Free Republic

-(Ammoland.com)- When various far-left ecology and animal rights groups such as the Sierra Club, the Humane Society of the United States, the Center for Biological Diversity, submitted a petition, calling for the mandatory carry of bear spray by hunters, it made national news. The petition was submitted to the Idaho Fish and Game Commission and others. The petition claimed that “Studies show that bear spray is far more effective than firearms.” That claim is not correct. The petition was written about in several Idaho outlets, and nationally.The Commission turned down the request that the carry of bear spray by...

Many places on the Internet continue to claim that bear spray is more effective at stopping bear attacks than firearms. There is no objective source for these claims. They are mostly based on a spurious comparison of the deterrent effects of bear spray on curious or food seeking bears compared to a selection of bear attacks where firearms were present, and sometimes used.  It is not a valid comparison.  Author Dave Smith explains the problem: Efficacy of Firearms for Bear Deterrence in Alaska and Efficacy of Bear Deterrent Spray in Alaska were 2 halves of a straw man argument...

A robot punctured a can of bear spray. Now 24 Amazon workers are Twenty-four Amazon workers in New Jersey have been hospitalized after a robot accidentally tore a can of bear repellent spray in a warehouse, officials said. The two dozen workers were treated at five local hospitals, Robbinsville Township communications and public information officer John Nalbone told ABC News. One was in critical condition while 30 additional workers were treated at the scene. All of the workers were expected to be released from the hospital within 24 hours, WABC reported Thursday. The official investigation revealed "an automated machine accidentally...

Teen fights off charging grizzly with bear spray after being pinned face-down on the ground [Good Morning America] MORGAN WINSOR Good Morning AmericaApril 11, 2019 Teen fights off charging grizzly with bear spray after being pinned face-down on the ground originally appeared on abcnews.go.com A teenager who encountered a bear in Montana on Sunday was pinned to the ground by the animal but managed to escape using bear spray, authorities said. The 17-year-old boy told wildlife officials that he was walking down a hill in a remote area some 30 miles south of Ennis on Sunday afternoon when he heard...

One of the issues in determining the efficacy of guns and bear spray in stopping bear attacks is how to decide if an incident should be included in the database. One of my selection criteria is: an incident should only be included if the bear spray was actually sprayed or if a shot were actually fired.  Here are two examples of incidents that should not be included in the statistics for the efficacy of either bear spray or firearms. The first is an example of when the bear spray was available, but not used.On 23 July 2011, a group of...

Twenty-four Amazon workers in New Jersey have been hospitalized after a robot accidentally tore a can of bear repellent spray in a warehouse, officials said. The two dozen workers were treated at five local hospitals, Robbinsville Township communications and public information officer John Nalbone told ABC News. One remains in critical condition and 30 additional workers were treated at the scene.

On 12 July, 2018, a salmon researcher was treed by a pack of wolves in a Washington state wilderness area. She tried pepper spray and yelling, but the pack surrounded her and she climbed a tree. She later climbed down, only to find the wolves still there. She scrambled back up the tree and called for rescue, about 12:30 p.m. From capitalpress.com: Washington wildlife managers initially opposed sending a helicopter or a search-and-rescue team to save a woman treed by wolves in the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, according to recordings and summaries of emergency calls obtained Tuesday.The Department of Natural Resources...

Dave Smith has studied bear behavior and bear attacks extensively. He has written books on how to survive bear encounters and animal attacks.  I have corresponded with Dave Smith. I find Dave to be the most knowledgeable, well read, and capable critic of the current literature.  Dave has worked prodigiously to understand the studies about the effectiveness of bear spray and firearms in stopping bear attacks. In November of 2017, Dave put a great deal of thought into an exchange of comments at a Wyoming public media site. I contacted Dave, and he agreed to allow me to edit and...

I have not found any other reports of this attack and the defensive use of spray and firearms. This is not unusual. None of the people involved were injured, except for the exposure to bear spray, which did not incapacitate them. This story was published in goHUNT.com on 27 December, 2017. The writer is Jake Purlee. Although not explicitly stated, a comment on Jake's facebook page says the the events recounted occurred two years ago in 2015. Jake and his friends were hunting elk and wolves. They encountered evidence of bears and decided to leave the area. The two...

A hunter who was tracking a wounded elk was attacked by a grizzly. The bear chomped on his hand, then retreated. The hunter had a rifle, but chose to use bear spray instead. He got ready for the bear with the bear spray. The bear came back.The hunter sprayed the bear and himself. The bear retreated. The bear came back. The bear spray was empty. They hunter threw the empty can at the bear.  The bear retreated.Having expended the potential for bear spray defense, the hunter readied his rifle.They bear did not come back. From krtv.com: He put up...

I am looking for help from someone who has access to the September-October 2012 edition of Sports Afield magazine. It is the 125th Anniversary edition. I am looking to confirm a quote from BYU professor Tom Smith. It is probably in the "Hunt Safely in Grizzly Country" article, but I do not have a page number. The quote is:  "If I'm actually out hunting and I have a gun in my hands a suddenly a bear comes at me--do you think I'm going to lay the gun down and pick up bear spray? Are you out of your mind?"...

Another case of bear spray failure occurred in Montana on September 4th at about 8 a.m.  A grizzly bear charged through bear spray to get at Tom Sommers.Sommers and his partner Dan were bow hunting for elk when they saw the bear about 30 feet away.  Dan put out a cloud of spray, but the bear charged through it.Sommers was unable to get the safety off his spray can and dropped it as the bear closed with him. He then accessed a pistol, but was unable to shoot before the bear swatted his hand down. As the bear attacked...

JACKSON, Wyo. (AP) — Grizzly bears continue to expand their range amid an ongoing effort to turn over management of the bears from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to the states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, a federal official said. “We’ve seen an 11 percent change in increasing range in just a couple of years,” Frank van Manen, head scientist of the Interagency Grizzly Bear Study Team, said last week at a meeting in Jackson. Since coming under the protection of the Endangered Species Act, grizzlies have steadily expanded their habitat outward from the population’s core in Yellowstone National...

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...

Another grizzly bear attack in Montana.  A man was mauled. It sounds like he sprayed the bear with pepper spray while being mauled, but that is a bit unclear. From kbzk.com: The Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks reports a man suffered bites to the head, shoulder and wrist after being attacked by a grizzly bear north of Whitefish on Sunday. (snip) He was able to use pepper spray against the bear during the attack, which caused the bear to flee back toward the direction from where it charged. It is possible that the dogs were part of...

Another documented bear spray failure.  In this case the victim chose to use bear spray instead of the pistol he had with him.  It is an interesting contrast with Kim Woodman, who was also charged by a sow grizzly with cubs.  Kim had a 10 mm pistol, a Glock model 20.  He stopped the charging grizzly at almost contact distance. Kim only had 30 yards to react.  Todd says the grizzly charged him from 80 yards off. Link to video From Todd's facebook post:  I yelled a number of times so she knew I was human and would hopefully...

Bear spray is a useful tool that can help protect humans and bears in limited circumstances.  It seems that if a bear is not serious about mauling, killing, and/or eating the human, the spray can convince a bear to stop investigating the human and leave them alone.  But the ability of spray to stop bears bent on attack is far less certain.  Here are two more cases where bear spray failed and bullets were necessary.  From kxlo-clcm.com: A lone female grizzly bear reportedly surprised a man hunting elk at Big Creek north of Gardiner on Oct. 28. The hunter...

Almost all bear spray comes in containers that are too large to be transported with you on commercial aircraft.It is interesting to note that bear spray is more difficult to transport on commercial aircraft than firearms are.  Both are prohibited from transport as carry ons, unless you have special dispensation from the government.  Then you can carry firearms, if you are an LEO with a letter authorizing it, a Sky Marshall, or a couple of other very special cases.  I do not know if Sky Marshalls or federal agents may carry pepper spray in the cabins of commercial aircraft.But...

Three recent cases of bear attack in Wyoming illustrate the flaws in studies purporting to show that bear spray is superior to firearms as a defense against bears.    On September 20th, 2014 the following incident occurred.  From county10.com: (Dubois, Wyo.) – The Wyoming Game and Fish Department and the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service both confirmed today that a third bear incident occurred this past weekend, on Saturday in northwestern Fremont County. In this incident, Lander Large Carnivore Specialist Brian DeBolt said a Grizzly bear was shot and killed “in an act of self defense” in the East...

A San Francisco man was acquitted Thursday of breaking into his ex-fiancée’s house and assaulting her new lover before getting sprayed with bear mace by a shirtless neighbor. The two had met in a hacky-sack circle in early February and announced plans to marry just two weeks later, Streets said. But the relationship quickly turned tumultuous, Streets said, and the pair broke up on March 25. Hall took his few possessions and moved out of his fiancée’s home and into a tree at Mclaren Park. But as Hall climbed the tree and attempted to sleep that first night, he became...