Recent Bear Hunt in Blue Mountains - Updated

[Pueblo]

I got out for a 4 day bear hunt in the Blue Mtns on the 18th of April.  I’ve never hunted bears in the spring before so I wasn’t sure what to expect and also unsure of the road and weather conditions.  I normally bow hunt but for this I dusted off an old rifle and got it all dialed in.  It turned out to be a really fun experience, even though much of the unit I drew was not accessible due to snow on the roads. 

The first morning I drove until the road was snow blocked and then got out and walked up to a good glassing point.  The slope of the hills prevented looking much further up into the mountains, but I could see a good ways out into the foothills I’d just come from.  The hills below the snow line were mostly barren but it took less than a minute to spot my first bear up high in one of these distant draws. He was a couple of miles away on the greenest spot in an otherwise brown hillside.

I went back to the truck and drove to the area I thought to be below the bear and headed out and up into the hills.   It turns out I’d picked the wrong spot, but rather than go back to the truck I side hilled around several draws to locate it.  While in this ankle bend journey I saw an animal outlined at the top of a draw and pulled up the binos to take a look.  A wolf! I sat down and pulled out the spotting scope for a better look and sure enough it was a somewhat scraggly grayish wolf travelling along just below the ridge.  From my vantage I also could see a couple of herds of elk on an opposing hillside and see seemed content to watch them from the distance.  When I got back I entered a location report with WDFW.

OK, so on to bear hunting, I could not relocate the bear so I went up on top of the ridge and peered over into the next creek canyon where I immediately spotted four bears right below me at just about 350 yards.  These north slopes hade the only available cover and each ridge running north has a dry side facing northwest where as it turned out the bears tended to be.  Here’s a couple of photos of the 4 bears, which turned out to be a brown phase mother, with 3 cubs, one of them a blonde. 




Although these were clearly last year’s cubs soon to get the boot from mom, I just couldn’t see whacking the mom, especially on day one of the hunt.  The weather went from mild to cold, windy and wet…I really appreciated my Russell APXg2 clothing as it was comfortable in anything. 

I ended up over the next few days seeing a total of 4 more bears, many hundreds of elk, dozens of deer and turkey (and 10 ticks crawling on various parts of my person).  The elk were in large groups at tops of each plateau, enjoying the fact  that no people were around to bother them which allowed me in one case to belly crawl right into the middle of a herd and get some good pics at about 50 yards.  They were very surprised when I stood up!

Here’s one young one I caught coming out of a draw at about 30 yards.  I assume that by hunting season many of these elk will be up higher in the Wenaha.



Only about a third of the unit was accessible and that tended to be the more arid areas that were not the best bear habitat.  As I said before the northeast slopes tended to have trees and the bears would venture out from there to feed in the open.  This all was on the east side of the Blues and it was a bit behind in greening up….very few sunflowers, etc compared to the Dayton side. 

This shot shows what the south facing slopes looked like….pretty dry.  There were 30 or 40 sheep in this canyon, mostly just lying around in the sun, with 15 being mature rams.




Spotting back from that far side of the picture above, I found a bear feeding on the open slope to the left here:


It was too late that day to get over there but hit it at first light. I worked my way down one of the open fingers on the timbered  slope and then out onto the open side so I could glass back into the various openings with the idea of setting up to do some calling. After settling in for a bit a I pulled out a Primos Coyote bear Buster and tried the shrieking rabbit.  Immediately limbs started cracking both up to my left and down to my right!  Over the next 15 minutes I alternately called and listened, occasionally hearing some noises; at one point I heard something like a cat yowl, or perhaps a baby bear?  I’d scan the openings looking for any movement.  Not seeing or hearing anything for a bit I switched to a fawn bleat with the same call…..instant action! I saw movement at the bottom of the opposite slope in a shaded opening.  I pulled up the rifle and steadied it on the shooting stick looking for a bear in the scope. It took a second but then saw movement….a micro bear…a brand new little cub so cute you’d want to take him home.  So knowing I wouldn’t shoot this mother unless I had to I stood up with rifle in left hand and camera in right hoping to get a photo before she knew what was up and ran.  It happened super quick as she can into view up the slope on a quick trundle...a nice blonde bear popping her teeth…a bit scary….I waved my arms and she turned around inside her own skin and was out of there!  No time for a picture…but a lifelong mental image.  What a lot of fun!

I saw no more bear and didn’t have time for turkey.  I’ll be back a couple of more times here in May and should be able to get higher up into the mountains and see more active bears. 

One odd and disturbing thing I was this scene:


That’s 5 dead turkeys and a bear’s foreleg all hanging from a tree at an abandoned camp.  I can’t imaging what went on here and have no idea whether the bear was taken in season (which started 4 days prior) or not.  When I got cell service on the way out I called the poaching hotline a couple of times but only got their message to call back (or 911 if the poaching was in progress, which this was not).  Don’t know if the bear take was illegal but I’m pretty sure wasting 5 turkeys is! 




If I have more to report I will. 

[Broken Arrow]

Great write up and pics. The hanging turkeys and bear leg is disturbing....wtf?

[kckrawler]

Great write up!  That's some neat country over there.

[h20hunter]

Wow wow wow. That post had it all! Very cool and very disturbing all in one!

[Michelle_Nelson]

Great post Pueblo.  Good luck on your Bear Hunt!

[fair-chase]

Great post Pueblo.  Good luck on your Bear Hunt!

 

[Pathfinder101]

Any chance that the game was hung there to be retrieved later?  That's a popular camping spot...  Was any of the game tagged?

[Rufous]

Pueblo, welcome to Hunt WA. I really enjoyed your write up and photos. What unit were you hunting? Good luck on filling your bear tag.

[Pueblo]

Any chance that the game was hung there to be retrieved later?  That's a popular camping spot...  Was any of the game tagged?

That crossed my mind but they stayed there for 2-3 days when I was there.  No tags....gave me the creeps so I didn't touch.  It was pretty sparse on people up there compared to later in the year.  I saw two other trucks total on that road over three days.  The road was blocked by snow just a 1/2 mile further.

[Austrian Hunter]

Cool write up, it had it all.  Sounds like a great trip!!!!!  Awesome job!  Keep it coming and welcome to the site. 

[KopperBuck]

Look forward to the next episode

[Pueblo]

Pueblo, welcome to Hunt WA. I really enjoyed your write up and photos. What unit were you hunting? Good luck on filling your bear tag.

Thanks Rufous...I guess I haven't posted much here.  I'm pretty active over on iFish where I make a point to write up my annual deer hunts under the same screen name.  I hesitate to name the unit...the guys who know, know, and I don't want to offend them by ratting it out.  I think any of the Blue Mtn units would give a similar experience. 

[Woodchuck]

That is a great story and pics.  Were there tags on the birds?

[PlateauNDN]

Pueblo, welcome and that was one heck of a write-up.  If that was the first write-up on here you sure did one heck of a job and great pics.

[trophyhunt]

Great write up, can't wait to see the pic's of the bear you kill and with your determination it's not going to take long. And thanks a lot for not posting what unit your in, your right about people knowing where your at and that's enough. I agree with you also that most units in the blues are good when it comes to spring bear, after reading your write up I sure miss not being drawn for that unit the last couple years.