8.19.2012

The BEST Way to Survive a Wild Animal Attack: Wild Animal Attacking Your Kids? – Run From an Alligator, Beat-Up a Bear! The Yosemite Chronicles


Backpacker Magazine's Predator Chart - Yipes!
Have you ever discussed with your 7 year olds what to do if a bear attacks?

Mom: “Punch him in the nose!”

7 year old: “What if he eats my hand.”

Mom: “Well….better your hand than your face…”  (!!!)

Ugh. What a conversation.

Here we are in Yosemite. As a “regular” of the area, coming here for more than 13 years, I heave heard the wild tales of bears breaking into cars for your smores-makings and possibly even dancing on circus balls for scraps as they’ve become so accustomed to zoo-habituated humans.

Well, not quite.

But for the over 13 years we’ve been coming here, I, myself, have never, ever seen a bear. Smelled a bear. Found signs of a bear. Smelled my own fear of a bear. A few deer, a coyote in the winter. But I see more of those in my suburban neighborhood than I do up here.

Today, however, on our rock-hopping along the south fork of the Merced River through the southern part of Yosemite National Park near the gentle Wawona, my two 7 year olds and Nana and I stumbled upon a momentous, fresh-ish, magnificently enormous pile of Bear. Bear doo-doo, to be exact. And just a half-city block from our cabin.

Filled with berries and assorted farmer’s market-like goodies, it was spectacular. And a sign. He was here!!!

Luckily, after reading the: “Animal Attacks” article in the September 2012 issue of Backpacker magazine last night, I felt reassured, ahem, sort of, of what to do if, say, a deadly predator came upon us, or we upon them.

Their advice? Run from an alligator – run away!!!! And…. Beat-Up a grizzly bear, black bear, mountain lion, and/or wolf.

Hopefully not all four at the same time.

There was no mention in the article of Velociraptors or Dementors. So at least we can leave our wild, scary-movie dream creatures of the Jurassic Park and Harry Potter variety out of the “predator” list. (Or, the all time horror-predator-movie-dream-nightmare creature: the toothy shark from Jaws. I have never waterskied in the ocean again.)

So…. anyway, back to the bears.

After the stumble upon Smoky the Bear’s scat and subsequent horrifying face-eating-off conversation, we walked a little faster home. Only after taking a sweet (as in cool and gross) photo of the findings, of course.

And now, time to bone up on our karate-chop.

Hayyy-ya!

Namaste & Three Jabs to the Chest –a

For more on wild articles by Backpacker magazine: http://www.backpacker.com

2 comments:

  1. Hi there! I've read many posts about wild animal attacks, and I can tell that yours is very valuable.  Since the beginning of time, humans have enjoyed spending their time outdoors. Even though recent developments in society have decreased the amount of time people spend doing activities outdoors, many citizens still like to spend their weekends discovering long forgotten places in the woods. See more http://survival-mastery.com/skills/bushcraft/how-to-avoid-wild-animal-attacks.html

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  2. These are really good tips because we really don’t know when will this happen to our backpacking and camping experience. A little more knowledge will go a long way. In addition to this article, you can learn a lot from another article I found that I’m sharing now: http://backpackingmastery.com/basics/how-to-avoid-wild-animal-attacks.html

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