Took me all day to figure out how to work the picture feature, and you unlucky fellows now have to see my ugly mug!

[This message has been edited by judgeg (edited 05-09-2001).]

Beautiful bear. Judging by what appears to be black spruce in the background I would swear you up by my cabin on LAKE WINNIPEG.Did you stalk him or use a bait, Either way he's a great trophy and taken with a recurve. Congrats..Magua

Magua,
The answer is "Both".
I first shot him over bait, though he could have cared less about food. He was sow hunting and didn't even look twice at the bait. His gut was empty and his intestines looked twisted like a rubber band on a model airplane. But that's getting ahead of myself. O.K. a shot high... though it looked good at the time... Then.... I stalked him. My first arrow went high through one lung and down the far front leg, leaving no exit hole. After the first shot, I watched him run for 125 yards and thought I saw him fall. With a little too much confidence, I walked over to where he was lying "dead" and found him full of piss and vinegar. He ran out of sight and I slipped up on him again. Right as I was about to put another arrow in him, my portable VHF radio in my pack went to making noise (I had forgotten to turn it off when I got out of the boat) and he went out of sight again. After turning off the radio, I circled the heavy brush into which he had disappeared and approached from the downwind side. I found him standing, looking at his back track and put an arrow from his last rib to his sternum. Even though he fell instantly, I shot him a couple of more times before I got closer. I'm not too smart sometimes, I guess, but I'd about figured out that this bear was a little angry at me. Sometimes you get the bear, and sometimes he gets you.

I was up near Lynn Lake. I'll be coming through Winnipeg, driving that way on June 14th or 15th. Can I buy you a cup of coffee?

[This message has been edited by judgeg (edited 05-09-2001).]

Details! Tell the tale, looks like you earned the right!

Congrats,
Don

You want some details... o.k., hope I don't bore (boar) you too much.

I was hunting with a group of friends with an outfitter called Lynn Lake Fly-In Outpost Camps. We pick a lake every year and fly a float plane in and fish and hunt bears. I've done it for 9 or the last 10 years. We had 14 foot Lunds with 8hp motors on the lake, were staying in tents and were about 50 miles from the roadhead at Lynn Lake. G. Fred Asbell (President of Pope & Young) was with us on this trip. On Saturday evening shortly after flying in, I portaged a canoe to a smaller lake and opened a bait with a bacon burn and left a bag of molasses and oats in a crib of stacked logs. When I came back on Sunday afternoon, all 50 pounds were gone and several trees were raked with claw marks. I put up a stand and tried to sleep that night. Sure enough, when I got in the stand on Monday, bears started coming from everywhere. A pretty good boar tried to get in the tree with me... I had stupidly put my stand right below the bacon burn site and the whole tree smelled like a Double Bacon Cheese Burger. The 300 pounder (who wanted to either mate me or eat me, I couldn't decide which) kept coming and going to the bait and my tree, very nervously. I figured a bigger, dominant bear was around. I wasn't wrong. The 300# bear just, all of a sudden, hauled butt. Then the big one came. I didn't want to shoot him. I didn't want to take his picture. I didn't even want to be in the same Province with him. I just wanted my mama. He looked like a Volkswagen. He came by the bait and didn't even look at it, except to wind a little, then he came to my tree, stood on his hind legs and sniffed my feet. He could reach that high without even stretching out much. I was trying to be anything but a sow in heat or a interloper boar. I asked Scotty to beam me up. He couldn't have cared less. He just pissed and started walking away. At 18 or so yards he turned to look at the bait and I shot him, thinking that I made the perfect shot. What I forgot was that he had climbed a little hill and was about level with me and the arrow had no downward angle. I guess it deflected some on the bottom of his spine and went down into his far shoulder/leg. I'm should have waited an hour or so to go find him, but I was sure I had seen him fall. As I said, even a blind hog finds an acorn, sometimes.

When we measured his hide, we didn't even pull it tight and it squared over 7'6". Fred said it was the biggest bear he had ever seen. I sure was the biggest I have ever seen or shot. That's it. It was a real thrill.

The picture really doesn't do the bear justice. I'm 6'2" and weigh 260. I had already gutted the bear when the picture was taken the next morning. You can get a pretty good idea how big he was by comparing his head size to the width of my shoulders, and remember, this ain't no Chuck Adams picture.. for those of us who know what that means.

[This message has been edited by judgeg (edited 05-09-2001).]

Way cool story, and a heck of a nice looking bear. Congrats! X-Ring

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Freedom wasn't free. Today they want our guns. What will they want tommorow?

judgeg,

I'd a been hollerin' for mama!

Great job,
Don

First the turkey, and now a bear, you are off to a good year in 2001, congratulations.

Duane,
Just have a big ol' buck waiting for me in North Dakota with I get up there in November!
We're still on for supper, right? I may still be sending you the .404.

Excellent adventure and I'm really impressed that you tracked him and put him down. If theres one thing fat bears don't do well is leave a good blood trail when they don't have great ventilation. Yes I would enjoy a coffee with you, so I will e-mail you my phone number. Till then have a safe trip and if Asbell is still around I use his Ramhorn longbow and its the sweetest bow I've ever shot.Till then...Magua

Supper is still a go on this end, and I will see what I can do about that 140" buck!