Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Guide and hunter mauled, guide missing

I’ve got neither condemnation nor approval for what happened. I’ve spent a fair amount of time in both grizzly (brown bear) territory and black bear country and have seen how fast a “normal” situation can turn into a life and death struggle despite all the best intentions and preparations. A bear can be amazingly quiet for such a big and cumbersome animal and even more amazingly how much ground a determined bear can cover when its mind is made up.

If I hire a guide to take me elk hunting I expect my guide to get me on elk, not to protect me in every possible scenario. The only situation that I might feel differently is in Alaska where the state requires non-residents to hire a guide. Since Alaska is owned by the guides association and they require non-residents hunt with a guide (non-resident guides in many cases) I put more responsibility on the guide (and the guides union/association and the state).

Hiring an elk guide doesn’t mean you hired a body guard and as far as I can tell the guide saved his client and sacrificed himself. That client sounds like a coward of the first order. Having been tested more than a few times I know that my first response is NOT flight therefore my opinion is that a grown man that chooses flight over fight in this situation is a coward. That clown should never hunt in places where bears, cats, or big rocks abound.