Bear encounters

[bowhunternw]

I would like to hear some experiences with encountering bears either entering/leaving stands in the dark or approaching bait sites. I know in normal situations I never even think about them, but do they ever stand their ground in a baited environment. Decided to try it this year and want to do it with a bow, just want to make sure I am not crazy.

[Boar]

ell the most adrenalin pumping experience Ive ever had was in stand I was working a state land piece that had been burned off years earlier and was mostly made up of brush and tall poplar, the poplar and low brush made it hard to put up a stand cause if i higher than the brushline Im exposed like a tick on a ear of a dog. The best thing I could do was hang it low enough so i blended in with the brush line which put the platform of my hang on at only 6 ft abouve ground. At 7 oclock a tiny little bear came to site and i never saw momma which was weired at the time an it scurried off real quick,which got my attention. 20 mnts later just of to my left the brush stated shacking an parting like the scean in King Kong where the chick is tied to the sacrafice alter, this bear came in right below my stand parting the bushes an huffing a puffingand stoped right below my stnad at about five feet from the base of my tree. Now i lterally coulda spit on him as my stand was only 6 ft off the ground, he was obsured by brush but i could tell he was big. As he came in parting the red sea like, I actually started to push myself back up the tree to get away as I was really kinda freaked out, then i remeberd, "oh yeah I have a gun" and decide to shoot him instead. never forget it. these pics wernt of that bear but the coolest pics ive ever had and really makes a guy think sometimes. your not actually safe in a stand.

[Boar]

I have been followed out after baiting and hunting but nuthing to extreame. kinda fun actually.

[bowhunternw]

Cool story, do you have any kind of protection when baiting before season? A guy told me a story of where he yelled at sow with cubs to see what would happen, he said that the cubs went straight up a tree and the sow came to the base of his tree for a while before they eventually worked off.

[Boar]

when i first started years ago i carried 44 mag or 454 casull and even a shiotgun with 00buckshot. but didnt take long to get comefertable that you want them to know you coming in to tsite and your the feeder and you want them to know your leaving, that rings the dinner bell.

[leech~~]

when i first started years ago i carried 44 mag or 454 casull and even a shiotgun with 00buckshot. but didnt take long to get comefertable that you want them to know you coming in to tsite and your the feeder and you want them to know your leaving, that rings the dinner bell.

This reminds me of one baiting story. We were making a bait run down an over grown road that we had two baits setup on. We would drive in with our bait in garbage cans on a trailer dump the bait and then move down the road to the other bait. One day we baited the first one but noticed we still had some bait left at the second one and thought we would dump the rest on the first bait we stopped at not more then 20min's before. We pulled up and made all our usual noises of loading the can talking and so on. I put on my 44 mag in my shoulder holster like always. When we walked in there was already a bear at the bait standing looking right at us. We were now about 25 yards away face to face! We waved and started to say hey bear, hey bear and nothing! He would not leave. For some reason I reached over and broke a stick off a tree and he took off for the halls at the sound of the stick crack! We got back to the truck and went over the whole deal knowing I may have had to pull out the 44 mag if needed. We loaded up our cans and I went to unload the gun. Not loaded!!!!! Face to face with a bear that didn't want to leave and forgot to load the gun!