I promised another bear story so here goes. I hope you enjoy it. A Long time ago. But it almost seems like yesterday. I was living down river from here. In a cabin near the river. It was getting near fall, but it hadn't snowed yet. I was getting ready for winter. Getting firewood and looking forward to the next trapping season. I had this dog. You know typical Alaskan type dog. He weighed about 65 pounds or so. He comes in one day and comes up to me whimpering, looking for help. I look at his face and the whole side of it was sagging. There was no open cut but his face was sagging like something slapped him so hard that it tore it loose. the eye slit was way off his eye so that he couldn't see through that side. I thought that the only thing that could do that was a bear slap in the face. Here I am, 300 miles from the nearest vet. I thought what am I goanna do? I look around for something to work with and all I could find was a roll of duct tape. So, I started moving his face skin around looking for his eye. I finally found it. It was about 3 inches off to where the eye slit was but nothing wrong with the eye. I lined up his eye with the eye slit then wrapped up his whole face pretty tight to hold his skin in one place and just left his mouth a little bit open so he could at least drink water. He went under the cabin and stayed there for almost 3 weeks. I'd bring him food and water every day. I don't think he ate the whole time. But I did see him drink water a little bit. When he finally came out from under the cabin, he was so skinny. I gave him some soft cooked fish to eat and so every day after that he started eating a little more and more. It was about 4 weeks or so before I took all the tape off his face And it took him about 3 or 4 months before he was all healed up. Winter goes by and spring rolls around. I'm planting the garden. Im out there in the garden and needed more cabbage starts. So I went inside the cabin and got more. I stepped outside and right there in the garden where I had just been, was a big black bear sniffing around. I thought oh man! Sneaky bear. I grab my 30 30 And let out shot. I hit it but it ran off through the thick brush. I had a neighbor About an eighth of a mile away. And they had kids. The dog was there tied up so I let him go and off he goes like a bolt of lightning after the bear. About 45 seconds goes by. I hear the dog and the bear making a ruckus. So, I ran towards them as fast as I could through the thick brush and finally got to them. The bear was pretty much done in but still very much alive. The dog had his big paw in his mouth jerking on it and growling. The bear looked at me once but turned back to the dog so I raised up my gun and finished him off. This was from about 4 feet away. So, the dog saw that it was dead. He walked right up to it and took a sniff and blew it out his nose forcefully. And then he started scratching the ground with his paws and seemed genuinely pleased that the bear was dead. He jumped up on me and put his paws on my shoulders and wagging his tail and licking my face. Happy dog. I skinned it out. It stretched out 6 foot 6 from head to tail. I don't know how much it weighed but it was in very good shape and very big. One of the biggest black bears I've seen in this country. In interior Alaska that is. I got to thinking that that must have been the bear that slapped my dog I the face in the fall time. It was in the same area. And the dog was really happy about the bear's demise. As a matter of fact, he seemed to be overjoyed. That dog was one of the best bear dogs I ever had. He would attack one on sight. Fearless, like my big black dog Shrush. Good dog!