LET'S GET OVER THE BIG PISTOL SYNDROME
Hunters, Use Bear Spray, Help Save Your Sport
Bear spray offers much more "personal protection" than handguns, so use it. Every encounter between hunters and grizzlies resulting in a dead bear not only delays delisting, but also gives more ammo to anti-hunting activists.By Bill Schneider, 10-08-09
Photo courtesy of the Interagency Grizzy Bear Committee.
General big game hunting seasons are opening soon, and legions of stealthy hunters will be silently stalking around grizzly country in pre-dawn darkness, but only after they’ve sprayed themselves with human scent blocker, “buck scent” or stale elk pee. As sure as the seasons will open, some of them will have a close encounter with a grizzly, often resulting in a dead bear.
Much has been written about this subject. Every wildlife expert out there has encouraged hunters to carry bear pepper spray instead of a big handgun for self-defense, but clearly, a lot of hunters ignore this advice, even though it’s all for their own safety and the future of hunting.
Witness the recent incident on the edge of Glacier National Park in the Great Bear Wilderness. Two bowhunters were quietly hiking up a trail before dawn when they encountered three or four grizzlies, likely a mother bear and her half-grown cubs. So, what did they do? Reach for their bear spray and start talking in monotones to alert the bears that they posed no threat. Hardly, they immediately pulled out their pistols and started blasting away at the bears, even though it was too dark to see what they were shooting at, and ended up wounding at least one bear.
Witness a Wyoming court recently deciding to charge a hunter for illegally killing a grizzly bear. The hunter came across a grizzly feeding on a moose carcass, and even though, according to authorities, the bear posed no threat, the hunter shot it instead of carefully walking by with bear spray drawn and leaving the grizzly to its much-needed meal.
Both incidents--and others like them every year--do little but hasten along the demise of bear hunting if not all big game hunting in grizzly country.
Wildlife agencies and conservation groups will never convince hunters to act like hikers, walking through the woods making noise on the way to their stand or during the hunt, but for at least three reasons, they really need to get over this Big Pistol Syndrome.
For starters, a big gun doesn’t work as well as a little spray. Hard to swallow, right? Bear spray offers more protection than .44 magnums. A recent study, in fact, found that hunters using firearms to defend themselves were injured or killed 40 percent of the time, while those using bear spray walked away unharmed 98 percent of the time. Another study of 76 encounters in Alaska found that bear spray was 92 percent effective in deterring bears; firearms only 67 percent.
Here’s the bottom line: Every time a hunter uses his rifle or handgun to take down a grizzly instead of using bear spray to deter an attack, it hurts the entire sport of hunting.
The grizzly bear is still a threatened species under the provisos of the Endangered Species Act, and anti-hunting groups have already proposed banning black bear hunting in areas occupied by grizzlies (most of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming) to prevent accidental shootings (mistaking a grizzly for a black bear) and to prevent inevitable encounters resulting in dead bears. Each hunter-related incident gives those who want to stop all bear hunting more ammo to support their cause.
And they might not stop with black bear hunting. Most hunter-caused grizzly mortality doesn’t occur while black bear hunting; most occurs while big game hunting, especially elk hunting.
Put yourself in the chair of somebody who’d like to ban all hunting. If elk hunters keep needlessly causing the deaths of a charismatic threatened species, we’ll hear calls--and most likely, see lawsuits--to ban all hunting in grizzly country until the big bear has been removed from the threatened species list.
And lastly, each hunter-caused mortality delays the day when the grizzly can, finally, be delisted. I’m sure most hunters, all wildlife agencies, and even most radical green groups would like to see delisting happen, but if hunters keep acting irresponsibly, that day could be decades ahead of us.
So, hunters, you have at least three excellent reasons to take bear spray (and know how to use it) instead of toting large handguns for personal protection. Let’s get with the program.
Footnote: For more information from professionals, click here. For detailed instructions on how to use bear spray, click here.
Like this story? Get more! Sign up for our free newsletters.
Comments
Add your comment below
The fact is that grizzly bear populations around Yellowstone and around Glacier have shown increases that just about test their Malthusian limits of population growth for the past thirty years. The grizzlies are maybe not 100% recovered in those areas, but the question is valid to ask, and if trends continue they will be recovered very soon.
Yes, there have been a few grizzly deaths due to hunters. And a few due to other grizzlies. And a few due to sickness or starvation I am sure. And maybe a few more due to tourists giving them food. And yet, year after year, the grizzly population seems to increase to fill the habitat.
So if you have something against hunting, say so. But don't be alarmist about what is to most people a complete non-issue. I hope anyways that most people understand that there will be some mortality in grizzly numbers.
Otherwise I am all for using pepper-spray in grizzly country. I just don't pretend that I am saving hunting by doing so.
I’m not sure what study Schneider is referring to, but there’s no data on firearms in “Efficacy of Bear Deterrent Spray in Alaska.” The abstract for Efficacy of Bear Deterrent Spray in Alaska states, “We present a comprehensive look at a sample of bear spray incidents that occurred in Alaska, USA, from 1985 to 2006. We analyzed 83 bear spray incidents involving brown bears, black bears, and polar bears. Of the 72 cases where persons sprayed bears to defend themselves, 50 involved brown bears, 20 black bears, and 2 polar bears. Red pepper spray stopped bears’ undesirable behavior 92% of the time when used on brown bears.” (Tom Smith, Steve Herrero, Debruyn, Wilder, 2008)
In October of 2008, I asked Herrero about numerous claims that his research shows bear spray is more effective than a firearm. He said there’s “no data” on firearms. We were discussing scientific, peer-reviewed, published research.
This is alarmist hyperbole. Where is there serious consideration of a ban on big game hunting? What groups besides PETA have pushed for this? What management agencies are sympathetic? Name names please.
Are grizzlies not important enough to protect without manufacturing an anti-hunting conspiracy?
On June 30, 1999 the IGBC released a “Bear Pepper Spray Position Paper” that said “No deterrent is 100% effective, but compared to all others, including firearms, bear spray has demonstrated the most success in fending off threatening and attacking bears and preventing injury to the person and animal involved.”
The current “Bear Pepper Spray IGBC White Paper,” says, “No deterrent is 100% effective, but bear spray has demonstrated success in fending off charging and attacking bears and preventing, or reducing injury to the person and animal involved.”
Sure looks like the IGBC lied about its claim that bear spray is more effective than firearms. I wonder if Grand Teton National Park, the Center For Wildlife Information, the Wyoming, Montana, Idaho game and fish departements, and other agencies belonging to the IGBC will ever correct their inaccurate claims about bear spray vs. bullets.
These well-respected agencies and organizations could easily get the media to publish press releases and public service announcements that set the record straight on bear spray vs. bullets—why won’t they do it? Why keep deceiving the public?
There are many incidents in which non-hunters have successfully defended themselves from grizzly attacks by the use of pepper spray. Leaving many of the populations 85% that do not hunt to question why shooting first is needed by hunters. If the shots don’t count, if they miss or only wound the charge not only is the shooters life in dire jeopardy also is the lives of would be rescuers; the bear loses as does the hunter heritage. We have the opportunity to do it right, why wouldn’t we.
These are animals that need to be taken seriously, whether you are a hiker, jogger, or hunter. In some cases, bear spray just isn't enough of a deterrent for these intelligent animals. Read this:
http://www.seattlepi.com/local/240146_grizzlybear10.html
Here is an excerpt.
"She had an "out of this world" strength, said Otter. "I was like a rag doll, and I weigh 185 pounds." She flung him back and forth, and he fell even farther. By then, he could feel his spine had fractured. (Doctors would later find five vertebrae breaks, plus three shattered ribs.)
"I reached up and grabbed her by the throat," he said. With his other hand he scrabbled for a rock or his bear spray, with no success. "I knew I couldn't push her away."
Frantic, he tried to cover his head with his arms, as hikers are warned to do by park rangers.
"I felt her tooth go into my scalp," he said. "I thought, 'Oh, this is no good.' " Then he felt his scalp rip clean away."
I'm sure they were also having the time of their lives until they were attacked.
I'd take possible threats to hunting seriously if I were you. Look at how much traction the ant-trapping movement has gained in Montana. There are 9 times as many people in New York City as there are in Montana, and many easterners see hunting as barbaric. In additon, there are fewer and fewer new hunters every year. Hunters are outnumbered, so we're going to have keep on a good face and convince non-hunters that we're not just killers.
I'm fairly sure PA has more deer hunters than MT has people. Lots of people everywhere dislike hunting, lots of people everywhere hunt.