2017 Skagit spring bear thread

[tarbabyone]

Well I had the butcher recover the bullet from my Bear to see how the bullet preformed.  It had gone into the left front shoulder, shattered the ball socket and then proceeded to take out a lung and traveling through to come to rest in the right front shoulder.  Pretty good performance I would say and not a lot of bullet weight lost.

[Gringo31]

Moving cautiously I worked down to the spot where he was last seen. Squish squish as I walked.

At first I assumed you were walking in a "swampy bottom".....but then, I realized you definitely were! 

[Timberstalker]

LMAO.

[tarbabyone]

A couple of days ago I took the wife back up to walk around where the bear was taken last week.  Sure a pretty place when the sun is shining.

[ghosthunter]

Moving cautiously I worked down to the spot where he was last seen. Squish squish as I walked.

At first I assumed you were walking in a "swampy bottom".....but then, I realized you definitely were! 

Yeah 12 feet away got everything going.

[X-Force]

Lots of peeling going on right now. Walked a 1/2 mile section of road and a dozen or more peels.

Saw 40-50 elk no cavles yet but it should be happening soon.

[fishinandhuntin]

Congrats to Tarbabyone and Ghosthunter with your bears and nice job on the write ups!  We have yet to see a bear this season but are having a wonderful time on the outings nonetheless. Tonight's sightings included deer, elk, grouse, and 26 really fresh peels!!!!  That sure got us excited!  Plan to hit it hard all weekend trying to find a bear for our son. Was a pleasure meeting X-force out there in the backcountry as well!

[saylean]

Looks like you're on the right path there fishinandhuntin.

[ghosthunter]

Congrats to Tarbabyone and Ghosthunter with your bears and nice job on the write ups!  We have yet to see a bear this season but are having a wonderful time on the outings nonetheless. Tonight's sightings included deer, elk, grouse, and 26 really fresh peels!!!!  That sure got us excited!  Plan to hit it hard all weekend trying to find a bear for our son. Was a pleasure meeting X-force out there in the backcountry as well!

Thanks

We were talking afterwards, Alex and I have different hunting styles and sometimes we have a hard time hunting together. He is a walker, a upland hunter . He doesn't sit for very long. I on the other hand am a sitter. I like to find area where there is good sign and sit on it FOREVEVER. A lot of people cant do it, but it works for me sometimes because being quite is not my strong trait.
We both used our own method to harvest. With good intel.
But if what you are doing doesn't work, don't be shy about switching up.
Good luck all.

[fishinandhuntin]

Was in the woods from 0600-2100 today!  Saw lots of cool stuff but no Bears. 5 encounters with different elk herds, deer, 12 grouse, over 30 new tree peels and bear tracks in the snow!  Someday we'll get a bear I hope!

[X-Force]

Another bear was taken tonight. I haven't seen it but there is a good one in the area it was taken.

[fishinandhuntin]

Lots of peeling going on out there!!  We drove this one particular 1/2 mile stretch of road on Saturday and counted 16 peels. We came back Sunday and hiked it and counted 28.  We finally made it back there tonight and hiked the same 1/2 mile stretch and counted 52 peels!!  We walked slowly and as quietly as possible and never saw or heard anything- bummer!  Thinking we'll get a trail camera put up to try and see when they are moving around most. Sure is exciting!!

[elkoholic1]

 

[brew]

5/4/2017This was a Spring Skagit Bear permit.  I was the lucky hunter.  But I give a good share of credit to Skybuster.  He shared a lot of information with us and was instrumental in letting us know a location where he had seen a recent Bear.  I acted on his information when I could and took a nice Bear.  When I called Skybuster and asked if he could help me get the Bear out he was there in about 20 minutes.  He is just a great Bear Hunting enthusiast.   Then Ghosthunter came up to help as well and assisted in hiding the animal for me.  So the only credit I can take is being retired and able to take a leisurely walk on a road suggested to me by Skybuster.  Anyone can pull the trigger on an animal at 30 yards.  The Bear was probably 280 to 300#'s.  By the looks of his teeth he is an old one.  190#'s hanging at the Butcher shop.  Going to have an upper torso mount done.

cool bear...congrats...not trying to jack the thread but i think it is interesting that he said the bear hung at 190# and there was a different thread on here about multiplying the quarters by 3.25 to get the live weight of a bear...i cant guess what parts of the bear where actually weighed at the butcher but can't imagine the ribs weighed 100 lbs...good job 

[tarbabyone]

That was the weight of the bear carcass hanging at the Butcher.  Hide, Head and paws cut off and of course gutted.