Living in "bear" country

[SvenLindquist]

Shooting of a properly trained horse is drama free. My Dad had a "mounted pistol" bar on his Expert Medal. Shooting a 1911 while navigating a course of dummy soldiers.

My plan is to "get outta Dodge" if I see a bear. If the horse leaves me behind, I have 5 for the bear and 1 for me.

[John Van Gelder]

I like nylon holsters as well, seems they do not wear the finish on blued guns as much as leather.

[Markopolo]

They hold up to getting repeatedly wet and dried when fishing in a Rain Forest..

[Dieselhorses]

This was interesting on my way to work one morning...

[Markopolo]

Awwwwww just a little guy.. and looks scared and lost... probably not an every day appearance.

[John Van Gelder]

Sometimes I have bears that become a real nuisance and pose a threat to me and/or my animals. I had one that was coming around on the order of three times a day for a couple of weeks. At some point enough is enough.

That is my 4" mod 28 S&W, using the 358429 bullet over 7 gr. of Unique.

[Markopolo]

Very cool... hope it was a spring Bear....

[John Van Gelder]

It was a later in the summer bear, and the photo was taken about 50 yards from my front porch.

[Markopolo]

Do you have salmon around there?? Is a summer bear an eater around there???

[John Van Gelder]

No appreciable fish populations in the area, these bears eat mostly vegetative material and berries when in season, they are not above killing deer and stashing them back under a dead fall to season.. I took this bear as a nuisance and surrendered it to the local federal game agent. We do occasionally get a big bear, the agent caught one in his big culvert trap, the bear was so big that he bent the hitch on the trap when he was thrashing around in the trap.

[Markopolo]

Ahhh I see... I forget about the lower 48 rules sometimes vs bush rules.. I always have a spare tag, but of course we get 5 black bear tags each here over the counter... so having a tag for such an occasion is a given... do they have Black bear tags there? Or is it a draw?

[John Van Gelder]

The black bear tags is just a general hunt, no draw, up here in my neighbourhood there are more bears than people. My friend the game agent goes from one bear call to the next in the summer months, and then there are the mt. lions and wolves. One of the little towns just south of here had a "plague" of wild turkeys, so the game agent was thinning the "herd" trying to get them to move out of town.

[luvtn]

I appreciate this no nonsense “bear thread”. I live in Middle Tn, and have bear. Every two to three years a bear, termed as a “honey bear” by the old timers, comes through digging up the yellow jacket nests. I have never seen them, only where they have been( nests dug up, scat, trees scratched). One evening at dusk I was on the road walking where there are dense trees-junipers on one side, hickory and oak on the other, I heard a deer blow back in the junipers, but instead of running away, it came towards me stomping its foot as it came within 30 feet of me. I was armed with an Ruger SP-101, in .357 mag, 158 gr LSWC over 13.5 grs 2400. While reading Stephen Herrera’s book on bear attacks, he described a black bear bluff attack exactly as I experienced it. I lived alone for many years. Coyotes, feral dogs and cats abound, so to protect self and livestock I have carried for many years. What kind of velocity do you get from the 329, and it’s short barrel?
Luvtn

[John Van Gelder]

I have had a bear hanging around since about the middle of May, he got into my horse feed one night and decided he liked it. He came back a couple more times, but my dogs ran him off. Within the last couple of weeks he had been comming closer to the house and threatening my dogs. I tried some warning shots to discourage the bear, but that only took for a day or two. Last Tuesday evening he was back, we, the bear my dogs and I, went went round and round through the thickets, brush up over my head, after about a 1/2 hour of this the dogs had the bear in a thicket just above my driveway, the bear tried to grab one of the dogs, my only clear shot. The light was failing, hard to get a good sight picture, I got off one shot with my Ruger 9mm, the bear took off so quickly there wasn't a chance for a second shot.

From the response I thought I had missed, the bear was gone, so good enough. A couple of days later I was walking through the same area, picked up a very bad smell and came on a tree full of buzzards. After the shot the bear had gone 20 yards into a thicket and died.

Lee 125 gr. RNFP over 4.6 gr. of Bullseye, Ruger 9E.

[luvtn]

I found this video on the news: https://apple.news/AQ-H9JmaMQgiiTcvQTIGPUg
Shows a dog chasing a blackie out of the yard. Note what attracted the bear.
Luvtn