I filled my second bear tag last night with a mature boar. I was hunting the same draw my brother had missed a chance at one due to a misfire and then rushed shot the third day of season, which upon further inspection he did graze the top of its shoulder. There was a cut in the hide just into the fat at the same angle and side it would have been on.
I was still hunting back towards the truck around 8 after being out since noon when I heard something down in the bottom less than a few hundred yards down hill from where the bear was on the third day. I couldn’t see anything through the tangle of Hawthorne and berry bushes but I could see movement so I figured I would try my cub in distress call. Instantly sticks were breaking, rocks were rolling, there was a bear coming fast. I got to an opening I could see in pretty well and not 30 seconds later A big bear busts out and I drop him in his tracks with a front on shot that took out a lung and his front shoulder. Then on the same trail another big bear comes busting out and starts backpedaling back into the brush as it sees me and the other dead bear. This other bear didn’t go far. It was popping it’s jaws, breaking sticks, huffing for the next hour in the draw down from me, Even after another shot to finish the bear off and me yelling hey bear the whole time I was dealing with getting it out ASAP it was still making a commotion.
I think it may have been a sow coming in to save the cub the boar thought he was going to eat. Or maybe another boar but seemed really odd that it didn’t just take off.
Luckily my wife and son came out with the other truck and the spool of rope, block and tackle. With lots of yelling back and forth and some machete work we were able to pull him up to the road. Took everything the three of us had to get him in the back of the truck. Had the hide off and crammed into the big chest freezer with the lid open Within a few hours of him hitting the dirt and then took it to a friends cooler early this morning.
174lbs hanging carcass, 60 lb hide and head and probably 40- 50lbs of guts and blood so probably 275ish on the pad. Probably my second biggest bear to date, but we will have to see if he scores better than 20 0/16 which is my biggest and was an older bear than this guy