I'll echo Worm, we have little black bears in WA- but the professionals here used a shotgun or a carbine. (45/70)

Everyone knows the best defense against bear is to travel with a slower companion, preferable someone you don't really like that well. If not, the 45/70 guide gun.

pfff....give me a good pocket knife and I can take anything down: a rabid squirrel, pig, duck...haha

no really, I would go for the 9mm

lol 9mm.... ha ha ha... good luck. Why don't you just carry a spear while you are at it? Carry a .45 if you have it, and get a 15 round clip for it. Then you might, stress the might, have a chance to scare it off, or 10-15 shots to the head should cause some damage.

Better file the sights off that 9mm....that way it'll hurt less when the bear shoves it up your ass.

Something like this loaded with 12ga. slugs is what I would carry for bear defense.

http://www.tokyohobby.net/shop/image...1100_defen.jpg

powderedmaggot, do you really want to lug that when you are hiking through the woods? No way. Maybe a good gun for the car/home. But the weight and size just isn't practical.

That doesn't look like a very big gun. And now that I think about it, what about an 8 gauge shotgun? I'm sure a slug from one of those bastards would slow a bear down.

An 8-bore is illegal in the US, although you could do it in Canada. 8-Bore is getting into Elephant Gun territory, and if it was firing a slug with the proper charge behind it would be more than capable of handling a bear.
Finding and affording an 8-bore which could handle modern ammo, on the other hand, would be a problem.

Why not carry what rangers carry? I don't think rifles or shorguns are too heavy necessarily. There are ways to carry them without too much inconvenience. I just think a handgun wouldn't be able to stop a bear.

Wouldn't the short baerel shotguns be weaker? I mean the wider spread and all? I'm not too informed on ballistics or gun basics for that matter.

Not necessarily. An 8 bore would be perfectly legal as a Title 1 firearm if the SecTreas found it was to have a sporting purpose. This is why a 12 gauge shotgun isn't illegal, unless it's one like the USAS-12 or Cobray "streetsweeper", which have been found not to have sporting purposes. A side by side 8-bore would most likely be found to have a sporting purpose, but a semi-auto 8-bore with a fifty round magazine capacity wouldn't. Of course, if the semi-auto 8-bore was registered as a DD, it WOULD be legal, but the transfer procedure would be the same as for a MG.

Yes, longer barrels generally result in higher projectile velocity, but when you've got a bear close enough to hit with a shotgun (you'd probably want to use slugs anyway) chances are the extra barrel length wouldn't make a hell of a difference.

Daswig:
What I meant was that an 8-bore shotgun would be illegal for hunting. Blackpowder rifles in the old largebore class ( 10, 8, 6, 4, and 2-bores ) are exempt from CIII regulations.

How different are the laws from Canada to US? How about state-to-state? I imagine Alaska would be a lot different from California (especially LA) and Texas.

For example: If I reside in LA but go up to the Sierra Madres or other areas or to Alaska to hunt or do whatever, which gun laws do I have to follow? Obviously I don't "need" a "bear" gun in LA, (not that it's anyone's business thank you very much 2nd Amendment) but if I live here and hunt elsewhere....

I want to take my dogs out in the wilds of Alaska or the Rockies. Go salmon fishing etc. Except I don't want to compete with the bears. So...in case I run into one, I want to come out alive.

Anyone else do this type of thing?

Seeing some of the suggestions in this thread has inspired me to decide that the obvious solution would be a grende launcher. Sure, you'd have to register it as a destructive device, but you can't be too careful with bears.

red snappers are 10x more destructive than a grenade launcher.....












I can't believe this thread is still going :lol:

Huge differences state-to-state. In some ways, California has stricter laws than Canada does (actually, maybe in all ways). I believe most of the midwestern and southern states have more lax gun laws, and the coastal states (with the densest populations) and north-eastern states tend to have stricter ones. Alaska's gun laws are actually decently strict as well (compared to Texas or whatnot anyway).

You'd have to obey the gun laws of both states if you were to own said gun. You need to obey the laws in California, as that is where it would be stored and from where it would be transported, as well as the gun laws in, say, Alaska, where it would be used. You could likely rent a gun or buy a relatively cheap on in whichever state you were to use it in, and then sell it or return it at the end of your trip. This would allow you to avoid the issues of California law.

Just a side note.....A good Air horn (as in football game standby) works extremely well on black bear, scares the fuck out of 'em.......browns....fuck that. Polar= load ,shoot, bend over, kiss ass goodbye.

Hey Suave,

Thanks for the tip. I was thinking if I go fishing in Alaska, I have to get a permit anyways so I assume they would fill me in on local details.

Also, maybe joining a local gun club or hunting club might be a good idea too. Still gotta find out about my dogs too. Don't want them to become "bear food". *shudder*

Tecoyah,

That air horn sounds like a great idea. But does it really work?
And wouldn't I feel the effects too not to mention my poor dogs! Well, I could always just leave the dogs at home.

Incidentally, has anyone here bagged a bear? If so, what kind of bear, where, with what, how, and did you have it stuffed etc.

The Air horn works very well....I used to take one with me on backpacking trips into the backcountry of the Sierras. I ended up using one three times there....every time the bears simply left immediately. The last time was with a huge sow, and I listened to her break branches as she ran for about five minutes....funny as hell.

I Would Not suggest using this technique on more aggressive bears though ie: Brown/Grizzly/Polar.......probably just piss them off.

.22 pistol, as reported here:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...40#post1612240

Any non-natural noise tends to scare black bears away (bells, whistles, motors, banging metal pipes, shots in the air), but if the bear is hell bent on doing what it's doing, noise won't do jack shit. An old, hungry bear that can't properly feed himself or a sow with cubs will be way more aggresive than most other bears. I've worked way the hell out in the bush for many years and had many bear encounters, every one was scared as soon as I made any kind of noise. Even though it would probably work on a Grizz, I wouldn't want to be the one trying it... when I see one of them, I'd just slink away backwards and come back later to do my work.

I've never bagged one (no desire), but have been hunting with buddy's that have. One was a Grizz up in Northern BC and the others were black bears in central BC. All are are rugs now.
I have managed to get some nice pics of a few of them...they are linked somewhere on the TFP.

Her'e's a good link for some info on kodiak and grizzly bears...now you'll know the difference..Bears

Wow, lots of info. Thanks guys.

ARTelevision, that's one heck of a story, one for the ages. Great pics. I really hope I never have that encounter.

Splck, thanks for the info. Those bears are a bit tricky to tell apart. I don't want to go after a bear, it was more for what do you do if you encounter one etc.

".22 pistol, as reported here"

Yeah because that is all you had, really why even waste your time with carrying extra weight. Little puffs in the dirt caused by a .22 could warn off a young or just curious bear, but when you have something serious, you need to be packing the heat, not a childs toy. like the horn idea above, not a bad idea, much better than a .22, but still i would stick with the .45 hand loaded to your specifications.

For the most part, a Kodiak is near the ocean and rivers eating salmon and berries, and anything else it can find :eek:, while a Grizzly is in the interior, eating berries and whatever else it can grub up (look for the huge purple shit piles;))

cavu - you are correct. that's all we had with us on that trip.

in general, the better armed...the better.

http://www.accuratereloading.com/700ne.html This right here would work... :D might be abit heavy though.

believe it or not...I'd also look into some mace that can hold them off for a bit while you wait for the rounds they've taken to really slow them down...

a bit heavy!?


the bear will still eat you after you die of exhaustion from carrying that thing :lol: