My recap of what happened during the final hunt for spring bear 2022.

First of all, I am a new hunter. Harvested some grouse in the fall but that’s it, no big game yet. I have accompanied my dad in my teens on a couple successful hunts, so I did have some experience and knowledge going into hunting along with tons of reading, research and just getting out into the bush.

So my and the girlfriend (she got all her courses/licenses with me) wake up at 4:45 to head out to a spot my family has hunted for a long time in region 3. I know the area extremely well and know there’s an abundance of bears. My uncle has a cabin and property in the area since before I was born that we use a base.

As we’re driving the highway, I tell her jokingly, that the plan was to drive up the fsr, see a bear on the road, shoot it and go home.

We hit the fsr approx 8:00Am. As we come up at 2km, bear on the road. Beautiful red colour phase. I jump out the truck to load the rifle, and as I’m watching the bear I start to hesitate and think hmmm. That looks like a pretty small bear. While I’m thinking it over the bear takes off across the road and into the bush.

ok, no big deal. We just got here and it for sure was a smaller bear, probably 3 years old at most. So we continue on.

We get to a spur road that we planned to hike. We head down a few km and set up to glass a hillside for the morning. Time passes and nothing. So we plan to head back to my families cabin for lunch.

As we’re heading back down the main fsr, we see some fresh scat and then a flash of another bear bolting across the road. I get out to see if it’s hanging out in the bush but can’t locate it. This one appeared to be on the smaller side as well but we only got a glimpse of it. We continue down to the cabin and have a lunch break with the family.

About 4pm we decide to head back out. We drive up and over the mountain, into some fresh burn areas and I decide to park and see if we can find some morels. 10 seconds of looking and we fine a bunch. Spent about an hour harvesting a couple pounds to have with dinner later and share with others.

We check out a couple spur roads up high and don’t see much sign so we decide to head down to the lowest spur road where there was a good amount of scat around and go for a walk.

It’s around 6pm as we start walking this road. It’s looking good with lots of sign and lots of grass, clover and dandelions covering the road. The road curves to face west and now we are pretty much blind as the sun is slowly coming down and directly in our eyes.

We continue walking, and I’m constantly holding my hand up to the sun in order to see.

Then we heard something we had never heard before. It’s hard to describe, but it was a loud raspy hissing noise with some huffing and snapping. We stop dead in our tracks trying to figure out what made that noise as we’re still partially blinded by the sun. The noise happens again. We’re frantically looking around and suddenly we both see this huge black body leaping 10
yards off the road about 30 yards in front of us. Huge bear.

it stands on its hind legs, and I’m trying to find it in my scope but the sun is making it impossible. It leaps again a bit further into the bush and starts going parallel to the road coming in our direction. It makes the noise again. I tell my girlfriend to get behind me as I’m holding the rifle. The bear is pacing back and forth in the bush, slowly getting closer to us.

Then miraculously, the sun disappeared behind the mountain. The bear paces again and makes its noise, louder and more aggressive. We’re now in a direct line from each other. It drops broad side, I crouch down on a knee and take a shot. I was shaking of adrenaline and a clear miss. The bear didn’t even flinch. It stares right at me and stands on its hind legs again trying to figure out what just happened. I move over slightly and have a clear shot at its chest while it’s still standing. I’m calm now and steady, aiming centre chest. Boom. Bear drops, it’s hit. It leaps back up and jumps over some dead fall and after that we don’t see or hear anything. Great. It’s over, we think.

I look over to my girlfriend and she’s basically hyperventilating at this point. The surge of adrenaline from hearing the noises of aggression, to shooting it was nothing we’ve ever experienced before. I help her calm down, and we agree to wait 10-15 minutes before heading in after it. Giving time for the bear to expire and for us to control our emotions and hydrate.

it’s hot out, I took that shot at 6:30PM and it’s 25+ degrees out. We give it 10
minutes then head in after the bear. We rush in and don’t find anything, no bear and no blood. I tell her let’s go back, find the shell (shot location) and head in slowly.

We head in and within 5 minutes we find blood. Awesome. We slowly continue on, finding more and more. It looks like the blood was spraying from its nostrils the way it was patterned. Great I think, lung shot. We then find a piece of spongey lung tissue along with a good amount of blood.

We go a bit further and the sign starts drying up. To the point that the last sign we could find was one single drop of blood on a leaf. Anxiety is setting in. Could this really be happening?

We split up, and cautiously look around further and further from the last drop, analyzing every little thing hoping to find at least one more drop. Nothing. We go back to the last drop and start over I don’t know how many times. Each time we go further and further hoping to see a bear on the ground. Nothing. I check the time and it’s now 8:45pm. We keep searching as sorrow and regret starts to set in. I can’t believe this is happening. We searched as far as 400 yards or so off the road, when I shot the bear was only 50 yards off the road, max.

it’s getting dark in the forest. It’s been over 3 hours since the shot. We went back to the last drop countless times, hoping and praying to see something that we missed.

Nothing. My girlfriend tries to be the voice of reason. We need to get out of here before it’s pitch black and we get lost. I finally agree. It’s over. We leave, broken and depressed, covered in scrapes, and thorns.