Idaho Bear hunt

UGAhunter · Jun 7, 2012

Oh what a year! I took two weeks to hunt bears this spring.

My goals were to:
1) Have a good time with family and friends
2) Feed some bears and get trail camera pictures
3) Help my wife, 12 year old daughter, and my father-in-law see/harvest their first bears

It was a great success! By the time I came home, we had 18 bears on 8 baits, thousands of pictures, and some happy hunters.

Here is the first bear to hit one of my baits...it took 7-8 hours for it to find it. Boar or sow?

eldorado · Jun 7, 2012

Probably a sow from the small head and slender snout.

Eldorado

UGAhunter · Jun 8, 2012

Well, I too thought this was just an average bear...until I found tracks and had other bears to compare it too. Although a closer look on my computer screen definitely revealed this big boar as ... well a boar!

This color bear showed up the next night. It is a 3+ year old bear with a 4-inch pad. After comparing it with the blackie that showed up the first night, I got excited!

UGAhunter · Jun 11, 2012

More bears on bait one, and four more getting hit now. Things are really getting hot now! How about the big brown bear? I want to hunt him.

UGAhunter · Jun 12, 2012

I took my 12 year old daughter up to hunt this small blackie for her first hunting day. He had been coming in pretty regularly for 4 days. We sat in a small ground blind.

After 3-4- hours, this is what we see:

He dove into the bait, facing us head on. She got the riffle up bracing for a 15 yard shot. I whispered in her ear "wait for him to turn broadside." After a few minutes, he stepped over the log and turned for a perfect shot.

"Where's your crosshairs?", I asked. "Right behind the shoulder" she responded. "Take him", I pleaded, all the while shaking profusely! "Calm down, and quit shaking, Dad", she responded. Then, "Boom!" The big fellow ran 72 feet before piling up.

Words can't describe how happy I was to be part of her first hunting success, and she bagged a great bear.

We came out just before dark and returned the next morning to take some more pics and retrieve the trophy bruin.

I believe...a family that hunts together stays together!

rmanwill · Jun 12, 2012

Congrats on all the bears, photos and most of the memories with freinds and family!!! Thanks for sharing.

Silentstalker · Jun 13, 2012

Awesome!! Congrats on a great bear!

UGAhunter · Jun 14, 2012

My wife Jenn is no novice when it comes to hunting; she has killed deer, elk, moose and antelope. However, she has never seen or killed a bear before. She decided she would only hunt with her bow, which she has never done before. She spent several weeks practicing and was quite confident she could make the shot.

We had this pretty bear hitting the bait in the evenings quite regular for 4 days, and she decided to hunt him.

Three days in a row she sat this site in a ground blind without seeing the bear. Our daughter sat with her since she already bagged the big brown bear. The first two nights he came after dark. The third night the bear did not hit the bait at all! She was getting a bit discouraged and was reluctant to sit another night at that site, but I was confident the bear would be back. She insisted this would be her last night sitting in the blind, but refused to take a rifle. The bear showed up around 8 PM, and she drilled him with a 125g Muzzy 3-blade. He went about 40 yards. We recovered him the next morning.

Nice job, Jenn!

Zeke · Jun 19, 2012

Great report and fun photos to see!
Zeke

UGAhunter · Jun 19, 2012

The same evening that Jenn got her bear, My father-in-law harvsted his. He was sitting on a quite active bait. These bears were coming at all times of the day and night, but were absolutely NOT nocturnal! He was hunting with his 44 magnum handgun. Here are a few pictures of the bears he was hunting.