Alright, now that we got the legal disclaimer out of the way.... This was my first year bear hunting. In Minnesota, you have to put in for a lottery, and you average a tag once every four years, give or take. Once we knew we had a tag, my Dad began baiting for bear, which is perfectly legal, and typically needed to have a chance at success.
Since the bear had not shown up on trail cam until after 11AM, I went on stand at 0900 the first day.
Say hello to my 'howitzer'. A lever action 45-70, loaded with 430 Grain Hard Cast Lead bullets that shoot at a hair under 2000 feet per second. I could hunt Cape Buffalo with that cartridge, so we know its overkill for black bear. But y'all know what I think about Overkill....
My Dad started saving all the spent casings from the deer that have been shot out of this stand. One of those was fired by me, another by FSFB, the rest by Pops. It was built in '08:
If you look dead center, and then halfway left, you can see a salt block. The bait was around there:
If it had been deer season, I would have taken a seven point buck (not as impressive as it sounds, younger deer, decent rack) within five minutes of being on stand. This is a picture from FSFB's stand, to give you an idea on how active the deer were day one.... That's the deer stand I'm on during deer season, for some reason.
So, day one, we saw a lot of a deer. ALOT. No bear though. We went off stand at 7:45PM, because back where I am, once the sun goes down, it gets dark quick.
Day two, we got on stand around 0800. Saw plenty of deer in the morning, but not nearly as many in the afternoon. Around 6PM, I heard one snorting up a storm off in the distance, never did find out what he/she was snorting at. Then it started raining. We were starting to wonder if the bear only came out on nice sunny days, since the pictures we have of them only occurred on nice days. So at this point I'm getting grumpy because of the weather. 7:15PM I'm starting to say Fuck it, and start packing up my stand, knowing the next day the weather is going to be absolute shit. Just as I'm about ready to exit my stand, I look out and see a black head sticking out right by where the aforementioned salt block is.
I muttered sonnofabitch, and shouldered my rifle. The bear took two steps, turned, and plopped down at the bait, facing me. So, the bear is lying down, setting up shop, looking right in my direction. I really didn't want to take a head shot with that howitzer, because it would've destroyed the skull, and then taken out half the back straps (the NY strip loins). I gave it a few seconds, then the bear sat up, looking in my direction at a slight angle. Well, I aimed below the skull and to the right which is a small window where you can take out one of the lungs. I fired, and the bear rolled over its head and to the side three times. Halfway through the roll I had a second round chambered, and had the scope back on him by the time he finished his roll. He was dead before he started the roll and absolutely motionless.
Well, the light is fading fast, and its raining, so now its time for the messy part. Even though I knew the bear was dead dead dead, we approached with our rifles to collect him five minutes after the shot. Yep, dead.
The shot entered the bear's front right quarter (shoulder), turned one lung to hamburger, and exited the animal with no damage to the back straps. The front quarter, well, that was mostly hamburger, too. I chose the round that I did so if I got a broadside shot (the preferred shot for hunting), I could put a round through both shoulders and the lungs, anchoring (killing) the bear on the spot. When you hunt bear, you want to used heavy bullets that retain their shape and energy for maximum penetration. Yes, the round and gun I used was overkill.
Beginning field dressing:
After dressing the deer, we dragged him up to the trail head, about 100 yards. 200 pounds of dead weight gets old quick. Pops showed up with the tractor and trailer and we threw it in their and hiked back home. Hung it up in the garage just to get the weight:
I really shouldn't have forgotten my ball cap....
When we skin deer, we leave it hanging, because you just end up cutting the feet off when you're done. Since we wanted the skins and paws for a rug, we laid it back down and got to skinning....
The heart and liver were saved to be cooked / dehydrated into dog treats.
Finished product, which is now on its way to a taxidermist in Prescott:
Pops and FSFB then took the skin down to the house to cool it off. The well water is a balmy 41F, so they sprayed the hide down. While they were doing that, I removed three of the four quarters (the front left was not really salvageable), back straps, and tenderloins. No pictures of the process, but as you can see the entire process can get a touch messy...
The back straps and tenderloins we'll cook up, and I'm thinking of just deboning the quarters and having sausage / sticks made out of it.
I'm beat, think its time for a beer, since I'm on Vacation until Thursday.