A Swedish man escaped a potentially fatal situation by roaring at a bear as it charged towards him to attack.
Ralph Persson was training his hunting dog when he noticed that the sound of its barked had changed. The reason? It had noticed a bear in the woods.
Persson said that his immediate reaction as the bear then charged was to make himself very big and scream as much as he could. This, he explained, scared the bear and resulted in it retreating back into the trees. The incident was caught on camera by both Persson and his wife Lena.
The Swede explained that he had encountered many bears in the years he had been a hunter, and attributed his knowledge of the animal as the main reason he was able to avoid the attack.
He revealed that he did not believe lying down and playing dead was the right way to go, saying that the way birds behaved in a similar situation was what made him act the way he did – explaining that he had seen cranes chasing bears off by spreading their wings as an intimidation ploy.
Bear experts in Sweden believe that more bears have seen people in the country than the other way round, but agree the Scandinavian brown bear is so shy that it tries to avoid confrontation. However, Persson admitted that he might have been too close, causing the animal to attack in order to protect its habitat.
In the past year there have been three recorded bear attacks in Sweden (none fatal) while, in comparison, hundreds of bears are killed each year as part of an annual cull.