I wouldn’t be too quick to count house cats out. Just ask this guy.
So if it must be a fair fight, is the human required to fight naked? Because I would only be about half as effective in a fight knowing how much more vulnerable my bits and pieces were 
I’m not sure where some people are getting the idea that the average person could choke out all these animals several times their size. You have to learn how to choke out a measly human to reliably be able to pull it off (it ain’t just a matter of putting your arms around the neck any old place and waiting), and even then people still get away. Where the hell do you put the pressure on an alligator or pig’s neck (if they even have one)? And what happens when they start to roll? Plugging their nostrils… uh, what do you do when they start breathing through the mouth and you’re using your other three appendages to hang on for dear life lest you slide around to the front and get stomped or gored to death?
These examples seem to be going along the lines of running from or chasing the animal around until it’s exhausted and already has one foot in the grave. That’s not how I read the OP and that’s not a fight. I’m talking about the hand-to-hand part, as in how well you could do with a fresh animal once the two of you make physical contact. Exhausting your foe first while staying fresh yourself is out-smarting them, not out-fighting them physically, which is what I think the OP is asking for. If I knew the terrain well enough I could probably eventually lure an elephant into quicksand or to fall into a hole and break it’s leg if I had enough time, then claim victory for my bare-handed slaying of the beast. Locked in a 30X30 foot featurless enclosure there’d be a much different ending.
If you knew how to kill the animal once it’s down, you might be able to kill a herbivor up to the size of a steer. We wrestle steers so I know humans can take them down. I don’t know how easy it would be to keep them down while choking however. The cowboy needs all his weight, a good starting position, those conveniant handles, and a specific technique and finishing position to do his thing (as well as years of experience). Letting go to go for the kill would probably result in the steer getting back up. I think even Rickson Gracie would have his hands full trying to choke out your average domisticated no-nuts ruminant.
There’s no way in hell I’d ever put my life on the line against a great ape or a baboon. Sure, if I have Mike Tyson’s KO power, have the ape stand still in punching range, and get lucky, I might put him out. But just like the ostrich example, it’s me that has one chance here, and if I don’t deliver the “touch of death” or at least KO at first contact, I’ll get ripped apart. And if you’ve ever seen a charging gorilla, you’ll know the last thing you’d feel like doing is trying to swat at it. I also don’t know how these apes have been measured as being slower than humans; I doubt there’s any evidence to back that up.
Saying that people have caught and subdued (as opposed to fought and subdued) wild horses and bulls adds little to the conversation. Firstly how many people were involved catching those animals? What kind of tools and ropes did they use? Were the animals trying to run away or stand and fight it out to the death? How much practice and handed down knowledge and experience did these people have? How many people ended up getting killed themselves in the process?
It’s a similar story using a handfull of isolated reports of people managing to fight off/kill animals over the past century as evidence that any of us would beat them in a fight. Few to none of these would have been actual fights as we’re talking about, and even fewer would have involved healthy animals in their right minds. These animals would be sickly, desperate and sometimes insane cases, which would have likely ended up dead on their own within days. Not quite a fair representation of what they can really do… not to even mention the many more reports there are of these same animals killing people.
Betting against a wolf that is built for and experienced in killing 200+ pound animals during freezing snowstorms in favor of a bare-assed office working human who’s killed nothing more than the odd insect is complete insanity. My thoughts on potential wins:
Carnivors/omnivors: land mammals up to 1/2 you body weight (you’ll require hospitalization after fighting anything over 50 lbs but you might still win). Cold-blooded is harder to predict as they mostly live in habitats and terrain that we don’t. But you did see Steve Irwin scramble up trees when the komodo dragons started chasing him right?
Herbivors: Your own body weight, or perhaps more if said herbivor is devoid of any horns or tusks. You’ll still be a mess unless you get lucky. One more factor that complicates things is how robust an animal is. A wild boar will be much harder to kill than an emu, even of they’re the same weight. I also know for sure that I would not simply pick up a defensive porcupine to smash it into the ground. I’d be looking for an alternate means of attack after my first hand is rendered useless after thrusting into the fur to get a good hold. If only a rabid (ie insane) animal will willingly take a face full of those quills they must be more than a mear nuissanse.
Be careful in your assumptions. I remember a friend of mine had a pet python and bought a couple of baby shrews when the pet store was out of mice, to feed it. Came back later to a cage containing two surviving shrews waiting for their next python.
Well, as Blake pointed out, these apes aren’t as fast as humans. I can imagine a grappler quickly moving in and pinning the animal or somesuch. Apes have human-shaped bodies, so a lot of wrestling moves would apply. Damn, I’d pay money to see one of the Gracies wrestle an orangutan for the sheer entertainment value of it. Or how about, say, a sumo wrestler versus a charging gorilla? Quite a few sumo moves deal with redirecting force, so I can see them working. Also aikido and other arts like that.
As for the bear vs. man debate, I give you this story:Judo Throw Saves Man From Bold Bear Basically, a 63-year old Japanese man was out picking mushrooms when an Asiatic black bear suddenly attacked him. The bear bit him on the hand and left thigh, then the man responded by hitting it on the nose and stomach and then throwing the bear to the ground, at which point it decided to bug someone else. A martial arts forum I can’t find claims the man used an open-hand blow on the bear’s nose and then kicked it in the stomach, then used a Tomoe-nage throw to hurl it away. Sure, the guy didn’t kill the bear, but the bear didn’t kill him, either.
And, just for the boxers out there: Pensioner Fights Off Bear With Right Jab This time, a 78-year old Japanese man was attacked by a bear, which he drove away with a well-timed jab. The bear is described as 31-stone, so 434 lbs. Not bad, what are these old Japanese guys getting in their pills, anyway?
<slight hijack>
I heard somewhere that a dog’s ribcage is built to compress well, but if you grab the forelegs and pull them apart horizontally, the ribs will separate from the sternum, killing the dog.
Any truth to this? I realize it’s unlikely (at least, I hope it is) that any of you out there get much practice at bare-handed dog killing.
Does anyone have that idea? I at least specifically stated that “This assumes ….enough training, intelligence and presence of mind to actually fight effectively according to your opponent.”
And yet people have actually used exactly this technique, so obviously that isn’t am insurmountable problem.
That’s a human’s biggest advantage. We have smarts and extraordinary stamina, Humans use this tactic against other human fighters all the time. A young fit boxer will try to avoid an older boxer for the first few rounds to wear him out. They still call it a fight. And yet you claim that it isn’t a fight, it’s outsmarting. By not a allowing a human to fight with one of their greatest weapons you are pre-empting the argument. Let’s put a human against a tiger, but the tiger can only use two legs. It’s silly IMO.
To me a fight is whatever goes on in the area where the two opponents face off. If a matador in an arena spends 20 minutes avoiding a bull until it is exhausted they still call it bullfight. You apparently do not. Each to their own I guess.
One man, one horse in the case of the Native Americans.
They used ropes, but after the horse was suffocated to the ground. Had they wanted to kill and not capture the animal no tools would be needed.
Insofar as any horse with a predator on its back is fighting to the death, they were fighting to the death.
As I said above, it’s hard to judge what would happen if you faced a truly determined animal because most animals cut and run at the first sign of danger. Of course most people do the same. Can you think of any examples where a person was trying to kill an animal barehanded (not trying to escape an attack) and the person lost? I can’t, but that tells us nothing because people are also smart enough to run if the fight goes badly and we get the chance.
No idea. I was merely pointing out that people have often subdued large grazing animals bare handed so such a task is more than possible.
Why would a porcupine quill render you hand useless. Please explain the physiology behind this assertion. I think it’s a load of horse hockey. The hands contain no muscles worth considering, so the quills can’t render the hand useless though muscle or nerve damage.
Of course they are, to an animal. They lodge in and become infected and can kill quite easily. But you may have missed the OP and the numerous later references stating that this is irrelevant. Unless you can support you assertion that they can somehow render a hand useless I think we can ignore this.
So you say, but you haven’t explained why. If we assume ‘enough training, intelligence and presence of mind to actually fight effectively according to your opponent” why would a 30 year old male office worker who goes to the gym twice a week be unable to take down a wolf half his size? Plenty of people have fought off much larger dogs than any wolf. I assume these weren’t professional dog fighters. I assume they were office workers.
And I doubt any wolf has ever killed a 200 pound animal on its own.
I wouldn’t want to try taking on any of the large herbivores, i.e., bison, horses, cape buffalo, moose, etc. In the wild healthy adults of these species have no predators, and for a damn good reason - it’s too risky for the predators. And if top-of-the-food-chain predators stay away, well, I’m not dumb enough to take a shot. Sure, we have an endurance edge on them, and if you find a sufficiently skittish animal you might run it to the point of death. But even just exhaustion would probably not be enough. An adult bull bison might weigh up to 2500lbs, most of it muscle. Even if it can barely stand, all it has to do is fall on you, and I have no idea how one might go about choking it, as its neck is just too big around. Personally, I wouldn’t want to try to take one on with a good spear, let alone barehanded.
Lionsa nd hyaena routinely prey on healthy adult zebra. Wolf packs prey on healthy adult moose. Not sure about bison, but I suspect they too were commonly reyed upon by both wolves and big cats. Predators always prefer to go for the young andthe weak, but they will take on healthy adult most of the time becuase there are not any young and weak most of the time.
I just found something about a former college wrestler, jujitsu enthusiast, and dog wrestler (yes, he wrestles dogs) who managed to drive off a cougar that jumped him with his bare hands and his wrestling skills: Park bicyclist conquers cat
Go to the bottom-most story. I can’t find the archives of the Peninsula Daily News, so I can only give you this second-hand link, but I remember this story from that time.
As you can see, it’s possible for a skilled person to defeat even the fiercest of animals.
Well I wouldn’t call a puma the fiercest of animals. I guess that honour goes to a tiger. But a puma it’s in the top 100 without a doubt, and like leopards, mastiffs and so on people have fought them off bare handed when the need arose.
Wolves predate heavily on moose, but not on healthy adults, except when they are to be found helplessly bogged down in heavy snow, etc. Cite (Interestingly, the cite refutes my claim nonetheless, stating that grizzlies can take them out easily. I did not know that.) A healthy bull moose will probably take out 3-4 members of a pack of a dozen before it goes down, which is an extremely unsustainable casualty rate for the wolves. They’d only press an attack on a healthy adult moose standing its ground if they were extremely desperate. Bisons are an even worse bet, given their propensity to appear in groups and their larger size.
I meant some of the fiercest of animals in existence. I should have been clearer.
And I brought out the news stories because lots of people here seem to doubt man vs. beast is possible, despite assertions to the contrary.
That reference says no such thing. It says clearly that "Wolves …take adult moose all year. " which rules out only taking them in heavy snow. It does say that “A healthy and aggressive moose is usually able to stand off wolves.” but that’s as close as it gets. Note that ‘usually’! There are accounts and even helicopter footage of a pack of wolves running down a healthy, adult, male moose. Yes there was snow, but the moose was not in any way hindered by it. As that page says the wolves suffered casualties. Nonetheless wolves do prey on adult moose when desparate enough, and they are successful.
First off, scaring off a bear isn’t the same as killing it with your bare hands. Sure, bears aren’t interested in fights to the death. They mostly want food, a mate, to protect their young, and sometimes to satisfy their curiosity. If fighting you doesn’t give them any of those things they’ll often bug out. Same with cougars and other predators. And for most herbivores running away is their first choice. So scaring away a bear by making a loud noise, or punching it in the nose, or giving a judo flip is right out. Remember, you’ve got to kill that bear. With your hands and feet. It cannot be done.
Remember, I’m assuming from the OP that we’ve set up a situation where the bear is convinced to fight to the death and running away is not an option. And of course the human cannot run away either. Heck, if we allow running away, you wouldn’t be able to defeat most insects, all bats, the vast majority of birds, and many many teeny little fish. Most animals could easily run away from a human, and unless you can track them they are going to get away. That whole “chase them till they’re exhausted” trick only works if you can find them, and only if you’re in really good shape.
And according to the OP, we’re not talking about top athletes in the peak of physical condition with a lifetime of knowledge about their chosen prey species. We’re talking Dignan here. Hey, I know next to nothing about Dignan, but I have to imagine he isn’t exactly the most ferocious hand-to-hand fighter out there. No offense if you are, but still. I think we can assume that your average SDMB potato isn’t going to be running any zebras or cape buffaloes into exhaustion.
Oh, and Blake? What evidence do you have that an ape’s legs are weaker than a human’s? Sure, they can’t run like humans, but they can knuckle-walk faster than you can run. Maybe they don’t have the endurance that trained distance runners do, but so what? And they are not indisputably slower, since I do dispute it. Provide evidence they are slower. Apes are much much stronger than an equivalent weight human would be. They would make mincemeat of human. They used to have (back before anyone cared about humane treatment of animals) carnival sideshows where a skinny muzzled chimpanzee was displayed. The village tough guys were challenged to rassle the critter. Nobody could stand against the scrawny chimp. A chimp half your weight is going to kick your ass up one end and down the other. And you you take off the muzzle and allow biting, he’s going to bite 3 or 4 times harder than you can. You think you can get off a roundhouse punch against a chimp? How are you going to stop him from grabbing your arm? He’s not going to stand their and trade punches with you, he’s going to grab your ass and bite the living hell out of you. And you’re going to get killed. Now, in a normal situation, I imagine a chimp would probably freak out and run away if a human attacked it. But we’re talking about a situation where both parties want to kill the other. Maybe you’re stealing a mommy chimp’s baby. In that case, the mommy chimp is going to kill you.
Of course, all bets are off if you allow even simple tools like clubs, thrown rocks, or sharp sticks. But drop Dignan naked into a cage with a naked chimp, and poke them with sticks until they fight, and Dignan gets killed.
But there’s a difference between WOLVES taking down a moose, and a wolf taking down a moose. I bet a pack of naked humans could take down a moose. But one human?
Explain to me again how this would happen. OK. You’re standing there in front of the moose. He looks at you. A glimmer of anger flares in his beady little eyes, and his rubber lips twitch with hatred. His hoof paws the ground. What will you do? What WILL you do? If you had an American Express card, you’d have something.
But your strategy is to let him charge you, over and over again, while you quickly sidestep at the last minute. When the moose is exhausted, you run over, get him in a headlock, and choke him to death. Is that the plan? Cause I don’t really see it working. It’s one thing to evade a bull and play games like a rodeo clown. But killing it by choking it to death?
I’m a cubicle dweller and I would not fancy my chances in a fight against anything larger (non-domestic) than a domestic cat if I had to be naked. If I could wear pants to protect the genitals and a pair of heavy shoes I might have a chance against a reasonable sized dog. Anything bigger than that and I’m at a huge disadvantage. Apes, big cats and large dogs would turn me into dinner very quickly indeed. People who think they can take on wild animals have obviously never seen a wild animal fight for its life nor have they ever been in a real fight. It’s very different to do armchair evaluations than to face a growling set of teeth and claws with your adrenalin-supercharged heartbeat thundering in your ears.
The tactic against a cat or dog would be to kick it in the head or possibly try to break the leg by dodging an attack and kicking. This would probably be the best attack against a deer (moose, camel or similar) as they have pretty long, slender legs, which gives good leverage for a kick against the knee of a leg planted firmly on the ground. And if I can grapple an animal around the neck area I’m not going to try to choke it, I’ll poke its eyes out. Well maybe not poke, but rather dig or otherwise damage using my fingers. An animal that cannot see cannot attack and would have its defensive capabilities severely reduced, so it would be a lot easier to take it out by attacking legs and try to break them and then go for the head or the neck.
It works matador style quite effectively. And you don’t have to be in really good shape. A moderately fit human will run/fight for 15 minutes. A moderately fit animal will not. Animals are mostly designed for short burst activity, and high temperatures are particularly detrimental, whereas humans are not bothered much.
And you can of course back that assertion up with sound physiology. There is a reason why, assuming I can keep flipping a bear until it is exhausted or incapacitated with broken bones, I can’t repeatedly kick it in the head or stuff my arm down its throat to kill it.
Ask and ye shall receive.
“We find that in the hindlimb, chimpanzees possess …. smaller PCSAs than are predicted for humans of equal body mass. …… In contrast, all forelimb muscle masses…… and PCSAs are smaller in humans than in chimpanzees.”
Thorpe, S.K. et al.
Dimensions and moment arms of the hind- and forelimb muscles of common chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).
Am J Phys Anthropol Oct 1999
PCSA = physiological cross-sectional area which “reflects the number of sarcomeres in parallel and is therefore proportional to the amount of force a muscle can produce. Muscles with high PCSAs have the capacity to exert large forces.”
Well if we can’t call something undisputed because someone somewhere believes it without evidence, then I guess that it isn’t undisputable that the sun rises in the east. However……
“human upper limb bones are generally straighter and less robust than their great ape counterparts, and muscle insertions are typically designed for less power output but they permit a greater range of motion, or speed”
Wood, B.
Human evolution : taxonomy and paleobiology
Journal of Anatomy. (2000) 196.
“as a result chimpanzees produce a greater force at distance, but have slower limb motion”
Swindler “An atlas of primate gross anatomy, baboon, chimpanzee and man.” quoted in
“It’s one thing to evade a bull and play games like a rodeo clown. But killing it by choking it to death?”
And again, you would have good physiological reasons why this can’t be done.
Those who should know, eg dog handlers etc. seem to be pretty much agreed that kicking will get you killed. If you’ve ever tried kicking an aggressive dog you will know why. Consensus seems to be that grappling is the best bet for a man, or perhaps sacrificing an arm and attacking with the other.
I think trying to break a camel’s leg with a kick is inadvisable. The bone alone is nearly as thick as a human forearm, and they don’t got kneecaps. Hitting any big animal will just hurt you.
It works matador style quite effectively. And you don’t have to be in really good shape. A moderately fit human will run/fight for 15 minutes. A moderately fit animal will not. Animals are mostly designed for short burst activity, and high temperatures are particularly detrimental, whereas humans are not bothered much.
And you can of course back that assertion up with sound physiology. There is a reason why, assuming I can keep flipping a bear until it is exhausted or incapacitated with broken bones, I can’t repeatedly kick it in the head or stuff my arm down its throat to kill it.
Ask and ye shall receive.
“We find that in the hindlimb, chimpanzees possess …. smaller PCSAs than are predicted for humans of equal body mass. …… In contrast, all forelimb muscle masses…… and PCSAs are smaller in humans than in chimpanzees.”
Thorpe, S.K. et al.
Dimensions and moment arms of the hind- and forelimb muscles of common chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).
Am J Phys Anthropol Oct 1999
PCSA = physiological cross-sectional area which “reflects the number of sarcomeres in parallel and is therefore proportional to the amount of force a muscle can produce. Muscles with high PCSAs have the capacity to exert large forces.”
Well if we can’t call something undisputed because someone somewhere believes it without evidence, then I guess that it isn’t undisputable that the sun rises in the east. However……
“human upper limb bones are generally straighter and less robust than their great ape counterparts, and muscle insertions are typically designed for less power output but they permit a greater range of motion, or speed”
Wood, B.
Human evolution : taxonomy and paleobiology
Journal of Anatomy. (2000) 196.
“as a result chimpanzees produce a greater force at distance, but have slower limb motion”
Swindler “An atlas of primate gross anatomy, baboon, chimpanzee and man.” quoted in
And again, you would have good physiological reasons why this can’t be done.
Those who should know, eg dog handlers etc. seem to be pretty much agreed that kicking will get you killed. If you’ve ever tried kicking an aggressive dog you will know why. Consensus seems to be that grappling is the best bet for a man, or perhaps sacrificing an arm and attacking with the other.
I think trying to break a camel’s leg with a kick is inadvisable. The bone alone is nearly as thick as a human forearm, and they don’t got kneecaps. Hitting any big animal will just hurt you.
I’ll give you that . Although they never been extremely aggressive, I’ve had dogs try to jump me with the apparent intent to bite. They always seem to back down if I raise my foot so that they can’t jump directly at the body. It may be different if they are actually trying to kill. However I’d once again point out that going for the eyes once you have grappled a dog (or any other animal) is the most efficient way if you intend to kill it. It does require you to loosen the grip with one arm which can be risky but blinding an animal gives a huge advantage not only physically but also mentally.
Maybe I was a little unclear. I don’t think I would have any chance of breaking the bone itself. The way a joint such as the knee or the elbow works usually only requires strength in one or two directions meaning that it is possible to dislocate or permanently damage a joint if force is applied from the side. Ever seen how easily a soccer players knee is destroyed by a force from the side and slightly from the front if he has the foot planted firmly? It is difficult to injure a human adversary this way as he knows how vulnerable a knee is and will turn or lift the leg so that the joint can move. An animal may not do so quickly enough.
As a side note: A few years ago their was a program on TV in which they showed a camel that had survived an attack by a three lions. It had kicked the first unconscious and trampled it. When the other two managed to attack its rear legs and behind the camel backed up against a tree severely wounding one lion by crushing force. Then it ran through some thorn bushes that left the last lion stranded in the bushes. the camel looked like it had been badly bruised but apparently none of the wounds had been very deep and it was fully recovered. I’d give myself maybe a 1 in 1000 chance against a adult camel.
When it was still legal and there was a market, my father made extra money harvesting alligators. He knew their weaknesses. Once, when I was a boy, he was showing off for friends, I think alcohol was involved, he lured a 6 or 7 footer to the shore and jumped on it unarmed. He wrestled it onto the bank and subdued it after a considerable fight. The secret, he said, was to grab their mouth with one hand, all their power is in compression, and to grab a hind foot, this limits their ability to roll, that’s how they kill. My mother recalls when they were first married, he took her hunting one night. Dad liked to shoot with a 22 rifle, then jump in and finish with a knife, less damage to the hide. A 22 does not do much more than stun a 10 foot alligator and mom literally thought she would be a widow as a newlywed. She watched him harvest hundreds of alligators.
I once saw my father go up behind a water moccasin, grab it by the tail, crack it like a whip, and it’s head popped off. He had been bitten by a moccasin once and got real sick but survived. He said that he would not try the same trick on a rattlesnake, they are more venomous. I saw him catch many snakes with a stick. My father was a man they make legends of, everyone around has a story about him. He died drinking and driving. (Sorry for the hijak, but I had to pay homage)
Once I saw a freind grab a deer as it ran by him. He thought it would be cool. It was a yearling doe, couldn’t have been 100 pounds. He wrestled it to the ground but it kicked him in the gut with its hind leg and ran off. It took quite a few stitches to sew him up. He was lucky it only scratched his intestines.
You can beat a dog if you let it bite your hand and you grab its jaw when it does. It will hurt like hell, but you will have the dog. A dog can’t do much more than bite and the shake its victim. Don’t let go!!! You can kick the dog at will. You will not walk away unscathed.