How serious are people getting about their spring bear tags?

[TeacherMan]

I was just wanting to know how serious people where getting about spring bear tags? How many days do you plan on spending in the field? Making a camping trip out of it? Combine it with some turkey hunting?

My dad is retired so I plan on setting him up a good base camp in the field and hunting out of it every weekend until I get one. Put up a couple nice tents, cook area, two weeks or more worth of wood, his boat, etc... During the week he is planning on just enjoying the outdoors, getting some good camping in, catching a fish or two, shooting a turkey and most importantly finding me a bear. Anyone who is hunting the Aladin area is invited to join our base camp. If you are interested PM me we are looking into three areas that I have seen plenty of bears in the past. No guarantees besides a good time and most likely some rain  . If you have any advice for the GMU don't hold back. 

Just a few days and counting, spending some time shooting this weekend.

[billythekidrock]

Not sure how many days I will be out helping, but I have already logged over a dozen hours setting up GPS maps and looking over paper maps for the one unit I don't know. The other unit I know pretty well, but haven't been in for over a month so I will have to start from scratch.

Oh yeah, and I don't even have a tag this year so I would say some of us are pretty serious. 

[arees]

I have been going over maps, ordered a custom map of the Monroe area from mytopo, and will be scouting this weekend.  I will be hunting the area evenings and weekends through the season due to limits on my vacation time.  This was my year to draw tags.  I got a spring bear tag, a multi-season deer tag, and a Oryx tag for New Mexico in January.  This is on top of a my already planned hunting and fishing trips.  (I know, it is quite a sob story).  Things are a bit frosty around the house these days.  My wife only has the fishing trip and a deer hunt in December.

This will be my first bear hunt and I am exited to go.  I have been reading through the archives here and on other sites and have calls into DNR and DFW.  I've blown the dust out of my rabbit calls and am reading through my shot placement guide.

[wazzu99]

Teacherman,

I've been getting stuff ready since I found out I drew two weeks ago.  My shop is a disaster.  Tents, stoves, packs, propane tanks, and other misc camping and hunting gear everywhere.  I drew Sherman up in your neck of the woods.  Absolutely love the Republic area.  We used to have a family cabin on Julian Bay on the northeast side of Lake Curlew.  Sold it a couple of years ago.      

I'm going to make a scouting trip up on the opener for a couple days but won't get to motivated until the last weekend in April with all the snow.  Me and a couple of buddies will be up for 4 days then, hopefully we'll be able to get a little higher by then.  I've only hunted bears in the fall up there and have some areas in mind but would love to hear any areas you think might hold bears.  The more area we can glass the better.  I'm going old school and trying to get a bear with a pre-64 30-30 with open sights.  I've got to get within a 100 yards to feel comfortable shooting.  I may also bring the 300 WSM just in case we see a monster that I can't make a stock on.   Wish I had some info for you on your area but I've only been there once.  However, it looks like good bear country.

Wazzu

[rasbo]

Im ready freddy,snow has me screwed,watching the snow melt,kinda like watching paint dry..I dont camp so I run in and hunt til dark.12 minutes from home..I wish I was on the east side I would hang with da stump during the week..shoot teachers bear

[coop2424]

I am taking it pretty serious and plan on hunting almost every weekend and take a couple days off to have a couple good extended camping weekends.  I have already been out shooting a couple times and this weekend I plan on getting all the camping gear ready to go.  Right now this is a top priority for me and really looking forward to it since it will be my first time hunting for bears int he spring.

 I actually will be pretty close to you teacherman.  We will be driving straight through your unit in order to get to mine (Kelly Hill).  I have a couple firends in the Aladdin area so I will talk to them and see if they have any information that could help you.  I know that they always want the Aladdin unit because they always see some nice bear in there and they are very familiar with it.   

Good luck everyone.

[saylean]

I panned over Google earth and found the general locations of where I need to be, some roads to go off on, etc.

I like to think I will take a weekend and go camp, but more than likely since it is so close to the house I will just leave early and come home late. We'll see.

[Machias]

Very serious.     I'll probably end up hunting bear for at least 20-25 days this spring.

[Jake T]

had my vacation slip filled out before i even knew i drew a tag.  got drawn and had my slip on the boss's desk 2 minutes later.  i'll have the first 11 days of the season off and will hunt every weekend and some weeknights after that if necessary until one falls.  not done much scouting because i roam around the unit for other seasons and just for fun in the summer.  no camping for me but only because i live close to the unit.  i'm so freakin excited.

[Archery King]

its in my opinion that you should take these tags very serousily these tags are not gonna get any easier to draw.  I am very worried about the snow pack in the blues i drew the Mt. View and our camp is at about 5200 ft i just hope we can get in by the first of may.

[WDFW-SUX]

I drew grande ronde not to worried about the snow and will take a trip down that way for 4 or 5 days sometime in may. I'm looking for a large bear 300lbs or bigger or some cool color phase. Might do some fishing and get some sun if the big bears are not there. That's my plan

[mulehunter]

I draw! Yes SERIOUSLY I am READY! 

Mulehunter 

[Alan K]

Last year when my dad and I drew spring bear for Kapowsin we spent like 3 days looking for 'em. Got to take a cut at one but missed and couldn't get a second shot off.

Really I just don't know how to hunt them other than just glassing a lot.  If I knew how to hunt them as well as I know how to hunt deer and elk I'd be just as pumped up over bear season as I am for the other species.