Bangs Bear Scare

Bangs Bear Scare

David Sparks Ph.D.
David Sparks Ph.D.
Ed Bangs, who for 23 years led the effort to reintroduce and recover healthy wolf populations in the northern Rocky Mountains, retired from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. I had many conversations about Wolf recovery over the years with Ed and the last time I talked to him I asked him if he would be willing to share some hunting stories with all of us. Here he is with a tale from Rasberry Island in Alaska. "One time we were on Raspberry Island hunting and a friend of mine shot a deer in the neck and it ran by me and I shot it in the other end and it ran off bleeding pretty good and so I was trailing it, he was behind me, and then I hear some brush crashing up in front of me and I thought it was a deer falling down and my buddy yells out, he's probably a couple of hundred yards behind me, and he yells Ed there's a bear up there and I say no big deal. Pretty soon he yells again hey Ed it's coming toward you you probably ought to get out of there. I tried down this hill just trying to get away and I yell out Chris where is the bear. Then I turned behind me and there is this brown bear 20 yards from me and coming like a rocket. I threw my bow away because you don't want to fall on your arrows and I had a pistol. So I cocked it and locked it and all of a sudden the bear realized I was a person not a dear and jammed on the brakes. After he left my friend came running up and said Ed I thought you were toast.

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