Fighting a mountain lion

[Kane Fan]

Where'd you read that? I've heard from quite a few people who say its the best thing to use. Sometimes if you shoot a bear you can get in a bit of trouble with the law.

Also heard sometimes its more dangerous to shoot and wound a bear, as compaired to spraying the eyes with some pepper.

probubly best to just leave the damned bear alone
it was on an internet site somewhere about Griz bears specifically
I was looking for some cool pictures of them for a screensaver or wallpaper and I did a search on grizzley bears and happend to start reading about them
I might have read that spraying pepper on items is not an effective way to keep bears away from them
but I am pretty sure I also read spraying it in their face wasn't always effective
ideally avoidence I think is key...

 

[-SD-]

I wouldn't take a 5.56mm against a BEAR ever. You'd be lucky if the round would penetrate the adipose tissue. Close range with a bear or any wild carnivore for that matter, I'd rather have a sidearm, preferably .45ACP or larger.

Wrong. A .45 acp is a large slow moving bullet made for slamming into humans and stopping them, not for penetrating deeply. If you were to want any handgun for a bear, a .44 magnum or .454 Casull would be your best bet. Since a rifle was mentioned (M16), in that case you would want a large high velocity round made for taking out big game.

 

[-SD-]

the .45 is twice the size of the 5.56
which is more bleeding
and more overall tissue damage
tho bears (grizzleys at least) do not tend to bleed a great deal from many wounds
so much so that they can be difficult to track from what I have heard
I wouldn't know first hand tho I don't hunt animals


I've heard what you said about the 5.56 taking more then one shot to drop someone
I've never heard anyone complain about a .45 lacking stopping power tho

Youre thinking of the stopping power to a person when he is shot, not a 1000 lb. Bear. big difference.

 

[Breeze]

to look at real world examples then
explain militiary complains about the .223 round
and the lack of complaints about the .45 round
also there are big game hunters who hunt with pistols
(I am not sure of them hunting bears specifically but big game in geneal such as boars moose etc) but I know of none that hunt anything bigger then a deer with a .223
(that dosn't mean it hasn't happend or anything just I've never heard of it)

.223 for deer, 300 mag for bear. No hunter in his right mind would pick a .223 to hunt big game.

 

[Breeze]

I heard from a number of sources around here a .22 will stop a lion easily, the sound will more then likely scare him away. I think you'd have to be near the den for it to contenue to attack you.

As for a .45 thing I've talked to someone who said he usess a load on his .45 that drops whitetail deer as quick as his 30-06 does. I guess the type of ammunition is what counts.


These arent facts but things I've heard by talking to people so im not sure about them but I'd imagine them to be true since its coming from older experianced outdoorsmen.

I also heard pepper spray is one of the most usefull things to scare away bears and mtn lions. Also its legal to carry.

A .22 might scare a lion but it will NOT stop one. No friggin way. A .22 is a basic round used for shooting squirrels and targets. It is capable of killing larger animals, but there is a huge difference in stopping an animal that is charging and having an animal wander off to die AFTER it kills you and whoever you are with.

 

[Kane Fan]

Wrong. A .45 acp is a large slow moving bullet made for slamming into humans and stopping them, not for penetrating deeply. If you were to want any handgun for a bear, a .44 magnum or .454 Casull would be your best bet. Since a rifle was mentioned (M16), in that case you would want a large high velocity round made for taking out big game.

I'd want a big game rifle to
or, better still to just avoid the Bear
or if I can't avoid it avoid upsetting it

 

[Kane Fan]

.223 for deer, 300 mag for bear. No hunter in his right mind would pick a .223 to hunt big game.

thankyou!

 

[Kane Fan]

A .22 might scare a lion but it will NOT stop one. No friggin way. A .22 is a basic round used for shooting squirrels and targets. It is capable of killing larger animals, but there is a huge difference in stopping an animal that is charging and having an animal wander off to die AFTER it kills you and whoever you are with.

a perfect eye or ear shot (or throat) but it's not something I'd want to bet my life on!

 

[Breeze]

Dude, just some basic math here....

Kinetic energy = 1/2 * (mass) * (velocity)^2

A 62 grain, 5.56 mm round traveling at 3025 ft/sec gives you about 1,259 ft-lb of kinetic energy.

A 154 grain, 7.62 mm round traveling at 2104 ft/sec gives you about 1,513 ft-lb of kinetic energy.

A 230 grain, .45 ACP rounf traveling at 850 ft/sec gives you about 369 ft-lb of kinetic energy.

Mind you that these are just calculations based on muzzle velocity of Wolf brand ammunition, but run true regardless of manufacturer. This doesn't even take into account the "spall" of the higher velocity rifle rounds once inside the body's soft tissues, which also causes considerable damage.

Now, I don't know about you, but having been in the military, and having seen first hand the effects of both rifle and handgun rounds on humans, I can say these things:

1. When a person gets hit by a handgun round, they pretty much keep doing what they were doing before you shot them. They don't knock people onto their asses like in the movies, as they simply lack the energy to do so. Multiple center of mass hits are required to put a person down with a handgun, and even with multiple hits by a .45 ACP, the target usually manages to lumber off somewhere to bleed out.

2. When a person gets hit by a rifle round, one hit usually puts them down if it is center of mass, with the exception of the 5.56 mm round. I can tell you from experience that it usually takes two hits to put a person down with the 5.56 mm round. The internal organ damage from the "spall" of a rifle round is usually enough to ensure death without prompt medical facilities.


Now, a bear has considerably higher bone density than a person. So, whereas a handgun round can fracture a human femur, it will not do so to any except the smallest of bones in a bear. Also, as was mentioned earlier in this thread, bears have considerable adipose tissue, which a .45 ACP round will most likely fail to penetrate. The end result, shooting a bear with a handgun will probably just really piss it off, unless you are very lucky.

I have hunted bears and can say from experience that you need a high powered rifle bullet that will penetrate through flesh and bone and still have enough left to damage the internal organs. For me, a 270 or 300 mag works just fine. I have also dropped a bear in its tracks with a 50 cal blackpowder rifle. You also have to consider whether or not the bear is pissed off and charging or is unaware that a bullet is coming it's way. There is little comparison to shooting a bear and shooting a person, the physical differences are huge. A 22 magnum will kill a wide variety of large animals, but that doesn't make it an ideal weapon. A 12 gauge slug will knock a man on his ass as quickly as anything, but it isn't versatile enough to make an ideal combat or bear hunting round.

 

[Tagio]

from that injury report link


24 May. 28-year-old Phil Anderson was attacked by an approximately 80 pound mountain lion in Olympic National Park about 20 miles west of Port Angeles, Washington. The lion moved out of the shadows "smoothly and quickly". A mountain biker and wrestler, Anderson first ran backwards but fought when it leapt on his chest. Anderson fell to his back, locked his legs around the cougar, flipped over and buried his thumbs in the animal's throat and choked the cat in and out of consciousness. He kept the front paws pinned back with his forearms. After about two and a half or three minutes, the cat still wriggling, got Anderson's thumb in its mouth and smashed it. That gave the cat the edge. Anderson lost his grip, and the cat's claws went into a whirl and managed to rip through his thick sweatshirt in a couple of places, giving Anderson puncture wounds to the chest. Not wanting more, the lion then fled.