By Cory Sheffield
“Let’s stop here for a bit,” I suggested to John, my client, as I stepped off my horse. We were in a beautiful high alpine valley in mid-August with all the glorious colors of fall on our way back to my spike camp. We put in a long day of hiking over ridges and looking in holes for Dall rams. I tied up our horses and climbed up on a rock to take in the view when I noticed something moving in a tiny little alpine tarn a good 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile away.
I brought up my glasses to see it was a grizzly bear. He appeared to be having a bath as only his head was sticking out the water. I signaled John over to have a look. It was a pretty cool sight to see. The wind was blowing right to him and even at that distance it wasn’t too long before he winded us.
After catching our scent he hopped up out of the tarn, shook himself off and stood on his hind legs, sniffing the wind to gather more information and decide his next move. I figured he would hightail it out of there. Instead, he cut up the side of the mountain until he was at our elevation. Again, he stood up and sniffed the wind. As he casually started loping along the side of the mountain towards us, my curiosity still out-paced my alarm.
This is interesting, I thought, as every so often he would stop and stand on his hind legs and check the wind. When the bear hit the 200 yard mark I got up and hollered at him as I walked over to my horse and grabbed my 44 Blackhawk out of the saddle bag. Tucking the pistol behind my belt buckle I then had John pass me his rifle.
Side-stepping to a more level piece of ground, I told John to get on his horse and stay there. I added, “If things get western just give the horse his head he’ll take care of you.”
The grizzly stopped about 100 yards out. I was cussing him pretty good as it was now obvious that this bear was hunting us. He moved towards us again. Through the rifle scope I saw him blow snot, violently shake his head, and break into a full-sprint right for us. Just as I was about to squeeze off a round he disappeared. I came off the scope briefly and saw a gully full of willow where he must have dropped down. Two seconds later he popped up 30 yards out, headed straight for us as hard as he could go. I let him have it at 20 yards and he folded up mid-stride. I gave him another one for good measure.
“Holy shit!” John called out from behind me, still in his saddle. “Good shot. I wasn’t feeling that good sitting up here with only my buck knife for fuck sakes.”
Grizzlies do hunt and kill stuff for a living. I’ve often wondered how that day would have turned out if we only had bear spray with us.
