June 3, 2023

Moose Attack People More than Wolves and Bears Combined?

I have to say this is a first. Yesterday, I read a good article about moose and moose hunting, that included some history and a bit of behavioral perspective on this large critter. As part of the picture the author was attempting to create of the moose, he began by stating that moose are not usually an “aggressive” animal but can be “provoked” or “frightened” to behave that way. I’ll have to agree with that and here’s an example:

A friend of mine who goes to deer hunting camp with me every year, one day was hunting when he came upon a young bull moose standing in the middle of a swampy area. It happened to be standing where my friend wanted to walk. He began messing with the moose putting his rifle over his head and pretending to have a rack of antlers and making other odd movements.

Consequently, the moose moved on and disappeared over a ridge at the edge of the swamp. The hunter proceeded on his way when all of a sudden he heard a loud crash. Turning, the same moose was approaching him from behind with what one would not jokingly call “aggressive” behavior.

But what was also contained in this article was a continuation of that aggressive behavior disclaimer that read: “In terms of raw numbers, they attack more people than bears and wolves combined, but usually with only minor consequences.”

That has to be a first for me. I’ve never heard, read, or anything else anything resembling serious discussion that moose attack more people than bears and wolves combined. Even with “minor consequences” we almost never hear anything about anyone being “attacked” by a moose. Wolves and bear for certain, but not moose. I’m curious where this author got his information.

I began doing some research to see what I could find to disprove or substantiate this claim. As much as I find Wikipedia to be an unreliable resource (I might use it as a starting point while researching), I ended up on Wikipedia looking for information about moose attacks on people. It appears this author copy and pasted word for word what was written in Wikipedia about aggressive moose behavior. Wiki’s words are: “Moose are not usually aggressive towards humans, but can be provoked or frightened to behave with aggression. In terms of raw numbers, they attack more people than bears and wolves combined, but usually with only minor consequences.” (More than these sentences can be found copied word for word in this article. However, because Wiki is an open source resource, it is possible the author was the one who contributed this information to Wiki.)

As with a lot of what Wiki writes, none of this is substantiated with resources to support this claim. A little read searching and we know that in Alaska, there are three times more moose than bears. Moose number approximately 175,000, bears (grizzly and black) number about 130,000, and there are around 11,000 wolves in Alaska.

When you examine the demographics of each animal, it might make sense that there are more moose attacks, especially when you consider that people attempt to approach a moose for photo taking and other stupid reasons. But I will have to seriously question the reporting of “attacks” by moose, bears, and wolves on people globally.

It is a bit dishonest to copy and paste information that is not substantiated (and spending a fair amount of time on this subject I could not come close to proving this claim). The claim is so broad it is impossible to prove. It might have been better to simply state that moose can become aggressive and perhaps offer some sensible tips on how not to piss off a moose.

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Bursting the Bubble of “Normal” Bear Behavior

If anyone might be interested to return to my seemingly endless commentary on bear behavior and bear attacks, they would discover that I’m a broken record when it comes to the sickening echo chamber of “bears don’t ‘normally’ act that way” and “bears don’t ‘normally’ attack people for no reason.” etc. And of course the most childish of all lame comments, “Bears are more afraid of you than you are of them.”

It never ends. When children don’t act the way we WANT them to, or what the indoctrination institutions and doctors consider “normal” behavior, we feed them chemicals to alter that behavior to make them “normal.”

“Normal” is a subjective issue that we have willingly given over to centralized authority and as such are slaves to their perspective of normal. Whatever doesn’t fit the “normal” mold is left either unexplained or simply passed off as an anomaly regardless of the frequency of not normal (by chosen perspective) behavior.

We can’t harness and drug bears. Instead, we insist on sticking to human-projected behavior patterns, framed around the bio-perverse obsession with protecting wild animals (large predators like bears) even at the expense of human life. In short, we want animals to be human-like and therefore project human characteristics onto animals.

A recent attack by two bears in Wyoming on a guide and his client has created a bit of a stir. The Media including Social Media and Internet websites have, once again, revealed to us the very reason we should NEVER believe ANYTHING we read on their platforms. Written accounts of the event have proven over and over to be inaccurate and yet the bad information gets embellished and passed along – and worst believed.

The brain trust – those who know more about everything than anyone else and has an “expert” opinion – have provided all the answers to any question asked and even those that haven’t.

In all of this, once again we are subjected to the vomit of the Media as they try to choke back their regurgitated nonsensical misinformation about bear behavior – and refuse to change.

I read this evening in the Newscentermaine.com website how we will probably never know why these two bears attacked two men attempting to retrieve a dead elk. The entire article is rife with terrible information that is formulated in the manner in which I described at the beginning of this piece.

Based mostly on the perverse need, having been indoctrinated into the minds of most American’s these days, to paint a completely positive aura about bears and other large predators, officials, brainwashed in their strong delusion that “bears don’t normally act this way,” now want to tell us we’ll never know why these bears attacked. Could it be that they attacked because they are BEARS??? Geez!

Here is a laundry list of nonsense repeated in this Online Media article:

“Wyoming wildlife officials say we may never know why a grizzly bear and her cub killed a hunting guide in an unusual and unprovoked attack.”

We are to believe that this attack was “unusual” because it doesn’t nicely and conveniently fit the narrative used to protect large predators. We are also to believe the attack was “unprovoked.” Try to understand how stupid that statement is. Because we refuse to understand that all animal behavior is unpredictable, this attack is called “unprovoked.” Obviously, something provoked the bears to attack, even if they were provoked by the simple fact that they are wild, unpredictable, large animals. Geez!

“We’re very fortunate that bears usually behave like bears should… But there are occasions where bears don’t behave like other bears.”

Once again, we are supposed to believe their inconsistent mantra that bears’ behavior is “normal” and predictable.

“Grizzlies don’t typically attack humans like that…”

Says who? Well, the authorities, that’s who. They don’t want anyone to have any ill feelings toward grizzly bears so they repeatedly tell us bears are afraid of us and are harmless except if you “surprise” them or meddle with cubs. B.S.!!! They even tell us bears are so harmless we can effectively protect ourselves by arming ourselves with bear spray – the same bear spray the guide used and died anyway. And note these same authorities who want you to carry bear spray so you won’t harm bears had to kill the same bear that attacked the guide and hunter with a rifle. Hmmm.

“Attacks are more commonly associated with either a surprise encounter… or if the bears were defending their food.”

None of my comments are intended to tell people this information about bear behavior isn’t true – it is just incomplete and saturated with the human condition foisted onto an animal. Each and every time authorities go out of their way, and the press becomes their echo chamber, to tell us how RARE it is that a bear, a wolf, a fox, a mountain lion, a bobcat – you name the animal – attacks someone, it’s unusual and not “normal” behavior. The truth is they don’t know what’s normal or abnormal behavior. If it fits their determined narrative, then it must be “normal.” Anything outside of that convenient narrative is just “unexplained,” as though it never happens but once in a million years. And yet we are always reading about those “unusual” and not “normal” attacks on people while refusing to change our understanding of wild animal behavior and do and say responsible things like, “______ attacks are considered to be not man-created normal behavior. All animals, wild and domestic can be and are unpredictable. You should always approach every animal in every situation as though just about anything will happen…including one of those ‘unprovoked’ attacks.”

But I’m not holding my breath waiting for them to change what they say.

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The Bear Spray That Didn’t Work

It was November 15, 2007, when I wrote an article on my former blog titled, “Bear Spray Versus Bullets.” This article came at a time when government authorities and members of so-called conservation groups (environmentalists) were claiming that bear spray was a better deterrent to saving your life than a gun when being attacked by a bear – specifically a grizzly bear. This difference of opinion has never really been resolved and probably won’t be.

I recall that it was only a couple days after I published that article I got a phone call from one of those “authorities” who was pushing the bear spray for protection meme. I assumed, and still do, this person had a financial stake in bear spray among other personal agenda reasons.

Regardless, I agreed to give him my mailing address and he promptly sent me a garbage pail full of propaganda that upon reading no more convinced me that spray was better than bullets than playing in the middle of Interstate 81 in Pennsylvania would be.

Most have heard by now that an experienced guide and an elk hunter were attacked by two grizzly bears in Wyoming. Both men were heading back into the woods to retrieve an elk the hunter had downed. The guide, Mark Uptain, was killed in the attack. The hunter was injured but not with life-threatening injuries. Exactly what happened at the scene remains to be known.

As is typical, reports as to what happened began making their rounds and what is also typical many of those reports turned out to be false. However, according to a report published in Ammoland, one thing is certain: “Mark Uptain appears to have relied on a can of bear spray to deter the attack. A can of bear spray, with the safety off, was found at the site. The adult sow grizzly had bear spray on her at the scene.”

So, the guide discharged his bear spray, and it got on the bear (although this report doesn’t say what part of the bear had spray on it, one would assume that bear spray placed anywhere except the face would be ineffective.)

Again, we come back to the burning question as to which is more effective in warding off a charging bear – spray or bullets. Maybe the real answer is contained in this same article: “The bear was shot and killed as she attacked investigating Fish and Wildlife personnel.”

It certainly looks like that while authorities were at the scene investigating this event, at least one of the two bears attacked Fish and Wildlife personnel. Why, as I pointed out in my 2007 article that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was heavily promoting spray over bullets, didn’t the FWS officials whip out their cans of bear spray and ward off that attacking bear? Did officials even have bear spray with them? Whether they intended to kill the two bears or not should have been of little concern. How did investigators know this particular bear was the bear that attacked and killed Mark Uptain?

Obviously, the agents doing the investigation believe bullets are better than spray.

Unfortunately, we now have evidence that in this one incident bear spray did not save one man’s life.

Perhaps it is time to revisit the irresponsible claims that spray is better than bullets. As I said in 2007, it depends upon many circumstances and each person has to decide for themselves how to protect themselves. Unfortunately, our own government is doing all that they can to force us to do it their way. Not necessarily the way they would and do it but how the government demands we do it.

The big question then should be this: If bear pepper spray is better for warding off an attacking bear, why did a government official(s) use a gun to do the job?

 

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Experienced Guide Killed by Attacking Grizzly

And the “brain trust” that have never been attacked by a bear have all the answers.

An experienced guide, while leading a hunter in Wyoming to retrieve a dead elk shot earlier, was attacked by a grizzly and killed. The hunter ran for his life.

Details of what specifically happened are lacking at this point. Some information can be found here, here, and here. At the last link, you can read all the comments from the intelligencers who have all the right answers and who have probably never seen a grizzly bear let alone be attacked by one.

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Bears: Looking Big and Making Noise Not Always a Working Solution

I’ve always ridiculed the advice given by people, mostly from those who have never encountered a threatening bear, that when you are encountering a bear, even an outright attack, “look big” and “make loud noises” to frighten a bear away.

Over the past weekend, I was part of a discussion that included a woman that I went to high school with. I had known for several years that she was once treed by a bear near her home while she was out for a walk. It seems that in the past 25 or 30 years, she and her husband have had several encounters with bears at and near their home.

The woman told us that the area around their home has historically been ideal habitat for bears and seeing the animals around their home is a common occurrence.

The day she was treed by a bear, it happened quickly, as one might suspect. She tried the “slowly backing away” approach which only afforded her time to reach a small tree a few feet away. The tree was small enough that she could shimmy up the tree just far enough out of the reach of the bear and also small enough that the bear could not climb it.

The bear persisted to a point where the woman was slipping and losing her grip but she hung on.

She didn’t realize at the time that the bear, once realizing it couldn’t get her from the tree, tried a different tactic – it retreated but only far enough to hide behind a tree. The woman emphasized that in many of her encounters with bears, this seems to be a common method of attack – to hide and wait in ambush.

When she got back down on the ground, she spotted the bear attempting to hide behind a big tree. She quietly snuck away and when she thought she was far enough away from the bear, she ran like hell for home.

What is most interesting is that in telling of the several other bear encounters, most of them right around the house, she was emphatic in saying that the advice to “look big” and “make a lot of noise” is quite ineffective. On multiple occasions, particularly once when a bear forced both the husband and wife into their garden shed, they did their best to “look big,” yelled and made as much noise as they could only to witness the bear basically ignoring their actions.

It is important to note that both of these people, who are not your typical “scaredy-cats” felt threatened by this and all other attacks. They find the advice always given worthless from their own experiences.

I would suppose the takeaway from all of this is that one probably should not completely abandon the advice given but to realize that it is ALWAYS under the circumstances of the moment that determine the actions and reactions of a bear. Perhaps it is for that reason, if someone is regularly hiking in bear country and/or seem to have regular bear visitors to their home, they should consider having at their disposal some other tool to deter a bear other than remembering to “look big” and “make noise.”

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Bear Doing What a Bear Does

There are reports of a 71-year-old wheelchair-bound woman having an “encounter” with a bear in her home. Authorities are “…concerned the bear may have rabies.”

According to repeated “facts” about bears, they don’t bother people, they are more afraid of you than you are of them, all you need to do to “shoo” a bear away is make noise and “look big.”

Never it is stated that a hungry bear will do things like entering a home perhaps because of the smell of food. In this case, the excuse for a bear’s behavior is it is suspected of rabies.

Maybe it was Yogi the Bear and was looking for food for him and Boo Boo.

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Dog owner during bear attack: ‘I stuck my finger right in its eye’

Forgetting to “look big” or believing that “bears are more afraid of you than you are of them,” and yet we are also repeatedly told how rare it is that a bear would attack anything…man or beast, yet one more “rare” bear attack. Regardless, a man stopped beside the road to let his dog take a pee. The report (linked to below) states that the man took his “11-month-old lab mix” about 50 feet into the woods and that’s where his dog was attacked and where he fought the bear off his dog. The event left the dog and the man with cuts and bruises but nothing life-threatening.

One has to wonder when you read the following nonsensical quips and quotes, what is this information being passed along based upon? – “This does not happen, except in freak instances…” and “Black bears, which rarely attack other animals…,” followed by, “The den was unusually close to a busy roadway, ‘but a younger one doesn’t necessarily know to go back into the woods’…”, and this, “I don’t want people to freak out and think they can’t go into the woods and without worrying about a bear nailing them.” and lastly, “Since the 1980s, fewer than a dozen Mainers have fended off a bear, and none have died.”

Granted, discovering a bear hibernating or otherwise next to the highway, in the dead of winter in Maine, right at the spot a man stops to “water” his dog, is a rarity. But let’s look a bit closer at the idiocy of this report.

The article, like a good echo chamber, states that black bears “rarely attack other animals.” Because this is extremely subjective, what does this actually mean? Later in the article, it reads that since the 1980s, “fewer than a dozen” Mainers (what about out-of-staters?) have fought off a bear attack. What about the many others that probably go unreported? Does everyone who encounters a bear call and report it to the Bangor Daily News? All of this brings us to the important point as to just how “rare” is it that bears attack animals? If the man did not have a dog with him when he entered the woods, would the bear have attacked the man? Would that have been okay…as in the man deserved it somehow? We know what the newspapers, prompted by the environmentalist-trained biologists and game wardens would say. Are we being responsible for continuously repeating black bears don’t attack people or animals?

We know that come Spring, black bears have learned where deer and moose go to calve their young. Attacking new-born calves is a very common thing…or is it a rare thing if you somehow feel the need to protect a predator even at the cost of human life?

I would like something more substantive from the press, and I know we’ll never get it, that supports their claims of the rarity.

I have admitted that it is unusual to find a bear semi-hibernating 50-feet off the highway, but aren’t we doing some projecting and placing human traits on an animal when we say things like, “but a younger one [black bear] doesn’t necessarily know to go back into the woods?” Many, so-called, scientists have studied varying species of animal to learn about their behavior. Seriously, have we reached a point that we now know what an animal “thinks” and why?” That is what we believe now…right? Maybe a lawsuit, on behalf of this young, improperly raised, and confused bear should be filed against the bear’s mother for abandoning it before it was mature enough to make good decisions, especially those based on weather conditions predicted in The Old Farmer’s Almanac. Or perhaps the MDOT should be sued for building a road where one day an immature, neglected, young bear decided to take a nap.

But more than anything else, the people should be sued because of Climate Change. That’s it. There’s no way this bear would have sacked out in this spot if it wasn’t for global warming. When will we ever learn?

The Maine Warden says he doesn’t want people to freak out and think they can’t go into the woods out of fear of “a bear nailing them.” I realize that we are all trained to believe that all people are incapable of making any kind of a decision without the direction of the State – and this is probably quite true – but which is being more responsible – telling people repeatedly bears won’t harm them or properly educating them on what might happen, even in one’s determination to never demonize a predator? If we should choose the education route to go, let’s find something better than telling a scared shitless, soon-to-be bear food victim to “look big.”

Perhaps the answer lies in the next to last paragraph of the article which states: “Since the 1980s, fewer than a dozen Mainers have fended off a bear, and none have died.” (emboldening added)

It is, therefore, to protect the bear, the tens of thousands of them, because attacks on animals (and people) are rare. The insane and perverse perspectives toward large predators are reinforced when we read that someone failing to get killed by a black bear justifies our ignorant and irresponsible actions.

Game Warden Shannon Fish confirmed that there were traces of a bear living in a small den where the attack occurred.

“This does not happen, except in freak instances, and Monday was a freak instance,” Fish said.<<<Read More>>>

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Money Talks and Bears Get Shot

Transplanting “problem” bears to another location sets the stage for a negligence lawsuit that could cost governments, universities and private entities millions of dollars.<<<Read the Story>>>

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Man Attacked By Bear – Fails to “Look Big”

*Editor’s Note* – Even though we can continuously read, day after day of yet another bear attack on a man, they never happen, or are extremely rare.

BUT DON’T GO LOOK!

Obviously, this man was hauled down from a tree more than one time because he failed to “LOOK BIG.”

“A bowhunter was dragged from his tree stand and mauled by a black bear recently. He resorted to stabbing the bear repeatedly with an arrow until it broke off the attack.”<<<Read More>>>

 

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More Bear Attack Survival Advice From Someone Who Obviously Hasn’t Been Attacked

It has always tickled me that “experts” or wannabe experts are at liberty to hand out gads of advice on how to survive an attack by a bear. To my knowledge, I’ve never heard or read anybody’s advice who has actually been attacked by a bear. But that doesn’t stop people from telling you what to do…right or wrong.

The latest, mostly nonsense, comes to us from an article found on Pajamas Media – “How to Survive a Bear Attack in America.” Are we to guess that none of this advice will work outside of America? Or is it that only American bears attack people?

The first mistake the author makes is to very quickly give advice to never “play dead” when being attacked by a bear because this act “can quickly lead to actual death.” A bit later in the article, the author advises, “If the grizzly charged you because it considered you to be a threat, you’ll want the bear to think you’ve passed on. Once the bear believes that you are a harmless corpse, the chances are really good that it’ll give up and move on.”

Perhaps the best advice is to not pay heed to this guy’s advice.

It also appears that this guy has full faith and confidence in bear spray as the only way to ward off an attacking bear. I wonder if he’s ever used it? Hope that the wind isn’t blowing when the attack happens. However, read this insane explanation about which kind of bear spray to use: “Both bear spray and normal pepper spray contain oleoresin capsicum, the chemical found in chili peppers that gives a nasty burning sensation when sprayed in the faces of humans and bears, but the difference is that bear spray contains 80-90 percent less of the noxious chemical than regular pepper spray. That’s because pepper sprays aren’t intended to incapacitate a grizzly, it’s designed to surprise and scare the hulking creature away from you; using pepper spray that was made for use on human goons on a bear is overkill!”

Seriously? Think about it for a minute. I agree that if I were being attacked by “human goons” I would want the most powerful spray available, or better yet the most powerful handgun on the planet today. But the same holds true for a damned attacking bear. Why would I care if I was using “overkill” to stop an attacking bear? The damned bear is probably about to rip me to shreds and I should be concerned over whether or not I’m using too much of a deterrent? Only an idiot thinks this way.

You can’t make this stuff up. Only a willing participant in this animal-perverse society would be concerned about harming the bear and not giving a rat’s hind end about harming another person.

According to this clown, if you are being attacked by a polar bear, you might as well pull out that most powerful handgun in the world and blow your brains out. He suggests that if the non “overkill” bear spray doesn’t work (huh?), “use whatever weapon you have available.”  Isn’t that “overkill?” If there’s a chance the bear spray isn’t going to work on a charging bear, why not carry a weapon that will?

I love this suggestion. Okay, so you are being attacked by a polar bear. According to this guy, “Avoid the enraged, starving polar bear’s powerful jaws and massive meat hook claws.”

Yes, the last time I was having a fight with a polar bear, I survived by using Mohammed Ali’s famed, “Rope a Dope.” I was able to avoid the powerful claws and jaws, kicked the bear in the nuts and while it was bent over in pain I remembered the advice to “back away slowly and cautiously.”

I am especially amused when experts give lip service to the reasons why bears might attack a person. It seems that in their pea brains the only reasons are either they are hungry or pissed off at you. Evidently this author suggests that the tactics you use against a hungry bear are different than from an angry bear. However, the author doesn’t expertly tell us how to tell the difference. Perhaps you could just ask the bear.

Always the advice to “scare off” an attacking bear is to “LOOK BIG!” This author in question doesn’t actually give that advice. The closest he comes is to tell readers to “stand tall.” Once you’ve calmly taken up the “tall” stance, then commence to kick the shit out of the bear. Works every time!

If you encounter a bear, any kind of bear in any kind of setting, it’s a crap shoot. If you come armed so as not to harm the bear with “overkill” then chances are you are willing to sacrifice yourself for the sake of the bear. God bless you! No matter how much experts want to pretend they know something, they don’t. Animals don’t think like humans and the more humans pretend to believe that animals rationalize things like people do, the more trouble you are likely to get into. When a person tells you that, “bear don’t like surprises,” what, exactly, are they basing that premise on? I can tell you. It’s Romance Biology and Voodoo Science. We want so much to rationalize a bear’s behavior based upon our own. It just doesn’t work that way.

Remember, after all this advice, consider the idea, BEFORE heading into bear country, that perhaps a bear will attack you just because it wants to.

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