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He definitely won't make it through winter: if I were you I'd definitely put it down, tag it, and harvest the meat and hide..
Harvest and punch your tag or phone the CO and let them deal with it.
tag it.....
Animals are a lot tougher than people. The 6pt elk I killed last week had been shot and lost by someone, what looks like 2 years ago. The bone attached to his shoulder blade was completely shattered by a bullet and healed into a giant mass of bent bone, pointy shards, and odd little bone spikes. That leg was 6” shorter than the other, and he wasn’t limping or favoring it at all.
A handful of years ago there was a doe that had been hit by a car and had about 20” of lower intestine outside her body, and she lived for a couple of years and raised 2 sets of fawns before getting hit again.
For me though, an animal that has no mobility and is waiting for coyotes to find it and eat it alive gets shot between the blinkers without a second thought, regardless of time of year or time of day. That’s simply finishing the job someone else started. I have no moral qualms about speeding up the process, and there is no thought to cutting a tag or salvaging anything. Exactly the same thing is going to happen whether that animal is finished off, or lived out the entire extent of it’s life away from the eyes of man - coyotes, birds, and bugs are going to eat it.
In the specific case of said bear in the OP, maybe he’ll make it, maybe he won’t. If he is noticeably deteriorating and isn’t showing any improvement after a couple days…. I’d have called a CO after first seeing him though. Anynof the times that has happened previously and they go out and can’t find it they have called back with a follow up and every time they’ve also indicated that if it can be safely done, then it’s ok to show some mercy without repercussions.
Like Kodiak said they're pretty tough. Shot a bear in my uncles oats few years back. Went to skin it and it only had 3 legs. Turns out some one had shot it before. The hair had and grown over where the front leg should of been. Having said that ya I guy hates to see anything suffer. I'm figuring you can use your one if two bear tags, call the co and see what they want to do or let mother nature take its course. I can't remember what the regs say about selling bear hides but for some reason I thought we were allowed to now or maybe I can only as a trapper. Your a good guy and I'm sure you'll make a good decision.
I won’t let an animal suffer..
I feel cruel to not put it down if any animal is definately on its last legs...but as mentioned they are driven by a toughness we can't understand...our group once shot a big buck that was fighting with other bucks and chasing does when buddy spot and stalked him...there was a wound from a straight on shot that hit lower neck and went in just inside of the ribcage travelling down between the ribs and lungs and out...It was running around with a 2 inch pus channel inside from neck to belly....
Phone the CO and offer to put it down for them if their not willing to come out and do it themselves.
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