Creatures magnificent

@Ionus,

Damn !!! I said that exactly wrong. Ah, it is too early. I am going for a walk to wake up. See below for correct version...
There have been several greenies studying bears who have been killed by Brown Bears when they become adult males. Most people who know a great deal about bear behaviour will no longer trust Brown Bears but will happily trust Black Bears, and this includes several researches who have raised both bears from cubs.

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@Ionus,

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There have been several greenies studying bears who have been killed by Brown Bears when they become adult males

Pretty precocious researchers.

What has this got to do with anything?

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@JTT,

Whales are wild animals. They are not a cuddly stuffed toy. Some clowns think bears are like hippies, free and communing with nature. There have been several cases of Killer (whales) Dolphins attacking divers. There is also a concerted effort to popularise the image of sharks as being friendly, a sort of best friend who you pushed around, so it really is the fault of anyone attacked by sharks. It certainly isnt the sharks fault.

One researcher managed to get himself eaten and his girlfriend eaten..well, mostly eaten..because brown Bears were lovely, just misunderstood really (note I included two eatens , one before and after the and, for pedantic people).

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Ionus said : There have been several greenies studying bears who have been killed by Brown Bears when they become adult males.

For your enlightenment, I include the pedantic version : There have been several cases of adult brown bears killing researches, despite those researches being familiar with the bears since the birth of the bears.

Does that help you see what this has to do with anything ?

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@Ionus,

This is a web site with a bunch of us armchair travelers filibustering about whether we know enough to trust grizzlies or their cousins the brown bears. I vote we send JTT to Kodiak Island with jungle bells on his shoe laces. Itd be an excellent bit of reserch and a nice treat for the bears.

Ill continue to
1carry a pistola when Im in black bear territory.

2Stay with the armed guards when in grizzly (brownie) country

3 I will NEVER piss off a polar bear (or get close enough to disturb it ).

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@farmerman,

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I vote we send JTT to Kodiak Island with jungle bells on his shoe laces.

I had a very strong image of JTT trying to hug a kodiak bear because it was a lovely animal.

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@Ionus,

Again, I ask, what has this got to do with the points I have raised, Ionus. I haven't said that these aren't wild animals. I haven't suggested that these animals don't have the capacity to kill, nor have I suggested that they haven't.

Neither you nor FM have addressed my point, but you both have run off on tangents that you seem to think are pretty hilarious.

I see you don't like to get into too much detail about your "I heard from Joe who was told by Sam that he heard a story from some relatives" ________.

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@farmerman,

How many black bears have you seen while on your hikes, FM? How many times have you been attacked? How many times have you used your pistola?

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@JTT,

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what has this got to do with the points I have raised,

I thought it was more of an open discussion rather than a formal debate. If you wish to formalise your points I would be happy to give you my opinion. As far as I could tell you were saying that animals kill for specific reasons...so do people.

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@Ionus,

It is, of course, an open discussion, Ionus. I didn't stipulate that animals kill for specific reasons. Quite obviously, animals kill for a number of reasons, as do humans.

I said:

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If you've ever been in areas where bears are, you've been in the presence of, probably, more than one. Millions upon millions of meetings and non-meetings, pretty much dependent upon whether a bear wants to have one, have resulted in nothing.

Millions of people hike thru bear country every year, have for centuries and the number of "collisions" is miniscule. Bears smell humans often, and from great distances, see humans much more often than humans see them, hear humans more often than humans hear them, and if they so desired, they could be there, where you are, in jig time. That doesn't happen and yet they clearly know that you are a walking piece of incredibly easy meat.

My point is that given the number of opportunities available to bears, and I was focusing mostly on Grizzly Bears, the number of people killed and the number of people killed and eaten is really miniscule.

There are a large number of attacks that occur where, after the perceived threat to the bear is neutralized, the bear leaves. This, after having gotten a good taste of what would be a pretty easy meal. And grizzlies don't often turn down much in the way of food/nourishment.

There are quite a large number of attacks where humans do incredibly stupid things like encroach on grizzlies' personal zones. Even in situations like this, it's virtually always resolved by bluff charges or the person getting smacked around a bit.

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@JTT,

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Millions of people hike thru bear country every year, have for centuries and the number of "collisions" is miniscule.

Tigers used to be very aggresive. Now they avoid people. They are not being natural, their behaviour has been modified by tiger hunts. I suspect FM is correct when he says Grizzlies used to be very aggressive.

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There are a large number of attacks that occur where, after the perceived threat to the bear is neutralized, the bear leaves. This, after having gotten a good taste of what would be a pretty easy meal. And grizzlies don't often turn down much in the way of food/nourishment.

It is common for Grizzlies to kill, wander off (? perhaps to secure the area) and then return to bury their kill returning later to eat it. Some large carnivores do this perhaps to add bacteria to aid digestion. The African plains is somewhat of an exception as anything left will be taken by something else in a very short space of time.

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@Ionus,

I don't know if FM is correct but his sources leave much to be desired. These were the 'kill em, kill em' people. Of course they would say they were fierce. There's not much in the animal kingdom that is more fierce than a wounded grizzly. And really, how could you blame him/her.

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Altogether, grizzly bears were eliminated from 98% of their original range in the contiguous United States during a 100-year period.

http://www.bearinfo.org/gbusa.htm

Native Americans got along fine with the grizzly for thousands of years.

Grizzlies continue to be very aggressive, if and when they need to be.

You're avoiding my point, and that may well be because you don't know much about the animals. Hey, you're an Aussie.

There is a great deal of contact between humans and grizzlies in both the US and Canada. There is also a great deal of no contact between humans and grizzlies, initiated and maintained by grizzlies. Much of this contact and no contact occurs in areas where guns and hunting don't enter into it or do so marginally.

That's the part that's so puzzling.

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@Ionus,

Quote:

It is common for Grizzlies to kill, wander off (? perhaps to secure the area) and then return to bury their kill returning later to eat it. Some large carnivores do this perhaps to add bacteria to aid digestion. The African plains is somewhat of an exception as anything left will be taken by something else in a very short space of time.

Not so common. Grizzlies diets consists mostly of plant life and kills aren't that common for most grizzlies except in the Spring, elk/deer calves. Carrion probably accounts for most animal intake.

That said, nothing is more important to a grizzly than a kill/carrion, 'cept for maybe a sow's cubs. And there really ain't nothin' that can take a kill from a grizzly - maybe the odd time a wolf pack, if it's large enough.

But even here, a human interloper is most often merely given a good dressing down, though it's a grizzly dressing down and those do hurt. Rarely are these people killed and even more rarely are they eaten.

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I think I mentioned the situation where a park ranger in the high country would often watch a grizzly eating berries, another food source that is staunchly defended, who would move off the trail into the bushes just a few feet off the trail to let hikers pass. The hikers never had a clue, good thing likely. The when they were safely out of sight, the bear would resume eating.

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Grizzly bears are incorrectly portrayed by the media as voracious predators. In fact, they are normally reclusive creatures that act aggressively toward humans only in specific situations (usually when they feel startled or threatened by human actions " generally around cubs or food sources).

http://www.bearinfo.org/biolandbehav.htm

I once happened upon a grizzly that was no more than ten feet from me as I was carrying my canoe back to my truck. I heard some movement in the bush and noting the berries said to the folks with me, "probably a grizz".

I was, of course, half ways kidding and I was a bit surprised when what was about a three year old grizzly walked out of the bush. The bear did not so much as glance at us and we moved off to give it room.

It continued moving around to the various berry bushes here and there and even when some idiots started following it with their cameras, the bear didn't do anything, even though those people were really pushing the distance envelope. Dumb dumb dumb

I drowned three of them in the creek and let the last one go to warn other potential idiots.

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@JTT,

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You're avoiding my point

I thought I addressed your point by the comparison with Tigers.

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that may well be because you don't know much about the animals.

It is rather hard for me to determine how much I dont know, so I will leave that for others. I thought I had a rough understanding.

I dont know if this contributes much, but when I was at Chitwan they had a man-eating tiger. They knew which one it was, and knew it had been injured in a fight over females and territory. They sent out for a sedative gun (note the concept of a tranquilizer gun is rather silly...) and brought the tiger in for surgery to fix its wounds. It had then decided that having eaten them and studied them from its cage, it would only hunt humans. It was released and ate some more people so they sent out for the sedative gun again and sent the tiger to a London zoo.

In general, tigers give people a wide berth but leopards go closer to people. It was widely accepted by the staff at the park that this was because of hunting, the leopard having not been hunted as much. This may be true of bears in North America. Tigers were very fierce untill the British nearly extincted them. Bear skins were a tradable item for trappers and settlers as well as Natives. As for Native Americans getting along fine with grizzlies, there were Grizzly hunts. Some war societies dressed in Grizzly skins, as did some medicine men, depending on the tribe. There were great differences between tribes.

Chitwan also has a sloth bear (no relation to bears apart from size) and it attacks people all the time. It usually is very quiet with its nose in an anthill but becomes very agitated if it thinks you have snuck up on it. It attacks untill you are still. I know one man who had his face badly mutilated from a sloth bear but of course plastic surgery is none existent in a poor country. Pity, as he was a handsome man before.

Incidentally, the people there share the terrain with tigers, leopards, crocodiles, rhino and sloth bears...but the biologist there thought I was the bravest man he had ever met because I walked around the Australian bush where the worlds deadliest snakes are...to each their own poison.

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@JTT,

Quote:

I drowned three of them in the creek and let the last one go to warn other potential idiots.

Firm but fair. I like that.
Very Happy

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@JTT,

Yes, I saw this on tv already. Who could have guessed. I think they are just playing. However my ears pop at 30'

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@JTT,

There was also a young guy who was on tv with his bear diary and he stayed ever too close to grizzs'. In the end he was attacked by a grizz and killed.
farmerman mentioned being chased by a coyote. In my neighborhood there was a coyote running down the middle of the street. A friendly,small dog thought it was a dog and ran to the street to greet him and got a wiff of what it really was and stopped on a dime and turned around and ran back to us.

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@JTT,

Quote:

Re: farmerman (Post 3915590)
How many black bears have you seen while on your hikes, FM? How many times have you been attacked? How many times have you used your pistola?

I see about 1 a year cause Im looking for em to maybe get a good picture. Most of my pictures are not so great because the bears do get a pre warning from me.(I usually walk in the woods with a clicker froggy so I dont sneak up on one and start a hassle .
In Maine since 2007, there had been 2 fatalities , one a little toddler who wandered away from a picnic and one person who was mauled beyond help in a hike. In 2001 and 2002, there were a series of bear attacks and animal killings in the OAK ORCHARD area.

I think that your question is merely sensationalism. I carry a gunfor an eventuality that I dont go hunting for (Rule about guns: you cant conjer one up if you didnt take it along at the outset). Im in the "its better to have it and not need it" school. I GO INTO THE MAINE WOODS ALOT. I paint watercolors, I photograph nature, and I just wool gather in the woods. I dont need to get re-assembled by some dickhead bear or moose thus saving my wife a call from a hospital .
This is certainly a free country, since I detect an air of Self confidence on your part, might I suggest that you just keep going on in that manner and feel 100% confident about bears in the woods n wilds.
I will take the cowards way out .
I am, however, enjoying the thread. You sound a bit like the guy who , in the poem, came into the barner shop loaded with "Cliff Claven" knowledge and began insulting a stuffed owl in the barbers shop. He was criticizing how the owl was stuffed, the ""fake "ose, and how no self respecting owl would look as ridiculous as the one in the shop. Then the owl looked the guy and flew off.

The only line I remember is

"Ive studied the owl" and other night fowl
ANd this I know to be true.
somethin somethin.

I diont claim to be a bear expert so forgive me if I take the road that perhaps OS DAve would take. I am always armed whenever Im in serious bear country, and I dont trust a black bear to "avoid me" cause I hate being a sttistic that counters the "epert knpwledge " about bears leaving you be

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@JTT,

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I don't know if FM is correct but his sources leave much to be desired.

Youve been posting about grizzlies and youve never heard of the CRaigheads? John and Frank Craighead (now deceased I believe) were the pioneers of the "Save Grizzlies from extinction" and were successful in theior lifetimw to have had the grizzly bear removed fro the endangered species list for the lower 48. They were inducted into the AUdubon and NAtionaql Geo "Most Important 100 Conservation SCientists in the world "

Their work has been based upon population ecology and they were the ones who stated (with evidence) that the grizzly , like the Pleistocene short faced bear, was a mean mother ****** in the time pre western expansion. A normal encounter usually involved someone shooting the more gressive bears. This leads to a genetic "bottleneck" in which the lack of diversity favos a few traits and the aggressive nature of grizzlies has been pretty much culled. This is also true for black bears. As the population grows, the aggressive "gene" seems to reinsert itself as the more aggressive bears are more liable to amte and pass on the aggressive tendency.
SO, in PA , and along the AT, we ARE seeing more encounters in which people who are unarmed are attacked savagely.

There is also something youve overlooked. BEAR MANAGEMENT is a DOI initiative for all Fed lands and PArks. WHen a bear is shown to be aggressive, hes given 3 chances with him being trapped, boxed up, and moved to more rmote areas. The Nat Park guys will box him up and ship him off only 3 times. SHould the bear STILL show that he returns to areas here people recreate, hes euthanized. So theres a management thing going on in which the population outliers (more aggressive bears) are only given so many chances and then they are removed from the gene pool.

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Native Americans got along fine with the grizzly for thousands of years.

Assertions are ok if they can be backed up with fact.
1Theres not much Indian literature save the Cherokee and Susquehannock "Written languages". The susquehannock have folk tales of marauding bears in the Eatsern Forests. Bears were revered and often clan names were taken for bears and wolves and wolverine. (Susquehannocks wre kind of "bikers" of the tribes)
"living" with bears for thousands of years doesnt mean "peaceful coexistence" .

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@farmerman,

You leap to a lot of unwarranted conclusions for a scientist, FM. Of course I've heard of them!

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There is also something youve overlooked. BEAR MANAGEMENT is a DOI initiative for all Fed lands and PArks. WHen a bear is shown to be aggressive, hes given 3 chances with him being trapped, boxed up, and moved to more rmote areas. The Nat Park guys will box him up and ship him off only 3 times. SHould the bear STILL show that he returns to areas here people recreate, hes euthanized. So theres a management thing going on in which the population outliers (more aggressive bears) are only given so many chances and then they are removed from the gene pool.

There is something that you misunderstand, badly. This has nothing whatsoever to do with aggressive bears, but don't let facts get in the way of a good meme.

This problem, mostly caused by people, has to do with fed bears, habituated bears, not "aggressive" bears. Bears can attack, have their way with humans under legitimate circumstances, for example, guarding food sources or cubs and they aren't even transported away as long as they are acting as real grizzlies.

Like that ever works anyway, flying an animal to a new location - arrant stupidity, though you can't really blame the bear managers. They're caught between a rock and an ignorant public.

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