Demonical, Thank you for your direct reply, and I certainly respect your experience and judgement, also. I know bears are individuals, with their own temperments. My son lives only a few miles from town, on twenty acres of trees and fields, and bears have "lived" on, or near, his place for twenty-five years. Virtually all the time they respect him and he respects the bears. They will eat from his dog food dish, if they get the chance, but usually he can just chase them away. He was telling me that one big bear was developing an attitude and wouldn't scare from him. He shot it in the side with a paint ball gun, thinking he woud know it from the paint. At being hit, the bear really took off and never came back!
One spring I was on a grizzly hunt by myself. I was near the CP mainline through the Rockies, about a mile by trail past a large work camp on the railway. I camped on the edge of a large meadow, with a "V" track on it, where steam locomotives used to turn around. In the evening a speeder type rail vehicle came to my camp. I thought maybe I shouldn't be there, but the fellow came to tell me the train crew had seen my tent, also two large bears in the meadow and the fellow came to warn me about the bears. I didn't do too good of a job of convincing him I would be OK and he told me to come to their camp, any time of the night, if I wanted to.
Before dark a large black bear did show up and was not easily scared away. I don't like a tent in bear country and I will admit it was hard to sleep while keeping both ears open for the bear and my arm wrapped around my rifle!
The next morning the work camp sent a truck in to see if I was still OK. I think they were glad to see me go a couple of days later, when I could find no grizzly sign, whatsoever.
I too, thought the bear that came had an attitude, but not enough I thought, to warrant shooting him. It's a good thing for the bear I made that decision before it got dark, and I could still hear him nearby in the bush!
