Black bear attacks mountain biker in Washington State park

No, you haven't a clue of how wildlife research is conducted, nor are you
familar with the increase use of information theoretic and Baysenian
statistical approaches
in the ecological literature (btw, much of the concesus in the field of
climate science is based
on these types of statistical models and not experiments (observations
placed within the framework
of statistical models that assist in revealing important factors that
contribute to our understanding
of how systems work. Experiments contribute to this understanding (such as
evaluating bird response
to large prescribed burns, herbicides and other forest treatments), but by
themselves they
represent a relatively small part of our knowldge base. Statistical models
for example are used to analyze
radio-telemetry data regarding habitat selection these are observation data
not experimental. Almost
all of our inferences on how large predators use the landscape are based are
based on how they react to various
habitat features (topography, veg cover classes, road density, human
dominated landscapes, ag, etc.); these are
largely based on comparing to what degree an individual or group of
individuals avoids or uses disproprotionately these featues,
again not experimental, but observational. In fact given the appropriate
ecological scale for many large predators
it would not be possible to even contemplate conducting experiments
regarding habitat selection as they would be
logistically impossible and therefore any attempt to do so would likely be
irrelevant. So know you are clueless as always.

Again no, while experiments provide an important framework to understand the
natural world, by themselves
they would be extremely limiting. Let me give you a simple example, in 1994
a adult female cougar killed a runner
along a trail above the American River in Cool California. She had two
young 4 to 6 month old cubs her were not with
her, but some distance away (a mile or so). The woman was killed in a
classic fashion (for a cougar) drug from the kill
site (as cougars will do) and fed on. What is the most logical and
consistent explanation (I suggest you would
plan the mt. biking community), not that she was defending her young, but
for some unkown reason (and no
experiment in the world would enlighten us on this matter) that day this
healthy prime age female so a human as
a prey item and killed her. Any other explanation requires us to suspend
reality and enter Harry Potter's world.
See how simple it is to infer motivation in some cases. Admittedly, other
circumstances are confusing and we
are left great uncertainity as to the cause.

So how do we interpret this, a very rare event that is simply unpredictable.
While this may cause some to restrict
their time in the woods, those of us her understand probability continue
doing what we do. I spend considerable
number of days in the backcountry each year without any concern about being
attacked by a large predator as I am
much more likely to suffer a slip and a fall off a steep trail (I find
myself caring to large a pack for most of
my backpack trips) or a cardiac event (while seemingly very fit I am in my
mid-50s).

So why don't you go play somewhere else.

In article ,
(Bill Z.) wrote:

If you really want some amusement regarding MV, though, read his
strongly held opinion last year about how cell phone towers are
causing a massive reduction in the bee population (as he totally
ignores more likely causes such as a virus that seems to be related in
some way to the decline).


did Mikey READ the latest on the Bee's Thing..... they HAVE isolated
a NEW, and as yet uncatagoized Virus that seems to have significant
infection rates in dead hives. It seems to have been imported from
China or Austrailia, about two years ago.......

Oh I suspect not.....Hmmm, oH well...... so much for MIkey's
Technology Understandings.....

You writes:

In article ,
(Bill Z.) wrote:

If you really want some amusement regarding MV, though, read his
strongly held opinion last year about how cell phone towers are
causing a massive reduction in the bee population (as he totally
ignores more likely causes such as a virus that seems to be related in
some way to the decline).


did Mikey READ the latest on the Bee's Thing..... they HAVE isolated
a NEW, and as yet uncatagoized Virus that seems to have significant
infection rates in dead hives. It seems to have been imported from
China or Austrailia, about two years ago.......

Oh I suspect not.....Hmmm, oH well...... so much for MIkey's
Technology Understandings.....

The article claimed it isn't airtight yet, although the virus seems
to be present in the dead hives. The problem is that the virus is
not killing hives in Australia. Possibly some other factor is
involved as well, but we don't yet understand why Australia is
different.

Just give the biologists some times. The most likely contribution
of cell phones will be when one biologist uses one to talk to
another.

--
My real name backwards: nemuaZ lliB

On Sep 6, 11:25 am, y_p_w wrote:
On Sep 6, 8:33 am, Mike Vandeman wrote:





On Tue, 04 Sep 2007 22:05:35 -0700, y_p_w wrote:
On Sep 4, 9:19 pm, Mike Vandeman wrote:
On Tue, 04 Sep 2007 14:46:48 wrote:
On Sep 4, 2:29 pm, Bruce Jensen wrote:
On Sep 4, 1:46 wrote:

WTF?

Tell that to the family in Utah whose 11 year old was dragged out of
their tent and killed in June by a male black bear. Male black bears
aren't known for being protective of their cubs. Some are known to
attack cubs, which could include their own young.

Yeah, but we are not at this point talking specfiically about a male
or female bear. There is a reasonable chance that the bear in
question was a female with cubs, based on other testimony. At the
very least, it was surprised.

The Utah incident above also involved some questionable human-food
handling, IIRC.

Sure. However - the attack was for a different reason than a black
bear sow defending its cubs.

I don't know that that was an "attack". It was probably simply
following the smell of food.

Dragging an 11 year old 400 yards from a tent was an attack.

BS. He was taking what he thought was food to his picnic area. If he
wanted to "attack" the kid, there would be no need to move him.

Possibly

one that could have been avoided, but still an attack. Bears have
been known to claw/bite people if they think they can get food.

I notice that you haven't offered any other reason for a black bear to
attack a human, even though you say there are such reasons.

Are you freaking kidding me? They'll attack when startled. I've read
of numerous incidents where someone was clawed or bitten when a bear
was surprised by a person while it was going through garbage/food. My
favorite stories are about idiots feeding bears that just turned on
them. Some attacks have been seemly random, like the Cherokee
National Forest mauling in 2006. That was just a family on the trail,
attacked by a male bear. It was also exceedingly rare.

http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_87516.asp

I posted this earlier, but I guess it's not valid if it doesn't
validate your ill-advised statements:

http://www.dfg.ca.gov/news/issues/be...incidents.html

"Los Angeles County, July 2003 - A male hiker was knocked down by a
bear at a remote campsite along the Pacific Crest Trail in the Angeles
National Forest. The hiker had just reached the camp, which was empty,
dropped his pack on a picnic table, and was looking for a place to
hang his food. As he walked back toward the pack, he heard a noise
behind him. As he turned he was knocked to the ground by a bear. After
standing over him for a few seconds, the bear grabbed the backpack and
began dragging it off. The man shouted at the bear and threw rocks
until the bear finally retreated without the backpack. The hiker
received only minor bruises and was not seriously hurt.

Los Angeles County, July 2001 - A woman was bitten on the arm by a
bear at a county-run tree farm near La Verne. The bear, which was
earlier spotted climbing on a nearby trash can, reportedly walked up
to the woman while she was seated at a picnic table and bit her on the
arm. The woman was treated at a hospital for puncture wounds. The bear
was later shot and killed by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies.
The bear weighed approximately 85 pounds and was estimated at one to
two years of age.

Trinity County, May 1986 - A 35-year old man was attacked at around 3
a.m. while camping in a tent in the Trinity Alps Wilderness. The
victim felt that he was caught in the middle of a fight between two
boars when one bear attacked him in his tent. The bear left when the
victim hit the bear with a tentpole. Two bears then returned and acted
aggressively toward each another before they finally left. The victim
sustained several puncture wounds to his shoulder and lacerations to
the back of his head.

Siskiyou County, September 1986 - A long-time resident of a small
rural community was injured while feeding a bear at his residence. The
victim had been feeding bears at this location for more than 30
years."

So that's just incidental to feeding (getting competitors for the food
out of the way). It's not an "attack" on a person.

Knocking/clawing/biting someone to get to food is still an attack,
even if just part of a plan to secure food. If someone punches/clubs
another person in order to steal a wallet, is that not an "attack"?
There are also plenty of documented incidents of bears injuring/
attacking people where there was no food being fought over nor cubs to
defend.

And I see you have no answer for the 2006 Cherokee National Forest
black bear attack. Again - male bear. No food being raided.

http://www.southeasternoutdoors.com/...erokee-fatal-b...

Here's a known predatory attack:

http://www.southeasternoutdoors.com/...oky-mountain-f...

"Subsequent necropsies preformed at the University of Tennessee
confirmed that both bears the rangers killed had fed on Ms. Bradley
and were most likely the bears that had killed her. The bears were not
emaciated and the necropsies did not reveal any underlying health
issues with the bears that may have contributed to the attack. This
lead officials to believe the attack was a predatory."

Certainly I'm not trying to employ any scare tactics against people
visiting the woods. Incidents like this are extremely rare, but I'm
not going to sit by while the completely wrong statement "It's a well-
known fact that black bears don't attack humans, except to defend
their cubs." is passed on as the truth.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

ALL BULL**** IT WAS STAGED BY THE WITCHCRAFT DRIVEN GOVERNMENT!!

ROLE PLAYING THE PUBLIC is what this insanity was. All women who
practice witchcraft are SICK!!

"Mike Vandeman" wrote in message
...
It's a well-known fact that black bears don't attack humans, except to
defend their cubs.

Actually, make that "well-known myth."

http://www.bear.org/Black/Black_Bear_Facts.html

In June I was biking out in the woods here in Maine and waiting out some
rain under some trees when a momma bear and her cub came traipsing down a
trail not 25 feet from me. The mother bear stood on her hind legs and
snorted and blew as her cub ran into the brush. When I took my backpack off
and unzipped it to get my camera out, the mother ran into the brush as well.
The two stuck around for a few minutes. Nothing happened to me when I turned
the corner onto the intersecting trail. And I managed to get a decent photo
of the cub in a tree:
http://bangorinfo.com/cityforest/Pho...k-bear-cub.jpg

I met the same bear just the other night and she had no problem with me
watching from 200 feet away as she scaled a tree and ate acorns. I was the
one who ended up leaving first, after 20 minutes, because it was pitch dark.

wrote in message
...
Mike, your ignorance of wildlife and factless statements become
irritating.
While black bear attacks on humans are rather rare, as a carnivore, they
can
and do attack humans from time to time. The probability of an attack is
measured in the 1 to 400 million or more (given the number of recreational
visitor days a year in black bear country). The motivation for the attack
can range from protecting cubs (and yes I would suggest this is one of the
more common reasons),

And according to a leading expert in the field, not true.

On Sat, 8 Sep 2007 17:27:50 GMT, wrote:

No, you haven't a clue of how wildlife research is conducted, nor are you
familar with the increase use of information theoretic and Baysenian
statistical approaches
in the ecological literature (btw, much of the concesus in the field of
climate science is based
on these types of statistical models and not experiments (observations
placed within the framework
of statistical models that assist in revealing important factors that
contribute to our understanding
of how systems work. Experiments contribute to this understanding (such as
evaluating bird response
to large prescribed burns, herbicides and other forest treatments), but by
themselves they
represent a relatively small part of our knowldge base. Statistical models
for example are used to analyze
radio-telemetry data regarding habitat selection these are observation data
not experimental. Almost
all of our inferences on how large predators use the landscape are based are
based on how they react to various
habitat features (topography, veg cover classes, road density, human
dominated landscapes, ag, etc.); these are
largely based on comparing to what degree an individual or group of
individuals avoids or uses disproprotionately these featues,
again not experimental, but observational. In fact given the appropriate
ecological scale for many large predators
it would not be possible to even contemplate conducting experiments
regarding habitat selection as they would be
logistically impossible and therefore any attempt to do so would likely be
irrelevant. So know you are clueless as always.

Again no, while experiments provide an important framework to understand the
natural world, by themselves
they would be extremely limiting. Let me give you a simple example, in 1994
a adult female cougar killed a runner
along a trail above the American River in Cool California. She had two
young 4 to 6 month old cubs her were not with
her, but some distance away (a mile or so). The woman was killed in a
classic fashion (for a cougar) drug from the kill
site (as cougars will do) and fed on. What is the most logical and
consistent explanation (I suggest you would
plan the mt. biking community), not that she was defending her young, but
for some unkown reason (and no
experiment in the world would enlighten us on this matter) that day this
healthy prime age female so a human as
a prey item and killed her. Any other explanation requires us to suspend
reality and enter Harry Potter's world.
See how simple it is to infer motivation in some cases. Admittedly, other
circumstances are confusing and we
are left great uncertainity as to the cause.

So how do we interpret this, a very rare event that is simply unpredictable.
While this may cause some to restrict
their time in the woods, those of us her understand probability continue
doing what we do. I spend considerable
number of days in the backcountry each year without any concern about being
attacked by a large predator as I am
much more likely to suffer a slip and a fall off a steep trail (I find
myself caring to large a pack for most of
my backpack trips) or a cardiac event (while seemingly very fit I am in my
mid-50s).

So why don't you go play somewhere else.

That's a lot of words, just to avoid admitting that your methodology
AT BEST only provides hypotheses that still need to be experimentally
tested, in order to determine cause. You just dismiss unpleasant but
logical conclusions, such as that humans don't belong in bear- & mt.
lion habitat.
--
I am working on creating wildlife habitat that is off-limits to
humans ("pure habitat"). Want to help? (I spent the previous 8
years fighting auto dependence and road construction.)

Please don't put a cell phone next to any part of your body that you are fond of!

http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande

Your right, I needed fewer words to expose your ignorance. Simply put you
have
put forth an uneducated view of the world not based on any knowledge of
bears or
the bear/human conflict data, and I have represented the general consensus
of the
scientific community regarding predator/human encounters - you sure you do
not
work for the Bush administration - based on your blind incompetence I am
sure they
could find you a job.

Another possibility is the bear had just purchased an I-Phone at full price
and went
postal when he found out Apple just dropped the price a couple of hundred
bucks.

Keep up the posting Mike so we can be sure you have taken your meds.

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 05:15:27 GMT, wrote:

Your right, I needed fewer words to expose your ignorance. Simply put you
have
put forth an uneducated view of the world not based on any knowledge of
bears or
the bear/human conflict data, and I have represented the general consensus
of the
scientific community regarding predator/human encounters - you sure you do
not
work for the Bush administration - based on your blind incompetence I am
sure they
could find you a job.

Another possibility is the bear had just purchased an I-Phone at full price
and went
postal when he found out Apple just dropped the price a couple of hundred
bucks.

Keep up the posting Mike so we can be sure you have taken your meds.

I notice that you carefully removed my indictment of your ignorance
about the scientific method, and changed the subject to "the general
consensus of the scientific community" -- whatever THAT is.

What are you afraid of? That someone might find out how little you
know?
--
I am working on creating wildlife habitat that is off-limits to
humans ("pure habitat"). Want to help? (I spent the previous 8
years fighting auto dependence and road construction.)

Please don't put a cell phone next to any part of your body that you are fond of!

http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande

You really do lack reading comprehension and your memory sucks. This entire
thread
started with you surmising incorrectly about why black bears attack people -
based
not on one shred of evidence to support your silly notions and a complete
and total
lack of the scientific lit on this subject. No you are sad and pathetic,
and mainly
delusional. Since it is you how has offered a viewpoint not
support by the evidence or literature and is inconsistent with the general
consensus,
I challenge you to come up with evidence that would require the scientific
community to change its mind - you may want to save your effort because you
have not credibility with scientists and you will fail miserably like you
always do.

Oh, if you do not understand consensus, talk to climate scientist to get a
refresher,
it is the very issue that has been driving the scientific bus that has
concluded that humans
are largely responsible for the current warming trend - but I guess you do
believe
global warming is a hoax also (also, the majority of our grasp of the
problem comes not from
experiments, but from observational data (such as ice cores).

Dude you need professional help.