Bears in front of my tent

[Big Frank]

One of my friends' motion sensor cameras picked up movement and recorded video of mama bear and 2 baby bears in front of my tent, about an hour to an hour and a half ago. I took a snapshot of a frame of the video in VLC Media Player. There's an ATV trail my friends made on their property. My tent is on the right-hand side of the first trail that crosses the main trail. On the left side of the main trail, they widened out the trail and made it into a feeding area for all sorts of critters. The bears are probably eating corn that was left for the deer, birds and squirrels. I hope my tent didn't get torn up.

[Big Frank]

They're back, looking for more food. This time they had their heads up, looking around, instead of pawing at the ground and chewing.

And I enlarged the first picture, since I made the second screen grab bigger.

I hope I don't have problems with them, but if  do, the G9 ammo I bought to deal with them has 36 inches 0f penetration in gelatin. That's 2-3 times the FBI standard. They don't have a standard for bears, but if it penetrates 3 feet deep it ought to work well enough.

[Rastus]

Bears are tough.  Good luck there.  You may want to strategically place some cayenne pepper outside your tent....I'm just sayin'....

[Big Frank]

I thought about loading up my VRF14 with alternating loads of 00 Buck and slugs, but it won't fit on my nightstand. Whichever one of my pistols I have is only a couple feet from my head, and easy to reach. I think that's better than a 12 gauge on the other side of the tent, near the floor. And a pistol is easier to maneuver in the tent. The smell of my friends' dogs peeing on my tent and pooping next to it doesn't keep the bears away. Not for long anyway. I don't give the bears a reason to come into my tent, like having food in there, unless it's sealed up in tin cans. I've thought some things though about the situation. I think bears can smell food up to 2 miles away or something crazy like that. It would be hard for them to miss the smell of food when they walk by me if I had anything in there.

[Rastus]

Trust me, whatever you are doing to kill the food smell is not doing enough.  Those suckers have noses like they are a land shark.  I have around 15 cameras set up year round on 120 acres around the place and have observed a lot of bear scent behaviour. 

If I, for instance ate a chocolate bar leaving it inside the wrapper 2-3 hours ago not getting any on my hands, then go out and put my hand on a tree or something they walk over and smell where I put my hand looking for the chocolate.  NO KIDDING...we thought it was happenstance but no.

They will tolerate dogs relieving themselves around and avoid it walking around/over it.  They don't spend a lot of time trying to smell and know what it is that did the deed...they know and don't care.  What they do care about is if the dogs are nearby and they can smell if they are around..which mostly deters them from being in a place near dogs.  Since I keep my Catahoula's in the old back house we have never had one come up around that place...they stay back in the woods 50-100 yards inside the treeline...based on camera observations.  Even with calves to eat along with household trash and food they don't come near where the dogs reside. 

If you have sardines around you....forget it they are coming.  Any kind of fish draws them.  Fresh meat...they smell blood from a mile away.  You cut yourself and dripped some blood around...chances most of the time are that you'll be fine but I'd keep a gun ready.

The bears really don't want anything to do with us.  That means nothing if they are nosing around for food and you get their attention...especially since that mama has 2 cubs and DO NOT get between her and those cubs. 

[Sponsor]

[Big Frank]

Trust me, whatever you are doing to kill the food smell is not doing enough.  Those suckers have noses like they are a land shark.  I have around 15 cameras set up year round on 120 acres around the place and have observed a lot of bear scent behaviour. 

If I, for instance ate a chocolate bar leaving it inside the wrapper 2-3 hours ago not getting any on my hands, then go out and put my hand on a tree or something they walk over and smell where I put my hand looking for the chocolate.  NO KIDDING...we thought it was happenstance but no.

They will tolerate dogs relieving themselves around and avoid it walking around/over it.  They don't spend a lot of time trying to smell and know what it is that did the deed...they know and don't care.  What they do care about is if the dogs are nearby and they can smell if they are around..which mostly deters them from being in a place near dogs.  Since I keep my Catahoula's in the old back house we have never had one come up around that place...they stay back in the woods 50-100 yards inside the treeline...based on camera observations.  Even with calves to eat along with household trash and food they don't come near where the dogs reside. 

If you have sardines around you....forget it they are coming.  Any kind of fish draws them.  Fresh meat...they smell blood from a mile away.  You cut yourself and dripped some blood around...chances most of the time are that you'll be fine but I'd keep a gun ready.

The bears really don't want anything to do with us.  That means nothing if they are nosing around for food and you get their attention...especially since that mama has 2 cubs and DO NOT get between her and those cubs.

In the words of Lynyrd Skynyrd, You got that right.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj_HnZEsqWw

[MikeBjerum]

Don't alternate rounds in the shotgun. Just slugs. Nothing else.

[Big Frank]

Good idea, Mike. I forgot I have a bunch of Brenneke slugs. I could load another mag with buckshot to deal with any other critters that come by, like the bobcats that were hanging around earlier.

[crusader rabbit]

I've got a quarter mile of driveway leading to my house and I have a motion sensor about 100 yards down from the house.  That  driveway alarm sounded in the early evening a few days ago and when I jumped up to see what caused it I discovered a good sized black bear meandering up the grade.  I didn't have time to get my 12 ga. (loaded with slugs) before Mr. Bear made a hard right turn and ran up the nearly vertical side of the mountain.  Never really appreciated how fast those bad boys can run--and almost straight up, too.  I think he's still in the area because since then I've had a couple of alarms in the dark of night.  I'm putting up some solar flood lights with motion sensors, probably sometime today.  Should provide a better view of things that go bump in the night. 

One of my neighbors about five miles away regularly gets a bear tag.  He told me that we just don't have any bears on this side of the mountain.  He has to go a lot closer to Tennessee to fill his tag each year.  Next time I see him I'm going to explain how wrong he is and maybe save him half a tank of gas.

Crusader Rabbit

[Big Frank]

My friend's wife texted me a 13 second video off one of their game cameras with 3 bears walking around in front of where I pitch my tent. She said, "You have friends. lol." I texted back, "I have ammo." She wasn't happy about that. She's an animal lover, which is okay if you don't take it to extremes. If bears come in my tent, she'd rather I lie there and be mauled to death than shoot one of the bears. If I wasn't already planning on staying home this weekend, I would after the conversation we had. I know when I'm not welcome. It's when I'm told to stay home.   Instead of shooting the bears, she thinks I should spray a big can of bear spray in my tent. Then I would be blind and choking while being mauled to death by bears. I don't see that as a solution to the problem. Maybe if my friends quit putting feed in front of where I set up my tent, the bears wouldn't hang around there. But I don't want to argue about it and piss off the only friends I have left.