Brambles
06-04-2007, 03:45 AM
Well I received my new bow from the factory (APA Black Mamba X2) about a week ago, got her all tuned up, had some new arrows built and decided to try some new broadheads ( Magnus Stinger Buzzcuts). The sight was taken off my previous bow.
I felt as if I should at least try and take a bear with my bow before the season closes, things are warming up here real fast and I was expecting to see that the bears have rubbed. So when a friend of mine calls me up and asks if I still plan on going hunting this evening I said "lets go". He wasn't interested in taking a bear but was looking to get out of the house.
The plan is to take the quad up the main forest service road and then hike up a reclaimed spur road that greens up real well and I had seen lots of smaller bears on it last year. The only drawback is the slope is "Freakin Steep. The reclaimed road has a nice grade to it, carved nicely out of the mountain but the sides drop off QUICK. (can you see where this is going?)
A fair distance from where we left the quad we come up to a cool draw with a roaring creek. I knock an arrow, explaining to my buddy that this is a nice spot to see a bear feeding. It wasn't a dozen steps after I said that when I seen black. Bino's up and sure enough its a bear about 100 yards away and feeding towards us.
We get as low as we can in the ditch and creep closer. I judge the bear for a bit, still 80 yards away. These yardages are rough because I was an idiot and left the rangefinder back at the quad:redface:
Looked like a decent boar, no dumbo ears, good swagger to his walk, eye's real close together, beautiful un-rubbed coat, but his legs looked longish. Oh well, lets try and shoot him. He's across a small draw and we're running out of ditch to hide in but the creek is loud and is actually creating nice wind for us, the bear has no idea we are there.
We sat there for probably 15 minutes watching him, ever slowly creeping forward as he's feeding towards us. Now he's about 50 yards but I don't want to take any shot further than 30. I didn't have time to verify my bow was shooting on target past that distance. So longer we wait. He offers me plenty of beautiful quartering away, broadside, you name it. Finally he makes the move and walks down into the bottom of the draw and I make my move to sit on the top edge of it. I estimate the distance at 30 yards and he offers me perfect broadside. From the seated position I draw my bow, aim and release. I tucked it in perfectly behind the shoulders cutting both triceps and lungs, a wee bit high but I'm just being picky.
He spins around and my buddy gets up with the rifle just in case but I tell him to hold on. The bear whirls around and is loosing steam FAST, very impressed how much of a hurt the bow put on that bear. He settles in behind some small shrubs but I can still see him, he's just laying there but I decide to give him another shot ( hey how many times do you get a follow up shot with a bow). WELL CRAP I nail him with the second shot, lungs again and he falls down the FREAKING BANK. Like a billy goat taking the plunge he falls probably 300 feet or so down to the bottom of a beautiful waterfall. We find a way to get down to him but did I mention how STEEP it is, plus its old growth with pine needle duff about 8 inches thick so your footing sucks too.
Anyways we try and drag him but make it about 10 ft, yup 10. Too heavy. I tell my buddy to go and hike back to the quad and bring it up, in the mean time I'm going to get the hide off and quarters de-boned. By the time he gets back I have the hide 3/4 off and he gives me a hand to finish up and take the quarters off and backstraps. We throw all the meat in the packframe and I put it on, OH OH MY, this is really going to suck. Buddy takes the hide. Well after a lot of grunting and scrambling we got the bear out of the ravine and strapped onto the quad.
No I'm not a guru on Black bear hide measurements but nose to tail looks to be 6'3" and paw to paw is 6' 8 1/2". The skull green scores at 18 10/16. Lets see how it dries.
Now a little kudo's for my buddy, he didn't bitch or whine once, he was right there with my 375 H&H to back me up but I called him off, he's new to hunting a couple years ago and wants to rack up some experience, I think he got a bunch this trip. Anytime he wants to get some more experience I'll be more than willing to take him. Hopefully we'll get something for him so I can return the favor.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v437/Brambles77/IMG_1045.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v437/Brambles77/IMG_1051.jpg
I felt as if I should at least try and take a bear with my bow before the season closes, things are warming up here real fast and I was expecting to see that the bears have rubbed. So when a friend of mine calls me up and asks if I still plan on going hunting this evening I said "lets go". He wasn't interested in taking a bear but was looking to get out of the house.
The plan is to take the quad up the main forest service road and then hike up a reclaimed spur road that greens up real well and I had seen lots of smaller bears on it last year. The only drawback is the slope is "Freakin Steep. The reclaimed road has a nice grade to it, carved nicely out of the mountain but the sides drop off QUICK. (can you see where this is going?)
A fair distance from where we left the quad we come up to a cool draw with a roaring creek. I knock an arrow, explaining to my buddy that this is a nice spot to see a bear feeding. It wasn't a dozen steps after I said that when I seen black. Bino's up and sure enough its a bear about 100 yards away and feeding towards us.
We get as low as we can in the ditch and creep closer. I judge the bear for a bit, still 80 yards away. These yardages are rough because I was an idiot and left the rangefinder back at the quad:redface:
Looked like a decent boar, no dumbo ears, good swagger to his walk, eye's real close together, beautiful un-rubbed coat, but his legs looked longish. Oh well, lets try and shoot him. He's across a small draw and we're running out of ditch to hide in but the creek is loud and is actually creating nice wind for us, the bear has no idea we are there.
We sat there for probably 15 minutes watching him, ever slowly creeping forward as he's feeding towards us. Now he's about 50 yards but I don't want to take any shot further than 30. I didn't have time to verify my bow was shooting on target past that distance. So longer we wait. He offers me plenty of beautiful quartering away, broadside, you name it. Finally he makes the move and walks down into the bottom of the draw and I make my move to sit on the top edge of it. I estimate the distance at 30 yards and he offers me perfect broadside. From the seated position I draw my bow, aim and release. I tucked it in perfectly behind the shoulders cutting both triceps and lungs, a wee bit high but I'm just being picky.
He spins around and my buddy gets up with the rifle just in case but I tell him to hold on. The bear whirls around and is loosing steam FAST, very impressed how much of a hurt the bow put on that bear. He settles in behind some small shrubs but I can still see him, he's just laying there but I decide to give him another shot ( hey how many times do you get a follow up shot with a bow). WELL CRAP I nail him with the second shot, lungs again and he falls down the FREAKING BANK. Like a billy goat taking the plunge he falls probably 300 feet or so down to the bottom of a beautiful waterfall. We find a way to get down to him but did I mention how STEEP it is, plus its old growth with pine needle duff about 8 inches thick so your footing sucks too.
Anyways we try and drag him but make it about 10 ft, yup 10. Too heavy. I tell my buddy to go and hike back to the quad and bring it up, in the mean time I'm going to get the hide off and quarters de-boned. By the time he gets back I have the hide 3/4 off and he gives me a hand to finish up and take the quarters off and backstraps. We throw all the meat in the packframe and I put it on, OH OH MY, this is really going to suck. Buddy takes the hide. Well after a lot of grunting and scrambling we got the bear out of the ravine and strapped onto the quad.
No I'm not a guru on Black bear hide measurements but nose to tail looks to be 6'3" and paw to paw is 6' 8 1/2". The skull green scores at 18 10/16. Lets see how it dries.
Now a little kudo's for my buddy, he didn't bitch or whine once, he was right there with my 375 H&H to back me up but I called him off, he's new to hunting a couple years ago and wants to rack up some experience, I think he got a bunch this trip. Anytime he wants to get some more experience I'll be more than willing to take him. Hopefully we'll get something for him so I can return the favor.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v437/Brambles77/IMG_1045.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v437/Brambles77/IMG_1051.jpg