Bearpaw Season - Fall 2022

[Machias]

Nice!!!

[bearpaw]

We’ve been trying to get this bull but he has eluded us, one of the hunters had his crosshairs on a big bull a couple days ago but needed a couple more seconds, the bull walked out of his life, today’s the last day of the hunt!

[bearpaw]

Early season hunting was hot and dry, but we called in a few bulls, unfortunately most of the bulls were missed or wounded (but only superficial wounds so I expect they are all fine). In southern Idaho the hunters only killed one cow, one young buck, and one bull calf, in northern Idaho the hunters got one good bull. Every year guys ask me about the misses in previous years, how can anyone miss an elk at a reasonable range? I tell them the excitement of a bugling bull and the size does something to people, it shakes them up and they miss. This year same thing, bulls mostly missed, but a cow or calf walks in and great shooting. But that rush of excitement is what keeps us going after those big bucks and bulls year after year!

[bearpaw]

The bigger bull

[duckmen1]

Awesome bull. Always love hearing how your season goes. Look forward to it every year.

[jrebel]

Beautiful bull.  Congrats to the hunter.

Did you guys ever figure out what was wrong with the AR and why it wouldn't chamber or shoot....on that black bear hunt.  I owned an AR 10 for about a year before selling it for the very reason it was loud.  I don't like walking around the woods with a round chambered and when you had to chamber a round, it sounded like a 1990's ford diesel trying to cold start on a winter morning.  Clank, clunk, thunk.....well you get the picture. 

[bearpaw]

Beautiful bull.  Congrats to the hunter.

Did you guys ever figure out what was wrong with the AR and why it wouldn't chamber or shoot....on that black bear hunt.  I owned an AR 10 for about a year before selling it for the very reason it was loud.  I don't like walking around the woods with a round chambered and when you had to chamber a round, it sounded like a 1990's ford diesel trying to cold start on a winter morning.  Clank, clunk, thunk.....well you get the picture.

Yes

When we stopped and got out to go hunting he didn't let it slam shut, he tried to quietly close the action. When he was trying to get it to shoot while the bear was watching, he didn't let it slam shut. IMO - AR's were made for the military, I'm not against them at all, but there can be challenges when using them hunting.

[Machias]

Beautiful bull.  Congrats to the hunter.

Did you guys ever figure out what was wrong with the AR and why it wouldn't chamber or shoot....on that black bear hunt.  I owned an AR 10 for about a year before selling it for the very reason it was loud.  I don't like walking around the woods with a round chambered and when you had to chamber a round, it sounded like a 1990's ford diesel trying to cold start on a winter morning.  Clank, clunk, thunk.....well you get the picture.

Yes

When we stopped and got out to go hunting he didn't let it slam shut, he tried to quietly close the action. When he was trying to get it to shoot while the bear was watching, he didn't let it slam shut. IMO - AR's were made for the military, I'm not against them at all, but there can be challenges when using them hunting.

You ride the bolt forward and it will rarely, if ever, fire properly!!

[bearpaw]

Beautiful bull.  Congrats to the hunter.

Did you guys ever figure out what was wrong with the AR and why it wouldn't chamber or shoot....on that black bear hunt.  I owned an AR 10 for about a year before selling it for the very reason it was loud.  I don't like walking around the woods with a round chambered and when you had to chamber a round, it sounded like a 1990's ford diesel trying to cold start on a winter morning.  Clank, clunk, thunk.....well you get the picture.

Yes

When we stopped and got out to go hunting he didn't let it slam shut, he tried to quietly close the action. When he was trying to get it to shoot while the bear was watching, he didn't let it slam shut. IMO - AR's were made for the military, I'm not against them at all, but there can be challenges when using them hunting.

You ride the bolt forward and it will rarely, if ever, fire properly!!

[bearpaw]

Beautiful day in Idaho, just waiting for the next pack out…..

[huntnfmly]

👍

[Pathfinder101]

Tagging along to see what else happens.  Looks like a great season so far. 

[RB]

Right on! 

[bearpaw]

We are hunting cow elk currently, we've seen elk every day on this hunt but not close enough or for a long enough time to get a shot, unfortunately this is steep country, one of our hunters is 78 and either the elevation or the physical exertion got to him yesterday, he said he needed to quit the hunt and was going home, he left this morning, usually I try to talk hunters into sticking it out, but I didn't want to push Don with his age being a factor to consider. Today is the last day of this hunt, this morning Russell went after elk he spotted at dark last night, unfortunately his hunter missed a cow this morning. So the horses are still standing in the corral, but my fingers are crossed for a last evening kill!

I was too busy earlier to post about our hunts but we had a fair Idaho mule deer hunt, the first two hunts were toughest because of the warm dry weather, deer just were not moving much during daylight, the third hunt we had a good storm and it got the animals moving better. I would like to have seen a little higher success overall but we did get a few good bucks so I'm thankful for that and happy for the hunters who were successful.

The first week Drew had a dandy buck scouted, two mornings in a row he watched the buck. On opening morning of season they spotted the big buck and were closing in, unfortunately another hunter shot on a distant ridge at an entirely different deer but it spooked the big guy and we’ve not seen him since then, I’m pretty sure he went nocturnal, it doesn’t take much for older bucks to do that.

Drew”s hunter ended up settling for a smaller buck later in the hunt.

[bearpaw]

A few hunters saw some good ones that got away and some of the hunters killed some young bucks to take meat home. This was the next good buck, Keaton tagged it with Daniel.