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View Full Version : English Setter Fends Off Bear


Todd Poer
02-28-2018, 12:54 PM
Just saw this. Seems a retired old hunting dog showed he had what it takes to the last. Hard one to read about and not get a moist eye. Whoever retired and got rid of old Pete if that is the story, well......

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/whats-hot/brave-senior-rescue-dog-sacrifices-himself-to-save-his-family-when-they-encounter-a-black-bear/ar-BBJDa4J?OCID=ansmsnnews11

Dean Romig
02-28-2018, 01:19 PM
He seen his duty an' he done it!

Man's best friend lives up to the name once again!





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Bill Murphy
02-28-2018, 06:37 PM
Let's hope that this story has a little bit of internet fantasy in it. Just my take on it.

Harold Lee Pickens
02-28-2018, 09:43 PM
That's why I have setters.

Todd Poer
02-28-2018, 11:28 PM
Dang Bill, tell me you didn't cry when Ol Yellar got shot.

Reality may be different though and it may or may not of happened just as they say it did, none of us were there and it sounds like only they could see part of it themselves. Don't know if Ol' Pete had any noble intentions are not and I am leery about putting human emotions and morality into animals, but dogs are something different. They do have protective instincts that can be engaged without much trigger. If there is a perceived threat and they can sense it, it is either fight, flight or submissiveness. I mean I have heard of polar bears befriending huskies and eating huskies.

Ask most highly regarded heros that are still alive what they were thinking at the time and most say, I wasn't thinking, I was just functioning. Maybe Ol Pete just reacted and obviously just bit off more than he could chew when bear false/bluff charged, or it could have been a real charge. Hard to say what a grouchy hungry bear will do that feels cornered or threatened. All we know is the result and it appears Ol Pete did not back down from a wild animal that was way better equipped and probably grossly outweighed him. Regardless of his intentions or function that old dog apparently did not tuck tail and run. Who knows that old bear might have even wanted to make a meal of one of those dogs, its rare but it has happened.

Anyway got soft spot for old hunting dogs since that is first dog that ever remember having, which was one of my dad's retired brittanies. Ol Ranger got too old to go and became a yard dog. I was about 3 or 4 and whenever I went to run around outside that old dog followed me like a shadow. I still remember that old dog hobbling around after me.

Rick Losey
03-01-2018, 07:49 AM
an Old Hemlock setter took on a bear in Vermont several years ago - the dog lived to tell about it

Dean Romig
03-01-2018, 08:30 AM
We had an article in Parker Pages a few years back about a setter, while grouse hunting, was attacked by a bear. The dog survived but only because the bear was "Parkerized" to death while in the process of mauling the setter.






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John Taddeo
03-01-2018, 04:22 PM
Shot a bear with a shotgun...?? :shock:

Dean Romig
03-01-2018, 07:09 PM
Yes indeed!





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Harold Lee Pickens
03-01-2018, 09:34 PM
Hunting in the wild and wooly places that we do, I'm surprised these interactions don't occur more often'. I have had 3 bear encounters, 1 wolf encounter, and 1 coyote encounter while hunting. Probably have related these before but here we go:
around 1989 in the UP, my Brittany Jess started a moving point that turned out to be a crippled and emaciated bear. It had a broken back, as it was pulling itself along with its front legs and couldn't have lasted much longer--yes I put it down with my VH 20 26" cyl/mod and a load of 8's.
Many years later, Jess the Brittany was 14 and quite deaf, but still hunting. As we moved thru a little clearing in the cut, a black bear rose up then charged across toward the unknowing dog--I fired 2 shots at it from 40 yds with my 1frame VH 16, and it veered off into the cut.
A pack of wolves closed in around us one day off the Big Wheels RD( sure COB knows where that is at). Betty was in full blown heat, and I believe that attracted them. I snapped a leash on her, fired 2 shots to scare off the wolves, and got the heck out of the area.
This year in Kansas, on the first day, a coyote jumped up just in front of Fancy, then whirled and came running back toword her--I greeted him with 2 loads of Fiocchi Golden Pheasant #5's.
Forgot about my first setter, Thicket--hunting one day off Deerfoot Lodge Rd, he came running back as we ran into a sow with 2 cubs--momma sent the two cubs up a tree--looked at us then backed off. The Parker 16 was on my shoulder and safety off. That cover has ever since been known as the Black Bear Cover.
Don't ever want to run into a big cat--but those at hanging out in the UP also.

Todd Poer
03-02-2018, 08:41 AM
Wow, Harold those are some crazy encounters. With protection I believe some wild large predator numbers are increasing albeit slowly but have not heard of too many statistics. Carrying capacity of landscape and terrain are still there in off the somewhat beaten areas and these animals are adapting. Its possible I guess to not be more surprised of these encounters as time goes on.

Bill Murphy
03-02-2018, 04:55 PM
I have been reluctant to mention that my late Wirehair, Eva, would make any average sized black bear sorry he ever messed with her. When you Google "prey instinct", Eva's picture is the first entry. She was almost an embarrassment in some of her encounters in the field, and in the neighborhood. She is gone now, but will be remembered by many.

James L. Martin
03-02-2018, 05:38 PM
About 8 years ago while hunting in Michigan's UP I saw what I believe was a Wolf. My friends setter ran over to me with its tail between it's legs and stayed with me for a while.

Todd Poer
03-03-2018, 09:05 AM
About 8 years ago while hunting in Michigan's UP I saw what I believe was a Wolf. My friends setter ran over to me with its tail between it's legs and stayed with me for a while.

Same thing happened to my dad in Minnesota with his setter. I think I mentioned here before, but he was working a on an old timber cut area and setter was acting birdie and hunting close. Out of corner of his eye he sees something moving and from about a distance and he sees this animal with a long face and wondered what the heck is that big old goat doing out here and he wondered if he was hunting close to someone's farm. Next thing he looks back and that goat was making a beeline thru the brush for his dog and it got within 5 yards of him and the dog but it was no goat but a big old wolf wanting a setter for lunch.

Wolf was so focused on the dog he never saw my dad standing there, and he raised his gun thinking he was going to have to shoot it but yelled first. The wolf froze looking startled and then the setter looked up saw the wolf standing there and then ran next to my dad. He said it was a pretty tense moment for a good 15 to 20 seconds and nobody moved inch until wolf sized up the scene and then just casually ambled off. Wolfs were/are protected so not to afraid of man too much in the area we hunted, but that is only one we saw.

We also never saw one but on more than one occasion came across some steaming bear scat in draw where we always found some grouse and woodcock. We called it the bear den but never had any run ins the several years we hunted that area.

Dean Romig
03-03-2018, 09:36 AM
There are a great many bears where I hunt in Vermont. Lots of old apple groves at the edges of the woods where Grace and I concentrate our grouse and woodcock shooting, and the 50-acre cornfield right below camp are big draws for bears. We hear guys running bear hounds almost on a daily basis in the area. There are loads of coyotes around too. I'm really glad we haven't had an encounter with either bear or coyote and I sure hope it stays that way. But just in case the need ever arises I always carry a side arm when I'm hunting, either a Ruger .357 revolver or a S&W 5906. And if it isn't legal to shoot a bear during bird season, I'm real sorry but Grace comes first on that short list of priorities.





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Todd Poer
03-03-2018, 10:05 AM
I have been reluctant to mention that my late Wirehair, Eva, would make any average sized black bear sorry he ever messed with her. When you Google "prey instinct", Eva's picture is the first entry. She was almost an embarrassment in some of her encounters in the field, and in the neighborhood. She is gone now, but will be remembered by many.

Bill, I've known a few wirehairs and yes Eva probably would have lit into a bear knowing the breed.

Not trying to go off on a tangent but just looked up on the wall to see the picture of relatives in front of the old family cabin up in the hills of Kentucky that was taken back in late 1800's. Forgot all about it. We still own the property but cabin is gone. My great grandfather was just a boy in the picture but when I was a boy of about his age in photo he told me about the time his grandmother killed a bear with an ax. Papa Reed was a great storyteller. Seems my great, great, great grandad was off somewhere I think part of the homeguard for Kentucky militia during Civil War or something.

Seems in the middle of the night a bear had gotten into the pig pen and she had an old mutt dog that was a lot like old yellar, so told. She let him out the door to go bark and run off the bear, but dog jumped in after the bear in the pen and then it was an awful racket of pigs squealing with dog and bear growling barking going at each other. Granny did not have a gun but runs out there with an ax and bear does not see her but just as the bear stands up and his facing the dog she sinks that ax right in the back of the neck of the bear and gets lucky and breaks the spine we all guessed. Bear goes down like a sack of potatoes and the dog just latches in and finishes off the bear.

Seems Granny also was pretty handy with a knife but that bear was too big to move by herself and that dog knew what to do and helped her drag the bear back to the cabin where she cleaned it. I don't have any pictures of her but she was described to be just like little old Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies.

Uncle of mine recorded that story and whole bunch of others ones like the shooting after a school board meeting and the ensuing trial. Seems even back then even during the trial everybody had a gun hidden somewhere on them in case someone got out of line.

John Dallas
03-03-2018, 11:44 AM
Several years ago, there was a report of wolves killing a pack of 7-8 rabbit dogs in the eastern UP