# You're in the forest and a bear passes by. Assume no baby bears, and he's not hungry. How dangerous? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 22, 2018, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042 "2018-03-22T20:34:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/61 "2018-03-24T20:20:00Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > It depends on the type of bear, but for the most part the advice is correct. Certainly for black bears they are more afraid of you. All my black bear encounters except one involved the bears taking off as soon as they figured out we were there. The exception was an Adirondack bear that associated humans with food sources. He was later relocated by the rangers, and eventually had to be killed. > > For Grizzly bears the advice is still good, running from a bear is never a good idea. It triggers their prey instincts. No loud noises or anything to startle the bear. They are more predatory than black bears so more caution is required. The big difference between your response to black and grizzly bears happens in the unlikely chance that they attack. You fight back with black bears, you play dead with grizzlies. Black bears, you want them to know you’re there. Grizzlies you’d prefer they didn’t. > > For Polar bears I think your best course of action is to carry a big gun and stay far away. However, since you said this takes place in a forest I think you’ll be fine. What if you’re in the outback and encounter a drop bear? ---
**Author:** ![Shamozzle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shamozzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shamozzle)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2018, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/62 "2018-03-24T22:50:26Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > It has been said that, to tell the difference between a black bear and a grizzly, you should walk up to it and kick it in the caboose. If it is a black bear, it will climb a tree. If it’s a grizzly, you will. You ain’t going to make it up the tree. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2018, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/63 "2018-03-25T03:39:31Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > It has been said that, to tell the difference between a black bear and a grizzly, you should walk up to it and kick it in the caboose. If it is a black bear, it will climb a tree. If it’s a grizzly, you will. You can also tell from the scat: twigs and leafy smell = black bear. Contains small bells and smells of bear spray = grizzly. ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Mills](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f0a364/32.png) [@Mister\_Mills](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Mills)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2018, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/64 "2018-03-25T18:43:20Z")
Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2018, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/65 "2018-03-25T19:15:34Z")
See post #59. ETA: Anyone have offhand a history of the expression “armed for bear?” ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2018, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/66 "2018-03-25T19:20:14Z")
There is a gun shop not too far from here called Bear Arms. In my head, I cannot resolve the name. ---
**Author:** ![j666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de0a6/32.png) [@j666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j666)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/67 "2018-03-26T01:10:41Z")
> [@Mister\_Mills](#): > > Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. Don’t be so hard on yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/68 "2018-03-26T01:28:07Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > …ETA: Anyone have offhand a history of the expression “armed for bear?” > > > [@eschereal](#): > > > > There is a gun shop not too far from here called Bear Arms. In my head, I cannot resolve the name. [OP’d.](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=20866577) ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/69 "2018-03-26T01:48:47Z")
> [@Mister\_Mills](#): > > Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. With a black bear, 99% of the time shooting it isn’t needed, and with a pistol it wouldn’t be effective. With a grizzly, a pistol isn’t going to do squat. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/70 "2018-03-26T02:17:38Z")
> [@Mister\_Mills](#): > > Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. Bacteria are far more dangerous in terms of the number of people sickened or killed. Are you also going to shoot bacteria? It will be just about as effective. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Poysyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Poysyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Poysyn)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/71 "2018-03-26T02:22:36Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > [side query] > Curfew? > [/side query] Just when they expect polar bears to be moving through. It’s mostly for kids, as I understand. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/72 "2018-03-26T11:17:07Z")
> [@Mister\_Mills](#): > > Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. I captured my recent bear encounter with a few photos. Even armed with a S&W 500, the most powerful production handgun ever made… I still chose to walk calmly the other direction. These were big boys. [Picture](https://s17.postimg.org/k5r5asilb/20245373_10211473119121461_5929449478144642316_n.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/73 "2018-03-26T14:45:44Z")
> [@Mister\_Mills](#): > > Bears are always potentially dangerous, and when I am in the woods, I like to have a pistol. That way I can shoot the stupid thing. > [@Telemark](#): > > With a black bear, 99% of the time shooting it isn’t needed, and with a pistol it wouldn’t be effective. > > With a grizzly, a pistol isn’t going to do squat. I think Mister Mills was suggesting that the “stupid thing” would not be the bear. ---
**Author:** ![senoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dbc845/32.png) [@senoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/senoy)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/74 "2018-03-26T15:26:46Z")
I can’t speak for grizzlies. I’ve seen them and been close to them, but not enough to have any indication of their behavior. In my fairly extensive experience with black bears though (I live in West Virginia, we never extirpated them and currently have about 15 thousand bears in state, in comparison to New York’s 8 thousand and Pennsylvania’s 20 thousand), either advice is correct. Although staying still is probably better. For the most part, black bears don’t give a rip about you. You’re furniture to them. (I’ve heard that young boars will stalk and prey on people though, but I personally have never seen it.) There are many times when I’ve been in the woods around a campfire or just sitting under a tree and I’ll hear a shuffling and a bear will wander by. If you stand up, they’ll sometimes startle and take off. Most of the time, they’ll look up at you for half a second and then keep rooting around for whatever they were after. Sometimes, they’ll change direction toward you figuring that you have some food somewhere, then you usually have to chuck a rock at them so your camp doesn’t get torn up. Have you ever seen the video of the crying woman screaming at a bear that’s eating her kayak? If so, that’s pretty much exactly how black bears act. They pretty much act as though the rest of the world doesn’t exist. The whole ‘mama with cubs’ is even greatly exaggerated. Mostly, a mama and cubs will just tromp along without caring a rip about you either. I guess if you were aggressive towards them you might be in for a treat, but if you mind your own business, they’ll mind theirs. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/75 "2018-03-26T15:59:46Z")
> [@senoy](#): > > Have you ever seen the video of the crying woman screaming at a bear that’s eating her kayak? If so, that’s pretty much exactly how black bears act. They pretty much act as though the rest of the world doesn’t exist. For those interested here is the video mentioned (the woman is a bit shrill so you might want to lower your volume some): [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nU5cMZymSr0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nU5cMZymSr0) ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/76 "2018-03-26T16:03:31Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > With black bears, the aggressive prey instinct is pretty low. They are omnivores, very little of their food comes from prey… More specifically–who says I don’t know nothing 'bout bears?–in following leads from this thread, I leaned a new word–“[hypocarnivore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocarnivore)”–which I and you are, apparently, and smack there in the Wiki illustration is a bear munching a dandelion. Texts says black bear–isn’t that photo a grizzly (I know being brown doesn’t rule out a black bear) with its hump and all? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/77 "2018-03-26T17:04:20Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > Texts says black bear–isn’t that photo a grizzly (I know being brown doesn’t rule out a black bear) with its hump and all? Looks like a Black Bear to me. Grizzlies have much broader heads and proportionately smaller ears. The “hump” just looks like the hair on the shoulders is standing up. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/78 "2018-03-26T17:09:02Z")
OK. You’re the critter boss here. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/79 "2018-03-26T17:19:15Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > You know, all these years later, I’ve thought the same thing. I think they did panic. I never really understood why they didn’t use the tranquilizer gun. It sounds like the motivation behind a lot of shootings in general – if you have a gun, and you feel your life is in danger, you use it. The only possible justification I can think of is that they may have felt (probably incorrectly) that this bear was a long-term danger to campers. Tranquilizer guns take a long time to take effect, like over half an hour. They’re useless as a defence against an animal that’s already acting aggressive; it could complete the attack before it even started feeling sleepy. That’s why they’re often used from helicopters; there can be a long chase before anything even starts to happen. Anaesthesia is tricky enough on humans under controlled conditions; there’s nothing fast acting that would be usable against a wild animal in a field situation without it basically killing most of the animals it’s used on. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2018, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042/80 "2018-03-26T17:56:36Z")
If a bear is approaching you and you have a backpack full of food, and you toss it his way, will it stop to investigate the food source, or ignore it and continue to menace/stalk you? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/youre-in-the-forest-and-a-bear-passes-by-assume-no-baby-bears-and-hes-not-hungry-how-dangerous/811042.md?page=5)