Forum Member Meets Alaska Bears Armed With A Pocket Knife

[MountainMan]

Pictures of bears taken by me while in the Alaska bush last summer.

Posted at least one of these bear photos on the Rohrbaugh and Seecamp Forums awhile ago. I was armed with a pocket knife - blade a little over three inches.
Well I also had a roll of toilet paper, camera, and etc.


Mother grizzly walks out of the bush about 30 ft. in front of me by surprise.







Stops to eat some berries instead of me - to see how close she was there is no zoom on this photo or the one right above.




As she was leaving saw three cubs - one pictured. I did not realize there were cubs until then. Would have made the incident even scarier since we know a lawyer who was killed by a mother grizzly while hiking and camping in Alaska several years ago – one of my wife’s clients. Saw many grizzly bears - this was the closest encounter.




Brown bear decides to share the salmon stream with me.
I decided he could have it to himself. If you look closely it looks like a bone in his mouth - last
salmon fishing guy?




Black bear above me in a tree.





Really more people are killed in Alaska and Canada by Moose each year than by bears.

Being stomped or antlered to death, or eaten alive - neither sound like a good way to end the day. My wife's client who was killed by the mother grizzly was only hit once with her paw - no bites. His two friends carried his body for several days before they could get help - flagged down a small plane at a lake. They did not want to leave him and take the chance that bears, wolves, and etc. would get to the body.

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[Bud White]

Them are some sweet pics .. But the ole heart was just hammering away at that close

[P95Carry]

Ahaha - repeat exposure Saw those in the Grizzly thread Dave but - well worth having a thread just for them.

Of course I had seen them before but - as a pic set they are really amazing - and dang - you's still here to tell the tale!. Most relieving.

[QKShooter]

You should have been armed with at least a 3.5" pocket knife.

Nice pics.

[ELCruisr]

My closest encounter with a bear despite years in the Appalachians and rockies was picking berries for my mom as a teenager at an old abandoned farmstead up the mountain from our house.(We lived in the sticks) Was just working along a big overgrown patch when I finally noticed a rustling sound about ten feet from me across the patch. You know a teen country boy should have known to be aware of his surroundings not day dreaming of girls, right? Well I straightened up to see what it was and the black bear straightened up at the same time to see what I was. It would have been comical if someone had been able to film it. My eyes about popped out of my head and I yelled "BEAR"! The bear looked real suprised and if he could of, looked like he'd of yelled "HUMAN"! We both turned and took off running. Sure glad it turned out that way, I'd have probably not been so lucky with a grizzly!

[Old Chief]

Mountian Man those are nice pictures. I am glad that you took, and then published them.

[my2cents]

I keep thinking about that joke where two friends are camping in the woods when suddenly they are approached by a huge bear. One of the friends calmly starts putting on his running shoes. The other one says, "What are you doing? You can't outrun a bear!." The first one replies," I don't have to - I just have to outrun you!"

Great pics - BTW.

[MountainMan]

What amazed me was how many people go into the wilds of Alaska basically unarmed. During my time in the Alaska we had a total of five different guides - two young women and three men - one was an indian. The indian had a rifle and one of the woman had bear pepper spray - the other three just knives.

They suggest as you are walking down the trails to make enough noise so not to surprise the bears. Most bears you see are just butts taking off into the bush. That is unless they have cubs then the bear is more unpredictable. You have a much higher chance of a bear encounter by the salmon runs where they stake out territory.

One of my guides (Trapper Jack) outside his cabin north of the Artic Circle - needed to fly in on a small plane to get there - those are wolf skulls on the cabin side.

[swiftyjuan]

Mountain Man-

Glad you didn't have to take her on with a pocket knife-I would have felt sorry for the orphaned cubs! I would have needed the roll of toilet paper...

[rstickle]

Well we know you didn't use the knife...... Did you use the TP?

Pretty sure I would have!

[MountainMan]

Wolves are not endangered there - he (Trapper Jack) hates wolves - they will come up and kill the dogs if they can in the winter (when it is always dark) for food - and these are big dogs.

Point of interest - this is were they got the dogs for the last White Fang movie.

Didn't need the toilet paper - actually when you are really scared your muscles tighten up - at least in my case.