Polar bears are very curious animals, so if you back away while slowly undressing they will stop to inspect each piece of clothing, giving you time to get away.
this post was submitted on 08 May 2025
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They are also one of the few, next to tigers, land predators that actually have a taste for human blood. The nature of a polar bear thinks it can eat it then it will certainly try. You also absolutely cannot out run them.
180 seconds (3 minutes) is a hilarious overestimation of any fighter's ability. Unless you're counting the time it takes to bleed out.
Or total time it takes to be consumed
Maybe that's counting the time taken by the polar bear to catch up to the ~~runner~~ fighter from the farthest distance they are capable to lock-onto a target.
10 seconds of fighting, 170 seconds of screaming while being ripped apart.
1 swipe from those giant claws will end you in less than 10 seconds.
Snapping out of your fantasy as you're being eaten alive is a bad move.
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Where's that "imma fight a gorilla" guy when you need him?
Are your second story windows at floor height?
Another reference, this time in 3D:
Me, 6'4" 235lb, that's a full grown and a cub 1:1 statue
That cub will fuck me up
It would.
Off on a tangent, but relevant, I recently watched a video from a big cat trainer, and he stated that lion and tiger cubs are absolutely lethal at the age of 6 months. They can literally play with you to death.
They absolutely would, if it wasn't for that Carol fuckin' Baskin!
That Jezebel! I know she done it!
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Worked in Yellowstone for a summer.
Spent some time with the rangers. They got all sorts of questions...
Like which handgun caliber would be best to defend oneself from a bear.
Essentially, the ranger broke it down stating there was a weakness in the skull about the size of a bullet that you had to hit directly to have a chance of dropping a bear with a handgun. While its coming at you and pissed/hungry.
So essentially, you've just pissed off the bear before it gets it claws on you.
Well placed slugs from shotguns, rifle rounds, and preferably (according to the ranger in question) a tranquilizer to re-home the bear away from people. That being said, the bears are tracked to an extent and bears who show repeated behavior endangering themselves/tourists tend to be exterminated, sadly.
Hand to claw combat? Human is going down.
This is why in the past, when bears were hunted, they were hunted in their dens during hibernation - at the end of spears to keep that hungry bear as far away as possible from your soft easily rent flesh.
Seriously emptying an entire .357 revolver or .44 wouldn't help? What about hollow point bullets?
That's insaaaaneee
It entirely depends on the bear species, but in general guns are a last resort defense against bears.
Primary defense is avoidance and making it so they can avoid you. A bear will eat you, but is unlikely to hunt you. For most bears we're an unknown quantity so they'll avoid us, since other food is reasonably available with less risk.
A bear has heavy fur, thick skin for storing winter fat deposits, and dense bones. While bullets will injure the bear and perhaps even kill it, it won't be enough to save you.
Much like how hitting someone on the head with a glass bottle will hurt them, almost certainly injure them, and potentially kill them, the type of injury is likely to be a fractured skull or brain bleed. Extremely serious and deadly, but they have minutes of functionality and hours of bewildered stumbling before they black out.
So it'll likely die... Later. For now you have a scared, confused and pissed off bear.
I believe hollow points have less penetration power, so it might not even get through the hide. Other bullets will get through fine, but are unlikely to stop the bear dead.
Woah. I must ask further in my quest to understand last resort bear encounter gun tips. What about an .45 calibred pistol with an magazine alternating between normal and hollow points? I get the skull take, even some fighting dogs are immune to 9mm skull shots. I don't live in America, don't own a gun but know a lot about guns, just very interested in this topic
.44 magnum is barely on par with an intermediate rifle round like 5.56 against large game. And that's before considering the massively lower felt recoil or the fact that a rifle is much easier to aim
So .500 blackout?
I carry a .45-70 rifle with me when I'm up north. The high powered rounds I have for bears will also fell an elephant. (In theory. I really don't want to find out.)
I haven't heard of .500 blackout before, and google gives conflicting info on whether it's "necked down .338 lapua magnum" or "like .510 whisper"
polar bears have historically been felled with "panicked shooting with ar-15", and the "standard recommendation" seems to be "magnum rifle round"
Dude, you're not killing a bear with a handgun before it eats you.
Your question is 100% valid.
All these people piling on you claiming a bear will just shrug off having a hand gun emptied into it. That just sounds like bullshit to me, they aren't robots... Bullets aren't pellets that shit will penetrate and any species with a survival instinct will back up.
I simply cannot believe what people are saying? Is there any proof or is it all just made up speculation people make by extrapolating size and injuries caused by bullets?
Angry humans can take several 9mm rounds to the abdomen and continue to advance.
Bullets also aren't magical death pellets. A bear has about 20 inches of hair, skin, fat, and muscle to get through before organ damage, assuming you miss a bone.
A bear that hasn't committed to an attack is entirely likely to decide "fight" isn't worth it after the equivalent of getting stabbed in the shoulder by a screwdriver.
If it's already decided that violence is the right way to handle the "you" threat it may continue to attack until it cannot. Then it becomes relevant that many guns don't have the power to disable a beat before it gets to you and does serious damage. The bear dying in 30 seconds doesn't help you if it's last act is to break your arm, and put a two inch deep slash in the side of your neck. The goal isn't to kill the bear, the goal is to keep it from attacking you. That requires a lot more gun, since the near can move and attack very fast.
This is also deep in the realm of "what if". Most bear encounters involving a firearm resolve successfully without even shooting the bear. They don't like loud noises and will run from basically anything. The most encountered bears will usually run from shouting and waving your arms.
But if you're looking to get a gun for bear defense, you need to consider that they're extremely durable critters, and to cover what can happen probably requires more than most handguns can deliver.
Avoidance is a better first defense, followed by pepper spray.
That reminds me of a dirty joke.
Tourist: So, which would you recommend for self-defense against a grizzly: a hunting rifle, or a large-caliber pistol?
Ranger: The pistol.
Tourist: Really? Why's that?
Ranger: Because it'll hurt less when the bear shoves it up your ass.
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They may kill SEAL with a slap but how many polar bear slaps does it take to kill members of other special forces?
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Do not – and I really cannot stress this enough – give any of those bears cocaine
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Fun fact: Grizzlies and Polar Bears are the same species according to the Biological Species Concept.
Meaning they interbreed in the wild (somewhat rare), and produce viable offspring that can have babies as well.
We’re actually noticing this happening more and more with climate change. As Grizzly populations move further and further north, they’re encountering polar bears more often and are more likely to mate. Some scientists actually think within the next couple centuries due to arctic sea ice pretty much disappearing polar bears will either go extinct, or interbreed with grizzlies so much that there isn’t a “pure” polar bear left. Most likely a mix of both.
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Bear is black, fight back.
Bear is brown, turn around.
Bear is white, say good night.
Black bears are pretty skittish, so usually acting big & loud is enough to make them jog away, but I'm not sure someone could take them in a fight if the black bear was cornered.
Speaking of which, bears are extremely protective of their cubs, so if you ever see any cubs, running away from them at full speed is probably the best choice.
Also.
Some black bears are brown.
Some brown bears are black.
Good luck everyone.
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Also, one of the few animals that will hunt humans for food
Can’t blame them. They’re running out of options.
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Here is a black bear, a grizzly, and a polar bear.
And Marcie.
Fighting bears isn’t that common of an encounter. I’d be more worried about deer and coyotes or even a single cougar than the off chance of encountering a bear. They will definitely fuck you up but it’s not like they are starting their day to be like “Imma go murder a human” in the same way other urban-adjacent animals are—I think they just wanna get that sweet sweet pick-a-nic basket.
dies from turkey assault
You mean there are single cougars in your local area ? I always thought these ads were lying
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Polar bears will absolutely try to hunt you. They'll eat anything that moves. The only way to deal with a polar bear is a gun.
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