Bear from a Tree stand (no baiting) Question

[Bogie85]

Hey everyone,

I got to thinking I spent the better part of last year baiting for deer with trail cams. I noticed something though, the bear won’t come in for about 3 days after I dropped bait. So I was wondering if you never baited a spot, and found a game trail. Has anyone had success setting up a tree stand and just sitting up there?

Or are they so cautious that they really will wait three days to even use the trail if they smell you around.

[huntnnw]

complete opposite of any bait I ve dumped in bear country. Ive probably started close to 1,000 deer baits or more in my life and I have bears on sweet mix or apples sometimes within a hour. If they already know its there Ive had bear come in minutes of leaving.

[Bogie85]

complete opposite of any bait I ve dumped in bear country. Ive probably started atleast close 1,000 deer baits or more in my life and I have bears on sweet mix or apples sometimes within a hour. If they already know its there Ive had bear come in minutes of leaving.

That’s super interesting, I was baiting apples. There were around 12 different bear I caught on camera. But they would never come in the same day. That being said do you think someone could find a heavily used trail set up a tree stand and have some success?

[Dan-o]

complete opposite of any bait I ve dumped in bear country. Ive probably started atleast close 1,000 deer baits or more in my life and I have bears on sweet mix or apples sometimes within a hour. If they already know its there Ive had bear come in minutes of leaving.

This has been my experience, with a much smaller sample size.    I've probably started 50 over the years, and bear sure seem to come in quick.

[Dan-o]

I'm having a hard time imagining that sitting in a tree stand to watch a trail would be an effective bear hunting strategy.

[huntnnw]

I'm having a hard time imagining that sitting in a tree stand to watch a trail would be an effective bear hunting strategy.

me too. could be alot of hours spent seeing nothing. Definitely not the way I would ever bear hunt.  Unless I had some intel on a food source and known bears being there all the time. Example would be orchards

[Pete112288]

That is how I hunted last year for bear. I am by far a very novice bear hunter.
No bait involved here for deer or otherwise. Just that there was 2-4 bears using the same general area all the time. From June till late Sept I would get at least 2 a week on the same 2 cameras that were only 50 yards apart. The most consistent was the biggest of them all. He would show up At least once a week. But it was common for it to be multiple times a week. During daylight. this is in an extremely thick area. The type of overgrown crap that bears seem to tunnel through rather than on top of. Like hampster tunnels through it all.
My most productive cam was right by a stand of half a dozen mature trees. So I sat in a treestand there. The first morning the big guy came through, just never had a shot. After that i didnt have much luck but I attribute that to me and my smell. I didnt think about it well. Its close quarters and on a good hillside. So the mornings were great, thermals moving downward took my scent to the main road 75 yards behind me and the bears worked the area in front of me. But I tried sitting too long too much. After a few sits the bears stopped showing up in the morning much. But I had been sitting so long that the thermals would switch before I was out of there and my scent was consistently blown up the hill into their prime area.
I backed out for a week and they started showing in the morning again. But I didnt manage to get out much after that.
So yes it would be possible. However it would probably require a steady food source like stated above, or patterning the bears somehow. And not pulling a rookie move like I did. Scent is king. Esp, with bears.

[D-Rock425]

We put bear baits in Idaho and had bears on them the same day. 

[Bogie85]

That is how I hunted last year for bear. I am by far a very novice bear hunter.
No bait involved here for deer or otherwise. Just that there was 2-4 bears using the same general area all the time. From June till late Sept I would get at least 2 a week on the same 2 cameras that were only 50 yards apart. The most consistent was the biggest of them all. He would show up At least once a week. But it was common for it to be multiple times a week. During daylight. this is in an extremely thick area. The type of overgrown crap that bears seem to tunnel through rather than on top of. Like hampster tunnels through it all.
My most productive cam was right by a stand of half a dozen mature trees. So I sat in a treestand there. The first morning the big guy came through, just never had a shot. After that i didnt have much luck but I attribute that to me and my smell. I didnt think about it well. Its close quarters and on a good hillside. So the mornings were great, thermals moving downward took my scent to the main road 75 yards behind me and the bears worked the area in front of me. But I tried sitting too long too much. After a few sits the bears stopped showing up in the morning much. But I had been sitting so long that the thermals would switch before I was out of there and my scent was consistently blown up the hill into their prime area.
I backed out for a week and they started showing in the morning again. But I didnt manage to get out much after that.
So yes it would be possible. However it would probably require a steady food source like stated above, or patterning the bears somehow. And not pulling a rookie move like I did. Scent is king. Esp, with bears.

This is what I was thinking, I am on the west side and it’s so thick with brush. There are tons of food sources nearby and had a bear destroy blind overnight once. East side bear hunting seems to be move around and glass a lot. Look for food or water sources and I have found them there. But on the west side, in 2 years of using cams I have seen between 12-15 in a 2-3 mile radius. I know they are there and plentiful, but I have only ever seen one in 5 years of hunting and he hauled ass as soon as he heard my truck I happened to catch him crossing the road. Since we can’t bait in this state, I am just trying to think of ways to get one in fall in this thick *censored*.

[jrebel]

I would think it could be a great way to hunt west side bears if you can identify their food source.  Point being this.....if you know of a blackberry patch they eat off of year after year, that would be a great place to get in a stand looking down on that brushy mess.  If there is food, water and poop to prove they frequent the area.....put in your time and one will come by eventually.  May be hours....may be days....but one will show up if there is a sustainable food source. 

We essentially do the same over wild plum trees and service berry patches.  We  don't use tree stands but we use ground blinds and it works great.  Find the food and find a way to hunt them in or around the food source.   

[Bogie85]

I would think it could be a great way to hunt west side bears if you can identify their food source.  Point being this.....if you know of a blackberry patch they eat off of year after year, that would be a great place to get in a stand looking down on that brushy mess.  If there is food, water and poop to prove they frequent the area.....put in your time and one will come by eventually.  May be hours....may be days....but one will show up if there is a sustainable food source. 

We essentially do the same over wild plum trees and service berry patches.  We  don't use tree stands but we use ground blinds and it works great.  Find the food and find a way to hunt them in or around the food source.   

Sweet thanks! A 1% chance is still better than none lol. I know of at least 5-6 huckleberries that get full every year. It’s pretty thick, so the only way I could see getting one would be through luck by waiting up high.

[dilleytech]

I have done just as you stated. Put cameras on trails and set up a tree stand. There might be one bear walking the trail every 2 days on their way to there food but It’s just a matter of time. Just have to be patient. Carry a call. If you are going to quit start screaming through the call before you leave. If there’s one around it will probably come in.

Bears seem to be creatures of habit. They don’t do the same thing every day at the same time every day but find their trail between their bed and food source and you will find success. And you don’t really need a tree stand. Bears are easy to fool. Standing against a tree of sitting along a trail will work just fine and is a lot less work.

[Seabass]

complete opposite of any bait I ve dumped in bear country. Ive probably started close to 1,000 deer baits or more in my life and I have bears on sweet mix or apples sometimes within a hour. If they already know its there Ive had bear come in minutes of leaving.

This has been my experience as well… been baiting deer since 2001.
 
That said, I do have ONE bear spot…just ONE…that I am 100% confident I could kill a bear from if I hung a stand. I have hunted that spot for 20 years and they cross at the exact same spot every time. However, It’s a hell of a lot easier to sit on the other side of the canyon and shoot them from there.

[7t9cobra]

     In my experience (on the west side) if you find a spot that has a bear that you've seen atleast twice, there are more bears in there and if you watch it long enough you will see them. I have a dead end road I watch. It is a patch of reprod. It has lots of shooting lanes and is loaded with cascara. One thing I've learned is if the area has cascara berries, they don't even bother with the blackberries. Around here they eat an insane amount of cascara berries. My road dead ends about 300 yards from where I sit. The wind typically blows in my face when I sit there. If the wind is going the other direction I will sit at the far end of the road. How I found this place is a buddy and I were headed out to shoot our pistols in June 3 years ago. We got out of the truck and started slamming doors and dragging out a big steel swinging target. A large boar walked out 80 yards away and just stared at us, then walked away. Then that September a different buddy and I were elk hunting and when we were walking out I was telling him about the bear. As i"m talking about it, the same bear walks out. Same exact spot. We ranged him at 117 yards and ran up the road to try to get a shot. We couldn't make it happen. So after that I decided that bear habitually visits that place. So from then on I sat in the road every chance I could get. I would leave work early almost every day during the season to sit in the road. I had some crazy experiences. I saw the boar several times but could never get a shot. I finally shot a 150lb bear that year and turned down another 150lb bear a week later.  I went back the next season and saw the top of it's back one time. But that was it for the season. I had a small bear about 50 lbs walk out of the brush ten feet away and I took some cool pics and videos of it. Finally last year I wasn't hunting the road much. But, I messed up my foot and couldn't walk much so I decided to sit in the road after work friday night. I could hear the bear off the road feeding but couldn't see it. I walked into the reprod trying to get a shot. It was borderline too dark and I couldn't see the bear but I could hear it breathing. I came back out the next morning and at about 11am or so I heard some branches popping. I saw a chunk of cascara get pulled over about 80 yards out. I slowly walked up the road and found the bear feeding 20 yards away and dropped him. So long story short, if you have a good area, I would definitely try a tree stand. It will take a lot of patience but if you can have the self discipline to sit long enough it will happen. I would recommend leaving the stand in there for a while before you start hunting to take care of the scent.

[KFhunter]

you can catch bear on a trail for sure in and out of something like an orchard, they'll leave a padded down trail they use it so much

If you happen to find such a trail, set up on it for sure