Originally Posted by L. Wolf
That's a great choice. My first year I carried a Smith 386 SC Scandium framed .357 magnum with the heaviest semi-wadcutters I could find, for penetration. It was nice and light, but the Scandium material was not very weather resistant, and began to corrode after the first week.
Last time out I switched to a Glock 32 in .357 Sig. I liked the weight, and the weather resistance was great, as expected. No rust at all, and the ability to mount a Surefire light was a big plus. I rigged a kydex holster that fully covered the trigger guard, and fitted it into a fanny pack. The holster was connected by a small C-clamp, by drilling a hole in the kydex, and attaching it to a ring on the inner pouch of the fanny pack. Adding some extra parachute cord to the pack's zipper, and I had an extremely safe carry method, that was very quick into action, even while wearing a full pack. The fanny pack merely rode on top of my hip strap, and never came off of me, even when I dropped my pack. The drawbacks were the lack of heavier bullets in the .357 Sig caliber, so penetration on a thick skinned animal would not be ideal, but it's a very effective round on perps, and thus a good compromise.
I own a Colt Delta Elite 10mm, but it's far too heavy to consider. The 10mm is the best choice for hikers who need a caliber that's effective on people and black bear. It's the equivalent of a lighter .41 magnum load, and plenty of bears have been taken with the .41 over the years. Carrying a .41 or .44 mag revolver would be quite a burden.
A Glock 29 would be my second choice, over a full sized 20, for the extra barrel length, and 5 extra rounds.
Always carry an extra mag, not for extra ammo, but in case your primary mag fails.
Btw, I have put in a fair share of miles over the past two seasons, and I never announced I was carrying, nor did anyone notice, as I did not want to put those who are irrationally gun-phobic in a tizzy.
That changed my last trip out, when I was hiking with my 10 year old son along the NC-GA border, and spent 3 days and nights with two North Carolina Deputy Sheriffs, who had started out from Springer. It was the end of October, and pretty cold through the entire trip, ending in a snowstorm.
The first night with the Deputies, who were really nice guys btw, I overheard one of them complaining that his buddy didn't bring his gun with him, and his buddy replied that he thought he was going to bring his gun. They were pretty forlorn, and I approached one of them and asked to see his badge. He produced it, and said he was a firearms instructor with his department. After verifying that he was a deputy, I then produced my Glock .357, and after unloading it, handed it to him, and showed him my carry permit. He was extremely happy to have a gun in camp, and I told him that if I was incapacitated, I would expect him of his partner to take care of my son. He said he would do so, gladly. He did ask a few probing questions, designed to gauge my familiarity with firearms (I knew what he was doing..), but I've been shooting for over 20 years, and am a firearms instructor myself, so he was at ease after realizing I knew at least as much as he did. He also asked if my son was familiar with firearms, and I said that he had been shooting since age 5, owned 5 guns of his own, and then, after rechecking my Glock to ensure it was unloaded, I handed it to my son, who broke it down to it's frame, slide, barrel, and spring, in about 30 seconds, then just as quickly reassembled it.
They both were fairly impressed with my boy, and let him know that they would be happy to have him watch their back, which made his day.
So, the moral of the story is to do whatever you feel is right to protect yourself, and your family, no matter what other people tell you. They are free to make their own choices, and take the chance that all the people they meet will be harmless, and all the wildlife will be of the Disney variety. I choose to plan for the worst, and hope for the best. I'm not looking for trouble, and hope it never finds me, but if it does, and I have exhausted all other non-violent methods, then I will still have options.
The other moral is to keep your decision to go armed to yourself. It's comon courtesy to not upset or alarm those who don't understand firearms, and share the woods with you. It's also not a good idea to alert a possible predator (of the two legged variety) that you are armed, as that can negate one of the advantages of carrying a gun, which is suprising your attacker.
Glock? What's a Glock?
Oh,I know. Its the one with the neat safety, right?
Click here:
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0411061foot1.html
And that was a highly trained professional!
Highly trained professional....my ass.
That guy violated the main rule of firearms handling: Treat every gun as if it's loaded.
The Glock did exactly what it was supossed to do when loaded, and the trigger was depressed. It fired.
The truth is this: Most police officers are woefully undertrained with firearms, and typically fire less rounds in a year than the average gun enthusiast fires in a month. There are exceptions at some departments, and there are individual cops who choose to educate themselves on their own time, but the average cop who comes out to shoot in competition has a long way to go to catch up with the average IDPA competitor.
As for the Glock, it does have a fantastic safety system, consisting of three seperate safeties that must be deactivated, and will not fire unless the trigger saftey is fully depressed, releasing the internal safety mechanism which keeps the striker at "half cock". Unless you fully depress the trigger, it's impossible for the Glock to fire, as the firing pin is not only locked in place, but has to be retracted from half cock fully rearward before it can fire.
It's the most popular law enforcement gun in the country, due to it's safety, and reliability.
For an explaination of how a Glock safe action system works, try here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLOCK
The male dino carries a Glock 9mm with hydroshock ammo. I carry a very loud and shrill whistle. If a bear wouldn't leave us alone and the whistle didn't work, the gun would protect us. The gun would also come in handy should any two-legged varmints try to harm us. So far, even the whistle has never been needed to frighten off a bear - they have turned and run on seeing us.
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y22...8/11080009.jpg
Having seen the rig JLB discusses here, I put one together my self. Mine contains a model 33 small frame .357 with the clip extension. The trigger gaurd holster works very well, I load my 9 round clip with hollow points and leave the chamber empty. The whole rig comes in at just under two pounds. Plus the 33 is small enough to fit in the overhead pouch in my Hennessee Hammock.
Does it filter water too?
No, the picture is to show the small size and ease of carrying such a weapon. While I might drop my pack for a short trip down a side trail for water, I won't leave the gun bag. I don't know about other states, but the Georgia permit to carry conceiled is valid in NC, according to our local police department. Be sure to carry your permit and photo ID, also fits nicely in front pocket of same bag.
If I saw a pair of Frolicking Dinosaurs on the AT or anywhere else, I would turn and run too!
Frolicking dinosaurs are friendly, slow-moving creatures - not scary at all.
Last edited by Frolicking Dinosaurs; 11-12-2007 at 02:28. Reason: Fixed broken link
Hey, you are friendly looking creatures....not quite what I had imagined... you know those leathery reptiles with sharp teeth. Can't imagine why a bear would be scared of you guys! haha
Happy trails!
When I go hiking I make sure to bring "Law" & "Order"
...thats the name of my left and right fists!!!
Some people bring along their insurance agent, from the company of Smith & Wesson.
Ya' know, guys, there was a time when I wouldn't have been very positive in my response to the posts in this thread, even as a former Marine with a couple of years on the trigger end of a reeeeel nice weapon...the Browning M2 air cooled belt fed gas operated 50 cal. heavy machine gun(aerial mount version) but that time has passed. I certainly hope no situation ever arises when I would wish to have Ma Deuce back in my arms, but if such situation ever did arise I hope one of you pistol packers are around!That is if I can't get to mine!
Eastern Black Bears have undergone a drastic personality change, especially around the trail(read smorgasbord)! They are no longer the timid docile retiring bears of even 20 years ago. They ain't scared of us no more! We represent a ready food source, and if they are hungry enough they still run, but it's AT us, not away from us!
Remember the guy that was killed by the bear down by blood mountain a couple of years ago? Van Mason, a good friend. Hell, I took his sister to her Senior prom! Well, that is your modern day eastern black bear attitude. A Glock in hand and Van might still be in the woods....alive!
And we won't even get into the two legged threats that seem to be more abundant than ever!.
No, it ain't like it used to be, so being somewhat rational and desiring to hike many more miles before I'm done I no longer feel comfortable leaving it to a roll of the dice, I like to keep my dice loaded and handy nowadays.
Tell us about the Guy that got killed down by Blood Mt. by a bear a couple of years ago. I missed that some how? I saw a bear while hiking the Freeman trail around Blood Mt. and I know of a few situations of some aggressive bears around there in the past but never heard of anybody getting killed. I'm not disputing your word about it, just like hear about it.
Well, Winton Porter discovered his camp when he hadn't reported in and was overdue, but chose not to look for him but went back home and called either the sherrif or DNR or some other agency and told them where the camp was and they went in and looked around a bit and found Van at the base of a small tree he had climbed in an attempt to escape (His normal M.O. when threatened by a critter) but this time he fell from the tree and broke his neck. Before you tell me that bears are better climbers than humans, I know that. Van tried for trees that a bear wouldn't climb because he would know it would not support him. This time Van slipped, reinforcing the bear's fears of injury, and became lunch, or dinner.
There were threads here discussing the incident and you could probably search the archives and get more details. Van was a loner who loved the woods, but he spent most of his adult life fighting one kind of deamon or another. It seemed that the only time he was ever at peace was when he was out on a trail somewhere or another. He was a good guy and a good friend, and I miss him.
All I know is I'd like to see someone stop a black bear with a 10 mm. Dreams are nice....
You are in heaven.
Been thinking about this thread all day, since it popped up on the new posts.
As many of you know from other posts, I'm a gun-totting dude, but dont hike with one. I wonder if anyone who does can give any CRITICAL, UNBIASED evidence as to why one should be carried. Not some irrational rantings by lunatics, or the just in case crowd. That argument is baseless and pointless, do you carry a defibrillator? That is a better "just in case" item to have, as statistics point that out ( far more heartattacks, drownings, etc than crime. )
So please give a logical answer as to why you feel you need to carry.
You are in heaven.
There are a few studies...
which seem to show that one is better off with bear spray than a firearm - better survival rate. And I'll try to dig them up. Problem is, they all deal with Grizzlies. There hasn't been a reason in the past to have such studies with blacks. It's obvious things have changed with them. My wife and I are going into the Wind River Range in August, where, in a number of trips, we've had problems only once - and that with a black bear. Although we'll be in the eastern part, and the grizzlies have only been moving into the part west of the CD, where habitat is more friendly, I intend for each of us to take a can of bear spray with us. I don't think there are any comparison studies involving guns vs. spray with bipedal predators...
OK, yeah Winton told me the story about the campsite and them finding him around the time it happened but I just didn't here the rest of the story. Thanks for sharing and I'm sorry to here about your loss of a good friend. I stay in the woods probably more than 80% of my time and I know my family worry some (not as much nowdays) but I just tell them when it comes my time thats where I'd rather be. Although I own guns and cut my teeth on them as a baby so to speak I don't carry one while hiking. I'll have to admit theres been a few times I thought I might need one for a second or two but it always turned out I didn't need one. I'm not crazy enough to think that there is no chance at all that I won't ever need one in the backcountry b/c nobody knows that fo sure but the chances are real slim. I've always liked taking chances in everything I do. Even though it's a small chance it makes things a little more interesting.
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