A humorous poem and the logic behind it

[stickygirl]

Yes, Tigers do kill a lot of people. There is no argument there. But as stated, for the most part they try to avoid humans.

I can state from personal experience that the part of the article you cited that talks about Tigers associating gunfire and war with bodies is absolutely true. A friend of mine has a Tiger rug he acquired when he killed it with a Claymore mine while it was perusing his position after a firefight. We figured it was looking for fresh bodies.

Comshaw

That rug must have been a bit holey

Zombies will also persistently hunt and kill humans for food.

 

[Comshaw]

That rug must have been a bit holey

Zombies will also persistently hunt and kill humans for food.

Yes, it is but not that bad that it looks like it's been through the wringer. He made sure the tanner didn't sew up the holes and they were visible and prominent. After all how many people have a story like that to tell and the proof to go with it?

Tells story. Listener, "Oh bullshit!" Storyteller points at the holey Tiger rug the listener is standing on with an, "Aw hum."

Priceless


Comshaw

 

[MetaBob]

Every single polar bear you ever see in the wild will consider you a food source.

Fortunately, this is not true. There are places and times where polar bears are perfectly well-behaved around people. I mean, don't tempt them by getting too close, but by and large they don't have much interest in you even when they're hungry.

As I mentioned in the "bear" thread, I have gone solo backpacking in polar bear and griz country. Yes, I was told multiple times that I was an idiot for doing so, but that didn't stop me.

After returning from that part of my ANWR journey, many many polar bears descended on the Arctic Ocean village where I was staying. I let it be known that if a polar bear came close, I would like to see it. At the "hotel" where I was staying, which was nothing more than two double-wide trailers pressed together, the proprietress woke me one night to let me know that a polar bear had just passed under my window. I scrambled to quickly get dressed and outside. In the couple of minutes in between, that polar bear had gone to an empty dumpster that smelled like meat from a previous load, then departed again. It was hungry; August is a thin time for polar bears.

In fact, hunger was the whole reason that bear and many more bears were clustered around the village: each village on the North Slope has one ceremonial whale hunt per year, and when the whale is killed, beached, flensed, and stripped of meat, the enormous carcass remains. Then the bears get their turn.

Polar bears know the schedule, the order in which each village has its annual whale hunt. So they move from one village to the next, scavenging the carcasses. They know they'll get fed and have no reason to threaten humans, though of course humans would be smart to not get too close to them.

Stupid me had to tempt fate. Mostly the bears stay in the water, paddling around between the village and its barrier island. I saw something like 40 polar bears in that water at the same time, just paddling lazily around. Waiting. Of course I went to the shore to get a closer look. The bears didn't care. They are smart enough to know that attacking a human would bring a world of hurt on them. So they don't. Just as they know the schedule of the village whale hunts: they start showing up a few days before the hunt begins and leave when the whale carcass has been fully scavenged. Then they're on to the next village.

 

[Handley_Page]

Fortunately, we don't get Bears on the local 'Chase.

Any coffee in the pot please ?

 

[alohadave]

But Tigers don't CONSISTENTLY hunt, kill and EAT humans. If that were so, because Tiger live in one of the most populated countries in the world (India) you'd see a lot more people Tiger snacks.

If they did target humans, tigers would quickly become an extinct species. Humans don't fuck around with predators that they think are trying to hunt them or their property. Even predators that are no danger to humans, like coyote, are reviled by many.

 

[MediocreAuthor]

Fortunately, this is not true. There are places and times where polar bears are perfectly well-behaved around people. I mean, don't tempt them by getting too close, but by and large they don't have much interest in you even when they're hungry.

As I mentioned in the "bear" thread, I have gone solo backpacking in polar bear and griz country. Yes, I was told multiple times that I was an idiot for doing so, but that didn't stop me.

After returning from that part of my ANWR journey, many many polar bears descended on the Arctic Ocean village where I was staying. I let it be known that if a polar bear came close, I would like to see it. At the "hotel" where I was staying, which was nothing more than two double-wide trailers pressed together, the proprietress woke me one night to let me know that a polar bear had just passed under my window. I scrambled to quickly get dressed and outside. In the couple of minutes in between, that polar bear had gone to an empty dumpster that smelled like meat from a previous load, then departed again. It was hungry; August is a thin time for polar bears.

In fact, hunger was the whole reason that bear and many more bears were clustered around the village: each village on the North Slope has one ceremonial whale hunt per year, and when the whale is killed, beached, flensed, and stripped of meat, the enormous carcass remains. Then the bears get their turn.

Polar bears know the schedule, the order in which each village has its annual whale hunt. So they move from one village to the next, scavenging the carcasses. They know they'll get fed and have no reason to threaten humans, though of course humans would be smart to not get too close to them.

Stupid me had to tempt fate. Mostly the bears stay in the water, paddling around between the village and its barrier island. I saw something like 40 polar bears in that water at the same time, just paddling lazily around. Waiting. Of course I went to the shore to get a closer look. The bears didn't care. They are smart enough to know that attacking a human would bring a world of hurt on them. So they don't. Just as they know the schedule of the village whale hunts: they start showing up a few days before the hunt begins and leave when the whale carcass has been fully scavenged. Then they're on to the next village.

That's a very interesting and informative story, but I do feel (based solely on my reading, mind you) that those bears may have been outliers. They had a huge, reliable food source, and they weren't interested in the relatively small potatoes (you) when they had a whale smorgasbord available.

I've read that one thing that many fictional stories gets wrong about animals is the representation of the aggressive, feeding predator.

Example: A hapless adventurer stumbles upon a lion/tiger/bear/T-rex/etc chomping on a carcass. The creature roars and immediately begins chasing our intrepid hero.
But why?
The animal already had a perfectly good meal to eat. Why would it chase another?

In reality it wouldn't. It would probably roar and maybe do a bluff charge to scare away competition, but then it would return to its existing meal. Because if it strayed too far, other critters might steal its hard earned lunch.

Same thing with your polar bear friends. But if you encountered them when they were hunting normally in the wild? Good night.

 

[MetaBob]

That's a very interesting and informative story, but I do feel (based solely on my reading, mind you) that those bears may have been outliers. They had a huge, reliable food source, and they weren't interested in the relatively small potatoes (you) when they had a whale smorgasbord available.

In this case that whale carcass was not yet available. The bears were just waiting around for the village's annual whale hunt to conclude and the whalers to beach, flense, and strip the carcass. The bears would arrive up to a week before they knew the whale hunt would occur and just loaf around until the carcass became available, which during the year of my visit didn't happen until several days after I departed. Bad timing on my part, but then I had no inkling that this would be happening before I planned my trip. The bears were obviously hungry, as demonstrated by the one who investigated the empty dumpster that smelled like meat from a previous load.

Human explorers have known for centuries that wild polar bears can have some unexpected, curious, and remarkably gentle social behaviors in certain circumstances. One example:

https://bear.org/bear-facts/polar-bears-and-dogs/

Polar bears are much more sophisticated in their behaviors than your characterization suggests.

Same thing with your polar bear friends. But if you encountered them when they were hunting normally in the wild? Good night.

As documented in the video above, wild polar bears are remarkably intelligent and adaptable predators, but can also be playful and harmless, even when they're hungry as those bears were. They, too, were waiting around for something, in this case for freeze-up near Churchill, Manitoba on Hudson's Bay, because they do most of their hunting on the sea ice with a very specific prey animal in mind: the ringed seal. Polar bears hunt them on the ice by waiting at their breathing holes and pouncing when a seal surfaces through the hole they're watching, or even just stick their noses through so they can breathe, among other hunting techniques. They will eat other prey, but strongly prefer ringed seals. Note that Churchill does significant business in polar bear tourism at that time of year, with polar bears arriving up to six weeks before freeze-up, at which time they will be hungry and getting hungrier by the day.

I was researching a novel featuring polar bears when I visited the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, trying to get as much background as I could from arctic biologists specializing in polar bears as well as other educators, an Inupiaq wilderness guide, Native American tribal leaders, and of course bush pilots. They all had wonderful stories to tell, firsthand experiences to relate, and sometimes fascinating theories about the cause of some arctic wildlife behaviors. I did see the previous year's whale carcass where it had been beached; a griz was sniffing around it, but of course that carcass had been scavenged long before.

https://www.travelmanitoba.com/churchill/experiences/polar-bears/

All that said, be like Brian Ladoon and don't get too close to a wild polar bear (or any other kind). His limit was "70+ feet", and if they got closer he would fire "cracker shells" to scare them away. And don't be like the idiot I was when I went solo backpacking in terrain frequented by polar bears, griz, and wolves.

Finally, note what the research says: "Contrary to popular opinion, polar bears have been no more likely to actively hunt and kill people than black bears."

https://polarbearsinternational.org/news-media/articles/understanding-polar-bear-attacks/