Well, got my first bear this Saturday (27May) - a 350 pound male black bear. 
And man, was it a cool experience...pics will follow shortly...
I shot it with my CZ-858 (that's why those extra 3" on the barrel are worth it) while standing; the shot went through it's head while it was 20 feet away and charging us.
It was quite the day...
My brother and our friends Sean and Greg and Greg's daughter had gone out into the same area on Thursday after work and gotten a 450 lb. male just as it was getting dark and ended up still carving it up until about 1am. That day and the day before they had seen a really big, probably ~600lb, bear that was obviously very wiley, it gave them the slip twice. They saw lots of mid-sized ones, too - so it seems it's a pretty decent area.
On Saturday, Steve, Sean and I decided that we would try and find this one again and, barring that, we'd go for something that was a decent size. I had my 30.06, Steve had his sporterized Lee-Enfield with iron sights and Sean had my CZ with some lead-nose 7.62x39 as 'backup'.
We drove up into the clearcuts on the west side of Wolf Lake on Vancouver Island. Pretty much where the transition from high-res to low-res imagery happens on this map...(Click Here)
Within 10 minutes of getting into the area both Steve and Sean saw a good-size bear up in a clear-cut. The clear cut was quite large, with the road we were on at the bottom, a road that went up then across about 1/2-way up the clearing and a road at the top. There were trees left coming almost all the way down the center, about 100yds thick - the clearcut was kinda like two 'BB's rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise (lying on their backs). The bear was just above the middle-road on the left of the tree line coming down, heading towards the trees.
We drove up to the middle road and parked and then started climbing up the hill on the right of the trees - we could hear the bear right in the middle, heading up hill above us.
Steve was in the lead and we were about 20 yds behind him when he froze and motioned us to stop with his hand. I looked at where he was looking and could see just the top of the head and the ears of the bear we were stalking. It was about 40 yards from him right at the edge of the trees facing him square on and looking at him. He aimed, fired and....nothing, not even a twitch....hmmmm....so he reloaded and fired again. This time the bear turned and started walking back uphill through the bush quite quickly, Steve took a third shot as it was moving away aiming for just behind the front leg. We then started up the hill again, moving parrallel with the bear and a little behind.
The treeline, which was on our left side, curved right so that it was in front of us at the next ridge and then curved left so that it was going straight up again. The bear basically followed the treeline about 25 yds in, and slowed down and then stopped when it was directly ahead of us. Steve was still a little ahead, so when he came to a place where he could see it he shot again. It started moving again, but quite slowly, so I came up towards the treeline and took my first shot as the bear was side-on to me. This one I knew was a hit because it kinda lurched and then turned facing uphill and then really slowly walked into the thicker trees.
We went a bit to our right and then up again, keeping pretty much even with the bear, which we could see kinda indistinctly moving up. It was obviously pretty badly hit from the way it was moving, it was even kinda circling back on itself a bit. It had pretty much stopped moving uphill and was just kinda meandering through the trees.
Steve wanted to go to the edge of the trees to where we could get a good shot and finish it off. I was a little wary of getting too close to the obviously wounded bear, but at the same time I really wanted to finish the job. I decided that if we were going to get into the trees that I was going to 'take point' and take my CZ as I felt that if any rapid shooting needed to be done I was probably the more experienced at that sort of thing and definitely the most familiar and comfortable with that rifle.
Steve was on my left as we went in and Sean was behind him, he now had my 30.06. We got to a place were we could see the bear, which was basically just moving very slowly with it's side towards us. Steve took a shot and both Sean and I saw it go quite high. This was a little surprising as Steve's a really good, calm, shooter and he's quite comfortable with his rifle. He took another shot and it went high too. He was getting pretty frustrated, the bear was ignoring the shots and I was pretty puzzled. Steve took another shot and that one obviously hit because the bear kinda stumbled and looked but it kept moving.
Well, Steve usually loads only 7 rds in the Lee-Enfield mag because it seems to have feeding problems with more then that so he was out of ammo. He gave Sean the 303 and took my 30.06 (3 rds left) and took his time and shot - this was probably about 35yds. This shot was a good one. And it invoked the wrath of this dying bear. It looked around for a second, saw us, and came running.
The trees weren't super-close together here, so it didn't have a lot of obstacles. It came quickly. I could see its eyes and its face and it was mad. Sean, who was holding an empty rifle, ran kinda sideways back towards the cleared area and got in behind a stump. Steve started walking backwards fairly quickly while trying to reload - he hasn't shot my rifle all that much though and was having some difficulty with my bolt, which is quite stiff (this all happened in about 5 seconds).
Me, I went calm. I (without consciously doing it - thanks TacRifle) planted my right foot forward, bent my knees and leaned forward, flipped off the safety, sighted in on the bear as it was running, swerving around trees, distinctly thought, "Wow, it's going to go the other way." when it kinda turned to its left, uphill, then realized it was just going around a big dead log and was still intent on doing some serious damage to whatever it was that had caused it so much pain. I saw that it was heading for a little rise with a log lying across its path about 20 feet away (subconsciously, anyways, I just consciously thought 'there would be a good place' but didn't realize 'til after why) and as it came up on the top of the log I aimed for the little white patch on its chest and fired just as it brought its head down and started re-aiming for a second shot.
But it dropped like a stone. I could see a little cloud of steam from its breath and then that was it. I backed up slowly keeping my eye on it until I was where Steve and Sean were, they had gotten right back to the edge of the clearing.
Steve and Sean were saying things like, 'Can you believe that?' and 'I thought we were dead!' and that's about when the 'holy crap' feeling hit me. The shaky hands and shaky legs and the 'Oh man, oh man, oh man, that was so stupid, we coulda been mauled and really hurt or worse!' type of thoughts started coming right after.
We walked up about 35 yds and then went back into the tree-line. We were all pretty sure it was dead but after that experience we weren't taking any chances. Steve and I walked downhill towards where it was lying. Its head and front paws were curled up under its chest; its momentum coming over the log had carried it a couple of feet further into a little hollow against another dead log. There were too big trees lying across our path towards it so Steve rested the 30.06 on that and shot it from about 15 yards in the neck 'just to be sure'. We gave it another 30 seconds and then walked down to it and it was really, truly dead.
We sat on a log, had a smoke and noticed that the rear sight on the Enfield had gotten pulled (probably by a branch when we were hiking up the first bit) so that it was sitting above the 600 yd. range. That kinda explained why Steve kept missing. It also got him thinking about checking everything beforehand and not just rushing in. We talked about how next time we go after a bear we'll have a plan as to who's going where and what-not and how we'll also take our time.
Steve had learned how to skin a bear to get the meat from Greg on Thursday and so we started in on that. There was a good amount of meat on it and we also took the paws because Greg makes really cool necklaces out of the paws and wanted to take the head for the skull but the whole top of the skull was fractured so we just took the front of the top and bottome jaw. We're going to mount them on a plaque with the teeth slightly apart so it looks like it's snarling.
We packed the meat out to Sean's truck, drove back into town and put it in our freezer, went and got another bear tag and some lucnh and headed back out hoping to see 'the big one'. All this before 2:00pm. We saw several more bears, including one that was probably a young male which totally ignored us even though he knew we were really close to him.
We spent an hour stalking what sounded like a huge bear right where they'd seen the really big one the other day. When we finally got to where we could see it it was really big but it was also a different bear; a momma with cubs. We watched them for a while and then spooked them and they took of running.
We drove around til about 8:30pm but never saw the really big one. It'll have to wait for next time. For now I'm just happy that I've successfully hunted a bear, that I was able to make the shot when it really counted and that everything worked out OK. And I can't wait for next time...
And man, was it a cool experience...pics will follow shortly...
I shot it with my CZ-858 (that's why those extra 3" on the barrel are worth it) while standing; the shot went through it's head while it was 20 feet away and charging us.
It was quite the day...
My brother and our friends Sean and Greg and Greg's daughter had gone out into the same area on Thursday after work and gotten a 450 lb. male just as it was getting dark and ended up still carving it up until about 1am. That day and the day before they had seen a really big, probably ~600lb, bear that was obviously very wiley, it gave them the slip twice. They saw lots of mid-sized ones, too - so it seems it's a pretty decent area.
On Saturday, Steve, Sean and I decided that we would try and find this one again and, barring that, we'd go for something that was a decent size. I had my 30.06, Steve had his sporterized Lee-Enfield with iron sights and Sean had my CZ with some lead-nose 7.62x39 as 'backup'.
We drove up into the clearcuts on the west side of Wolf Lake on Vancouver Island. Pretty much where the transition from high-res to low-res imagery happens on this map...(Click Here)
Within 10 minutes of getting into the area both Steve and Sean saw a good-size bear up in a clear-cut. The clear cut was quite large, with the road we were on at the bottom, a road that went up then across about 1/2-way up the clearing and a road at the top. There were trees left coming almost all the way down the center, about 100yds thick - the clearcut was kinda like two 'BB's rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise (lying on their backs). The bear was just above the middle-road on the left of the tree line coming down, heading towards the trees.
We drove up to the middle road and parked and then started climbing up the hill on the right of the trees - we could hear the bear right in the middle, heading up hill above us.
Steve was in the lead and we were about 20 yds behind him when he froze and motioned us to stop with his hand. I looked at where he was looking and could see just the top of the head and the ears of the bear we were stalking. It was about 40 yards from him right at the edge of the trees facing him square on and looking at him. He aimed, fired and....nothing, not even a twitch....hmmmm....so he reloaded and fired again. This time the bear turned and started walking back uphill through the bush quite quickly, Steve took a third shot as it was moving away aiming for just behind the front leg. We then started up the hill again, moving parrallel with the bear and a little behind.
The treeline, which was on our left side, curved right so that it was in front of us at the next ridge and then curved left so that it was going straight up again. The bear basically followed the treeline about 25 yds in, and slowed down and then stopped when it was directly ahead of us. Steve was still a little ahead, so when he came to a place where he could see it he shot again. It started moving again, but quite slowly, so I came up towards the treeline and took my first shot as the bear was side-on to me. This one I knew was a hit because it kinda lurched and then turned facing uphill and then really slowly walked into the thicker trees.
We went a bit to our right and then up again, keeping pretty much even with the bear, which we could see kinda indistinctly moving up. It was obviously pretty badly hit from the way it was moving, it was even kinda circling back on itself a bit. It had pretty much stopped moving uphill and was just kinda meandering through the trees.
Steve wanted to go to the edge of the trees to where we could get a good shot and finish it off. I was a little wary of getting too close to the obviously wounded bear, but at the same time I really wanted to finish the job. I decided that if we were going to get into the trees that I was going to 'take point' and take my CZ as I felt that if any rapid shooting needed to be done I was probably the more experienced at that sort of thing and definitely the most familiar and comfortable with that rifle.
Steve was on my left as we went in and Sean was behind him, he now had my 30.06. We got to a place were we could see the bear, which was basically just moving very slowly with it's side towards us. Steve took a shot and both Sean and I saw it go quite high. This was a little surprising as Steve's a really good, calm, shooter and he's quite comfortable with his rifle. He took another shot and it went high too. He was getting pretty frustrated, the bear was ignoring the shots and I was pretty puzzled. Steve took another shot and that one obviously hit because the bear kinda stumbled and looked but it kept moving.
Well, Steve usually loads only 7 rds in the Lee-Enfield mag because it seems to have feeding problems with more then that so he was out of ammo. He gave Sean the 303 and took my 30.06 (3 rds left) and took his time and shot - this was probably about 35yds. This shot was a good one. And it invoked the wrath of this dying bear. It looked around for a second, saw us, and came running.
The trees weren't super-close together here, so it didn't have a lot of obstacles. It came quickly. I could see its eyes and its face and it was mad. Sean, who was holding an empty rifle, ran kinda sideways back towards the cleared area and got in behind a stump. Steve started walking backwards fairly quickly while trying to reload - he hasn't shot my rifle all that much though and was having some difficulty with my bolt, which is quite stiff (this all happened in about 5 seconds).
Me, I went calm. I (without consciously doing it - thanks TacRifle
) planted my right foot forward, bent my knees and leaned forward, flipped off the safety, sighted in on the bear as it was running, swerving around trees, distinctly thought, "Wow, it's going to go the other way." when it kinda turned to its left, uphill, then realized it was just going around a big dead log and was still intent on doing some serious damage to whatever it was that had caused it so much pain. I saw that it was heading for a little rise with a log lying across its path about 20 feet away (subconsciously, anyways, I just consciously thought 'there would be a good place' but didn't realize 'til after why) and as it came up on the top of the log I aimed for the little white patch on its chest and fired just as it brought its head down and started re-aiming for a second shot.But it dropped like a stone. I could see a little cloud of steam from its breath and then that was it. I backed up slowly keeping my eye on it until I was where Steve and Sean were, they had gotten right back to the edge of the clearing.
Steve and Sean were saying things like, 'Can you believe that?' and 'I thought we were dead!' and that's about when the 'holy crap' feeling hit me. The shaky hands and shaky legs and the 'Oh man, oh man, oh man, that was so stupid, we coulda been mauled and really hurt or worse!' type of thoughts started coming right after.
We walked up about 35 yds and then went back into the tree-line. We were all pretty sure it was dead but after that experience we weren't taking any chances. Steve and I walked downhill towards where it was lying. Its head and front paws were curled up under its chest; its momentum coming over the log had carried it a couple of feet further into a little hollow against another dead log. There were too big trees lying across our path towards it so Steve rested the 30.06 on that and shot it from about 15 yards in the neck 'just to be sure'. We gave it another 30 seconds and then walked down to it and it was really, truly dead.
We sat on a log, had a smoke and noticed that the rear sight on the Enfield had gotten pulled (probably by a branch when we were hiking up the first bit) so that it was sitting above the 600 yd. range. That kinda explained why Steve kept missing. It also got him thinking about checking everything beforehand and not just rushing in. We talked about how next time we go after a bear we'll have a plan as to who's going where and what-not and how we'll also take our time.
Steve had learned how to skin a bear to get the meat from Greg on Thursday and so we started in on that. There was a good amount of meat on it and we also took the paws because Greg makes really cool necklaces out of the paws and wanted to take the head for the skull but the whole top of the skull was fractured so we just took the front of the top and bottome jaw. We're going to mount them on a plaque with the teeth slightly apart so it looks like it's snarling.
We packed the meat out to Sean's truck, drove back into town and put it in our freezer, went and got another bear tag and some lucnh and headed back out hoping to see 'the big one'. All this before 2:00pm. We saw several more bears, including one that was probably a young male which totally ignored us even though he knew we were really close to him.
We spent an hour stalking what sounded like a huge bear right where they'd seen the really big one the other day. When we finally got to where we could see it it was really big but it was also a different bear; a momma with cubs. We watched them for a while and then spooked them and they took of running.
We drove around til about 8:30pm but never saw the really big one. It'll have to wait for next time. For now I'm just happy that I've successfully hunted a bear, that I was able to make the shot when it really counted and that everything worked out OK. And I can't wait for next time...
