RE: Dealing with black bears while deer hunting
My friend had a run in with a blackie in the great dismal swamp in VA. Deer quotas are very liberal and he shot a few deer the first week out. On his way to the stand (at o'dark 30) a few days later he busted "something big" most definitely not a deer. An hour later while on stand he saw the bear again. Evidently he was attracted to the gut piles. He said the bear was literally 3 feet below the base of his stand, looking up sniffing and "whoofing". He simply lowered his 870, flipped the safety off, aimed 3 feet to the right of the Bears head and touched one off. He never saw that (deaf) critter again.