Seeing as the forum's rather new, I figured I'd tell about this years bear. This is the first one I've Personally shot, so I took the time to write the whole thing down for you guys.
What a couple of days. Allright folks - get yer cup of coffee and prepare for a hair-raising tale of action, adventure, and general mayhem.
First off - Many many many thanks to gatehouse (in case he manages to show up here someday) - he was awesome in his kindness to both me and rob for having us up and looking after us.
This is the first year I've had the time to take a crack at a spring bear. It's the best time to get them - they're VERY tasty if you get them while they're still browsing on buds and grasses. My dad had planned to take me to his favorite little bear 'honey spot'. Unfortunately he had to back out at the last minute. My buddy Gatehouse mentioned he had a few areas scouted, and offered to go with me and our friend Rob to check it out (he lives about 2 hrs from us). Rob is new to hunting altogether, and we were hoping to break him in a bit.
Gatehouse had a gorgeous little cut picked out that in the evenings had turned up bear for him in his scouting ventures, so we walked about three klicks in to check it out. Nothing was out when we got there, so we sat down and waited. Rob picked out a bear working his way along the top of the cut after about 20 minutes or so. (he's got pretty darn sharp eyes!) He did an absolutely first rate job of sneaking his way into a shooting position. The bear wasn't making it easy tho, and it was a bit of a challenging shot (and not that big a bear). Rob missed low (although thinking about it today i'm not sure he didn't just catch a bit of the ground clutter the bear was foofing around in). There was a cloud of dust right where the bear was, and the little bugger took off like a shot, stopped a few times to figure out just what the hell was going on, and then lit off for parts unknown. (I could see all this from my vantage - but was WAY to far for a shot).
After an extensive search for any sign of wouding, we hiked out (ok, THEY hiked out, i sort of wheezed and gasped my way out looking less like the 'great white hunter' and a little more like 'gollum' but the point is we got out). The next day we tried our luck again in a few areas, but despite seeing a fair amount of deer we didn't lay eyes on another bear.
Rob unfortunately had to take off as he had to work very early the next day, and I stayed to take one last crack at it. We checked out a few areas, and then decided we'd take one more poke at that cut to see if there was anything there.
None of us had gotten much sleep the night before. (I do NOT snore - there must be some wild boar in the area. I think it's their mating season). No one wanted to pull a bear very far if we did get one, so we were carefull to pick suitable terrain, and agreed to no downhill shots where we'd have to pull the beast up too far. Poor Gatehouse was beginning to nod off from time to time in the truck - no small feat with my truck's suspension - waking only briefly to mumble 'Uphill! Fer gods sake shoot 'em uphill!'. I myself was feeling pretty tired. So we parked a little closer and decided we wouldn't stay all that late.
We walked in, and saw nothing. We were earlier than the night before, but I knew I couldn't hang around too long as with only two people it would be pretty late by the time we were done if we shot at dusk, and I did have to go home that night. So we talked about it and figured we'd give it a few minutes.
Suddenly, 100 yards away, a fuzzy face poked up over a fallen log looking right at us. Gatehouse was on to him in seconds, and pointed it out to me (my repeated querries of 'is it behind the fallen log?' were somewhat inneffective in a large clearcut. Mind you, in fairness his responses of 'it's beside the tree over there' weren't clearing things up for me either).
We were already inside 100 yards when we'd spotted him, and for the most part all we could see now was a couple of fuzzy ears pokeing up occasionally. However, at that range any movement on our part to try to get a better angle or a rest would have immediately given us away given the terrain. Eventually he moved around to the front of the log, but immediately chose a bit that had quite a bit of ground clutter.
This was maddening of course. We could clearly see the bear now, and watch it lick along the sides of the log, but couldn't get a shot. Although i'm sure the bear didn't know we were there, every time I carefully manuvered a bit, the little bugger would shift and still be covered. In hushed whispers we decided to wait him out.
Finally, he began to work his way down the log into a clear area. Or at least clear enough. POW!! - freehand shot from about 90 yards or so. I had been holding the bear in my sights off and on for some time and my arm was a little tired, but i was pretty sure it was a good hit. The bear leapt around and took off. I tried a quick second shot for the leg/shoulder but it was still going (we later found the second shot it it's leg, pretty much blowing away the paw.) I raced up a small incline to keep my eye on it. After about 60 yards or so it was obvious that the bear was near death, weaving and struggling. It lay down almost out of sight about 85 yards off and I chambered one more round, just in case. I'm sure it would never have taken another step, but it's head came up for a moment as it tried to come to its feet again. It wasn't that far from cover, and I wasn't prepared to risk it so I fired for the neck (the neck and head were all I could see). It's head snapped around, and it was down hard. (i'd caught it perfectly in the neck just above the spine).
Later examination reveiled that the first bullet had struck slightly to the rear of where i'd wanted, breaking a rib and I believe severing some arteries and destroying the diaphram. It didn't enter the gut area, but it didn't exit the other side either.
We had quite a time getting the bugger off the hill and into the truck (note to self - some sort of meat hook might be appropriate when trying to move a 300 lb bean bag shaped like an animal).
We got the skin off, washed it down a bit (oh man, if I thought it was hard to handle the thing with it's skin ON - wet fat sure isnt' any easier to grip!) Hilarity ensued when 2 grown men played 'greased pig' with a couple hundred pounds of wet bear meat covered in fat on wet tarps and lawn.
I got home about 3 am, exausted but revelling in the whole experience. There were a few hiccups this morning - most notabe was when my GF opend the back of the truck to put her bag in before I had a chance to 'mention' that it was occupied.
In the end - good times had by all! The meat is in the butchers, everyone's home safe and sound, and there'll be food on the table for a while!
It turned out to be bigger than we thought - about 6.5 ft long - measured out to 6.25.
Edited by Foxer