Hey all! I have secured some private ground in N. Idaho that we have seen a few black bears on, I have never baited for black bears.

I think I have the general ideas down, dig hole, big sealed metal drum with some holes in it, I have also secured all of the fryer grease I could ever want from a friend who owns a restaraunt. Cover the "bait bin" with snags or branches etc. and wait. Any ideas or tips beyond that would be appreciated.

IV

Bears will tote off a drum full of grease in a heartbeat. Make sure that it's chained to something. Most folks will build a crib around the bait to cause the bear to give a quartering shot.. Just a "V" shaped pile of logs, etc., with the drum at the bottom of the "V" so the bear has to present you his vitals. You, of course, are watching from the open part of the "V".

Another good idea is to nail a tin of fishy cat food on the south side of a tree right by the bait. Make sure it drips some. Put it about 8 feet high and if the bear can reach it without climbing, you've got you a really good 'un. Also, you can check the bark and determine color phase, etc by collecting the hair that will be rubbed off in the effort to get at the tin.

I sweep clean the area around the bait so I can measure the track size, also.

You are right about covering up the bait so lesser animals and birds can't get to the give you the idea that a bear's been there when it was just coons or ravens or something. Make the bear tear through a few limbs... You should be able to see his teeth marks in the grease... claw marks, too.

To "open up" a bait I usually get a five gallon bucket and put fish guts, old meat and whatever may stink, and, securely putting the top on, I let it sit in the sun for a couple of weeks... then, unopenned, I take it to the bait sight, cut a hole in the top (darn, it'll gag a maggot) and put an old tee shirt in the top touching the foul liquid... like a wick. I then get a long stick or pole and hook the can to the top and gingerly raise it up about 12 feet and let it rest against a tree so that the smell will wick out. If there are bears down wind, they will come and once they've found the grease, etc. you're in business!

Another trick is to pour grease in the "V" of the crib so that bears will get it all over their feet and track it wherever they go. Any bear that crosses the track will backtrack to see what the heck is with all that smelly grease.

Probably because I like sweets, but it does seem to work, I put out candy... I just chunk out a hand full of strawberry and grape stuff that you can get for $2.00 a bag at Walmart. I've watched bears roll giant boulders just to get a tiny bit of sour apple taffy.

I often sweeten up baits with a sack of oats and a can of molassas... or even pancake surrip. Just mix the sweet stuff all over the grains and bears will love it. It's easy to carry to the bait because it isn't a gooie mess like grease.. but it doesn't smell that much, so grease is better for a start and the sweets and grain is just to keep them there.

Good luck!

In Wis. We are very limited to the type and amount of bait we can use. Here w can't not use more then 10 gallons and can not be meat ect.

We dig a hole about 18" square and dump the bait in that cover it with a section of tree. I use anise oil for scent. It normally takes about 2 days to get a bear to come in. Just keep feeding them and you well get to shoot one.

I would mix the fryer oil with some corn and sun flower seeds or cheap dog food. Maybe throw a couple of handfuls of sugar on every 50 lbs or so. The bears eat very seed when I bait like that.

One only needs a couple of drops of anise oil every other day or so to get them to come in.

I will use a drag made of a rag with anise oil, diluted with mineral oil. If you can grasp what I am saying, say you walk in a mile to your bait you have created a good scent trail. And also by covering up the barrelopening with limbs, about wrist size,and such, say when you leave the bait, and return the next day, you can look from a distance with bino's to see if it has been hit. You can also use the barrel size as a judge as to how big the bear is. We always used plastic 40 gallon barrels. Chained to a tree, layed on its side, with a hole about 1 foot square cut in the end, like a dog house. Then we cover the barrel with brush and put limbs over the opening. Like Judge G says it keeps the birds out. I would also hang a gallon plastic jug in a tree near the bait, filled with the oil/anise mix. Poke a tiny hole so it drains slowly. Hang it so a big bear can't quite reach it. Just more scent! You might dribble the grease as you walk in, walk in places you can see tracks like in a muddy area. Then when you return you can see if anything has followed and left a print. As a rule of thumb, a 5 inch wide track is close to a 6 foot bear.

Good Luck and let us know what you get!

quote:

Hey all! I have secured some private ground in N. Idaho that we have seen a few black bears on, I have never baited for black bears.

I think I have the general ideas down, dig hole, big sealed metal drum with some holes in it, I have also secured all of the fryer grease I could ever want from a friend who owns a restaraunt. Cover the "bait bin" with snags or branches etc. and wait. Any ideas or tips beyond that would be appreciated.

IV

_______

IV,

If you're travelling light and want to hit several areas, try a case of liquid smoke (4-6oz bottles) and 6, or so bottles of oil of anise (Durkee). They like it and it's easy to do and spread + a little of each goes a long ways. Throw in a infrequent predator call (screaming rabbit and fawn bleat).

DB

Another trick I have used is Jello, Buy several fruit flavors and scatter it all around the area. It puts up a cloud of fruit scent, I always did this before getting in the stand. I used butcher scraps for several years and it worked proably the best of everything I tried. Day old bakery is a close second. I have a buddy that owns several Mcdonalds and he uses the left over food..It is outstanding.

Thanks for the replies so far, those all sound like excellent ideas.

Another question, how often should I plan on rebaiting? Can I set it up and go out every 2-3 days, and plan on bringing new bait every other trip or....?

Can people leave them unattended for 7 days or more?

IV

IV,

If it doesn't rain real hard, the bottled liquid smoke and anise oil last a long while. To where they eat the logs or eat a hole in the ground going after it. With heavy rains I'd just guess the solid stuff mentioned here would be much better.

Elkman, I'm going to bring along some kool aid packets next time just for grins.

DB

Had good luck with beef suet, doesn't spoil as fast, collected day old pastries--they request them.
We too initiated baits with a grease (fryer) trail--you don't need to use rotten meat for them to find a bait. Honey burns too.
Use a timer on each bait to weed out the early risers no sense in working too hard at bear camp.

I would bait every other day up to a week before season. Then I like to bait every day. But a lot of this depends on how much bait one can put out.

Like I daid before we are limited to 10 gallons in Wis a couble of bears can clean that up in a night.

I like to bait at the same time each day. The bears come to expect it. If you bait at the time you will eventually take the stand, you may well be surprised to see the bear come in immediately to check thing out (thinking you've baited and left as always before).

Another thing... once you have a bear(s) coming, focus your bait where you can see to shoot, either with bow or gun. If you have "stuff" all around, a bear may hang up on a tidbit and never get to your shooting lane.

This is not baiting, per se. You might want to put something down that you can see from your stand that you can use as a size reference. I find it somewhat difficult to gauge bears. Having a known refernce next to a bait would sure help.

-Steve

More important than what to bait with is where to bait.

You are going to have to do a lot scouting. I would suggest that if you can, you run at least 3 bait setups. They should be several miles apart. They should be near a wet area. They should be on or near an active bear trail. If you can find a "bear tree" so much the better. DO NOT put your bait next to that tree. A 100 yards away is better. A bear tree is used by a boar. He marks the tree and leaves scent. This is used to warn off other males and to attract females. If a female is interested, she will rub against the tree.

You need to check the baits everyday, hopefully at the same time. Take a bottle of anise that you can spray. Once you finish baiting, spray the tree and surrounding area. In effect, you are conditioning the bear(s). After a while, the anise acts like a dinner bell. Most good trapping suppliers can provide anise. If you need a source try: http://www.bearscents.com/SCENTS.html

Take the anise on stand with you. Occasionally, spray touch around you. Do not spray it on you.

The grease is a good idea. Cooking oil is also good. The bear gets in on their paws. They then leave a scent trail back to the bait.

In most cases, the larger, more dominant bear will come later in the day. Often times, with baiting, the largest bears show up after legal shooting hours. But you can never be sure.

Again. Do a lot of scouting. Where to bait is much more important.

Good luck with your hunt.

quote:

Originally posted by IdahoVandal:
Hey all! I have secured some private ground in N. Idaho that we have seen a few black bears on, I have never baited for black bears.

I think I have the general ideas down, dig hole, big sealed metal drum with some holes in it, I have also secured all of the fryer grease I could ever want from a friend who owns a restaraunt. Cover the "bait bin" with snags or branches etc. and wait. Any ideas or tips beyond that would be appreciated.

IV

Bears will eat pretty much anything. I have used bakery (doughnuts, buns, etc.), candy, chips, ... Another item a hunting buddy of mine used was popcorn. It's cheap and the bears ate it up. You want to make sure they can't carry away what you put out and popcorn fits into that category. It also forces them to hang around the bait for a long time as they pick it up kernel by kernel.


Good luck,
Doug

Motor oil. Bears love petroleum products. Pour some on the ground and they will come back for years digging a hole.

Peanut butter

Popular baits in Canada:

#1 BEAVER CARCASS

I learned quickly that there are 2 very different schools of thought on bear baiting.

1) Little is better.
2) As much as possible is better.

I'm looking at a hunt in far north Manitoba where the bears hibernate for 7 months. They are starving when they wake up. But the outfitter puts as little as a gallon of food in the bait barrel per trip (which is daily). The scent is there and fresh but many bears come in and there's no food left. This makes them come in earlier and earlier, thus, the hunter sees more bears. I've seen the videos, and talked with references...not one complaint.

On the other hand, I went hunting in Maine last Sept, where the guides dumped a 5 gallon bucket of mixed bait daily. It was cleaned daily too, but I saw 2 bears in 4 days.

Baits used: fryer grease, any sweet cakes you can imagine, donuts, butcher scraps, animal fat of any kind, (LARD), Lobster scraps, bread, buns, sugar beats, peanut butter, the list goes on.

But the number one bear attractant I've seen is beaver carcass in a burlap sack tied high in a tree for scent. To get a bear started on a bait site, I've seen outfitters use a "stink" bait. Ex. about 2 dozen rotten eggs that have been sealed in a 5 gal. tub dumped within 30-40 yards of the barrel...really raunchy, but it sure brings them in.