This is not a bluff charge: A 550-pound female grizzly is upon you in mere seconds, slamming you to the ground like a defensive back for the New York Giants. All you see is a blur of fur—and then you’re face down in the dirt, choking on the pungent breath of your attacker, which reeks of rotting meat. You struggle to your feet but the grizzly clamps her jaws around your torso, hoisting you off the ground. You’re six feet tall and weigh 190 pounds—not petite by any definition—but the mighty grizzly shakes you like a rag doll.

There is nothing predictable about a grizzly bear—except maybe its massive size and uncanny ability to kill you. The grizzly of North America is called Ursus horribilis, and this species is aptly named. Each one weighs between 250 and 750 pounds and is basically indestructible; when a bear attacks a human, the results are almost always gruesome.

There are about 35,000 grizzlies living throughout North America, but only about 1,200 can be found south of Canada. Most of these roam in or around Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks. But for all the hype that bear attacks receive, only nine people have been killed by grizzlies in the United States since 1980. And serious maulings add just fifty-seven additional tally marks to the body count.

With these reassuring odds on your side, you confidently take off on the Yellowstone River Trail for an overnight stay in the backwoods. Park rangers report that there have been no recent bear sightings in the area, but you still take the necessary precautions, like making plenty of noise as you walk along the trail and clapping your hands as you round blind curves. As you ascend the trail, circling around a large boulder, you spot a large grizzly about one hundred feet up the trail. No reason to panic, you figure—a few loud noises and some careful backstepping should deliver you from harm’s way. Then a soft rustling in the leaves causes you to look over your shoulder, arid you see two small bear cubs eating blackberries. Now, this IS a reason to panic: By unwittingly walking between a sow and her cubs, you have positioned yourself as a threat—and a startled grizzly becomes very angry very quickly. Her charge is fierce and lightning-fast—a grizzly can cover a distance of fifty yards in three seconds.

You try to protect yourself by hitting the bear with your fists, but this only further provokes your attacker. For the record: A grizzly bear has six pointed cutting teeth, two strong, sharp, curved canines, and molar teeth that are superior blades. When you raise a hand to the bear’s salivating mouth, the appendage is severed at the wrist bone.

You are now aware that you are losing copious amounts of blood—yet it’s not nearly as painful as you’d expect, because the sympathetic
division of your autonomic nervous system has been activated. This helps your body respond to stress by directing the adrenal glands to secrete two hormones: epinephrine (adrenaline) and norepinephrine (nonadrenaline). In concert, these chemicals accelerate your heartbeat, increase muscle tension, raise your blood pressure, and divert blood flow from the internal organs and skin to the brain and muscles. All of these biological responses make you less sensitive to pain, because your body is otherwise preoccupied.

Once the grizzly perceives that she has killed you (and thus ended the threat to her cubs) she stops shaking you and backs away. Drawing on energy supplied by the adrenaline, you manage to rise to your feet. Big mistake—you should have just played dead. The bear swipes again, this time at your torso, and your ribs snap like a bundle of dry twigs. As you fall to your knees, the bear puts your head in its mouth—an absurdly unnecessary, instinctive movement to prevent you from biting back. Blood is streaming from your head and pooling in front of your eyes. Another swipe to the chest pierces your rib cage and punctures a lung; your breathing becomes laboured as air escapes through a hole in your chest. Your facial and neck muscles contort and throb as they work to replace the oxygen escaping from your lungs. Luckily, you feel strangely detached from everything that is happening. Victims of grizzly attacks describe the experience as numbness, often accompanied by matter-of-fact thoughts like “I am going to die today.”

Once you finally stop moving, the grizzly leaves you alone, gathers up her two cubs, and resumes her walk down the trail. But it’s too late for you. Blood flow to the brain is slowing and you feel consciousness slipping away. The effects of the adrenaline begin to abate and your brain starts registering the searing pain delivered by millions of nociceptors in the tissues and organs of your body. The last thing you remember is a flurry of gnats and no-see-urns flitting over your face, attracted by the blood spilling onto the trail.

In another hour or so, a troop of boy scouts will come marching around the large boulder, chanting songs, clapping hands, and doing everything else their scouting handbook recommends to ward off bears. Your corpse will serve as a not-so-gentle reminder that they can never be too safe.

>:3

There was once an old lady who lived by herself with her faithful dog. One night she heard on the news that a madman had escaped from the local mental hospital and was in the area.
Very frightened she ran around the house with her dog locking all the doors and windows before finally going upstairs to bed.
She slept fitfully and kept jerking awake at the slightest noise.
At 1am she could hear the drip drip drip of the tap leaking in the bathroom.
She put her hand down to stroke her dog and he licked her hand affectionately.
Several times the dripping woke her and her pet was always there in the dark to quell her fears.
Finally dawn broke and she got up to use the bathroom.
On opening the door she found her beloved pet hung from the shower rail, his throat cut.
In his blood on the tiles was written ....Humans can lick too....