Dean Weingarten at AmmoLand:

On Tuesday, August 30, at about 6:50 p.m., James Little settled into campsite 674 in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA). His youngest child was a few feet away.  His youngest cried out, and James grabbed the child and took a couple of steps, uncertain of what had happened.

Then his oldest yelled, “Bear!” and James turned around. The bear was about six feet from him. It had been within 3-4 feet of his back when the child was startled. This was the start of the remarkable incident. In James’ words:

Just finished a trip to Horseshoe that should have been three nights, but turn to one. (Campsite 674) Had a bear walk right into camp and within four feet of my youngest! Nothing would discourage him till I fired a couple of rounds.  We packed up and bolted to an open site (campsite 677) a half mile away on the other side of the lake. Weren’t there five minutes and was pulling up the food bag and my wife screamed. There was another bear fifteen feet away heading to our canoe with our kids in it. I had to fire another round before he would be deterred.  Left that site and unexpected BWCA.com member Ausable and his crew took my family and me in for the night. (Campsite 672) Early the next morning, we broke came and headed out. My family had had too much. Across from the portage from Caribou to Lizz, (campsite 645) the campers there had their breakfast intruded upon by a bear who would not be deterred till he had taken their food bag.

This correspondent talked to James, who reported the incident to the BWCA authorities.

James used a North American Arms mini revolver, the Wasp model in .22 magnum, with a 1 5/8 inch barrel. The revolver was loaded with Speer Gold Dot defensive ammunition.

Read the rest at the link.

Mr. Weingarten explains several drills that can be used to prepare for a bear encounter.

AmmoLand:

Realistic bear defense drills can help prepare gun owners for actual situations.

The success of Eli Dicken in stopping a mass murder in the early stages, with excellent marksmanship at a claimed 40 yards, has engendered a plethora of people creating and executing some form of a “Dicken Drill” of ten shots at 40 yards.

There have been a number of “bear defense” exercises, usually arranged to simulate a worst-case scenario. I know of one such scenario, as it was related to me, by the inventor/trainer who ran it for a major agency.

The “bear” ran on a cart, as I recall, starting 10 yards away.  Speed was determined by the person who ran away from the shooting line, pulling the bear, which also moved up and down on the terrain, toward the trainee shooter.

I’ve seen a video of a drill similar to this.

The trainer prepped the trainee, to be tested, thus the trainee was armed with a pump shotgun with a sling. There were rounds in the magazine, but none allowed in the chamber. The shotgun had to be slung on the shoulder, with the safety on, and the bolt locked forward.  To engage the target, the trainee had to unsling the shotgun, disengage the bolt lock, work the action, disengage the safety, then shoot.  Alternatively, the trainee could unsling the shotgun, disengage the safety, dry fire the shotgun, which would disengage the bolt lock, work the action, and then shoot.

Once preparation to do the drill was ready, the trainer would engage the trainee with a question or small talk. When the trainee’s attention was off the “bear” the trainer would give the secret signal to start the bear charging at the trainee. Unsurprisingly, few trainees managed to get off a shot and hit the “bear”.

Trainers can create a drill to obtain the effect they want to establish.

A bear’s brain is reasonably close to the size and shape of a 12-ounce beverage can. To build confidence in shooters concerned about bear defense, I suggest these drills, taken from actual bear defense situations. The 12-ounce can should be oriented close to how it would be in a bear.

I have serious reservations about going for a headshot with a grizzly or even a black. Their skull is pretty thick. Large caliber hits at center mass seem like the best option. He explains The Ralph Fletcher Drill, The Dusel-Bacon Drill, The Cecil Rhodes Drill, and The Tanner Allen Drill.

Source:

A hunter was attacked by a brown bear Thursday morning [This happened at the end of August] near Ship Creek after he shot it but didn’t realize it was still alive, an Alaska Department of Fish and Game official said.

That’s a perilous situation. Any large animal and all predators can be dangerous when shot, and it can be hard to know if they are actually dead.

The hunter, treated at a hospital for injuries, was able to make his way out of the area without calling for rescue, said Cory Stantorf, an assistant wildlife biologist for the Anchorage area.

The man shot a large adult brown bear between about 9 and 10 a.m. in an area near Ship Creek and up the valley from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson land, Stantorf said. It is legal to hunt in the area, he said.

The man then approached the bear, which he thought was dead, and it got up and charged him, the biologist said.

The bear wounded him during the attack, according to Stantorf, although he said he could not provide additional details about the injuries or how severe they were.

Others in the hunting party shot at the bear, Stantorf said, and it stopped attacking and left. The hunters made it out of the area without further incident, he said.

It wasn’t clear by Friday morning if the bear had died from the gunshot wounds, Stantorf said. The hunting party was returning to the area to look for the bear, he said.

Grizz are tough critters.

There have been several other bear maulings in Anchorage this year. A soldier was killed and another was injured during a defensive attack involving a sow brown bear with cubs on a remote area of JBER in May.

A man was treated at the hospital last month after he surprised a sow brown bear with a cub in Eagle River. A woman was also injured last month when a black bear swatted at her on the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail near Point Woronzof.

Stantorf said it’s important that anyone recreating outdoors in the backcountry or even in Anchorage is paying attention to their surroundings and looking for bears.

F&S.

A man in the ski town of Steamboat Springs, Colorado shot and killed a black bear that entered his home in the middle of the night. According to the Colorado Department of Parks and Wildlife (CPW), homeowner Ken Mauldin dispatched the bruin with a .40 caliber Glock handgun after it opened and walked through an exterior door.

“The door was unlocked, and it’s one of the older-style lever door handles. So, the bear pushed on that to get the door open,” CPW public information officer Rachel Gonzalez tells F&S. “[Mauldin] was alerted when his wife screamed. It was just after 2 a.m. when we received the incident notification.”

Three things pop into my mind.

First, this is yet another anecdote that justifies carry inside the home.

Second, this anecdote justifies closing and locking the door.

Third, that’s a lot of rounds.  Nine rounds to put this bear down.  This advocates for accuracy or high capacity, or preferably both.

Source.

Early on July 6, 2021, Leah Lokan awoke to a 417-pound grizzly bear a few feet from her tent, so close that she heard when the bear “huffed” at her head.

“Bear! Bear!” Lokan yelled, prompting Joe and Kim Cole — two other cyclists camping in the small town of Ovando as they trekked across Montana — to spring from their nearby tent, armed with bear spray and clamoring as much as possible, according to a 26-page report addressed by the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee’s executive body earlier this month.

The bear fled.

After scaring it off, Lokan, a 65-year-old visiting from Chico, Calif., moved food out of her tent to a nearby building. She armed herself with a can of bear spray. She declined an offer to stay in a hotel for the night. Then, she and the Coles returned to their respective tents.

Lokan’s extra precautionary measures weren’t enough. The bear returned about an hour after the first encounter and mauled her to death.

A year later, wildlife officials said the bear that killed her had developed a “predatory instinct.” Although they couldn’t determine exactly how such an instinct evolved, food and toiletries inside and near Lokan’s tent, as well as the lingering smell of cooked food from July Fourth picnic celebrations, likely played a role.

“While foraging under the cover of darkness in Ovando, perhaps due to a simple movement made by the sleeping victim, or a certain sound made by the victim, the bear reacted,” the committee’s board of review wrote in their Jan. 4 report, which was discussed earlier this month during the executive body’s summer meeting. The 11-member review board included officials from Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; and the U.S. Forest Service.

The bolded section highlights three bad decisions.  She should never have had food in her tent to begin with.  Next, bear spray isn’t enough.  Third, a hotel rather than a tent near city establishments would have been a better choice.

Getting rid of food is essential.  Protection is necessary.  A large bore handgun would have been the right medicine.

Via WRSA, On The CCP Role In The Ongoing COVID Con

This story is about a bear stalking somebody that moved into the woods, which the author, the target of the bear, uses as a metaphor for facing the Covid Vaccine damage. You’ll be interested in the Covid Vaccine data. The author indicates that CCP is at war with the U.S. but is missing a known piece of the puzzle; the illness started in a lab in the U.S., making the U.S. government a combatant against its people. You should read it; the vax data is excellent, assuming it’s accurate.

But the best part is about the bear encounter.

I sped indoors, locking the door. I grabbed a weapon out of the hall closet. In my haste, I grabbed the weapon that looked like a rifle, instead of the actual rifle, which was in a case. Thus I found myself locked in an upstairs bathroom, cowering, armed with a BB gun.

[…]

I looked under the bed: hiding there could not save me if the bear made it into the house. I realized I was holding a BB gun, and felt ridiculous. Even if I managed to shoot it, this would do nothing but enrage him. The thin bedroom doors that I had thought so rustic and charming, could be broken down by an angry animal of that size in no time.

My heart pounded as I realized that he was not leaving; he continued pacing and circling, no matter where I went.

I went back into the bathroom, and locked that door with its flimsy lock.

City folk are cute.

When I called back in spite of myself and begged the police for help, they told me to call again only if he managed to break into the house.

When seconds count, the police are a third phone call away.

Outdoor Life.

Hiking with kids can be a unique experience, especially when there’s a black bear following your family up the trail. Last week, Brighton Peachy, her husband, and their three young children were hiking a popular trail in British Columbia when a black bear started following them, according to KUTV News.

While the bear appeared to be more curious than aggressive, it blocked the way back to the parking lot so the family of five—with kids aged one to six—had to keep walking up the trail as the bear lumbered along behind them. Peachy was able to record a video of the encounter with her cell phone.

Video at the link.

He has his wife and children on a hike through the wilderness of British Columbia, and he had bear spray.

I think you know what I think.

Dean Weingarten.

Cynthia had been dropped off by helicopter.  She was hiking along a narrow path on a ridge a few miles from the Salcha River, about 60 miles southeast of Fairbanks, Alaska. A “small black bear” startled her with a crash in the brush. It appeared to her, staring at her, from about 10 feet away. She yelled at it. She pounded a rock with her hammer to make noise. The bear was not intimidated.  Cynthia took a step back, which was also higher on the rock.

The bear moved out of her sight, then struck her from behind and knocked her down. She had been told playing dead was the best strategy, so she did. The bear proceeded to drag her for nearly half an hour. During that time, her right arm was disabled as the bear tore and chewed on it. She was able to get her radio out of her pocket with her left arm and signal for help.

The bear managed to eat and destroy much of both her arms before help arrived. She did not resist the bear.  If she had a firearm, she could easily have shot the bear. At 10 feet, standing still, even a small pistol could have worked.

[ … ]

Marti Miller was working for the Geological Survey as a cook when she met Cynthia, two years before Cynthia was attacked. They had become close friends. Marti visited Cynthia in the hospital and was well aware of the details of the predatory bear attack.

In 1981, Marti joined the Geological Survey full-time, after she finished her college degree. She had her own encounter with a predatory black bear after she became a project leader, sometime before 1995. In January of 1995, she was interviewed by Larry Kaniut, the well-known author of Alaskan bear books.

Marti Miller’s experience was similar to Cynthia’s in many ways. One difference was she was the project leader when her event happened. She was dropped off by helicopter in a very wild area, to work on a geological survey …

[ … ]

Marti decided to climb fast to get above the bear, to a place where she could see it approaching her.  She chambered a round in her rifle.  When she had gained elevation and space, she tried the radio again. Still no contact.  Then she saw the bear again. She moved directly upslope of the bear, and in her best command voice, yelled: “Get outta here!”

The bear was about 100 feet away. It looked at her and purposefully started walking toward her. When it was 70 feet away, she fired, aiming at the bear’s nose. The 180-grain Nosler bullet broke the bear’s neck, killing it instantly.

Dean is the king of bear attack reporting.  I’ve left a number of details out – go visit Dean’s article.  And never go into bear country without a firearm.

I would rather never be in a position like this.  That bear closed fast and had ill intentions.

Dean Weingarten.

According to the Taylor County Sheriff’s Office, authorities received a report of a bear attack at a home on Castle Road in the Township of Medford Friday around 11 p.m.

In a press release, authorities report a husband and wife noticed the bear eating from their bird feeder, opened the window and yelled at the bear to scare it off. The bear then turned and charged at the home, breaking through the window and began attacking the couple, while their kids were asleep in their bedrooms.

This correspondent was able to talk with Larry Woebbeking, Sheriff of Taylor County.  While Sheriff Woebbeking was not at the scene of the attack, he had talked to an investigating officer who was. Larry had interesting information to add. He was sure of his facts.

The bottom of the window was about three to four feet above the ground. The bear had to jump up to get through the window. The window appears to be a typical northern Wisconsin type which slides vertically up and down, with an insect screen on the outside. The screen is gone on the picture from the sheriffs office, so the bear probably clawed the screen out as it came inside.

After the wife yelled at the bear, the bear forced its way through the window and attacked the wife. The husband came to the aid of his wife, interjecting his body between them. The bear attacked him. He suffered severe bites to the neck and may have had an arm broken.

The wife, freed from the bear attack, accessed a knife and attacked the bear mauling her husband. The bear turned its attention back to the wife, which allowed the husband to escape momentarily. He was able to access a 9mm Sig handgun. He quickly returned and killed the bear.

Dean goes on to make interesting points about female black bears not displaying strong maternal instincts, and that 9 out of 10 times a female black bear will abandon cubs rather than face danger.

This bear had something else in mind.  Perhaps food.

I would never have allowed my wife to open the window and scream without having a firearm nearby.  And this is yet another instance of the need to carry inside the home.