WestbankRye
05-19-2016, 06:32 AM
Hey guys I don't post much on here but I'm hoping to get some feedback.
A few friends of mine wanted to head out bear hunting and, since I'm the only that has had success in the past, planning the trip was basically left up to me. I used to hunt bear in an area by the arrow lakes but it has since become full of vacation homes and cabins and isn't huntable any more. So I was left to find an area to set up base camp and hunt in. Also one of my buddies coming with doesn't hunt and wanted to fish all weekend so he wanted to camp on a lake with good fishing. I ended up picking Missezula Lake in 8-6 off of highway 5a and we went this past weekend (May 13-16). We scouted a lot on the first evening we were there and found some solid tracks and bear scat that I would guess was within 24 hours old. We hunted that area hard but lost the tracks and never saw any other sign. Over the weekend we would return to that area as well as hunt some other good looking spots in the area but never saw any other sign or any bear at all. It seemed like a perfect area with tons of grassy slopes and good sight lines where we could glass big sections. My thinking when we didn't see anything was that maybe we were too late for the area as it seemed to have been green for quite a while already. But what do you guys think? Were we too late to the area or is it just not a good area for black bear? Or did we just have some bad luck that kept us from connecting? All in all it was great weekend camping with some good friends but a bear in the freezer would have made it way better. Any feedback would be awesome. Thanks guys.
A few friends of mine wanted to head out bear hunting and, since I'm the only that has had success in the past, planning the trip was basically left up to me. I used to hunt bear in an area by the arrow lakes but it has since become full of vacation homes and cabins and isn't huntable any more. So I was left to find an area to set up base camp and hunt in. Also one of my buddies coming with doesn't hunt and wanted to fish all weekend so he wanted to camp on a lake with good fishing. I ended up picking Missezula Lake in 8-6 off of highway 5a and we went this past weekend (May 13-16). We scouted a lot on the first evening we were there and found some solid tracks and bear scat that I would guess was within 24 hours old. We hunted that area hard but lost the tracks and never saw any other sign. Over the weekend we would return to that area as well as hunt some other good looking spots in the area but never saw any other sign or any bear at all. It seemed like a perfect area with tons of grassy slopes and good sight lines where we could glass big sections. My thinking when we didn't see anything was that maybe we were too late for the area as it seemed to have been green for quite a while already. But what do you guys think? Were we too late to the area or is it just not a good area for black bear? Or did we just have some bad luck that kept us from connecting? All in all it was great weekend camping with some good friends but a bear in the freezer would have made it way better. Any feedback would be awesome. Thanks guys.