Hunting Grizzly Bear with a Spear

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Zoogster

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I was curious if it is legal to hunt a bear with a spear.

I was thinking about how just about anyone, even some out of shape half dead retired old man with more physical ailments than you can count can shoot the biggest toughest land animals from a safe distance. In all but the rare case they succeed with little risk of failure.

Not particularly sporting.


However if we look back in history plenty of people hunted some of the biggest baddest creatures on earth with very little. In fact they were so good at it they could not only kill them, they could even capture them alive. Imagine taking large bears, lions, tigers, and other large cats alive with no tranquilizers. Yet the Romans did this so successfully they managed to wipe out species. Most of the large European and North African predators went extinct this way, captured alive so they could be transferred to the arenas, where they were then killed by men with hand held weapons for entertainment.
http://www.endangeredspecieshandbook.org/persecution_roman.php

By comparison killing something with a spear is a whole lot easier than capturing it alive without drugs or modern tools.


As far as humane it certainly would be no less humane than the thousands of deer taken by broad head arrows, shot with a large blade that cuts into them and lets them run off to bleed out typically over several minutes to an hour.
This is a well respected activity, often requiring quite a bit of time to kill the animal.


I know in some places they hunt boars with dogs and spears, or large knives, an activity in which they finish off the animal once the dogs got it.


So ethically it would seem no worse than activities already done, yet would certainly be more challenging. Even if someone used armor and a shield or worked in teams it would be more challenging and sporting than standing hundreds of yards away with a rifle.

So does anyone know if there is any legal method for taking an animal in such a way? They do have primitive hunts with bow and arrow right? Could a spear get a primitive exemption?
What about limits on group hunting? Would a group of men working together with tags be able to assist eachother in taking the same bear, or helping fill eachothers' tags?
 
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Zoogster my hat is off to you and I would like to buy you a drink of your choice and your last meal too. Good luck, sir.

Just being a fat old fool,if I wanted to kill a grizzly bear (which I do not) without a backup gun and gunner I would buy a 458 Win mag and a hatfull of ammo and start pracitcing diligently. I know that I cannot possibly outrun even a wounded grizzly bear and he would probably feel highly annoyed at me, with cause, I might add.
 
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If you weren't a long time poster, I'd think this a troll post. :D Tell ya what, you mind I take out a life insurance policy on you first? I'll be the beneficiary of course.

Even Ben Lily, a man who hunted black bear with a knife and dogs, took on griz with a rifle.

http://www.gilawilderness.com/infopg/benlilly.htm

Why don't you pick on hogs with that spear, a lot safer. :D I've taken a hog with a knife, lots of that down here using dogs. You can even book a knife hog hunt with an outfitter. I was with a guy from work who's friend hunted with hog dogs. Griz? Nah, I wouldn't do that when I was younger and even dumber.
 
I'll hold your beer. har.
Actually, if you had enough of the right kind of dogs, I'd think you could probably get away with it. I'd wear a helmet and have a big ol bear knife though in case you had to rassle with it. good luck
 
Yet the Romans did this so successfully they managed to wipe out species.
Click to expand...

There were a lot of Romans and the Romans also had slaves. What was the life expectancy 10BC?

As far as having other hunters help, that would be fine in GA, you just can’t use radios to communicate.
 
Finnaly someone crazier then me, yeah people have hunted them with spears in years past, but they also hunted in groups. Bears can be big tough and mean, keep a safe distance, because that sharp stick does not scare them as much as you like to think.
 
A parallel would be the Masai of Africa, with their assegais and shields used in a lion kill: It's a group effort. One guy, in a test of manhood, might be the actual spearer, but the lion is surrounded by numerous guys with their spears and shields.

Back sixty years ago on Palawan Island in the Philippines, hunting of wild hogs was quite the sport. These hogs are of the same temperament as what we read of the Russian boars. They had rather tunnel-like trails through thick jungle. A hunter might use a Garand, but he had a local as a backup--with a spear.

So a hog would charge and the hunter would shoot. His backup would have the spear protruding out past the shooter in case the shots were ineffective in stopping a charge. A cross-bar at the head of the spear prevented the hog from pushing on down the shaft to get to the people. The butt of the spear would be pushed into the ground with the backup's foot on it.

Friends of my mother who had done this said that it was indeed rather exciting. :)
 
I think it's a great idea! We got lots of bears, grizzlies, just up north of here fattening up for winter.
Maybe if we sent lots of idiots up there wandering around the woods trying to poke a bear with a sharp stick they'd quit taking so many cattle.
Wouldn't hurt to clean up the gene pool a little either.
Ride up a fresh bear kill while on horse back and tell me what kind of spear you wish you had.
 
More power to ya! They can write on your tombstone "Tried to take a Griz with a spear, enough said." :p Just giving you a hard time. Could it be done? Sure, they did it in Biblical times. Is it wise or prudent when we have such great advancements in weaponry? No, not in my opinion. A gun just helps level the playing field. I look at it this way, the bear already has the advantage; long sharp claws, strong jaws, faster, way way more stronger than any human, 3-4 times the weight of an average human. So if you think taking a full grown grizz like that makes you more of a man then feel free. He'll just see easy lunch.
 
You could go all bangstick style.. you know, what you poke a shark with. I'd use like a 20mm HE and be ready to climb a tree.
 
Actually it was spearfishing that got me thinking of this. We go allover with spears in the ocean, and in a couple locations we have seen large great whites several times.
I won't report the locations because I hate the tourist boats that take people to see them and train them to think of boats as a meal ticket.

However I have had to come to terms with the fact that doing such an activity I am no longer on the top of the food chain. That there is a bigger animal that even with the typical weapons I have on hand I cannot hope to do much to if it decides it wants me.
I have decided I would be content if I could takes its eye or wound it badly so that it died or was unable to hunt later. But have given up on the idea of actually successfully incapacitating a large one in the few seconds they take to remove a limb.
They tend to be ambush predators so you only get a few seconds.

A guy hit one with a 12 gauge powerhead 9 times and didn't kill it, powerheads are more powerful underwater than the same cartridge on land and still didn't get it done, and a powerhead is difficult to legally take with you many places in California (white sharks are also a protected species). The one hit 9 times is similar in size to some we have seen from the safety of a boat.
So something like a speargun/polespear or knife is not going to incapacitate it.
I have studied its anatomy, tried to find the weakest points.The brain is long, odd shaped, and protected by a lot of tissue. Deploying your typical powerhead would be difficult, and one guy hit off the farallons even had a large bangstick in his hands he was unable to deploy before the attack was all over. (They have a safety, and need a sturdy one or you would blow your own leg off or injure a dive partner with it bouncing around as you swim and deal with surf.) So even someone with the inconvenience of carrying a large bangstick around with them still wasn't even able to use it in an attack.
Hunting it offensively might not be too hard, but defensively they are ambush predators and it will be facing you and likely vised down on a limb or torso, potentially with momentum of the attack propelling you through the water. I think I could takes it eye, maybe both of them, though. So thats what I have settled on as a strategy, stab/cut and destroy eyeball so it has to deal with that for life. I don't plan to be able to stop its bite, they deal with 1,000+ pound elephant seals with skulls much like a bear biting them and trying to fight back. But I do plan on ruining its life even if I end up dead.

I tried to think of anything similar on land. Nope, nothing. Man owns land now, anyone with a gun can easily kill the toughest animals we have.
So I thought of ancient times where man had to deal with large powerful animals without firearms.
There they were, killing bears and large cats with primitive weapons. Not in the rare case, but regularly and successfully. Even capturing them alive on a regular basis.
Honestly a grizzly bear with a spear seems a whole lot easier than a 16+ foot great white with a spear.
Their power is tremendous and they can claw, bite, and even crush people in seconds.
They run faster than people. However they seem slower going around objects. I can see a team of men tackling one with spears much like wolves deal with large animals around trees. Stay defensive and when the animal is facing someone else bite its haunches, or rather stab it with the spear. Wound it badly, disable a body part required for movement. As it turns to face that person, someone else does the same. I think if you had a team of people you could depend on not to hesitate when it was facing someone else, you could get it done. Any hesitation though would screw the person it was focused on. Even then it would obviously be quite dangerous.

It certainly wouldn't be easy and would require some training working as a team. A lot more time and effort going into training and planning than just sighting in your rifle before you head out with a guide.


My question was more to deal with the legalities. Are the laws written in such a way that it would be possible to hunt in such a manner. Most hunting regulations seem to be geared to the individual with a projectile weapon, and many may not accomodate teamwork. For example a person who had already filled their own tag may have trouble assisting someone else with lethal force in a place that considers attempting to catch, capture, or kill, hunting. As they would be hunting something for which they no longer have a tag.






And it also brings up the question of dogs. What are the legalities of dogs assisting?
 
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I read a book a long time ago. I don't know if it was fiction or "true". Anyway, the story goes, and it was just a passed along story/legend, that once upon a time our hero was bopping down a trail and old mr. bruin reared on up like and the fellow tossed his hat at its head.. when the bear went to catch it, the fellow gutted it with his knife and continued down the trail, whistling his merry song.. after dusting off his hat. This supposedly happened in the Urals.. where they drink a lot of vodka.
 
Might want to practice getting close hunting some large boar with a spear firsts. You know polish your skills. Then may be with a knife on a few large hogs. NO extra hunters now!! That way if the bear gets you the knife may finsh it off. Good luck.
 
So looking for stories of spears killing bears, apparently this guy was fined for killing a black bear with one in Canada:
http://www.fieldandstream.com/blogs/bear/2009/03/man-spears-bear-pays-1000-fines


Oh and here is a guy that has hunted with a spear several times, I guess I should see how he does it:

http://www.huntingwithspears.com/

pic17.jpg


pic4.jpg



That is what is great about the internet, while half the people may mock you for asking something outside of their comfort zone, you can also find information from people who have actually done it.

It appears he mainly threw the spear, from a tree? Not quite what I was interested in, but certainly different from your typical bow hunter.


The African Maasai hunt lions with spears.


Oh this looks promising, Russian Brown Bear hunting with a spear: http://www.besteuropeanhunts.eu/bear-spear-hunting/

In Russia there were hunters which bagged bears with a spear (Russian word for the bear spear is “rogatina” and the hunter is called “rogatchik”). Russian Nobility/aristocrats were keen spectators of this very dangerous method of hunting, with only a few people being professionals. They have to be a brave and strong person, and have to anticipate the unexpected bear behaviour. The great specialist of bear hunting was the main huntsman of the great duke Nikolay Romanov – Mihail Andrievskiy. In the magazine (“Nature and Hunting” 1894) he published a well known and very interesting article about bear hunting with “rogatina”. He described every detail and all aspects of this hunting: bear behaviour, psychology and strategy fighting, construction of spear and so on.
Click to expand...
Nature and Hunting 1894...
 
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It also seems there was in fact bear spears that used the strategy I was thinking. Using it more like a pike to resist the weight of the bear with the rear planted into the ground after stabbing the animal.



So does anyone have any answers on the legality of such hunting?
Is spear hunting bears legal, and where? Obviously only a few states have brown bears remaining. However information on states with black bears would be interesting too.
Multiple hunter assistance information would be helpful as well.


Looks like they did use dogs:

spear-hunter.jpg
 
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You are missing some critical points (pun intended). What the Romans did involved huge groups of people to capture the animals and often involved the use of slave labor and hefty nets along with all sorts of traps.

People can and do hunt with spears in various ways. Yes, the Massai do it. Great. They also have the benefit of generations of predecessor knowledge about it as well.

Great thing about Gene Morris is that he doesn't tell you how many animals he inhumanely mamed or just simply wounded with improper spear shots...given he is self-titled as the greatest living spear hunter in the world. Great white hunters are like that, sometimes. Looking at his images, a lot of his spear shots were very poorly placed...and he was the greatest, right?

Yeah, you can do it. You can also hunt animals with rocks and it was done apparently for big game during the Ice Age, but that doesn't make it a good idea.

Except for Gene, remember that a lot of the spear hunters hunt in groups. Folks that spear hunt bigger game in Africa are generally backed up by their guide and others who have GUNS. If you are throwing the spear (not that you indicated you wanted to), then be sure you are darned good at doing so before throwing away your weapon at an animal. If you are using it as a large toad sticker, practice your charges on hay bales (not the big round ones) and then moving hay bales to see how accurate you can be. I am sure you can be plenty accurate. If you are going to use dogs, then you might as well use a knife if you are going to let the dogs take all that risk, but you want the excitement of being in close.
 
It's not impossible. You just do it when they're hibernating. The Athabascans in the interior have a tradition of doing it, and even eat the meat.

So does anyone have any answers on the legality of such hunting?
Click to expand...

I believe it is legal here, as long as you abide by the rules and GMU restrictions for bear. Black bear would be vastly less insane than brown. In fact you could probably pull it off. They are on par with feral hogs in most respects, and I believe they have been taken with spears quite a bit in recent times. The big brown ones? You could try, but some of them have a whole ocean of mean in them. And I would not want to be poking one in the ribs from some tree stand only to have him look up at me with those "YOU GONNA DIE" eyes. It would be an experience, and might land you in the newspapers. Those guys seem to know they're top of the chain. Unlike smaller bears and feline predators they aren't used to having to take guff. They do what they want when they want. There's a kind of pride to them, and poking that pride with a sharp stick just can't end well.

And unlike firearms, the bear will understand the spear and what's happening to it. It isn't a sudden magical hole opening up. It's a stick attached to some trail monkey poking it. It knows that it can stop the attack by, for example, removing your arms. And it can do precisely that.

There is apparently an account of modern attempts in "Shadows Of the Koyukuk," but I don't have that book.
 
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The Grizzly bear is the largest bear in the world and were a nasty surprise to the Lewis and Clark expedition. The Romans never ran across this beasty, though they did capture elephants and lions.

I wonder if Neanderthal hunted bears this large?

I suppose if you could get the thing to impale itself on a massive spear you would win.

It would take some nerve to hunt one of these with a spear.

Best of luck.
 
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