Grayskies wrote:Short of buying a .454 with a wrist brace so my wrist doesn't shatter on the 1st shot, and since my income is not huge, and my wife loves off-roading the toyota (not entirely a bear safe car), what can I do legally?
There are two things you can do to guarantee NOT seeing a bear in the woods:
1) Buy a bear hunting license
2) Buy a good camera, carry it with you at all times, and call yourself a "nature photographer."
Or,
You can continue to roam the woods as you have with the realization your odds of even seeing a bear rate just a bit ahead of winning the lottery. Twice. In a row.
Your "concern" over black bears is a bit over the top. The risk of being attacked by one is extremely low, much lower than your fears merit. The only places I would have any concern would be the BWCA and maybe some state parks. The former due to the number of people using it, how careless far too many are in keeping their camps, and the remoteness as it increases the time between when problems occur and when the authorities are notified and can respond. To a much lesser extent are state parks with my concern being more on damage to my property than my person.
Bells are meant more for grizzlies than black bears. Bells are not to scare off bears but to lessen the chance of provoking an attack due to surprising a grizzly. In other words, if a grizzly comes after you and you are wearing bells, it is an intentional attack.
Problems from 2 legged critters are so much more likely and even they are rare. Tooling around in the Toyota is by far your most likely source of woe.