Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Grizzlies shut down popular Montana hunting area

You are living proof wild Indians were not the only wilderness inhabitants which didnt attack and kill folks who were "touched".

They need apes and grizz?

Outside of the social insects humans are about the only species where members of the group, especially males, routinely and voluntarily place themselves in extreme danger often to the point of death to protect the members of their social group.

You can believe that Indians in particular and/or all humans over the last 100,000 years had no sense of honor if ya want.

FWIW
I've been reading the actual diaries of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on their journey with the Corps of Discovery. Loved reading Undaunted Courage, but this is the real deal penned in their own hands. It's a tough slog reading this combined diary full of strange spelling and turns of phrase but it helps me go to sleep.

Anyway, I wish I'd kept track of how many "white bears" they've already killed on the westward journey. It's a lot, and they're not even in the Rockies yet. The bears harassed them to no end and they'd hunt them just so they could sleep at night.

California was crawling with grizzlies back in the early 1800's The Golden Bear.

They're all gone now, but I read the state wants to reintroduce the grizzly into California. Yeah, good idea. Disarm the population and introduce an apex predator.

The concept of the presence of grizzly bears closing a HUNTING area IS just a little strange but with the increasing pussification of modern man, it's not real surprising. Here, just like much of northern Montana, we live with grizzlies and it is almost unusual, during a mountain hunt, not to see at least one. In general, we try to avoid them when we can and, if we can't, we can shoot them (I have not been in a position to have to do so, mind you). To me, not having large predators where we hunt would diminish the experience. It seems ridiculous though, to stop hunting just because there are grizzlies in an area.
As to whether hunting grizzly would change their behavior, I cannot really say. I know that Val Giest thinks it does but I'm not so sure.
Was it the Masai who, as a rite of passage, would challenge a lion and kill it with spears? Since this was a structured hunt, would there not be honor in doing it right? Honor is recognized by a society or a tribe. Their criteria for and honorable act may not be exactly the same as ours but it is their judgement to make. GD

Well you're sorta right. It's more conditioning rather than breeding. It's true the fearless don't last long. When we get a dumpster diver in town, we put a load of Remington Nitro Steel in their ass. Usually that pretty much runs them off for good. Sometimes the oddball shows back up an we may hit them again or just dump him as a DLP kill. I helped skin and flesh one that had steel shot in his hide of about three different ages. There were bright, shiney pellets. There were dull grey pellets, and there were rusting, dissolving pellets. He'd been smacked three times in about a month and half period to two months before he was killed. What I learned from the guy that killed him was that he exhibited wary and skittish behavior when he heard metallic clicks or if there was obvious human activity nearby. He's unass the area and sneak back in after about thirty minutes. That's basically what we want to accomplish. To have them be wary of people after getting burned. He turned out to just over nine feet. I had to file divots out of my fleshing knife afterwards.

How dare you forget New York, Detroit, Chicago, Seattle and Portland......I'm sure there are many more communities needing to be listed.

Just wondering aloud, Do you think running bears w/hounds would educate them? Not shooting/killing/hurting them, just harassing them enough w/hounds that they move to places where they're less likely to encounter the hounds/humans. I'm not a hound-guy, maybe Griz don't give a hoot about hounds and just kill them rather than run?

It is not the act--it is the repetition of the act, i.e. pressure. Consider it nagging--how much will you take?

Probably just kill the hounds.

No chance hunting them will educate them. You do realize that if there ever is a season again it will likely be a handful of hunters across their range in Montana. This isn't like hunting deer where they're being persued by thousands upon thousands of people. The number of human encounters likely won't change from what it currently is during hunting season. The difference being, now some of the bears that have encounters will be dead.

horse1,

I would guess this would be a much more effective way to change their behavior.

I was trying to guess how folks would mitigate bear encounters during the Westward expansion of the 1800's and a pack of hounds seemed likely. Now, of course bears treed/cornered were likely killed during those days, but, there had to be some that slipped away and learned that nothing good can come from human contact. Those bears that survived would've been "trained" to avoid the sounds/smells of humans (and hounds) and females would've trained their offspring similarly.

We're mighty short on Griz population here in ND and I don't have any hounds, so, as I said earlier, mostly just wondering aloud.

As an aside, IMO, anyone involved in policy-making or legal decision-making regarding Griz (or wolves) should have to live within 25Mi of a documented population of same.

Grizzlies can’t climb trees, so they will turn on dogs and defend themselves. Normally this involves the dogs turning tail and running back to the handler with the bear in pursuit.

I have a real problem with the feds shutting down areas because they see a grizz. I thought this land was our land,this land was your land. How can the feds just see a grizz and shut down entire areas?? What law gives them the right to do this??

As to dogs, I have 2 that run loose on my place. I had one pile of black bear shidt on my side of the fence a year or 2 ago. Nothing else. Neighbor is a houndsman and has a pile of the barking fiends, but all in kennels or chained up. He's had grizzlies demolish his chicken coop and be a general pain in the ass. I have plenty of sign and trail cam pics of the cock suckers cruising past, but not into my place, at least as yet. I have absolutely no doubt my dogs are the only reason I haven't had issues. yet.

I agree on your last sentence there horse1.

Constant and relatively predictable noise doesn't really bother any wild animals. We have deer and turkeys stand out on our range while people are shooting. So, it doesn't surprise me that bears will maraud the roundsman's place. It's just noise, not physical harassment. We have coyote tracks @ the range, but never see them, and the one and only raccoon I've ever seen there was haulin' tail for cover.

Nobody shoots @ the deer or turkeys on the range. I don't think there are any members who WOULDN'T shoot at raccoons or coyotes. The deer and turkeys just amble off into the woods if someone walks or drives down to one of the targets but they're never in much of a hurry about anything.

BGG, what I'm getting at is that I think you're right in that your dogs being loose and able to harass the bears are the reason they move on.

I was not aware of that, then I remembered soldiers and cops and firefighters etc. You too choose to live in your own world. Anyone who lives an honorable life probably has a sense of honor, this often varies w/in societies. Some embrace "honor killings" of their own families. Killing apex predators may just be a survival strategy for some. Romanticizing history is probably fun for many.


mike r

It would seem that Dogs can be used to educate Bears.

Karelien Bear Dogs

It would be nice if guys would read the ESA as it pertains to grizzlies. It would also be great if guys understood what a grizzly season structure in Montana and Wyoming would look like if the Feds ever delist. Without very strict season structures the bears will just end up back on the endangered specie list.

Heck you can't even run black bears with dogs in Montana, suggesting running grizzlies with dogs is just plain silly.

I realize you can't bait or run bears in MT. My ? wasn't as much about hunting bears as it was about harassing them until they learn/decide that hearing/smelling humans isn't a dinner-bell.

I agree that a hunting season isn't going to really educate any bears as the limited number of tags and enormous range of griz country would pretty much ensure that. Most likely it'd be boars only which pretty much ensures that it isn't going to do much to the overall population either. Again, thinking more along the lines of how does one get a bear to think it's better to be where human activity isn't?