So, I have not been updating this substack very often the past few months. The typical excuses come to mind of losing my job, having young kids, being slow out of the gates on TheOutfitter.Guide, feeling uninspired blah, blah, blah… but it’s all bullshit. I just haven’t felt like writing.
Until now! Moving forward on a more frequent cadence I plan to use the LetMeDieLearning substack to cover as much as I can about offgrid living, hunting & trapping, and diving into the trade work industry in more depth. But for today’s blog, it’s all about bear.
For the past three weeks I have been going hard on spring bear hunting with extremely varying levels of success. This year I decided to sit and bait two spots, one of which I had seen many bear on last year and is within (a steep) walk from my cabin, the other is a higher altitude rifle spot near some old mining equipment.
In preparation for the season (which started at the end of April) I had left two beaver carcasses in 5-gallon buckets from trapping season out to rot… a trick that I was assured by numerous “experts” would be the ultimate bait to bring in big spring boars. And one that brought a lot of flies to our yard. Yay!
But as early May rolled around, my somewhat rotted beaver meat was still… frozen. Yes, the beginning of May here in central Idaho was cold and snowy. A far cry from the dry and green early May we had seen the year prior, which meant that bears were simply not moving at our elevation. For weeks after baiting the first barrel with dog food and expired sweet treats there was nothing, until about late-April when something finally showed up:
With the help of a good friend, we kept the barrel baited and started to get in a few different bears over the next week.
Knowing there was activity at our main barrel site, we decided to also branch out and set up a second barrel at a higher elevation. After scouring some old bait sites we settled on an area that had a great outcropping which would give an awesome 165 yard rifle shot and went to work hauling the barrel, bait, and rotten beaver into the area. With both barrels set and bears moving, the next thing was to actually go and sit them.
The Sit
With my focusing on archery hunting, I chose to sit the barrel that was directly behind my house. It was in a flat spot surrounded on three sides by hills which would offer natural blinds and allow me to sit within 35 yards of the barrel and see any bear that may be coming in. However, what I hadn’t accounted for on the first 4:30 am dark-walk into the spot was the wind…
As myself and a buddy sat about 45 yards away from the barrel in the dark, waiting on a mountain monster to lumber through, we quickly realized that the morning thermals were carrying our scent directly into the barrel no matter where we sat. As it swirled and drifted, so did our dreams of seeing a bear that morning.
As we walked out and back to the house we discussed what one of our other, more hunting knowledgable friends had said to us… which is that, “it’s going to be a barrel we need to sit in the evening.” With that fact confirmed, we heading back home and decided we would sit the high elevation barrel and give the spot we just blew time to “cool off”.
After hanging up my bow for that day, I joined my other friend to re-bait our second high-elevation barrel and to sit it until sunset. It seemed there had been no disturbance whatsoever and save for a few circling crows, we watched the sunset on dry un-touched barrels.
With a full day of nothing in the books I went back to evaluate what I may need to do on my “archery” barrel to have some more success. I landed on two things:
I needed to set up a ground blind close to the barrel as our natural cover was scant, and;
I needed to sit it in the evening when the wind would be carrying our scent uphill and away from the barrel
With a plan hatched I made my way back up the hill for the next few days to sit our blind every evening.
With some redneck engineering and a lot of shoveling, we made a somewhat level space to sit the ground blind and set up shop. Our plan was to sit from about 5 pm until last light at 9:45 pm. Settling in, we began the pursuit of boredom with only intermittent breaks as golden mantels, squirrels, and one curious pine marten came in to check out the feast in the barrel.
The Miss
As the clock pushed forward as it always does, I was sitting in the dirt when my friend nudged me and began speaking in a hushed tone. Through gritted teeth and with no movement in his neck or face, he whispered, “Zach, grab your bow. There is a bear. A good bear. 40 yards away.”
It was 7:30 pm.
Not believing him, I poked my head up to see that in fact there was a beautiful red-colored bear staring directly at us from a fallen tree 40 yards away. Slowly I nocked an arrow on my string and we both sat in silence. For 10 minutes this stare-off ensued while the two of us sat stone still. Yet, despite our discipline, the bear huffed at us and ran back up the tree and out of ear shot.
Disappointed, we talked about how cool it was to see him and discussed if the wind was still screwing us and whether it was our movement or scent that gave us away. With no answer we sat for another hour before we heard rustling less than 5 yards off to our right. With no clear view out of the side of our blind, we both grabbed our side arms (a 10mm for him and a .44 magnum for me) and assumed that maybe the bear had worked around us to get our scent. But just as the adrenaline was spiked for both of us, we saw two mule deer doe pop out right in front of our blind, oblivious that we were there.
Studying these two animals we both felt that our bear hunt was over for the day as I had always heard an old adage that “if you see deer milling about, there is likely no bear around.” Quickly, however, they trotted off and we resettled in to stick it out until dark. As our butts once again got comfy and less than 5 minutes after those deer left, I once again got an elbow in my side and another hushed whisper, “He’s back!”
It was 8:30 pm.
Sure enough, our bear was walking straight back down the fallen tree, but this time with more confidence to get into the prize sitting in the barrel.
This time we decided to be patient and wait. The goal would be for this bear to get his head into the barrel before I drew my bow so that he didn’t see us move so close to him. It took time as he cautiously moved in and all around us. At one point, I had a broadside shot, but no way to draw my bow as he was looking directly at our blind. Thinking I had missed my one opportunity we waited as he trotted off up the trail. We once again looked at each other with excitement thinking about the cool experience with a sense of gratitude. As the sun began to set and we were getting ready to pack it up for the day, the bear decided to come in once more and actually get into the barrel!
This was it. It was 9:30 pm
With the bear mounted on the barrel facing us, and with sunlight fading, I drew my bow. Yet, as I settled my pin on the bears vitals, his head popped up and he made direct eye contact with us. In a flash he had turned and jumped off right as I let an arrow fly. A clean miss followed by the sound of breaking branches and crushing buck brush as he ran off into the woods.
The above is the footage as the bear walked back to the barrel for the last time right before I took my missed shot… we were sitting in a blind 15 yards to the right of the frame.
All-in-all, you can’t be disappointed with such awesome encounters so close to bear. We have learned a lot this season and are still getting out almost everyday with the hopes of having another shot on boar before the season closes on June 15th!