Like many of you, I carry my gun just about every waking moment. It is so much a part of my routine that on those rare occasions when I can’t carry (air travel, a trip to the doctor’s office), I feel almost naked without it. And, like you, I probably do so for the same primary reason: protection from violent criminals.
But dangerous predators come in many forms. One of the most famous examples is the terrible story of Timothy Treadwell, the “Grizzly Man,” who spent more than a decade studying Alaskan brown bears in the wild. Ultimately, in 2003, he was killed (and eaten) by one of the bears he had “befriended” during his studies. Unfortunately, his girlfriend and protégé, Amie Huguenard, was with him, and suffered the same fate.
Worse, Treadwell’s cameras were rolling at the time, and while they did not catch video, they did record the audio of the horrific screams of both people as they were savagely mauled and eventually eaten by the rogue bear. Out of respect for the families, the audio has never been released to the public.
When the story first came out, most of the people I encountered in social settings expressed unbridled sympathy for Treadwell and his companion. They described their deaths as “unfortunate” and “a terrible tragedy.” Any caring human being would.
However, as time went by, I actually became increasingly angry with Treadwell. True, if he wanted to spend years placing himself in close proximity to one of the largest carnivores on Earth, completely unarmed, that was his prerogative.
But Treadwell was also responsible for another person’s life. Amie Huguenard trusted him. And no matter how much he loved the bears that he was studying, he had a moral obligation to protect her. And in Alaska, the locals know that means carrying a gun—a really big gun.
And there are other stories. Mountain lions have mauled numerous mountain bikers and hikers, sometimes fatally, in a number of Western states. And in almost every case, neither the victims nor the people who came to their aid were armed. In one California attack, a Good Samaritan pitifully told of throwing rocks and clumps of dirt at a mountain lion that had a female mountain biker’s head in its jaws.
Thankfully, the young woman survived, but throwing rocks? You’d think that even people not familiar or comfortable with firearms would at least carry some heavy duty “bear” pepper spray.
Black bears inhabit much of the nation, are less and less fearful of humans, and contrary to their “cute” TV image, can be quite deadly. Wild hogs have taken over much of the Southern half of the United States, and they are getting bigger (and more aggressive) every year. I’ve already encountered several while fishing in Florida, and I’ve only been here a little more than a year.
Okay, I’m an “outdoors” guy. I hike in the wild. I hunt. I fish. I camp. And I am always armed. But an incident just a couple of weeks ago underscored what can happen in even the most “civilized” environments. An 83-year-old man was attacked and killed by four neighborhood pit bulls that had gotten out of their fenced yard. And such attacks are no longer rare, nor are they always pit bulls.
Bottom line? Carry whenever, and wherever, you can. And be aware that threats can be anywhere, in many forms.