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This series of posts have been some of the best that I have seen on this forum about bear protection mainly because they have been focused not on which caliber is better or worse or which bullet is to be used for best penetration and damage, but more on what the methods are that each and everyone one uses and why, more importantly, that we use them.  The advice on bringing along a good partner that you trust is priceless.  With all the talk about shooting a scoped rifle at close range and if it can be done sounds like a good reason to go to the range and practice either point shooting or whatever, but I am guessing with enough practice it can be done.  Just another obeservation about this post is look at the lack of arguing, I'll go out on a limb and attribute this to how people have been posting.  Rather than stating why their prefered gun would do the most damage or would just get the job done they are just posting why they feel it is the best method for them.  In the end I doubt anybody is going to do exactly what a another person has done, but the reasons that everyone has provided with this series of post have outweighed all the other garbage about ballistics and terminal damage ten fold.  I thank everone for their reasons and feel that anybody asking this question about bear back-up or the correct caliber should consider each and everyone of the previous posts before they even start to wonder which firearm to go with I know I would have and will in the future.  Because really there are only three options that a person has in my opinion. 1. Not carrying a firearm at all.(Nuts if you ask me) 2.  Carrying a Handgun. and 3. Carrying a rifle or Shotgun.  Everything after that doesn't mean a whole hell of a lot.

Message Thread:

• Back up hangun for bear defense hunter1339 Dec 04 2005
  • Back Up alaska bush man Dec 11 2005
  • Lightweight sidearm Dirtysouth Dec 06 2005
  • Interesting Reading Daveinthebush Dec 06 2005
  • What I do bradb1169 Dec 06 2005
    • Great Posts Jake_65_65 Dec 06 2005
  • Another opinion martyv Dec 06 2005
  • Thought Process Jake_65_65 Dec 05 2005
    • Thanks, Jake! Michael Strahan Dec 05 2005
  • Bear Backing Brian Richardson Dec 05 2005
    • Jum in Delta Snowwolfe Dec 05 2005
  • Handgun bear protection Kirk Dec 05 2005
  • Jim in delta AlaskaCub Dec 05 2005
  • Heres what I figure Jim in Delta Dec 05 2005
  • Back up gun PastorBob Dec 05 2005
    • Back up Snowwolfe Dec 05 2005
  • take overkill jklingel Dec 05 2005
  • The archives are full of bear protection info... Michael Strahan Dec 05 2005
    • I forgot to mention iron sights Michael Strahan Dec 05 2005
      • no front sight homerdave Dec 05 2005
    • regarding the bear protection thing... sourdough Dec 05 2005
    • bear protection sourdough Dec 05 2005
      • You nailed it on the head Sourdough AlaskaCub Dec 05 2005
    • second what strahan says AlaskaCub Dec 05 2005
      • bear in a scope mariner Dec 05 2005
        • Handgun for bear protection?!? TABoylan Jan 02 2006
        • Mariner response AlaskaCub Dec 05 2005