May 4, 2007
SOMETIMES THE BEAR:
A hike into horror and an act of courage: A California man visiting Glacier National Park with his daughter instinctively puts himself between her and the rampaging bear's claws and teeth. (Thomas Curwen, April 29, 2007, LA Times)
Glacier National Park, Mont. — JOHAN looked up. Jenna was running toward him. She had yelled something, he wasn't sure what. Then he saw it. The open mouth, the tongue, the teeth, the flattened ears. Jenna ran right past him, and it struck him — a flash of fur, two jumps, 400 pounds of lightning.It was a grizzly, and it had him by his left thigh. His mind started racing — to Jenna, to the trip, to fighting, to escaping. The bear jerked him back and forth like a rag doll, but he remembered no pain, just disbelief. It bit into him again and again, its jaw like a sharp vise stopping at nothing until teeth hit bone. Then came the claws, rising like shiny knife blades, long and stark.
Johan and Jenna had been on the trail little more than an hour. They had just followed a series of switchbacks above Grinnell Lake and were on a narrow ledge cut into a cliff. It was an easy ascent, rocky and just slightly muddy from yesterday's rain.
Johan took some pictures. Jenna pushed ahead. It was one of the most spectacular hikes they'd taken on this trip, a father-daughter getaway to celebrate her graduation from high school. There were some steps, a small outcropping, a blind turn, and there it was, the worst possibility: a surprised bear with two yearling cubs.
The bear kept pounding into him. He had to break away. To his right was the wall of the mountain, to his left a sheer drop. Slightly behind him, however, and 20 feet below the trail, a thimbleberry and alder patch grew on a small slope jutting from the cliff. As a boy growing up in Holland, Johan had roughhoused with his brother and had fallen into bushes. He knew it would hurt, but at least it wouldn't kill him.
So like a linebacker hurtling for a tackle, he dived for that thimbleberry patch. The landing rattled him, but he was OK. His right eye was bleeding, but he didn't have time to think about that. Jenna was now alone with the bear.
She had reached down to pick up the bear spray. The small red canister had fallen out of the side pocket of his day pack, and there it was, on the ground. But she couldn't remove the safety clip, and the bear was coming at her again. She screamed.
"Jenna, come down here," he yelled.
She never heard him. She was falling, arms and legs striking the rocky cliff, then nothing for seconds before she landed hard.
The bear did hear him, however. It looked over the cliff and pounced. Johan had never seen anything move so fast in his life. He tucked into a fetal position. The bear fell upon him, clawing and biting at his back. His day pack protected him, and his mind started racing again.
His daughter didn't have a pack. He always carried the water and snacks. If the bear got to her, it'd tear her apart.
He turned, swung to his right and let himself go. Only this time there wasn't a thimbleberry patch to break his fall. It was a straight drop to where Jenna had landed, and instead of taking the bear away from her, as he had hoped, he was taking the bear to her. [...]
For millenniums, bears have lurked on the periphery of everyday life, dark shadows just beyond the firelight. On this continent, they have been our respected competition and greatest threat. Even though close encounters with bears, especially grizzlies, are rare, they trigger a conditioned response, a reflex of fear and flight that is seldom called upon in modern life. Sometimes we get away. Sometimes we can't.
At the point where they're intentionally talking loudly to let the bears know they're there, it's hard to maintain overmuch sympathy. Posted by Orrin Judd at May 4, 2007 7:27 AM
You really are a city boy, aren't you?
Posted by: Bryan at May 4, 2007 8:09 AMCity boys use pepper spray.
Posted by: oj at May 4, 2007 10:17 AMYou don't want to surprise a grizzly ever, ever, ever! If they know you're coming they will usually get out of your way, especially a mom with cubs. If you surprise one, especially a mom with cubs, it's likely to come after you. I hiked the trail above Grinnel Lake this summer and there was bear sign everywhere. Some people we met on the trail were making noise, some weren't.
When you're in bear country you need to make noise constantly so the bears know you're coming. Talking or banging rocks/sticks can do that, but you eventually get too tired or distracted to keep it up. That's why I dangle a small shop bell (the kind that rings when you open the door) from my pack. It's a pleasant ring and can be heard for a long distance. They sell cheaper bells in park concession stores, but they don't make as much noise.
This father and daughter stumbled into a near worst case scenario, and I feel for them, but bear country is bear country. You have to take precautions, even though I've never seen a bear on the trail. I suspect a lot of bears have seen me, though.
Posted by: BrianOfAtlanta at May 4, 2007 10:21 AMYou don't want to surprise a grizzly ever, ever, ever! If they know you're coming they will usually get out of your way, especially a mom with cubs. If you surprise one, especially a mom with cubs, it's likely to come after you. I hiked the trail above Grinnel Lake this summer and there was bear sign everywhere. Some people we met on the trail were making noise, some weren't.
When you're in bear country you need to make noise constantly so the bears know you're coming. Talking or banging rocks/sticks can do that, but you eventually get too tired or distracted to keep it up. That's why I dangle a small shop bell (the kind that rings when you open the door) from my pack. It's a pleasant ring and can be heard for a long distance. They sell cheaper bells in park concession stores, but they don't make as much noise.
This father and daughter stumbled into a near worst case scenario, and I feel for them, but bear country is bear country. You have to take precautions, even though I've never seen a bear on the trail. I suspect a lot of bears have seen me, though.
Posted by: BrianOfAtlanta at May 4, 2007 10:26 AMCity boys wind up as bear skat. Brian of Atlanta is correct.
You were being snarky about their loud talking bringing on a bear attack and you were precisely wrong. And, as usual, once your original point has been discredited, you ditch it in favor of an entirely different point and pretend the original, incorrect point never existed.
Stay in your ivory basement. It's safer.
No, the point is that they knew the bears were there. That's why they were talking loudly and carrying pepper spray as they traipsed through bear grass. It's all the same point, you merely stumbled, again, on the reading comprehension portion of the standardized test....
Posted by: oj at May 4, 2007 10:48 AMGetting attacked by a bear is like winning the lottery. You have to get lucky to have it happen to you. The real problems come from people who get ready to "get closer to Nature" by going to REI and buying all the most expensive gear so they are insulated from any kind of discomfort for their 3 day trip. They are the kind of people who go out looking for trouble without realizing it, thinking, "It can't happen to me." Just like these two. What has both annoyed and amused me are the tourons on well used trails practically in the developed areas wearing their bear/dinner bells while plugged into a Walkman.
During '80s and '90s, I spent whole summers in and around the thermal areas in Yellowstone, hiking alone or at night, and rarely do I see bears (black or grizzly) and have no desire to see them. Closest I've come is finding a grizzly footprint on the trail in the fresh 1 inch deep (and rapidly accumulating) snow of a late May snowshower. Our normal conversations almost certainly scared it off of the nearby elk carcas we were out to inspect and as anyone who's been out in such storms know, falling snow muffles sounds. (Yes, inspect. The trail was closed because of the nearby bear-bait, but there were so many carcasses that season that this one hadn't been touched and we were going to reopen it. Nevermind. And the bear never came back.)
But I was stalked by a bison once. It was just lonely.
Posted by: Raoul Ortega at May 4, 2007 11:12 AMAnother gun-free zone case.
Posted by: Lou Gots at May 4, 2007 11:13 AMDid you know it is possible to distinguish between black and grizzly bears based upon their scat?
Black bear scat is torpedo-shaped, hard, and contains fur, bones, etc.
Grizzly bear scat is larger, more brown, contains little bells, and smells like pepper spray.
Posted by: Mairnealach at May 4, 2007 11:31 AM