Posted on 06/04/2008 2:26:03 PM PDT by george76
The husband of a 70-year-old grandmother who was killed by a bear in northern Quebec ...
Conservation experts set traps after Friday evening's attack, but ... the bear was still at large in the wilds of northern Quebec.
As she scouted a fishing hole for walleye, Ms. Lavoie became separated from her husband. Barely 10 minutes later, Mr. Lavoie felt something was amiss and went searching for his wife of 51 years. Metres away he came upon the nightmarish scene of her body being dragged into the forest by a bear.
Mr. Lavoie chased the predator for nearly 200 metres and managed very briefly to scare it away from his wife. He tried but was unable to carry her limp and bleeding body back through the dense spring foliage.
He left her and went for help. When he arrived with police, the bear had returned and was combative.
"The bear was still around and the bear was aggressive,"
The bear was so aggressive, police were forced to delay attempts to retrieve Ms. Lavoie's remains until early Saturday morning...
In 1991, a black bear killed a Toronto couple in Algonquin Park...
In 2001, a high-school student was attacked and partly eaten by a black bear 25 kilometres northeast of Yellowknife.
In 2007, a Calgary woman, who was cycling on a trail near a British Columbia resort, was stalked and killed by a black bear.
(Excerpt) Read more at theglobeandmail.com ...
There were four different adult bear around my place last year—one or two of them each night. They were after the “pioneer” (native) neighbors’ garbage, etc. But there are too many bear around. And with or without garbage, they’re going to be trouble. We’ll see, come August through October.
What can Americans bring into Canada legally ?
Most bear pepper spray has a spray distance of 25 feet or more. Here’s what I carry: http://www.counterassault.com/html/bearquestions.html
See also: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1284001/posts?page=75#75
The spray can be good stuff, although some users of it have only been mauled a little. ;-) It’s not much good in the wind, though, and it’s windy almost every day here. ...unless you are young, quick and knowledgeable enough to get upwind before firing the stuff. Also, it’s not much good for trying to stop a bear from entering a house, especially with an asthmatic around. A bear that is already in the house will behave as if cornered.
All of that said, the spray is certainly better to have than nothing at all. A large bore weapon and much training is better. The bear will be perceived as a general threat before long, and they will be largely exterminated as pests again.
If the bear knocks down the tree and kills you, it was a grizzly.
If there was no trees around, and it kills you, it was a polar bear.
Aaah bears, my most troublesome critters up here in the Colorado Rockies. I have not had a human break-in attempt in over 10 years in Colorado (home invasion in Florida though), but have had two incidents with bears. One was when we were out of town and neighbor was watching the dogs. Came home to a window broken in. not just the glass, but the whole window frame was caved in including the nails being pulled out of the wall studs. The dryer vent was also clawed out and there were claw marks in the wood on the window where the bear tried to tear the window open, probably just before bashing it in. I assume it happened at night and the dogs were awakened and chased the bear off. It did not get inside.
Second incident happened when my wife heard something outside and I was looking out the windows to see if I could see anything. I had lights I could turn on around the house except on the back deck. I had ny nose against a large window, about 4ft X 4ft, while my wife was looking to find where she last left the flashlight. My wife found the flashlight and was about to hand it to me when something hit the glass hard. The double paned glass flexed and hit me in the nose and forehead, but did not break. My wife shined the flashlight out the window and we could see a black bear try to squeeze under the window sill to hide. I ran and grabbed the 12ga shotgun and decided to let the dogs out on the bear first, for training. The sliding glass doors were only about 4 ft from the bear and the dogs were right on his tail as he ran across the deck, jumped over the railing (1 story high) and jumped into a close pine tree. It climbed down head first and has not been seen again. The next morning you could see the muddy paw print on the outside that went across where my nose and forehead print was on the inside of the window. Really glad the window did not break!
Bears are strong.
They can and do rip open car doors, go thru house windows as well as rip off house siding.
They lean on locked door lever handles, destroy the mechanism, then enter house thru the door opening.
You might install motion activiated flood lights everywhere. Get the ones with pulse technology to minimize false alarms from wind and rain. They can be adjusted for time and sensitivity.
dang another misunderstood bear..
I have the flood lights in front of the house and have the parts to put them in back. I am also in the process of taking the glass out of the windows and replacing with double sheets of thick lexan. And am putting heavy screws to fasten the window frames to the wall studs. The nails pulled out as if they were finishing nails.
The dogs do a good job though. A Belgian Tervuren, a Belgian Sheepdog (Groenendael) and a St Bernard. All are very protective. The occasional bears, mountain lions and the fox-making daily rounds really don’t like three upset dogs. The fox has made it a habit of tormenting the dogs from a few feet outside the fense though.
So, grandmother was just a typical white person anyway. /rimshot
My place looked like a bear convention during the nights of last fall (September through October).
For those who can have dogs, at least two large dogs are great against bear. I’ve watched that happen. The dogs hit and run from a distance of about 20 feet, while the bear stood, not knowing how to react quickly enough. The bear walked away as soon as the dogs gave it time and space to do so. The dogs were not injured. Small dogs, on the other hand, are snacks (acquaintances’ house dog experiences).
BTW, bear don’t like extremely loud metal music, either, although they react a little slowly and grudgingly to it. ...or large amounts of cayenne pepper around doors and the like. They’ve sniffed first, and walked away. And bear most often avoid bright lights (100 watt halogen spotlights), creeping around the periphery of the lights.
But this year, bear will likely be more numerous and bold. I think they’ll multiply and attack more often in the near future, until many of them are exterminated.
Of course, “used properly” opens the door for all kinds of data selection mischief. If it was windy, or the bear was too far, or the person missed the bear with the spray, or hit it in the “wrong” place, or who knows what.
A bear attack investigator that I respect said that pepper spray appeared to work about 2/3 of the time, but get a big can, because you may have to use it multiple times to deter a determined bear.
That was one of the articles that I read but what you say is very reasonable, nothing is perfect and it was evident the study was pushing the use of it over lethal methods.
The country I’ve hunted and camped in over the years has only been inhabited by black bears and I’ve never been too concerned about them. It looks like they are becoming more aggressive and people should be more concerned now.
According to Freeper Kanawa, thats all you should need:
( Kanawa killed an attacking bear with that very same kind of knife.)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1670661/posts [Man (Freeper kanawa) stabs bear to death]
According to Freeper Kanawa, thats all you should need:
( Kanawa killed an attacking bear with that very same kind of knife.)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1670661/posts [Man (Freeper kanawa) stabs bear to death]
The wind up here in the Colorado Rockies is often very high. I have had times when I was washing the car when the water out of a nozzle set on stream would only make it a few feet before being blown back. Also, if the dogs are involved, I could be spraying them at the same time and eliminating much of my defense. The Fall season, before bears hibernate, is the very worst time for home break-ins. Within a 20 mile radius there are usually 50-100 home break-ins by bears each year. I keep my CCW gun loaded with bear loads (except for urban excursions and except in winter) and keep the 12ga loaded with Brenneke slugs for the first few shots followed by 3-inch OO Buck. I don’t want to harm a bear, but I don’t want to be converted to scat even more!
Motion activated lights are good for 2 and 4 legged critters.
Also welcome mats often work for bears.
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