A Black Bear Bit Her on Her Butt

On August 10, Jackson, Wyoming resident Maggie Schwartz was hiking on Teton Pass, following a trail she hikes nearly every day, when a black bear knocked her face-down into the brush.

The bear proceeded to bite Schwartz on her butt.

“I must have flipped myself over onto my back,” Schwartz told Outside, “because I remember being on my back and her continuing towards me. I put my feet up on her chest and was screaming and fumbling around.”

Schwartz reached for her bear spray, got both hands on the bottle, and then sprayed it directly into the animal’s face.

“She turned around and left immediately,” said Schwartz. Her Fitbit chart from that evening shows a brief but large spike in her heart rate.

Schwartz was treated at the emergency room in Jackson for three puncture wounds and scratches on her thighs, back, neck, and elbow, some from the bear and some, she suspects, from landing in brush. Her bites were left open rather than stitched, and she was given antibiotics and a tetanus shot.

A Surprise Meeting With Cubs and a Mother Bear

Schwartz, a lawyer, and her mother both grew up in Jackson. They hike the History Trail, a 3.4-mile out-and-back route, together most days in summer, with their Bernese mountain dog sisters Marta and Heidi.

Schwartz says four things were different during her August 10 hike. Her mother, who hikes with her most days, was at an event. Schwartz decided to hike all the way up to the lake, higher than usual. She wore hiking shoes instead of her usual Chacos. Prior to departing her car, she finally figured out how to use her bear spray.

She had always thought bear spray holsters were absurdly tight, impossible to rip off your waistband in a hurry. That evening she realized she’d had the apparatus backward—the holster stays on, and only the can comes out.

“I was laughing at myself for how dumb that was, but I practiced it a couple times and it just slid in and out super easy,” she said. “I was making a note to tell my mom how silly we’ve been about that.”

She set out around 5:30 P.M. on a warm, slightly smoky evening. The dogs were within arm’s reach when they veered off the trail, sniffing in the bush. Schwartz saw something black and fluffy, and thought for a second it was another dog. She realized it was a cub, and determined that the mother had to be nearby.

That’s when the mother bear charged, mouth open and growling. Schwartz guesses she was no more than six feet away. The bear knocked her down, and then Schwartz sprayed her in the face. Her aim, she said, was “less the sign of my gun slinging skills and more a sign of proximity.”

Schwartz still isn’t sure how she had time to reach the bear spray bottle from her back, with the mother so close. “I’m thinking maybe she looked up to see where the dogs were, which gave me the chance,” she said.

The bear fled downhill. Schwartz went up the hill. “I wasn’t really feeling pain at that point,” she said.

Later, Schwartz reached for her phone in her back pocket to call her mother. She felt her torn shorts and the puncture wounds. She walked down the Old Pass Road because it is wider and usually busier than the History Trail.

A local ski patroller named Johnny was in the parking lot. “I was really embarrassed that the bite was on my butt and that this had just happened. I didn’t really want to show him, but he was so professional,” Schwartz said.

He told her she needed the emergency room, but she wanted to see her parents. He loaded her into his van with gauze and drove her to the Old Wilson Schoolhouse, about five minutes away, which is where her mother was attending an event.

When her mother came out, “I just started bawling,” Schwartz said. “I completely lost it.”

Her mother drove her to the hospital, where they learned that one of the punctures had bear hair embedded so deep in the tissue that the nurse could not remove it. So, she removed a section of flesh.

Nobody at the hospital could work out why there were only three punctures when a bite like that should leave four. The Wyoming Game and Fish found the answer the next morning when they discovered Schwartz’s phone with a tooth mark in it. It had been in the back pocket the bear tore off.

What Hikers Should Know About Hiking in Bear Country

In its report on the incident, Wyoming Game and Fish characterized the attack as a surprise, defensive encounter involving a presumed black bear sow with at least one cub in terrain with dense vegetation and low visibility. No bears were found when investigators returned, the report said, and no further management action is planned.

Investigators reconstructed the rest of the attack with a metal detector. It turned up the hair fork she’d been wearing, which put her head right beside a log with claw marks and bear hair on it.

“We are grateful that she was well-prepared and carried bear spray, which can make all the difference in these unpredictable situations,” Brad Hovinga, the Jackson regional wildlife supervisor for Wyoming Game and Fish, said in a statement.

Linda Merigliano, a volunteer trail ambassador with Friends of the Bridger-Teton, who spent 45 years with the Forest Service before retiring last September, was at the Old Pass Road trailhead on August 11, helping turn hikers around while officials completed their investigation.

“Even though these are popular and frequently used trails, they still are backcountry,” Merigliano told Outside. “You can expect to encounter an animal anywhere in the forest.”

Schwartz said knew there were bears in the area. Orange signs had gone up at the trailhead the previous Friday. Four black bears had been in the Teton Pass area over the weekend, at least one sow with two cubs.

Game and Fish does not believe Schwartz’s dogs are to blame for the attack. Brian DeBolt, the department’s large carnivore conflict coordinator, told Outside that there is no definitive data concluding that hiking with dogs increases the chances of an encounter.

“Good practice is for hikers or other recreators to keep dogs leashed or close by under voice control,” DeBolt said. “Dog owners should be able to control their dogs, regardless if they are leashed or not. Dogs have successfully distracted bears during encounters, allowing people to escape or use a deterrent or firearm.”

DeBolt advises hiking in groups, making plenty of noise, and be cautious along streams or in thick vegetation, where the sound of your approach is muffled and an animal has no warning you are coming.

“Bears seek seasonal food items, which this time of year can include berries, nuts, carrion and other items,” DeBolt said. “Avoid, or be particularly vigilant, if you are in areas with these types of food sources. However, with this year’s drought conditions, bears are ranging more widely in search of food and could be encountered in almost any part of Wyoming.”

And carrying bear spray, he said, where it is quickly and easily accessible, and knowing how to use it.

The Mother Bear Was Protecting Her Baby

Schwartz recounted the incident to Outside five days after the attack.

“A lot of it feels like it happened to a different person still,” Schwartz said. She hasn’t gone back to work, mostly because sitting in an office chair doesn’t sound appealing.

“I randomly start crying and then randomly feel totally fine,” she said. “I don’t even know if I’ve processed it yet.”

She has walked with her mother every day since, on a path where there are people and dogs. She hasn’t gone back to the History Trail.

Before the investigation wrapped up, Schwartz was afraid that something would happen to the mother bear, and was relieved when it did not. “It’s not like she was some psycho killer out there,” Schwartz said. “She was protecting her baby.”

“I remembered laying in bed last night, thinking how cute her butt looked as she turned around and ran away through the bushes,” she said. “It’s funny, the random things that kind of come to you.”

Schwartz is a private person and agreed to the interview for a specific reason. “I’m a local, I grew up here, I used to not carry bear spray,” she said. “Just maybe it makes people think a little differently about being on our favorite everyday trails.”