Ep. 95: Dealing With Large Predators

see them, they're probably there. While I don't necessarily consider many of them extremely dangerous, there are certain precautions that should be taken. This week on the podcast, I'm gonna be covering the different species of large predators you might encounter, as well as the potential threat they may provide. We'll talk about ways to keep dangerous interactions to a minimum and the best options for defense. But before we do that, I want to tell you this story of a few

different encounters with one of North America's stealthiest predators. Now I'm not talking about myself. I'm talking about Puma Concolor, the Mountain lion. I'll tell you what if I just think of all the predators in North America. Absolutely, the one that excels in stealth has to be the mountain lion. I've had quite a few encounters over the years with mountain lions. I have actually lost count of how many

I've seen just out and about. I know that there's people that say, like, oh, if you've seen a mountain lion, there's probably too many mountain lions because they are so stealthy. Many people might go their entire life hunting and never see one. I think I've I wouldn't even know. I've probably seen over a hundred just out wild glassing, encountered them. Um one day, I actually saw eight in one day. But I've I've been in areas where there are lots

of mountain lions. I've encountered quite a few of them and probably have twenty good stories. But none of them are those um attack type stories that everyone wants to hear. They're just encounters with mountain lions. But I think there's definitely something to be learned with each one of these type of encounters. This one year, I was actually hunting down in Arizona or late season archery hunting cou'se de

or have Alina was walking back toward camp. In the place I was hunting, it was like in these mountains and there's these big washes that kind of worked their way back into the flats where I was camped out in the flats. So I was walking through and walking down and looked down. I'm like, oh sweet, there's some tracks here. I was like in the big drag mark

like investigating, and I see lion tracks dragging something. So of course curious nature that, I am like, maybe it got a deer, Maybe there's gonna be a rack there, maybe it got a cow. There's a lot of free range cattle. Just figured to investigate. So I started following

the drag and ends and I'm like, oh, okay. So there's like this grass and I'm looking around and I see this kind of like it took me a while to see it, but there's this dead calf, like a beef calf, and it's covered up with brush like a the cat covered it up. And the mountains will do that a lot. They'll kind of like stash their cash, their kill. They'll cover it up to try to keep other predators and things from getting it. And so I'm like, oh sweet, that's cool. So I figure I'll just take

some pictures. I'm bent down getting into my pack and I've got my camera just at the bottom of the pack. It's just covered up with a bunch of crap, you know, jacket, whatever, gear, just all kinds of stuff. So I'm digging down there and I look I kind of like something didn't feel right. I don't even know what it was. I look up and at the same second like I kind of like, I like lock eyes with this cat maybe five feet away, crouched down, he luckily jumps off the other way. My

heart was racing. I was like, I mean, I'm bent over, like not paying attention, and this thing is two arms length the way. I probably could have like literally just jumped and got it with a knife if I was like trying to. It was like, if it was a deer or is this like it was right there that close, it could have easily just jumped up and grabbed me. Luckily,

though I think I had. I mean, there's kind of some sticks and other stuff in the way, and it was just it had probably heard me coming, moved off the kill, crouched down and just went completely unnoticed, completely unseen, just a few feet away, and I didn't even notice it was there. Had I that cat wanted to make me dinner, it easily could have because of the way that it used its stealth in the way that I approached that situation, just kind of like didn't see it

and really couldn't see it. Um, he was just laying down that close and luckily jumped to the other direction. That kind of story. Uh, it just it kind of reminded me of how stealthy some of these large predators are. When you're talking about large prayers, I'm kind of thinking of mountain lions, black bears, wolves, grizzly bears, you know, as the primary ones that we have in North America.

I guess it would have been last year. Yeah, probably beginning of it, before the whole world kind of slowed down. A friend of mine and I were out chasing mountain lions and we met up with these guys and that had a bunch of dogs and houndsmen, and so we're just looking trying to cut some tracks and maybe chase

some cats. So towards the end of the day, one of the guys had cut some tracks and like sweet so custom tracks turned out the dogs pretty good sized pack of dogs and they're running the track, and the cat went somehow went down and and then kind of the dogs started to get all confused and lost the scent lost. The track is probably there earlier in the day and really heavy winds that day, super cold temperatures, and I think that had kind of lost a little bit of the scent. So we went back to kind

of figure out, Okay, what was this cat doing? Where did he go? So we start following the track, and then that kind of track split off into another cat track. So there's a really big tom track and then another track that went away maybe it was it was probably a smaller female. So we're just following these tracks out while the other guys are trying to get the dogs. And I followed the one tracks the cat tracks up.

And a lot of times when you're following tracks in the fresh snow, we sometimes you might jump the cat. Sometimes you'll find, you know, a kill. I found quite a few kills this way. Um, sometimes you'll find line. Sometimes you'll never catch up to him, and that's why it's always a lot easier to find them with dogs. So for following the tracks, and they split off and some of the other guys went down, I went up, and then my tracks kind of went back down to

where they were. So they rounded up a few of the dogs and I see them all down there, and the dogs are kind of working and doing their thing.

So I walked down and I lost kind of the track in the The snow had burnt off and was wind blown, so I just dropped down to go talk to those guys, and like you know, we're all sitting around talking and the dogs are running around all over the place, and then all of a sudden, one of the dogs, after they've been working this area, maybe fifty yards away from us, boom jumps a cat pretty much like between six of us. That cat had just been there that whole time, laid down sitting there watching us.

The dogs chased into the cliff. We got to watch the whole jump and everything. That was pretty cool. It's cool to watch the dogs work, and it's just really to see how these animals react. And one thing that it just reminded me is how stealthy so many of these animals are. I don't know how many times I've chucker hunted in this particular canyon or canyons nearby, and it makes you think how many times am I walking past these animals and never knowing that they're there. They're

just laying down, watching, hanging back. And of course they aren't super aggressive, which is, you know, pretty good for us as hunters, because if they had the temperament of a I would say of like an African leopard, we'd all be in trouble. But for sure, they're definitely more of a shy predator. They use their health to be successful. But it goes to show that even when you're looking for them, even when you know that they're right in there,

they can just hunker down and essentially be invisible. And because of that, I've really come to the realization that throughout our day to day in hunting scenarios, more often than not, we're probably encountering these things and never know. We don't see them, but they might see us, or we just don't cross paths in a way that we have an encounter, but they're definitely in a lot of

the areas that we hunt. One of the main reasons that I wanted to talk about large predators and encounters and what to do and what to expect is because it's a question that I get so much. It's a question that I get a lot. It's a question I think primarily it comes from people that maybe didn't grow up or aren't familiar with hunting in areas where there are large predators. The thought of being somewhere where there's something that could eat you, attack you, harm you in

some way can be scary. It can be like you might think back and be like, Okay, I don't really know what to think, what to do, how real is the situation? How should I proceed? I think a lot of people that maybe have hunted, you know, Central United States, or hunted the farm behind their house their whole life or something like that, where that you haven't had these type of encounters regularly, it makes a lot of sense

to want to ask these kind of questions. So I think that it's really good to take the time to talk about it, and I know that I have in the past. I think it was even episode pretty early on in the podcast. You can always go back listen to. Episode two is just pretty much focused on brown bears, grizzly bears, and how to be safe. But a lot of people have asked, Okay, I've heard about brown bears, I've heard about grizzly bears. What about everything else that's

out there. There's wolves, there's lions, there's black bears, there's brown bears. So it seems like there's a lot of predators, a lot of things with teeth that are always out to get you. And while it might seem like that, um, from my experience, you know, I think about it in

two ways. I think that you should not necessarily worry about it, but I also think that you should be informed and have a plan and be safe because there it definitely can be a real threat, but it's not necessarily something me personally, I think about every second of every day, you know, if I I mean, I was trying to do a little bit of research and just see, like I when I comes to mind, let's talk about maybe even just ranking some of the predators and the

type of threat that they are. For wolves is one that you know there are in most Western states. They're very vocal. You hear them in the area, it can be a pretty eerie sound. I've actually been in a pack of I think it was thirteen wolves. Um. I never really I was afraid for my safety, But you know, when I think about it, I've never actually really heard of wolves killing anybody recently or really having any I mean there's been encounters, but nothing that seems even very aggressive.

So on the list of like threats and predators, wolves is really at the bottom of my list. I did have an encounter with two wolves one, but I think it was just more happenstance than anything. I was going down this trail in Idaho is like this logging trail I was hunting. I think it was a spring spring bear season. It's just really overgrown logging trail. Um. I think it was over in the Loch saw Er or something pretty high wolf populations before they had a wolf season.

And um, I was walking down this trail and all of a sudden, I see kind of like the grass and brush moving in front of me. And it was just happened so fast, And it was within a second a wolf within kicking distance, not quite kicking distance because I tried to kick. It was like this, all of a sudden, something running at me really fast. I just didn't really it first, didn't really know what it was because it was so thick, I know, hey, and kind of like try like make a big motion toward it.

And I was going to kick it if I could, but it all happens to us. I wasn't thinking, this is just like a gut reaction, hi, you know. And it ran off the trail and I had my gun on my shoulder. I pulled my gun off, and another one was coming on the trail just as fast, right at me. So I just shot into the ground right in front of me, and that muzzle breaking noise that anything that was gonna come running after that was gone. I don't think that that wolf was trying to attack me.

I mean, it was running in it kind of had like a little smile on his face. It seemed like from what I remember in that quick glance of like seeing it running in um, but it was more I think that there was just two wolves kind of like chasing each other for the most part, playing But you know, I won't know. I mean I kind of stepped in and yelled and and made some movements, and who knows, maybe I thought I was a different kind of animal

was running into check it out. But for me, it seemed like they were chasing each other, and I just thought, you know, it's just something that happened and scared him off, and great, no problems I wouldn't even say that it was even scared. It's just more of like startled by something running at you. Now, the next one on the list would probably be a lion. I looked it up. There's probably been like maybe the past hundred years, a

hundred and twenty attacks onwenty seven of them fatal. It seems like most of the recent ones are in places that don't allow mountain lion hunting, mostly California. There, California actually has a lot of mountain lions. If you think about it, you're like, okay, that's that's not a lot.

But also any time, in my opinion, when we're talking about large predators and attacks, well it's not a lot in comparison to numbers of people going outside and recreating, but it's also those are the people that are getting attacked. If you're on outside doing these things, you will have zero encounters with mountain lions, black bears, brown bears, or whatever. So because we're hunters were acting as prey or or what those animals would see us prey, oftentimes we're probably

ones that put ourselves at the most risk. It seems like a lot of the attacks are people on bikes, people that you know, maybe on hikes or other things in areas where the animals might not have as much food source or kind of mistake people for prey. But I don't think that very many mountain lion attacks are like brown bear attacks, where it's more like provoked in a non predatory response, which actually is kind of scarier

when they think you're prey. They're treating you like prey as opposed to startling one and then defending its turf. It's more going to be something where it's it's stalking you, sneaking in and making this attack because they are so sneaky. But still, you know, mountain lions, I think that there's a lot of them around. I think that you probably don't encounter them. They're very reclusive, they're very shy, they're very timid. That's just the nature of their species, and

I'm very thankful for that. There's a lot of other large cats that don't have that temperament, jaguars in particular, African lions, tigers just like other rand leopards that have kind of a completely different temperament, whereas mountain lions are very timid, very shy. Whether that's um just how they are, or maybe that's the fact that maybe they were chaste

enough to fear people are or larger predators. Um, I don't really know, but I do know that they're just general temperament, even when backed into a corner not to attack, is to try to scare, but mostly backing up, backing up, backing up. They aren't really the type that likes to be aggressive. Now, the next one on the list would be black bears. And if you're like a threat, you you see black bears higher of a threat than mountain lions.

I would say, yeah, probably. I mean, I was looking and it's hard to find some of these statistics and I don't necessarily know if any of them really matter, but you know, on average, maybe the past twenty years, there's probably been like from what I've seen, a couple of places, maybe up to twenty five deaths from black bears. So that's greater than one per year. So it's a

real it's a real thing. And I think black bears probably because there's so many of them, there's higher populations of them, they're in a wider range of places, and you're they're encountered in day to day life, and they're also kind of the things that provoke bear attacks might be um more common. They're more people in bear kind, tree that contains black bears. Black bears, you know, I would say, if you're ever gonna be attacked by any kind of bear, it's probably over a couple of things.

It's going to be a sow protecting cubs, or getting between a food source and them. And many times that's human provided food source. Maybe somebody didn't take care of their trash properly. That bears a fed bear, and then he becomes territorial over that trash. Cancer it's something it's like interacting around people's homes, interacting in places where there's a lot of people and a lot of people that might not even be prepared. There's also I've seen black

bears in just random places that seem very comfortable. People get comfortable with them, and then they do stupid things. They get too close. They maybe they see it, they're like, oh, look at this cute little cub, and then there's the moment bear there. Now, many of those kind of encounters might not necessarily be fatal, but they are encounters. They can be negative encounters, and then you can find those negative encounters you know in the wild, I've heard stories.

I know two people that have been attacked by black bears. One was hunting in California. Um, I just kind of heard the story secondhand from someone else archery hunting and got charged and scrapped up a bit. And then another person, a friend of mine's cousin, was guiding and river guiding in Idaho and she got pulled out of her tent while sleeping. So those are the kind of encounters that

really freak people out. And I think that those are kind of encounters that you know, when you're thinking about being out there alone, being out in a new environment, those are the things that are running through your mind like they constantly happen. But I do think that black bears actually are a real threat, whether it's life you know, maybe there's more encounters that aren't life threatening, but a

lot of encounters. The plus light is black bears are fairly timid when it comes to bear species compared to the next one that we talked about, brown bears. Black bears they like to do the bluff charge, they like to swatt at trees, they like to huff and let you know that they're there. Because they don't really want to have that negative encounter. They're just trying to say, like, I'm here, I don't want to mess with you, but

I'm trying to scare you away. And then the next one would be brown bears, and these are a legit I would say threat. They're the highest in lethal encounters and they aren't really to be messed with. I don't really think any of the large predators are to be messed with, But if you're in brown Bear Country, you definitely need to use certain precautions. Then hunters are really going to be the ones that are going to encounter

them the most. You're dealing with meet you're dealing you're walking off trails in their territory, You're being quiet, you aren't letting them know you're there, and so because of that, I would say that that would be your largest threat.

But even if you aren't in brown Bear Country, there are other large predators that you should consider and just kind of take things into consideration on how to be safe, how do you think safe, and if you're uncomfortable, how to be prepared in case you need to defend yourself.

You know, I was thinking about it and I was like, man, I could dive into statistics and be like, tell you all the barracked acts, this, that and the other thing, and get the exact numbers of And honestly, it doesn't mean jack ship because when it comes down to it, you just have to ask yourself, are you uncomfortable? And if you are, then you need to take certain precautions to make yourself comfortable. And then the other question you

gotta ask yourself is are you being stupid? Are you in a place where there is a real potential danger and you just they're ignoring it. So I think that you need to find that balance between thinking you're gonna get attacked behind every tree and being completely stupid going to sleep in grizzly country on top of a carcass. You know, there's there's just like a good balance between that from what I gather. And I think that, like you could probably ask five people their opinions on these

things and you probably get five hundred different answers. And I think that, like, in my opinion, I just like to let people know these are my opinions. I don't think that if anybody claims that they're an expert on like what to do and how it happens and all that stuff. I think that they're just like it's not actually truthful. Um, you know, everybody's got their own opinions on things, and these are just kind of some of

my opinions. But I think that the best way to kind of like it's like, well, what's the best course of action? And that's just preparation to avoidance. Um, you know, you you have to use certain amount of caution when you're out hunting. It doesn't matter what you're doing, You're you're gonna be out there, and so you kind of need to always in the back of your mind be

thinking about being cautious. And one thing that I kind of consider is, like, you know, I'll go through kind of my list of places where you're especially cautious, and it's like set up with caution when you're calling or acting like prey. So you're a hunter, you're you're you're trying to mimic things that large predators eat. Mountain lions

and wolves eat them, um, bears eat elk deer. If you're crawling around calling and mimicking those animals, you will probably have encounters with the things that eat those animals. If you do it enough. Times while hunting elk, I have called in wolves, I have called in mountain lions, and I have called in bears. It's something that's gonna happen. But as I'm moving, I'm always well, I'm always paying attention to try to find and make sure I'm not

seeing elk. But if I'm gonna set up calling for a long time, I generally like to set up like I would which is good for a hunting scenario, with something at my back and somewhere where I can see a little bit, because it's actually the best way for if that whatever I'm calling comes in. But it's also something you think about that, hey, it's a it's a

real thing that I could call in an animal. There's been times where I have called in mountain lions that are literally stalking up to the call, and it's those kind of things where you're like, Okay, I'm glad, I'm paying attention. I'm glad, I'm I'm aware that this is a thing because hey, I'm acting like something that they're eating. It's not like they're in there to try to kill me as a human. They're just in there to get get a meal, and they think that I am that meal.

In that scenario, I generally, unless I'm trying to kill a really big bull, generally let them know that I'm there and try to get them to go away. The next one would just be, like it goes to say, is you should do this all the time. Be aware of your surroundings. It's when you're hiking, look around when you're when you are in an area that's thicker, timber,

or more likely a large predator's bedroom. When I'm in grizzly country, you know, when I'm walking through really thick stuff where I smell something dead, or I'm you know, I'm using my nose, I'm using my eyes, I'm using my ears. When things don't add up, when things don't seem right, when something seems like, hey, this is a an area where there will be a large predator a high likelihood of that, I use extra caution. I pay attention. I'm not walking with my head down. I'm not um

going and trying to do stupid things. I'm just kind of being aware of my surroundings. Another thing that I do for avoidance is just to kind of keep a clean camp and don't invite trouble. So I generally even if I'm in like black bear country and there's no grizzlies around, or I'm in an area where I know that there's like a high density of some kind of you know, mostly black bears, I still keep a clean camp. I hoist my food up into a tree. I don't

generally keep like things in my tent. You know, you might think, like, well, they smell this sack of meat sleeping in the tent. But for the most part, you know, when a bear catches your wind. Think about when you're hunting black bears. As soon as they catch your wind, they're gone. Even when you're hunting brown bears or whatever. When they catch your wind, they're out of there because they still know that humans are predators to them or in some way they know that um and so they

generally don't like that kind of trouble. But if they smell something that's kind of like an easy food source for them, something sweet, like I generally keep my toothpaste and my other stuff out of my tent, like in my bag. I love to bring Snickers bars. If they smell my five D Snickers bars inside my tent, I'm using it as a pillow. Like the generally not smart thing to do. There are times where I do keep

stuff close to my vestibule or whatever. So it's like if I did hear something or whatever, I would think that my human scent would spook him away, and I could scare him away if I've got something to defend myself with, great, But I generally don't try to invite trouble as far as like having a meat and cooked stuff poured out like baking grease poured out inside my camp.

Like I'll go to a safe place and get rid of things that might really attract bears, because you don't want to feed something and then cause trouble by it going for food that thinks it's it's food and you're like, this is my food, and then there's a problem. Then there's an encounter. One thing I like to think about is like instances are rare. You could look at all the statistics, but really as hunters were in those high likelyhood places, so if something were to happen, it would

be to somebody out there in their environment. You know, you read about statistics of bear attacks and you you can look at it from any group side, but the groups that are like bears don't teck they love people. And it's really you're more likely to get struck by lightning twenty times than attacked by bear. It's like, yeah, that's true if you live in a city and you never encounter bears. But if you live in Rule, Wyoming and you spend the majority of your fall in the wilderness,

you're probably highly likely to encounter bear. And based on what you're doing, carrying meat, shooting an elk in their home, in their turf, the odds are a lot higher that you're going to have an encounter and potentially a negative encounter. So for the people everybody else in the world, yeah, it's great, But for us who are out there all the time, yeah, you probably have a higher likelihood of

those instances. And because you have that high likelihood, you kind of have to just throw those statistics out the window and say, am I in an area that's highly likely that all encounter a predator? And if so, I need to be prepared for the worst case scenario. I think the last thing that you want to do as well is just listen to your instincts. And I've told this story before. I don't know if on this podcast, but humans we definitely have this instinct to know when

something's not right. We I don't know if it's something we hear something, we smell something, we see something just makes the hair on the back of the next stand up. And sometimes maybe it's in our head, but oftentimes it's worth listening to that instinct. A few years ago, UM, my wife was with me and we for outfitting business. We stay in this little tiny cabin we've got like our lodge, our bigger cabin down the way across across

the field. And she was going out to cook and it was like really early in the morning, you know, probably like three thirty four am, something like that pitch black out, no moon. And she started to go out and she came back in and she was like, I don't feel right. I feel like something's watching me. I'm like, okay, well, maybe you're scared whatever, but it doesn't like I don't know. Sometimes you just get that weird feeling like you're being watched.

And I'm like, yeah, I'll walk you over. So I grabbed a flashlight and you know, walk her over to the cabin and walk back, and I really think anything

of it. I've got my flashlight and I look and right there, maybe I don't know, five ft off the cabin is mountain lion tracks crouched down and she wouldn't have been able to see it where the railing was, but it was like crouched down right there in the fresh snow, feet away from where she had gone out the door, and it probably didn't slink away until she

had come back in, would be my guess. It was like definitely in that you could see the tail, you could see the pause, you could see everything, and I'm like, wow, you know that was whether she heard something she didn't know, but she just felt like something was off, something made her feel scared, and she was like, I'm not gonna walk down that path, and it was a good thing.

Who knows what would have happened, but you know, listened to those instincts because there was, unbeknownst to her, a mountain lion in a very close proximity to where she was going to be. One question that gets asked the lit I was like, well, or it's like one of those fun things the reading the books, like what do you do if you get attacked by mountain lion? What do you do if you get attacked by a black bear?

What do you do if you get attacked by a grizzly, I think the first thing you do is just try to scare it and fight it and defend yourself or protect yourself. It's like, well, how do you what's the exact order that you do. It's like anytime something charges in on me, your your initial reaction is to yell at it for the most part, and I think it works. I mean, I've told this story as well, but I've

had a kyote like run in. I think I was like all camed up, had my hands out, and I think you just saw my hands and thought it was like a wounded rabbit and came running in and it just like mock three, just running for me. And I went to go like punch it in the face, and that thing when I popped up, was like, hey, you know it hit the brakes and just started rolling down

the mountain. I was like, okay, um, you know. But there's that like instinct that just kicks in that just tells you to let them know that you are not prey. And for the most part that in think to just be like hey, get out of here, or that yelling that that being big that's spooking them. Off. I think for the most part, they think that they're attacking something that maybe they didn't really realize what they were going after.

I think in the most cases with like a predatory response is kind of just an accidental identification, you know. You see that with sharks and other things, where it's a surfer that they thought was a seal. But it's random that. You know, not a lot of people are attacked by certain sharks when they kind of know it's it's a person for the most part, which is strange

to me. I don't I don't really understand that. The one thing that I've seen that doesn't necessarily tend to not attack people would be crocodiles, and I've heard that is also true with polar bears. But um, for the most part, you know, there's an innate fear of humans. I think this, I don't know, this is just my own philosophy here, but like when they haven't been hunted for a very long time, maybe maybe they start to

lose that innate fear. But for some reason, you know, you're initial fight or flight instinct is generally true, generally right, and can probably save your life. So for me to tell you exactly step one, Act big step two. I mean, it's it kind of seems to be something that you naturally do, but maybe not everybody does. So I think that that's just something to think about. Let that thing know that you are a person and you aren't going to be taken lightly. Um And that kind of brings

us to the defense portion. There's so many options people love to know, like well, what should I carry. For the longest time, in non grizzly bear country, I really didn't carry anything, And even in grizzly bear country, I didn't and I look back now and I'm like, that was just stupid. As lacks of daisical, it is just it probably wasn't the best way to do things, and part of the reason I didn't have a lot of

encounters with stuff. But I would say over the last ten years, I've seen an explosion in large predator populations in a lot of the places I hunt, whether it's black bears, whether it's wolves, whether it's especially grizzly bears. I mean there's places where I gone where we used to go look for black bears, and now seem more

grizzly bears than you would see black bears. It's just like things have changed over the time, and there's gonna be more encounters, and there's gonna be probably more attacks, and there's probably more need to be prepared. There's very rare times that I don't go out with some form of predator protection, when in the past I probably would rarely use it um And I just think that that incidents and just being smarter and having a little bit more more to lose now probably lends itself to that.

So I think when it comes to any kind of protection, whether it's for black bears, whether you're worried about what, it doesn't matter what what you're worried about what's in the area. I think there's gonna be two methods. One is going to be the spray bear spray, and one's going to be some form of lethal weapon, not the movie, but a pistol, a rifle, a shotgun, something to kill whatever is trying to attack you. So they're pros and cons to both. I think there's a lot of sides

that particularly root for one or the other. I personally feel safer with the pistol if I look at like stories that I've heard in statistics that I've seen you're like, well, yeah, maybe you gotta make a lethal shot. Maybe you need to be Um, you could wound it and make them more mad. But I feel like the bear spray works in certain scenarios and not in others. I trust myself

more with the pistol. Um, and I feel like, well, you know, there's also things about the pistol that maybe you get attacked and mauled up a little bit, but you don't die, or it might scare them away before the attack even happens. The loud noise of taking a warning shot. If it's out there, a black bear or something out there slapping a tree and getting aggressive and you just shoot one off and say, hey, I'm over here, And that loud noise pretty much every time I've needed

to has scared him away. Um. You know. But I also see the benefit of the bear spray. So the bear spray, you know, they say you don't have to be as accurate with it. You can spray kind of like the grass that they're going to run through. Um, it maybe has like a it's like a steady stream, so you can adjust as the things going coming at you.

And you weren't thinking as much, and that's true. There are also, though, those kind of scenarios where you might encounter something in the winds blowing really fast in your face. There might be those encounters where, um, you know, it seems like a lot of stories I've heard where people have sprayed the bear and it didn't stop them and then they died, or there's you know, an empty canna bear spray, or they've used the canna bear spray and

had to use a pistol. Uh. But there's also probably just as many stories of the spray helping stop something. But I don't think, in my opinion, it's just my opinion, I haven't heard as many stories of guys, like you know, having a pistol and using it and then being fatally killed. I'm sure there are, but um, you know, it's just in my mind, it doesn't seem like there's as many. So take that with what you will. Is conjecture at this point, I'm just giving you my opinions on things.

But I feel safe, like if I'm in big bear country, I feel safer with a pistol I like, and sometimes like if I'm bow hunting in grizz country, I generally will honestly have both I'll have bear spray and a pistol, because I don't think that every scenario like maybe you'll get to one faster. Maybe it's like that's the instinct, you grab this one, and that's what works. I don't know, um, but sometimes it's light enough that it may not matter. So that's my thought on that. As far as pistol models,

I mean, there's so many you could ask. Like I said, this is one of those things. Everybody's got their favorite gun, everybody's got their own theories, Like, just have something that you're comfortable with. I like the Smith and Wesson forty four mag for a lot of reasons. It's super lightweight. I like the Revolver because I just feel like it it's gonna go off when I needed to, um, not as my any moving parts and whatever. And on mine, I actually it came with a wood grip. I swapped

it out for synthetic grip. And then I've mentioned this maybe in some Q and a's before, but uh, the cylinder actually has a lock on it. I didn't realize that, but mine malfunctioned and the cylinder locked on me. So I took it to a gunsmith and had that lock removed. I'd probably just suggest that straight out of the box. If you go with a revolver and it happens to have a cylinder lock on it, it's like this weird thing a safety feature to lock it with a key.

I didn't even know that was possible. But if you have it, I would just spend the money right to have a box and get rid of it. If it's for like saving your life, you know you don't want that. Like mine malfunctioned and I couldn't fire it again, I couldn't open the cylinder, I couldn't do anything. Um So that's that's something you think about. Another really popular one, and I like this one as well, glock twenty in ten millimeter. There's a lot of good reasons to carry

this instead of a revolver one. You've got sixteen rounds. You got fifteen in the magazine and one in the chamber. That's a lot of firepower. When things go down, you can go through a few rounds pretty quick. You can probably stay on target faster, you might be more accurate with it. Um So that's another good choice as well, and people now I would say that's probably one of the more popular calibers for even large bear defense like brown bear, grizzly bear defense in Alaska. I see a

lot of guys carrying it. It's lighter, it's lightweight. UM, it's pretty durable. It seems to be a pretty good standard. I actually had a a SIG ten millimeter, but the one I got it was like the Sig Hunter. It's more of like made for hunting. It's a little bit heavier, and so I don't really carry it that much because it's it's pretty heavy. UM with anything, I actually say,

you know, make sure you just get good ammo. I like having like a solid you know, hardcast bullet or um full metal jacket, something that's just pretty solid, a lot of weight, and you know, maybe souped up with a little bit more powder, something that's got just a little bit of snap, a little bit of pop, a little bit of kinetic energy. What's probably gonna kill the bear is shooting it in the head if it's a

large or anything. But I think that that sound of the gun going off, um, in that kind of defensive action, especially with things like mountain lions, black bears, whatever, it will probably it could be enough to scare them off. Even if it's not going to be fatal right away. When I'm in non big bear country, I generally, if I'm considered like thinking, okay, defense from black bears, defense from mountain lions, I want to carry something, I generally

just take nine millimeter. I've got to pick some solid heavy rounds available, and it's more just peace of mind. The nine millimeter is a little bit lighter. It's kind of my e d C anyways, So I just kind of take that on a lot of hunts where there's not where I'm not expecting to encounter big bears. And I have read a lot of stories of guys that have like killed brown bears or stopped a brown lethal brown bear charge with a nine millimeter, So it is possible.

I don't think it's recommended by anyone, but I don't know. I mean, I know guys that carry them in Alaska when they're fishing and other things because they're accurate with it and they feel safe with it. And that's I think is like just feeling confident, like you feel safe and you're gonna do your best you can to survive if something does happen. I think the last bit of advice is just whatever you choose, you really want to

make sure that you know how to use it. Uh, there's a couple of drills that you could do, or quite a few drills that you could do that I think you should do. Whatever you're gonna use, know how to use it, no how the safety catch works, know where you keep it, keep it something that's like you don't even have to think about it. You've practiced drawing,

you've practiced shooting, You've practiced all these things. What I like to do with my pistols is just put targets, you know, a bare head sized target out at varying ranges, and then make it that I've got to shoot in one, two, three, you know what I mean? Really fast, Just draw, shoot, draw, shoot, just like you would in any kind of self defense shooting scenario. It's a fast draw, fast, accurate shot, and understanding how that gun works in the best way for

you to make that quick, fast shot. The same thing goes with the bear spray practice pulling it out, flipping off the safety. They actually have practice canisters. I've lit off a few um old ones that I feel like now they're expired and I just want to see they put it out a decent fog, a decent stream. The amount of time they last seems like a long like thirty I don't know how long they last, but I feel like some last for like ten twenty seconds. That's

a long time. It seems like a long time. But you also think about it, You're like, Okay, don't do it with the wind blowing towards you. Um. I've actually been toying with this idea of building like a I've kind of got this like plans for this robotic not robotic. Um, I'm gonna hook it up to a rope, like a toable target that kind of rolls towards you. I've seen guys use tires with targets and it just practice shooting it a moving target. There's lots of lots of good

ways to practice. But you know, you shouldn't like feel super confident with yourself going out and not practicing, because it's just like anything. I would never go out on a deer hunter or an l hunt with my bow and not know how the bow shoots and not shoot it really well. So I wouldn't trust my life with a pistol and not on how the pistol shoots are operates or shoot it really use it really well. So I think that those are all things to kind of consider.

And then the last thing. Anytime that I'm in backcountry scenario and I am used carrying something for predator protection, you definitely got to maintain it while you're out there. It's a pain, but it's something you need to think about. If the components are rusted, then it's not gonna work. So throughout the day, I generally like clean it the best I can. Every night when I get back to the tent, I always carry like, um, I just carry like an extra lens cloth. I don't like vortex binoculars

came with like a lens cloth. I used that mostly like a shammy type towel thing. Dry them off, and then I often we'll take one of those just like oiled rags and kind of coat them up. And then I take all the ammunition out, take all the bullets out, line everything out, dry everything out, laid out in my tent for a little bit, and then put it back together once it's all dry, and make sure everything works. And you know, generally don't when at night, I don't

stick it back in like a wet hole. So you just make sure you've got it somewhere safe where it's not gonna you know, you're gonna accidentally discharge it or anything like that, but um, just somewhere where it's dry. Make sure the holster's dry. Make sure everything is dry. Could even like if you got flown in you could even just have like a backup holster that you put it in. Whatever. Um, just make sure that everything's dry

so you don't get a rusted gun. When you need to use it, it doesn't fire, so you just maintain it. And with all those things, you know, you should have a little bit more confidence when you go out there. I will say, like kind of as my closing thoughts, I think that it's something that you need to consider, but I don't think it should be something that detracts

you from going out there. I also think though that if you're like, hey, i've never hunted in big Bear country, maybe just or any country where there's a large preders, maybe go somewhere where there's black bears and mountain lions and no grizzly bears for your first trip and kind of say like, Okay, I'm comfortable. I understand like these encounters are very rare. I'm ready in case something does happen,

but it's not detracting from my entire experience. And then as you kind of build up that experience and that confidence, yeah, go into areas where there's larger bears and just understand. It's a recognizable threat. It's something that can be dangerous, but just like anything, you're prepared for it. You're taking proper precautions and not doing stupid things, and for the most part, you should be okay. That's my disclaimer, you

should be okay. But yeah, I think that it's something that I think a lot of people get sketched out on or it gets in your mind and you start thinking about it. I think that you should think about it. You should be prepared about it, but you shouldn't let the fear of it kind of ruin your outdoor enjoyment. And that's just my two cents. I hope that answered

a few questions. Speaking of questions, next week, we're gonna be doing a Q and A that's I really enjoy those Q and A s. And actually I've been getting a lot of great questions already, so keep those coming. Um. I will compile all those here. Probably the day after this this episode air. So if you're on the front end of listening, if you listen to it every the podcast every Thursday, your questions are probably gonna get answered first. Because I like to just compile those questions as soon

as I get them. The best way to send them to me is at Remy Warren on Instagram and um the way I do it, I generally kind of like scroll through, see good questions or questions that are similar, screenshot them, and then I sit down and just kind of randomly start reading through those or find ones that had a lot of people kind of asking similar questions. I also try to tailor a lot of these episodes

to those questions. So if you're like, man, I really want to see this podcast this direction or this direction, you gotta reach out. You gotta let me know, because if I don't know that, I can't talk about it. Um So next week is going to be the your chance to interact with me and me to answer you know, your specific questions. I do generally try to keep a lot of like identifying stuff out of it, as far as so many people say, Hey, I'm hunting in Montana

in this mountain range, right or whatever. I will leave that out just because not for that person particularly, but anybody else that might hunt there. I don't want to blow spots out or anything like that, but I would ask that if you want um put your name, you can either do first and last or just first name and where you're from, city, state, whatever, anything you know something to kind of um let people know where you're from and where you're at, and I'll give you a

little shout out. And I appreciate I appreciate you guys listening into the podcast, especially the guys that listen kind of every week, and and definitely everybody that leaves a comment. I've been reading through some of these. I really appreciate those. If you guys can feel free to, you know, subscribe, leave a comment, leave a rating. I appreciate all that kind of stuff. So until next week, just be bear aware and don't get eaten by a mountain