X-Force bagged a skagit bear tonight

[HUNTINCOUPLE]

OK now great job! Now the pics?

[Boss .300 winmag]

Congrats, hmmm bear pics. 

[saylean]

Meats on the way to butcher, hide to taxidermist....story should be up soon I would expect....

[bearmanric]

Sweet. Rick

[dc1608]

Good job on the bear.  Can't wait for photos!

[X-Force]

So a little story…

First I would like to apologize that I don’t have any pictures yet. I also don’t have any great pictures because I did not bring a camera with me when I harvested the bear. The pictures I do have and hope to post soon where taken after the cavalry arrived and then it was all business.

A little back story

Since the first weekend in April I have been working on my new house; stripping popcorn, demoing walls, generally making a mess. My wife and I have an in house target date for the middle of June. With that schedule I knew that my time hunting this spring would be minimal to say the least.

With that being said I took the last two days off work just to work on the house… no hunting. My wonderful wife said that since I took off work I don’t need to waste my time hunting. I needed to be productive.

The story

Well last night after putting in long nights all last weekend and most of the days this week I said, “hey honey lets go for a hike” aka bear hunting. She shot me down about as fast at the words came out of my mouth… typical. So running late I had to stop by ACE and the house to get things together so that I could work on the house after my evening hunt.

The whole time I have had the place I haven’t had one neighbor stop in to say hi, no welcome to the neighborhood etc. Last night that changed. I had a nice elderly lady stop in to welcome me to the neighborhood and asked if she would snoop around the place. I was grateful to have someone finally show interest in their new neighbors plus I got to show all the things we are doing with the place.

After all the looking and bsing I was running another 30 min behind and I didn’t leave Woolley until 6.
Even though I was running late I wanted to stick to my plan of hitting a spot Saylean and I looked over last time I had this tag.

I got through the gate, drove to a predetermined spot, dumped the truck and slowly hunted through stands of trees that are just about the right age. Its early in the season and I didn’t see any fresh peels, no scat, no real sign of bears. I worked my way into a clearing with ankle high grass and caught a couple elk out in the open. I hunkered down so as not to spook them and watched a herd of about 20 feed 45 to 80 yards from me. Eventually an old cow got down wind of me and pushed the herd out of sight. With the elk busting me but not barking I decided to head up farther. But just before I hit the timber again I caught elk out of the corner of my eye. They didn’t bust. The cow pushed them just out of sight but they turned and were working their way back.

I again hunker down. It was getting to be the right time of the evening. Critters were stirring. Within 10 or so minutes I hear something rustling in the brush… Just by the sound I knew I was at least going to see black. As the bear came into view it laid down. With a dead tree in the way all I could see was its head. It was a good bear. Immediately, I knew I wanted to take him I just had to be patient.

The wait seemed to drag on forever but was probably no more the 10 minutes. But with all the bloodsuckers swirling my head it took all my strength not to start swiping them by the handful.

The bear got up and started to feed toward me. As he did he cleared all the brush and branches between him and I giving me a clear window. Now, all I had to do was wait for the shot to present itself. Meanwhile the elk herd either smelt me again or spotted the bear. A cow started barking and it was make or break time.

This whole time while the bear was walking toward me I kept the cross hairs on him. When the cow barked the bear was almost dead on straight on me. I didn’t want the bear to skedaddle so I settled the cross hairs center of chest and squeezed. The bear spun on a dime and nailed the trail it came in on. Within seconds I hear the death bawl.

I can’t believe he went 40 yards. The bullet clipped one lung and took out his heart.

To be continued. Im working on an hour sleep.

[Boss .300 winmag]

Great story, awesome looking bear!

[50CalJim]

Congrats! Looks like a good Hide.

[notellumcreek]

  Good work man!!! Beautiful animal you have there.

[FSTaxidermy]

Good work man!!! Beautiful animal you have there.

 

[h2ofowlr]

Congrats.  I took the same shot last year.  Dead on, center of chest right at the bottom of the neck.  Dropped straight down and never moved.
Nice looking bear.

[Watimberghost]

Well done! Congrats on a good looking bear! Cool story as well

[jrebel]

 

[BullMagnet76]

Great Bear, Very cool, Congrats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Dbax129]

Awesome!