Post by: Dean44 on May 30, 2010, 10:30:18 AM
We drove up Thursday night with gear to camp for a four-day weekend. This was the first weekend that I was able to have both of my boys come at the same time, ages 12 and 24. It was raining and almost dark when we came through Dayton so we stayed in a motel rather than set up tents in the dark and rain. We cooked rib eye steaks and watched hunting shows on the TV.
Up fairly early on Friday morning we prepped our gear and headed for the Tucannon drainage. The rain had given a brief reprieve and I was hoping that the break in the weather would bring some bears out on the ridges. We were planning on a full day hike and we had our packs filled accordingly.
Arriving at our planned camp site and starting point for hiking at 6AM, we got out and started a final check on the packs. My oldest son walked down the hill about 30 yards where you could see several ridges down the drainage. He came back quickly and very excited, telling us to come quickly.
We followed him down the hill and he pointed out a bear working low on a ridge, with one additional ridge between us. We ranged it at 756 yards but the ridge in between was about 500 yards so we knew it would be in range from the next ridge over.
The bear was busy turning over rocks and digging up roots so it looked like we had some time to execute a plan.
We decided that the boys would stay in position and watch things from high up, while I skirted around the top of the mountain to catch the next ridge and slip down into range. The plan went pretty good. It took me about 45 min to get into position. I came down the side of the ridge away from the bear to avoid giving away my presence until I was ready. On the way down the ridge an elk bugled from several hundred yards up the drainage. The boys reported that this put the bear on alert for a while but he eventually just sat down, looked around, and then went back to feeding.
After dropping about 700 feet in elevation, I knew that I should be about lined up with the bear. I skirted to the edge of the ridge and as I was aware would happen, there were several trees partially obscuring my view. The forest fire had burned about half of the trees, so you could find windows through the branches that were big enough for shooting.
It didn’t take me long to spot the bear; it was busy digging and turning over rocks facing straight away from me. The range finder said 96, yards, 109 yards etc so I knew that it was picking up the branches between the bear and I. Finally, I punched through the branches and read 209 yards, which meant a dead-on hold. Although I could see the bear, there were too many branches to risk a deflected bullet so I tried several positions before I found a shooting window, which happened to have a tree trunk to shoot against. My preferred shooting position is sitting with the shooting sticks but to get through the shooting window, I had to be in a standing position so the tree rest worked fine.
The bear still was facing straight away so I waited another 30 seconds or so for it to turn, finally it quartered away from me and started to walk down hill. I placed the bullet just behind the front left shoulder and it exited the forward portion of the front right shoulder. (.338 Win, 250gr Sierra Boat Tail).
The boys had been watching the whole thing from 700 feet up and a half-mile away but I heard them hoot and holler after the crack of the rifle finished echoing.
The pack out was 700 feet up and about 2 miles after circling around the top of the mountain to get back to the truck. After the kill, the rain rolled in with driving wind and 34 degrees so I knew we were fortunate to get this opportunity during the brief break in the weather that we had.
The bear is of course smallish, but I am very pleased with the beautiful coat that it has on it and the coloring. This is a hunt that all three of us will remember for a lifetime!
Post by: the1rod on May 30, 2010, 10:40:46 AM
Post by: PacificNWhunter on May 30, 2010, 10:57:45 AM
Post by: buckhorn2 on May 30, 2010, 11:05:50 AM
Post by: runamuk on May 30, 2010, 11:09:41 AM
and there aren't any elk over there ;)
Post by: billythekidrock on May 30, 2010, 11:13:18 AM
Post by: bucklucky on May 30, 2010, 11:14:38 AM
Post by: winston2789 on May 30, 2010, 11:45:58 AM
Post by: machine on May 30, 2010, 12:48:20 PM
Post by: bonecrusher on May 30, 2010, 12:59:02 PM
Post by: Kain on May 30, 2010, 01:13:01 PM
Post by: Michelle_Nelson on May 30, 2010, 02:41:39 PM
Post by: bowhunterforever on May 30, 2010, 04:02:17 PM
Post by: rasbo on May 30, 2010, 04:07:42 PM
Post by: Austrian Hunter on May 30, 2010, 04:24:54 PM
Post by: markts on May 30, 2010, 05:13:54 PM
Post by: Rufous on May 30, 2010, 09:51:30 PM
Post by: zackmioli on May 31, 2010, 03:01:06 AM
Post by: saylean on May 31, 2010, 08:52:34 AM
Post by: ratherhunt on May 31, 2010, 11:34:47 AM
Post by: bigpaw 77 on May 31, 2010, 12:29:31 PM
Post by: FWilliams on May 31, 2010, 12:46:19 PM
.
Fred
Post by: Jeremy S on May 31, 2010, 02:30:38 PM
Post by: Elkstuffer on May 31, 2010, 07:43:18 PM
Post by: madmack76 on May 31, 2010, 08:38:54 PM
Post by: carpsniperg2 on May 31, 2010, 08:42:14 PM
Post by: Dean44 on June 01, 2010, 05:23:46 AM
Rufous, yes it was a cold, wet spring. We made 4 weekend trips and only one of those had warmer, dry weather. We saw 6 bears total this season, and 4 of them were during that warm weekend. If felt pretty fortunate that we found this bear on the last weekend of the season with with poor weather.
Madmack76, yes that surprised both us and the bear to hear the elk bugle. It was just the one bugle but it was long and loud. We saw a ton of elk most days. They seemed to be in pretty good shape!
Hunting that part of the country was an incredible experience in itself. The Blue Mountains are an awesome place to spend time hiking and if you happen to be hunting at the same time, then all the better! My son even got in a little lake fishing and we had BBQ trout for dinner one night. I will try to post some more scenery pics when I get them sorted out.
Post by: C-Money on June 01, 2010, 06:11:23 AM
Post by: GoldTip on June 01, 2010, 06:46:51 AM
Post by: hoyt5199 on June 02, 2010, 03:18:35 PM
Post by: yakimarcher on June 02, 2010, 04:41:51 PM