Slugs for the shot gun can be useful.
Where our mountain property is, a fellow homeowner inadvertently left his garage door open and a bear got into the freezer in there. The bear started showing up every day and may have even broke into the house once when the owners (thankfully) weren’t there.
The owner called the Wildlife authorities to report he had a nuisance bear. They pretty much blew him off and didn’t responde.
On the 3rd or 4th day in a row that the bear showed up the homeowner finally shot it. He called the Wildlife authorities and said “You know that bear I called you about, you can come and get his carcass now” They were there within 30 minutes.
They darned near arrested him. They said the autopsy (done on site) showed he shot the bear in the back when the bear was “clearly running away”. He said to the wildlife people that the bear had already showed up every day for three days and there was every reason to think it’d show up a 4th day..and he was tired of it. Plus, he’d reported it and they hadn’t done anything.
I think that last finally saved him from arrest but it was touch and go for a while as to whether he’d be charged.
A friend told me recently that a woman in Ouray CO was found killed and eaten by bears. She’d been feeding them and was warned by the wildlife authorities to STOP doing that. Apparently she continued, or by that time the bears were already conditioned to come around for food anyway.
Bears can smell food up to 5 miles away I’ve been told...