2020 Spring Bear

[frazierw]

This year was the first time I had ever drawn an Spring Bear tag, and since I hadn't killed a bear before, I was pretty excited.  The area I drew, I knew well, but I haven't spent much time there looking for bears.  Once I drew the tag, I reached out to my Dad, my Brother and my Uncle to see if they wanted to join in on the hunt.  I knew the answer to the question before I asked, they were all in!  Due to the COVID-19 stuff the date for the hunt was pushed around, but as soon as we found out when we could hunt we settled on an extended weekend to head up into the mountains and go chase bears.  The time finally arrived, and we loaded the truck to the brim, my Uncle, my Dad and myself, and took off to the unit.  My brother lives in Clarkston and had already scouted a spot to camp and would meet us there after we had arrived.  Once we arrived, we got camp all set up, the 16x20 wall tent was like our own personal palace in the woods, and we would be able to hunt from camp if we wanted.  I had some intel from someone back home who had seen a bear while turkey hunting the week before, so we headed down low to where he suggested to see what we could turn up.

We parked the rig and took off up a gated skid road and started hiking around, the area was pretty thick, so we hiked to an edge of a canyon so we could see some more country.  Once we had the spotters set up, it wasn't long until we turned up a bear.  Unfortunately it was a sow with a couple cubs that looked like little bowling balls from the distance we were away from them.  We stayed there for a few more hours and turned up four more bears that were all way too far to ever go after, but it got our hopes up to see so many bears.  We also saw some elk, some deer, some sheep, and had a coyote going nuts next to us for about twenty minutes.  Before dark we started our hike back to the truck, and when we got to the crest of a hill that was a pretty good vantage point, we got a glimpse of a bear moving through the trees.  It was about 850 yards away, so we busted down quickly to try and get in front of it, but never saw it again.  We made it back to the truck in the dark, optimistic with how many bears we had seen on the first night. We got back to the tent around 10pm ate some dinner and played some cards before we hit the cots around midnight.
We were in no hurry to get up in the morning, so we took off from camp, my Brother and I going in one direction, and my Dad and Uncle taking off in another.  My Brother and I spent the morning glassing but never turned up a bear, and we were constantly distracted by the gobbles of a near by turkey.  We decided to head back to camp and grab our shotguns for what turned out to be a long hike where the turkey got the best of us.  On the way back we found some Morels, so there was a silver lining to that dark cloud.  That evening, I returned to the same spot, this time with my Uncle and Dad in tow, and my brother went up high to see what he could turn up.  After glassing for only about an hour, we could hear footsteps approaching us quickly, and before we knew it there was my brother.  He said he had spotted a nice bear and we needed to hustle back up to where he was.  We packed up and immediately took off.  It took about an hour to get to where we needed to go, but once we got there we all knew this basin would produce bears.  We never saw the bear he initially saw again, but we did catch a glimpse of a different bear as the day faded to night.  Once the last of the light faded, we hiked up and out of the basin and back to camp.  We feasted on pizza and played more cards as we discussed what the plan was for the next, and final day of our hunt.  The decision was unanimous, if we wanted to kill a bear, we needed to head back into that basin. 

After a good nights sleep, and another lesson in how not to kill a turkey, it was almost noon.  We cooked up an early dinner, with the hopes we would be back late with a bear on our backs.  Steaks and morels were delicious, and we hoped we weren't jinxing the hunt by eating the celebratory dinner before actually killing anything.  We took off from camp again, to sit and over look the basin that we had watched the night before.

Anyone who has been to the Blues, knows that country is daunting.  The only hesitation we had in returning was how steep the basin was, and how awful the pack was going to be if I was lucky enough to harvest anything.  As we got settled, we put those thoughts in the back of our mind, as to not put the cart ahead of the horse, and started picking apart the terrain trying to turn up a bear.  It was not long until I spotted a chocolate bear on the edge of a small clearing 500 yards away.  I grabbed my gun and got settled, by the time I was ready, he had snuck back into the trees, never presenting a shot.  We stayed glued to that area, knowing it was still early, and he would come out again.  Sure enough, not 15 minutes later, he snuck out of the trees, and into a larger clearing 50 yards closer than before.  I had a good rest on a rock outcropping, and got settled in.  I had thought about this moment since I saw selected next to my name when the draw came out.  I dialed in and squeezed the trigger, the .300 win mag erupting into the quiet basin.  The bear immediately took off into the trees.  As it bolted, it did not look hurt and no one could pinpoint where the bullet impacted.  We gave the bear some time and knew we had to head over.  My Dad and I would start the arduous hike over to see if we could find any evidence of the bear being hit. We discussed with my Uncle and Brother what the signs would be so they could steer us in the right direction once we were over there.  Down we went the steep thick terrain, the whole time agreeing that this would not be the best way to come back up and out, regardless of if we had a bear or not.  We made it through the bottom, around a little island ridge between where I shot from and where we last saw the bear, and up to his last location.  As we got close we glassed to my Brother and Uncle, they were pointing to their right, letting us know we had to move across the face further.  Before long, we were right where the bear was standing and on his tracks.  As we followed the tracks, there was no sign of blood or hair, but we kept following to be sure.  As we were walking, I happened to look where my Brother and Uncle were standing, and they were both waving their arms.  I put the bino's up and they frantically start pointing to the little island ridge that was between us.  The way they were pointing made it obvious they could see a bear just on the other side of where we were. Since we could not find any evidence of the first bear being hit, we took off and tried to cut this bear off before he disappeared.  The ridge was only about 200 yards from bottom to top, but it was steep and we were hustling.  By the time we reached the top we were both huffing and puffing, but were were in a good spot to see the bear if he continued our way.  Little did we know, but my Brother and Uncle were sure it was the same bear I had missed just an hour earlier.  We sat and waited for a while, until it was apparent the bear either went a different direction or gave us the slip.  We decided my luck had run out, and we were going to start hiking back towards the top, which was going to be a task in itself.  We slowly trudged up a different ridge than we came down, because it was more open and not as thick, but still just as steep as every other ridge around us.  We slowly made our way up talking about the hunt, and how beautiful the terrain was even though I was not able to connect.  We climbed through a rock out cropping about half way up the ridge and continued just on the right side of the ridge line.  As we approached 3/4 of the way up, we noticed some rocks that had been rolled and figured a bear must have been up here at some point.  We continued along for another 50 yards, and started to go over the ridge line, when I froze in my tracks.  Just as I crested over the ridge, I could see the top a bears back, just 20 yards in front of me.  My dad and I hunkered down back on the other side of the ridge, knowing the bear hadn't seen us.  I uncapped my scope and shouldered my rifle.  We slowly stood up and barely took a step forward.  The bear was definitely enjoying what turned out to be his final minutes, as he turned over more rocks looking for grubs or roots.  I aimed at what seemed like an individual hair, in my Nightforce, being so close the whole scope was filled with bear.  He was slightly quartered toward me, but looking down.  I steadied my heavy gun and slowly pulled the trigger.  The bear was dead before he heard the sound!  He then began he rolling decent into the bottom of the draw.  My Dad and I stood there shocked.  Sometimes all you need is a little bit of luck.  My brother and Uncle were still on the ridge next to us, and heard the shot.  They busted quickly to an area where they could see us and hear us.  We yelled to let them know we had a bear down and to meet us at the bottom of the draw.  Once everyone was reunited, I shared the story with them of how everything unfolded.  We compared the video of the first bear to this bear and were sure it was the same bear I missed the first time.  Funny how things work  out.  We were all ecstatic.  After pictures, my Brother, being the expert he is, did most of the caping, and then we quartered the bear and loaded our packs.  It turned out missing this guy the first time was the best miss of my life, because it made our pack about 1/4 of what it would have been.  Just 55 minutes later, and completely in the dark, we were back at camp with the heavy packs off of our backs.  We reminisced again on the kismet of the situation and just kind of laughed.  Its better to be lucky than good!  We went to sleep happy and satisfied. 

This was what we all considered a bonus hunt, and relished at the opportunity to spend time together in the woods.  I am blessed to be able to hunt with my family every year, and have since I was 8 years old.  Each year, the hunts are more and more meaningful, and I look forward to being able to take my son in the woods in the future.

[Machias]

Awesome write up and congrats on a nice bear!!

[trophyhunt]

Thanks for posting, great story!  Congrats!

[jrebel]

That is a very pretty bear....Love the color.  Thanks for sharing

[KFhunter]

This is why I love HW, thanks for taking the time to write that up and share your success      

[Stein]

Cool story, great looking bear!

[Bob33]

Great story!

Congratulations.

[bearpaw]

congrats, great bear, well done 

[Dan-o]

Fantastic     

[castnblast]

Great story.  Thanks for sharing.  Congrats on an absolutely beautiful bear. 

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[ShaneTyTrey]

Beautiful bear, congratulations!

[hoyt2002]

Great story, congratulations on a nice bear.

[Wolfdog2314]

Thanks for taking the time to write the story! Great bear!

[HoytHunter24]

My wife was showing me your bear on Instagram. Nice job man! Sounds like an awesome hunt!

[D-Rock425]

Nice bear.