Hunting Events Calendar

The first group of hunters had some success with 5 of the 6 hunters getting shot at animals. We had 3 elk hunters harvest 1 elk, one hit and not recovered, and 1 missed. Travis shot his very first archery animal last week, and it was a beautiful bull elk, congratulations on your first bow hunt! The 3 deer hunters had some action with 1 miss, 1 hit and not recovered, 1 harvested, and the one of the bigger bucks slipping by at 25 yards without a clear shot. 

It was a wild week to say the least, although tons of fun. The one hunter hit a buck Thursday evening, he couldn't get it to stop walking so the shot hit back further than he wanted. We waited until the next morning to look for the deer. That morning I walked a hunter into a stand about 400 yards from that spot the deer was hit. Walking out in my headlamp I saw a set of eyes just off the road and when I walked by it and shined into that area I was surprised how thick it was that I even saw eyes in there. I got to the truck and told the other hunter about seeing eyes and thought if it was a deer they usually stand there and watch you walk by in the dark if you keep moving. When the hunter walked out at 10:30 AM he said he bumped into a bear 10 yards off the road, it stood up and looked at the hunter and it wouldn't leave the area. I asked him where he saw it and it was right where I saw the eyes coming out in the dark. The reason I saw them at one point was probably him standing up to look at me and then when I walked by realizing the brush is high and wondering how I saw eyes in that brush. Here it was above the brush. After we put two and two together we figured his deer must be laying over there right next to the road. We still had small drops of blood to follow so we stayed with the blood trail. After 3 hours of trailing pin drops of blood it was headed in the direction the bear was, good sign! Sure enough when we found the deer, we found the bear! I walked at him with bear spray to get him off the deer so we could grab the head. The hunter said it would be cool to shoot that bear and hang the bear hide next to the whitetail euro mount. I said I have a bear tag and he said he would tan the hide and wanted it. So that evening I went back with my bow. I waited 15 minutes for the wind to change in my favor before walking in just in case he was back. And when I got there, he was. When I got to him I took off my backpack, unhooked my quiver because I don't shoot with it on, and a seat I took to sit on down on the path. Long story short, I had this bear at 21-26 yards for 30 minutes at eye level trying to get a shot at him through the brush. I finally decided I had to move closer to shoot over the brush. So when he laid down at 26 yards I made my move and got another 4-5 yards closer, that took another 10-15 minutes because it was dead calm. He heard me and stood up but was looking past me and around me. He started to turn to the right and I thought he would give me a broadisde shot so I started to draw and he then started to turn back and he saw me drawing. He then locked onto me and faced me at 22 yards. I had 1 arrow and a can of bear spray in my back pocket in case he charged me after the shot being so close. I put the 20 yard pin dead center between his shoulder half way up and figured I would hit a lot of important stuff and sent it. The arrow disappeared into his chest and he spun around and took off, luckily away from me. He piled up 25 yards later. That was pretty inteste I thought walking back to my pack...lol. I text the hunter that wanted the hide from the bear I got him and he was pumped. I had plenty of help getting him out. Thanks for all the help! That story of seeing the bear in the dark, the hunter walking past him in the daylight, then tying the pieces of the puzzle together, recovering the whitetail, AND getting the bear hide to hang with the deer skull that was on the hunters deer when we found it will make for a very cool story for the hunter to tell.