I am considering a brown bear hunt. When would be the best opportunity to see bears, late may or a fall hunt in say mid september.
Any thoughts about pros/cons of either season.

Thanks as always for your opinions.

I see grizz around our place when there are patches of snow still on the summit. End of May is also when they are running down all the moose calves soon as they drop. You can bait in some GMU's and it is a tradition in many others.

Also when they are fishing, which varies due to run.

Hunt in the fall. bears are bigger in weight,less bugs and they are where the fish are...I hunted in spring and fall hunts a few times and the fall was better, you see alot more bears,you can go fishing for the salmon when completed and sometimes its better weather. Hides are even-no rubs but shorter fur and all the fall colors too...Have fun....

JCS,

You'll see more bears in fall. The coats are really not that much better in spring and in fall you are not playing roulette with the weather as far as bears being out of the den as you are in spring. I can offer you an exclent fall hunt with an average of 9' squared and 85% success. If you'd like more info send me your regular e-mail and I'll return pricing, references etc.

Regards,

Mark

I would have to say spring hunts are generally better than fall at lest where I live in Southeast Alaska. If I where looking at a hunt in Southeast I would look at the tenth of May till the end of the season which is the end of May.May the days are getting longer weather is usaully better than September(September it will be dark by nine May light till ten thirty). Boars start looking for sows late May which makes them stupid like any other game animal.The best hides are going to be spring hides although you will have to deal with rubbed hides some years.A lot depends on where you are going in Alaska and what kind of hunt you want . Fall hunts in southeast you walk the salmon streams and it can be close and personnel . Spring hunts you are spotting from a skiff and stalking within shooting range.
James Phillips
Guide Southeast Alaska

+1 for fall bears. The only real negative for fall over spring is the bugs.

I say Fall when the the streams and rivers are stuffed with salmon. I prefers size to hair lengh. I hunted the Tsiu with Sam Fejes and had an awesome time chasing Brownies on the river.

What is the latest FALL dates that I guy could still expect decent brown bear action?

Chopper 12,

The latest hunt we offer is 1-10 Oct. After that the ponds and lakes may start to freeze quite quickly making getting around difficult and the bears will be on the way to denning.

Mark

Interesting post as I am flying out tomorrow on a brown bear hunt. I hunted last June (09) on the Copper River and in ten days never saw a single bear of any kind. Very disheartening, of course. I very much needed to go back and do it again but was reluctant to go and have the same kind of thing happen. There are several guys that post on here that I have communicated with .. but I finally decided on an outfit suggested by another poster ... The silver salmon are supposed to have a great run this year and that was what made up my mind ... So I shall update this information in the middle of September when I get back ... Over the years I have gone on a fair number of hunts that I heard about from AR ... Fabulous leopard hunt in Namibia and the young PH got quite a bit of follow up business as a result .. a water buffalo hunt in Oz where the outfitter damn near starved us to death .. and by saving a $100 in groceries lost many thousands of dollars in follow up clients .. (the hunting was fabulous .. )Great Cameroon self guided hunt .. etc. etc ...

Cheers !

Scruffy

My Cabin is 6 miles from Copper river. Seeing bears during the different fish runs is hit or miss until the Reds run in July. I will average seeing 20 plus bears per day after July 10.
By mid September the bears begin thinning out as the weather is getting colder.
Longshot

Longshot ..

That is so very interesting to me. Starting in April and ending with my hunt .. in 40 days of hunting the Copper River in 20009 the guide and his client (s) saw only 4 or 5 bears in total if I recall correctly ... Timing is everything ... Cheers !!!

Scruffy

Scruffy

Good Luck---Following you out on Sept 10th

Save a big brownie for me.

kodiak brown bear don't open until oct 25th, i've shot bears well into november down there.
see more bears in the spring there than i do in the fall. vegetation is down in the spring.
same with grizzly hunting the berries..a hot sow will trump food almost every time...

Got back from my second brown bear hunt in Alaska. I still have not seen a brown bear. No blueberries in that area and the river was so high from all of the summer rain that the silvers kept on going .. My guide also got lost the first day which is a bit disheartening for all concerned .. I was extemely upset by this, of course. These are not cheap hunts by any stretch of the imagination. The manager and one of the owners both approached me the day after the hunt ended and invited me back next year ...free hunt .. Total class act. I am a hard negotiator and offered them some shekels ... the deal was struck and I will be back next September 1st ... How bad can one's luck be ???

Scruffy,

Your going to give these guys the impression that brown bear hunting is hard. Not even seeing a bear is extremely uncommon. I did have a guy that on a spring hunt did not see a bear because he was too early or the spring was late however you want to look at but that is very rare. I can't imagine not having a shot opportunity let alone not seeing bears on a fall hunt. If you book an area having a healthy bear population you'll see bears and lots of bears.

Mark

You sound like a booking agent.

Richard

Just flew out of camp and saw yur comments

Yes it was a tough year for us. Although the other hunter in camp while you were there did kill and saw a number of Bears your hunt was disheartening. I hope you are excited about coming back with us. We did harvest a couple more good Bears and had a couple missed opportunities but we want to have you come back for another shot on us.
Also The weather turned terrible. Over 70 degrees for the Last 9 days with temps in the sun running over 80 degrees. Made for some tough hunting

I wish you well this winter and see you next fall.

Doug Klunder
NWA

Hi, Doug !

Not much a person can do about the weather and that is a fact. And luck, of course. While I could not get a sighting of a darn bear anywhere, Ed from Iowa who was hunting in the same area was seeing bears every day and saw a total of 10 in 5 days with three opportunities and got that boar on day 5. A very nice guy and I was thrilled for him. The food was fabulous and lots of it ... great folks running the comfortable camp .. excellent gear .. it was all good. Very interesting guys who were there on their 11 day moose hunt and that is always fun to chat with other aficionados of this drive that some of us hunters have ... I am really excited about coming back next fall .. and as I said in a previous post - you guys are a class act. Next September, however, I am leaving my high end Helly Hansen rain gear at home and bringing my custom made rain gear ,, made up mostly of smoked bacon ... I have my reasons ...

We are looking forward to having you as well.

We will lick that Mojo and get this thing done for you.

Wish I could have had more time to visit with you personally but with the crew we had in camp I was overwhelmed.
You yourself are a class act and it will be great when we get that Bear killed. I like the Bacon suit. Pretty good Idea.

Take care buddy