12 May 2004, 22:44
Russell E. TaylorMy Hunt for Brown Bear
Well... it's taken me a day or two to work up typing this out, since it has a bear-less ending. Regardless, I feel I owe it to those of you who frequent this site as I do to share what I learned and how things went.
I went to a place in GMU 16B that was, to be honest, a fairly decent area for bears. I want to make that clear up front.
I flew into Anchorage and caught a shuttle/limo ride to Palmer on 29 May 04. I was due to fly out to the base camp the next day, but fog made that impossible. Later in the day, things cleared up enough that the outfitter and my guide were able to make it out to get things set up; I would fly out, weather permitting, the next day.
The next morning, I was able to fly out. The weather was clear. I arrived at the camp to find that there was a boar, or "dry sow," already spotted. This was unbelievably good news. Two other hunters flew in a few hours after me and, after a coin toss -- which I actually won (tails) -- I would head out the next morning with my guide to put a stalk on the bear and make the kill.
The next morning, the bear was still there. The day before had been sunny and he/she had been out sunning himself/herself, playing around, and sleeping. On "hunt day," however, it was somewhat overcast. Still, the bear was there and we pulled out. It was an all-day ordeal. If you have dabbled around in the "hilly regions" of 16B, you have a fair idea of what I mean. After several hours, we were on the den with a good spot for shooting. Doing a lase to the den read 235 yards. It was about as close as we'd get, but WELL within my capabilities as well as those of my rifle and loads (.416 Remington Magnum with 370-grain North Forks and 81 grains of RL-15 over a 215M primer). I had a ROCK-steady (!!!) sitting position, shooting downhill. Charles Whitman never had it so good.
No bear.
We waited for hours. Fog had been rolling in and rolling out. Perhaps the weather encouraged the bear to finally move on. He/she had probably been at the end of his/her "wake up" time -- perhaps having been up and about for four to six days before people started flying in. We probably just caught him/her at the end of his/her "it's time to bug out of here" wake-up period. Regardless, for whatever reason, the bear was gone. We made the LONG trek, up and down the "hills," and got back pretty late at night. I was pretty well soaked with sweat and was dead beat. I took all the next day off. It was MY hunt and MY money and I took all the next day off. Short of spending 24 hours a day on a stairclimber for about three months prior to leaving Illinois, I don't know how any mortal can get in shape for something like this. My guide, however... Derek... is the exception. Truly super human, stronger than all get out, and with stamina that would make a healthy ox look anemic. I don't think Derek's pulse ever got over 60 at any time during our days of hunting. He hauls logs around with his bare hands, or something like that, as some kind of "lumber guy" for his regular job. Anyway, I wasn't in that kind of shape and never will be. Still, I never quit. I'm sure I'm part pitbull or something, but I just kept going. First time I ever used my .416 Remington Magnum as a walking stick, but it worked.
Also, some of you will wonder why I didn't go after the bear when I landed in camp. You can't fly and hunt in the same day in Alaska, as most of you know -- but I thought I'd share this for those who were unaware. I knew the deal, though. Anyway, that's why I didn't go out the day I got there. Regardless, I got to see a fairly decent brown bear, either a boar or a dry sow. If a boar, he was probably about six years old, perhaps a shade younger. Big enough for shooting, though, and I most definitely didn't feel overgunned for the job.
To continue... day after day, Derek was up at the crack of dawn -- which in itself is a misleading statement, since it never really got dark enough to have a "dawn"... or a "dusk," either, for that matter. This is the "daylight" time of year up that way. Plus, we had a full moon -- for which I was glad, coming back so late at night that first day of hunting. Anyway, Derek would get up early, well before my muscles would even contemplate movement, and head out to find bears for myself and the other two hunters. Derek just LOVES "doing" things. You can't keep the guy planted, except when he's spotting. The guy can find bears, though. However, all that was left seemed to be sows with cubs. One had three... which turned out, after a few days, to actually be FOUR cubs (!), and another had three cubs. They were a gazillion miles away, but we'd watch them in our spotting scopes. Pretty neat.
Anyway... day after day, the weather kept warming up and the snow went away more and more. The concept is, of course, to do a Spring hunt with nothing but snow everywhere you look, using your spotting scope to find little black specks on the white landscape. These little black specks are the dens, of course, of bears coming out of hibernation. You evaluate whether it's a "shooter bear" or not, and proceed accordingly. It didn't work out this way, on my trip, but "that's hunting" -- and, as such, you take what you get.
The snow was melting away daily. It was so warm... well, I got sunburned pretty badly, as did Derek, that's how warm it was. If you remember Clint Eastwood crossing the desert as the prisoner of Eli Wallach in "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly"... well, that's about how bad I was burned. I'm peeling as I type this. Quite a sight, I assure you -- and I don't mean a pretty one. (Since I've been back, and people who see me are shocked about my being sunburned, they keep saying "I thought you were going to ALASKA!" -- meaning, as opposed to some sunny place like Tahiti or wherever. They don't understand how I could get so sunburned. To date, I've just been telling them that, when you're in the mountains of Alaska, you're a lot closer to the sun. This puzzles them to the point of shutting them up, which is my intent, and the subject is dropped.)
After six days of decreasing snow and increasing brown-ness everywhere... all the harder to spot brown furry critters with claws bebopping along, I said "enough" and cancelled the remaining 10 days of my hunt. You can drown a dead horse but you can't make it drink. Staying day after day wasn't going to get any better. Mainly, for where we were, the "shooter bears" were long gone.
Were I to do a Spring hunt in Alaska again, for brown bears, I'd do it in April... either weeks one and two, or two and three -- probably the latter. Personally, I feel that "all white" is the way to go. Find the little black specks and go accordingly. Also, it's colder -- which means the snow isn't so bad to work through. It's just Hell using snowshoes when they sink in the snow up to your knees or crotch... and NOT using them in such wet, "soft" snow is insane. Nope, got to have snowshoes. Cold weather, white landscape, firm snow, find the little black specks. That's the deal for a Spring brownie hunt.
I'll be doing a Fall hunt as something of a second chance in the next three years, at a reduced cost. The outfitter is pretty good about things like this.
The other two hunters, older than I am and not up to climbing the mountains Derek and I were climbing, also said "enough" and flew out the day after I did. It was a no-win situation, unless fate intervened and a bear walked through camp. Possible, but not realistic. Further, anything any of us would have seen would have been, in all honesty, virtually unstalkable due to the terrain conditions. A slow-walking bear still moves a lot faster than most people can jog, let along stalk -- with and without using snowshoes, climbing, getting stuck, and so on.
Fall. I'll have at it again some Fall. Over spawning salmon. (Yeah, right. I'm sure that won't go as easy as it seems. I got quite an education on doing Fall hunts for brownies while I was up there; still, I think doing bears over salmon is the way I'll go from now on.)
I learned a LOT about hunting brown bears in the Spring in Alaska on this trip, so I do not count the time as "wasted." I learned a lot about what to bring for clothes and gear and what to leave at home. I learned a lot from the vast experiences of the other two hunters in camp, who have hunted moose and caribou in Alaska. I learned a lot of things. It wasn't a wasted trip.
Anyway, I came back in (a Super Cub was the "bush" transportation on this trip) late last Friday. Had my heart set on a pizza, but the only place that delivers in Palmer stops delivering at 2230 hours and I called as soon as I got to a telephone once I was back at the B&B where I was staying... 2231 hours. Nope, they "STOP" delivering at 2230 hours. I'm a lot more tolerant in my post-Iraq old age, so I just said "okay, thanks" and hung up. I ordered pizza the next afternoon, after I woke up. I showered, got in touch with Northwest Airlines, and got an earlier flight home for the next day so I could take Mom out for Mother's Day (which didn't happen because of some lousy weather in Minneapolis, but that's another story). I received some very nice offers from some fine folks from this forum to do things in Anchorage at the end of my hunt but, with changing flight days and such, it just wasn't to be. I hope to meet up with those folks eventually, though, when I go back for my Fall hunt... perhaps in 2006 or 2007.
Anyway, that's it. Got home after driving all night with four other guys who got screwed out of their flight, too. We chipped in to rent a minivan and three of them drove throughout the night so we could GET HOME.
Tidbits:
The TuffPak I took was great. Made getting around MUCH easier.
NWA in Moline wanted to see the guns (rifle and revolver) and have me show them they were empty. No problem.
NWA in Anchorage, coming home, couldn't have cared less whether I had a recoilless rifle in my TuffPak or not. After opening it up for inspection, the old lady behind the counter said she didn't need to see the guns. Whatever.
NWA in Moline took my two pieces of luggage (TuffPak and my Kifaru Rendezvous backpack) with no problem.
NWA in Anchorage slapped me for $50 extra per item, $100 total, for the same stuff. Go figure. "Overweight" they said. Interesting, I told them, since it was the SAME stuff I did NOT pay $100 for coming TO Alaska. Whatever. I paid the money. These days, arguing with personnel at airline counters gets you labeled as a terrorist, thrown in jail with a big guy named "Bubba" who has more testosterone than he knows what to do with, and it just isn't worth it to get into a disagreement with people working at the airport. I paid the extra $100.
Well, that's it. I know non-hunters will ask me, "For that kind of money, aren't you guaranteed a bear?" My feeling is, if you're guaranteed a bear, it isn't hunting. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. It was hunting.
Next month... black bear in Manitoba. Stay tuned.
Take care.
Russ
