Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Canada Self defence-bears -laws-shooting

Prairie dogs don't bite into the base of yours skull and split your spine. After paralysing you they start chewing you up while you are still alive and you can hear them chewing on you for along time but aren't able to move. I know 3 people that have been killed by bears and it is a terrible way to go. My brother got dragged down out of a tree and he stabbed the bear several times with an arrow before it let him go. They are dangerous and unpredictable so be careful especially in spring when they are very hungry.

Report it and be prepared for the system trying to run me over.

Sad day when protection of you and yours causes fear of repercussions.

Urbanites dominate. My daughter was in a college ethics class and got pounded for saying hunting was normal. After the noise died down the prof took a poll of the hundred or so in a class.

Show of hands please of those that have shot, caught, cooked and eaten anything. Three students had raised there hands. The son of a fisheries employee, a First Nations fellow and my daughter.

These are the policy makers of the future. We are in deep doo-doo.

Yeah Bow up we are a dying breed, we should have been born a 100 years ago.

Where i stream fish for trout in the Cadomin and Robb area, there are bears present. I would not tell a soul. I have a wife and kids to support and do not have the expendable funds to waste in lawyer fees and court costs. In todays liberal world it would be foolish to report it and hope you would not face legal and financial repercussions. (sp??)

The 3 S system works well.

Glad for this post because I am planning a camp trip this summer with my adult son & his 3 boys age 14,12 & 11. We are thinking of SW AB in the hill country & were wondering how to handle this very eventuallity. We were planning on taking one rifle & bear spray. I'm thinking now of talking to the CO's about this & seeing what they have to say on the matter. This would give us a starting point in deciding where to camp if they were too uptight about the subject.

Thanks all, for the discussion on the topic.

P.S. What if the one you shot had a tracking collar on ... hard to SSS that bad boy ... don't ya think???? :-0

I would quietly leave the scene if there was a collar involved. Its to iffy in todays day and age how something like this would be portrayed in the media as well as carried out in the courts. Sure in the end you may be found not guilty but if the expenses financialy ruin you, how good is that?? I am not a trigger happy person by any stretch, and have seen bears while fishing the Embarass river with my 4 year old daughter at my side and love seeing them and sharing those experiences. But i could also sleep at night knowing i did what i had to do to protect myself, my family and our best interests if things happened to go awry.

Some of you guys are pretty paranoid. If I had to shoot a bear in self defence I'd leave it where it fell and call the CO right away. Of course I wouldn't be shooting a bear in "self defence" at 100 yards either. I've had hundreds of bear encounters with very few problems and none where I had to shoot them. But I'd have no problem or fears in calling the authorities if I did. There was just a big article in the Vancouver Sun over grizzly populations out of control in Bella Coola and other places. The Sun did a freedom of information search and printed findings of a lot of bears shot in self defence including grizzly that had been reported, inspected and no ramifications what so ever..

Salty, i can understand your attitude due to the fact that you have lots of bears in BC. In Alberta my govt says there population is dwindling and there is no more hunting season here.

I choose not to get in a debate with them if it comes down to a who's right situation.

I just read the article about Bella Coola and it sounds like a friggen infestation from how its portrayed. Where i live the grizz population isn't like that.

And another thing ....... Was talking to a gun store guy today & he had a valid point that I hadn't thought of before. If you have to tell the CO's that you had to shoot a bear in self-defence, it would be better to be able to tell them that you took a shotgun rather than a rifle. Then they would be more inclined to believe 'self-defence', knowing that there would likely not be any 100+ yard shots involved.

Just my take ...

Leverboy The low population of bears out there is an issue all right. I'd still like to think the authorities would back you up if was a real self defense situation, no?

I always carry a bear tag when hunting,just to be legal in case. Here in BC we have to take meat as well as the hide. I think the cost of doing a hide is @$500.

Well, that bear didn't have anything to breed to anyway, so he's better oft.

And don't take any Texas Heart Shots, and make sure your story matches exactly with any witness......a co will bust your ass if they have the slightest suspicion you did something wrong..and then the courts will be able to determine your guilt. But because of your honesty it will only cost you a few thousand dollars in legal fees and several trips to the courthouse...

I've shot lots of black bears. They are no more than vermin, a big rat. I shoot them year around and don't plan on stopping either. Grizzly is a different matter, they are protected and usually stay well away from men and they are far less killings from them then black bears.