Having a gun makes no difference in the outcome of bear attacks!

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/03/08/2058759/gun-is-no-insurance-policy-in.html

I would imagine the number of fatalities to the bears probably goes way down when the human is unarmed!

there's was a thread on this a while ago.

-john

Sorry for the duplication. I was busy fighting off bears...

Some very interesting things said in that article:



Totally agreed. I highly recommend that people carrying guns for self-defense should be trained, and not just shooting paper targets on a square range. Training to shoot under stress is key.

Regarding handguns:



Handguns are often far more useful in close quarters encounters, especially in the brush.



Emphasis added.

My belief is that a trained person with a gun is safer than he or she would be without it. Training in this context means knowing how to avoid bear encounters as well as knowing how to shoot under stress.

I believe this is the original discussion referred to above: Teens mauled by grizzly in survival skills course

That said, the article you refer to brings the results of an additional study to the table that I don't think we had during that discussion. While there were the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's study results comparing firearms to bear spray, I believe we only had Dr. Tom Smith's study on the effectiveness bear spray ... now it looks like we have the results of his study on firearm effectiveness too. The more information we have, the better.

Here's a good quote from the study's author from the university's press release that sums things up for me:

“People should consider carrying a non-lethal deterrent such as bear spray,” said Smith, a gun owner himself. “It’s much easier to deploy, it’s less cumbersome and its success rate in these situations is higher than guns.”


With respect to this, wouldn't a bear banger do the same thing? I'm not saying the shotgun is necessarily a bad idea, but I'm just not sure that its the only tool that can provide this benefit (i.e., make a loud bang to scare the bear away).

"Longtime bear biologist Tom Smith and colleagues analyzed 269 incidents of close-quarter bear-human conflict in Alaska between 1883 and 2009 in which a firearm was involved. They found the gun made no statistical difference in the outcome of these encounters, which resulted in 151 human injuries and 172 bear fatalities."

I'm not a scientist or a bear expert, but I find flaws in both your reasoning and the statement in the article.
The study was of 269 incidents where the human was armed with a firearm. Out of 269 incidents, they tallied 151 human injuries and 172 bear fatalities.

From that, he and you draw the conclusion that firearms made no difference in the outcome.

A scientific study would have included (at least) groups of armed and unarmed encounters. But then, attempting to study the "unarmed encounters" may leave you frustrated at the difficulty in locating witnesses. There are the occasional findings of finger bones in bear scat that could bear (npi) witness, I suppose.

Let's see, I would guess that if there were no firearms involved that there would have been NO bear fatalities and the outcome would have been leaning toward: Bears: 269, Humans: 0. Does that make sense?

172 bear deaths in a study of 269 cases where there would have been NO bear deaths without firearms is called "no statistical difference in the outcome of these encounters". ? ? ! ! ! Really?

Does the biologist have his own agenda?? There were NO deaths of humans mentioned. How many deaths of humans would there have been without the firearm available?

Firearms used to be called "Equalizers" for a reason. They give you a chance, but you must have the training, knowledge, discipline and ability to use them correctly.

I agree. I always go armed in bear country and in Alaska. The people who had guns obviously weren't proficient with them. A 300 grain solid from a .44 magnum does wonders for a bear problem when properly placed in the vitals.

[quote=Bingley]Having a gun makes no difference in the outcome of bear attacks!quote]

I guess that is why no one in bear country carries a gun! No one! - Alaska State Troopers, pilots, hunters, fisherman, guides, residents. They all learned from the real experts like - Timothy Treadwell (4/29/57-10/5/03). I think he died hugging a tree.

Here's a paragraph that addresses your concern:



From: http://news.byu.edu/archive12-mar-bearsandguns.aspx

Keep in mind that these are news articles, not research reports where Smith presents his findings in a detailed, comprehensive manner suitable for scientific scrutiny. If you are interested, check out the next issue of the Journal of Wildlife Management.

This forum is not the place for debating gun rights and such. I'd suggest a bit of care and attention to what the researcher is trying to accomplish, giving him the benefit of doubt, before accusing him of having "hidden agendas."

Are for other posters clamoring about always carrying in bear country: it may be so that people carry firearms, but it does not alter the statistics. Just because I think having my little blanky with me prevents a meteor from falling on my head, and no meteor has yet fallen on my head, it doesn't mean the blanky is a good meteor repellant. If you have hard numbers to show that firearms give you a higher survival rate in bear encounters, please do share. Otherwise you need to respect the people who actually put in the work.