show people on how fast a bear can charge attack an individual.’ The bear was not injured and the...

Todd and Kim Robertson are convinced their Ford Focus was targeted by a black bear because of the aroma of donuts that permeates inside. =============================================================================================================================== Doughnut delivery drivers in Steamboat Springs might want to start looking over their shoulders. Todd and Kim Robertson awoke early Monday to discover a black bear was so determined to break into their doughnut delivery vehicle, it ripped off the car's back bumper. The Robertsons had no doubt about the bear's motives. "It always reeks of doughnuts in there," Kim Robertson said. The bear left a paw print on the car and left the scene...

Momo is a good dog. Now, we know everyone says that about their pups (and they’re right), but this shepherd-husky-lab mix enters an elite group of really good dogs after saving her friends from a grizzly bear in a Canadian park. Kenzie Campbell said, on Sunday, he took Momo on a hike at Banff National Park in Alberta with his girlfriend and another friend. They didn’t get very far on the Cascade Ampitheatre Trail. “We just made it to the trailhead and walked around a corner, and the bear was maybe 20 feet away,” Campbell said. They backed slowly out...

Dave Smith, a well known author and expert on bear attacks, sent me a heads up on a proposed Grizzly hunting regulation.  In the  Wyoming Grizzly Bear Management Plan(pdf), on page 47, (page 55 on some pdf versions), dated  5/11/2016, is a regulation requiring that grizzly hunters carry bear spray. “All grizzly bear hunters must carry bear spray while engaged in the act of grizzly bear hunting (WGFC Regulation Chapter 16, pending)” When you are hunting bears, you would normally be carrying a rifle.  You would have to drop the rifle, then access and deploy the bear spray.  That does...

Pedals, a beloved American black bear who walked upright and strolled around the suburbs of New Jersey like a Hanna-Barbera cartoon come to life, was believed to have been killed by a hunter last week, animal welfare activists said. His age was not known. Since 2014 residents of Rockaway Township have posted videos online of the bear strolling through their neighborhoods and backyards with admirable posture, his forepaws pulled close to his chest. Many commented that on first glance, Pedals resembled a man wearing a bear suit. But it appears that local celebrity was not enough to save Pedals during...

Hiker hospitalized after bear that 'came out of nowhere' attacks near Sierra Madre - LA Times http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-bear-attack-sierra-madre-hiker-20161010-snap-story.html "An estimated 25,000 to 30,000 black bears live in California, though the animals are more commonly seen in Central and Northern California. The larger and more bellicose grizzly bear was wiped out in the state more than 90 years ago, *although in recent years there has been a modest campaign to reintroduce the animal here."

The 10mm is becoming increasingly popular as a wilderness defense gun in Alaska.  Fully loaded it is as light, and a bit more powerful than a loaded, small frame .357 magnum. The Glock 20 holds 15 rounds versus five or six for a .44 or .41 magnum revolver.  In this case near Homer, Alaska, on the Kenai peninsula, it did the job in stopping a charging brown bear sow. It happened on 29 July, 2016, a Monday afternoon about 4 p.m.  From homernews.com: A Homer man shot and killed a charging sow brown bear at Humpy Creek last Friday....

Bear breaks into house: bear and two cubs chase homeowner around inside California home. In the video, Ginn can be heard shouting, "There's a bear in my house", before quickly sprinting upstairs to hide as the bear chases him up the stairs. According to Ginn, he was locked in the room for an hour before the mother bear and her two cubs finally left and returned to nature. See the news video here.

Crews from Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation were able to capture a wild black bear that was seen in Cutler Bay. Officials were notified to the animal’s location near SW 86th Court and 207th Avenue on Friday after a nearby business said they saw the bear on their surveillance camera from the night before. The bear was eventually captured after a search of the area. FWC determined that it was a wild bear after checking with nearby facilities that house similar animals to see if they had reported any bears missing. The animal was taken to Zoo Miami, where FWC...

Check out this bear cub fight a cop. Luckily for this guy, this bear is just a cub. Bears when fully grown is best not to mess with one. Well that is unless it is a pet bear cub. This little bear has plenty of fight in it even though it is still pint sized. Give it a few months and this police officer would have no chance in hand to hand combat with a determined bear. While we do not know any specifics on this video, we do know this little bear is not to be messed with. Who...

Many hunters have talked about what to carry for bear defense while out in the woods. Here are some conversations on 1911forum and Reddit. BPHORSEGUY: There have been increasing small bear sightings in my and my dogs hiking area. I am considering carry a .45ACP instead of my 9mm and solids instead of HP. magazineman: I'd guess .44 mag or better. + running shoes. But for your purposes I'd see what handgun bear hunters use. I'd be surprised if 9mm or .45 were on the menu for that job. Big revolvers are probably the preferred item. AtheistInfantry: As a life...

A West Glacier man was killed by a grizzly bear Wednesday afternoon while riding his mountain bike on a forested trail in the Halfmoon Lakes area south of Glacier National Park.

KALISPELL, Mont. – Montana authorities say a grizzly bear attacked and killed a bicyclist riding in the Flathead National Forest just outside Glacier National Park. Flathead County Sheriff Chuck Curry told The Associated Press the person was killed Wednesday afternoon about a mile from the West Glacier KOA campground.

A black bear cub scaled a 12-foot fence in its new enclosure at an Ohio zoo and escaped for about 15 minutes before being corralled and sedated. The Columbus Zoo was put on lockdown Saturday morning for a few minutes until workers could contain the 7-month-old black cub named Joan, said zoo spokeswoman Patty Peters. No one was hurt.

Joanne Barnaby and her friend Tammy Caudron were searching for morel mushrooms in an area near Fort Smith when they were separated. Barnaby was accompanied by her trusty dog Joey. Barnaby recalls, "I heard this growl behind me. There was a long, tall, very, very skinny wolf. A black wolf. And his legs were spread and his hair was standing, and he was growling, and baring his teeth." This black wolf seemed to know what it was doing and was pushing them back further into the woods. Barnaby said, “He was trying to wear me down. He was trying to...

Human flesh and hair have been found inside the stomach of a bear thought to have killed at least one person in Japan. Locals have been warned to stay away from the mountainous Akita region after the body of a badly mauled woman was found last week. Last month three men in their sixties and seventies also died in apparent attacks while harvesting bamboo in a mountain forest. Bear attacks on humans in the region are not unusual - but fatal ones are. Local vet Takeshi Komatsu said it was possible the bear may have "got a taste for human...

Joanne Barnaby was stalked by a wolf for 12 hours, eventually leading the animal into a trap What's the best way to fend off a wolf that's stalking you? Bait it with a bear cub, of course. It sounds incredible, but that's exactly what Joanne Barnaby did when she got into a terrifying situation while out picking morel mushrooms near Fort Smith, N.W.T., last Friday. Barnaby and her friend Tammy Caudron headed out to an area burned by wildfires to spend an hour or two searching for the elusive morels. They soon became separated, leaving Barnaby alone with her loyal...

A black bear bit through the tent and into the lower leg of a man who was hiking the Appalachian Trail and camped for the night at a national park in Tennessee, park officials said on Thursday. Bradley Veeder, 49, of Las Vegas, was sleeping around 11 p.m. local time in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on Tuesday when the bear attacked, park spokeswoman Dana Soehn said by telephone. Because it was so dark, Veeder and nearby campers did not see the bear, which was initially scared away by his screams, Soehn said. Park officials said it was a...

An assistant professor who was mauled by a bear while teaching a mountaineering class is in critical condition. 35-year old, Forest Wagner, was teaching to a group of 12 students on Mount Emmerich near Haines, Alaska, when he was attacked ... Wagner has been teaching in the outdoor studies program at the university's Juneau campus since 2006. ... A second man, 77 year old, Glenn Bohn, was mauled on Friday by a bear. He is recovering from his injuries. Bohn's son-in-law killed the bear during the attack near Mile 68 of Denali Highway.