ORIGINAL POST =========================
my friend has a bear that comes around when she is not there and takes the
door off the house . its been back 3 times in daylight and also when i was
up there last there was a mountain lion in the drive. what is a good way to
keep wild life back away from the house? is there a noise maker or electric
fence or what kind of dog or what size gun etc. what would u all do. she
said she had a talk with the bear and told it not to come back but it did.
I worry about her. what do u do when u face a bear or mountain lion?
=========================================
Bear and Cougar are carnivors with different hunting and eating
preferences. Of the two, Bear are more dangerous to human beings.
Just seeing a cougar is not particular cause for alarm (at least for
personal safety when seen from a vehicle driving up on it by surprise. A
stalking cougar is a threat to deal with indeed.
Cougar and bear will be removed and relocated by F&W (F&G) authorities in
most areas.
Whether you see them or not, they are in many more areas than people assume.
Cougars regularly even stalk game at night in some cities, taking stray cats
and dogs.
For persons with livestock to protect inner defensive perimeters should be
standard practice, with dense thorny windbreaks, like holly bushes further
fenced with wire chicken netting can be effective against fox, racoon on up.
Rats and possums are still problems to deal with. Elecrified fencing works
for 500 pound lines in African villages to defend their livestock at night
in kraals, and they also use thorny brush where electric fencing is not
available.
One cannot reason with hungry predators. They will appraise you as to the
potential for becoming a meal. You can act like a meal and imitate their
prey and help them make up their mind. Turning your back and running gives
them the advantage, and is what prey does. -- DON'T DO THAT!
Bear need to be judged as to their immediate threat. A female will protect
her cubs by swatting you to the ground and leading her cubs away. You might
survive this atack if you do nothing threatening. All bears (and cougars)
can outrun the world's fastest Olympic atheletes, and both can climb any
tree you can climb.
A male bear, or female without cubs, may be startled and evade you. If one
attacks, protect your head and neck (which they go for, and you may survive
to get medical care with minor to major injuries. Any bear that attacks at
night is feeding, and you will have to fight for your life, because the bear
intends to eat you. Bear do not show mercy to whining or crying prey. Be
prepared to fight and kill. Pepper spray is cheap and presumably effective
as a close-quarters self-preservation item. It may be even better than a gun
unless you get a clear fatal shot off in the few seconds you have in any
surprise encounter. A wounded angry predator may not leave the fight but a
pepper-blinded one is more likely to call it quits and go looking for water
to jump in.
A bear who has battered down the door three times should be considered a
dire threat. One should get armed with large caliber shotgun. A farmer
cannot defend their livestock from a large persistant predator unless they
are prepared to kill it to stop the assaults. If your friend is not a farmer
with livestock, she should discourage future visits by animal-proof waste
disposals and not try to reason with a hungry animal she very-well may have
summoned with food signals from garbage cans.
Unfortunately, your message has too few details to offer more specific
advice.
These animals have roles to play in the ecology, and should not be harassed
or killed unless they are a present threat (such as stalking). Battering
down doors constitutes a present threat. Fish & Game may not be there to
help when next it happens, so one must be ready to do what they must
themselves.
Bear and cougar who have presented no threat should be given space to live
their lives, and often pass over people's property lines without incident.
It is possible to have a relationship (as I have had with a free-living
cougar), but it takes a rare person and a rare beast to find the right match
of neighborliness. It might be best if people did not assume they have what
it takes, and that the beast coincidently also has what it takes. Err on the
side of safety.
-- Lion Kuntz
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Apr 05 2000 - 20:00:36 EDT