Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby dan » Fri Apr 14, 2017 6:36 am

Darkknight54 wrote:
Jim Wallner wrote:Only two times have I seen consistent beds. Because of bait and drought, low water.

Ok so a say a bear that isn't being hunted or baited could just roam randomly year to year across the state? As in there is no "home range"?
Great info Jim! Thanks for the info

I think the only way to have consistent success without bait is to hunt them at a food source... That would probably make Jim laugh after hunting the same ground as him. Food there is really spread out. But I have seen bears on consistent patterns around corn fields and apple orchards and even isolated oaks dropping acorns...


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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Bearman13 » Fri Apr 14, 2017 9:27 am

I do know people who hunt them where the bears are feeding in corn. The sit far back off the trails leading in.
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Bearman13 » Fri Apr 14, 2017 9:30 am

I could be wrong but, I think that window is a small one as the bear only hit the corn when it's milking? Maybe someone else knows more. There's not a cornfield for 200 miles around here
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby dan » Fri Apr 14, 2017 9:37 am

Jim Wallner wrote:I could be wrong but, I think that window is a small one as the bear only hit the corn when it's milking? Maybe someone else knows more. There's not a cornfield for 200 miles around here

An old bear hunting friend who is to old to go anymore used to hunt West central Minnesota in the non-quota zone. Him and his buddy leased a farm every year and each tagged out just hunting the feeding pattern opening week each year they hunted, even when it was a 2 bear limit. But they were not picky on what they shot.
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Bearpawon » Mon Jan 15, 2018 11:16 am

Awesome thread!
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby OldMtnMan » Tue Jan 16, 2018 4:54 am

If there's no hair or scat. How do you know it's a bear bed?
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Horizontal Hunter » Tue Jan 16, 2018 8:26 am

OldMtnMan wrote:If there's no hair or scat. How do you know it's a bear bed?


I feel it's a bear bed there should be hair there.

No baiting allowed here during the season and for 10 days prior to the opener. No burns either. For that reason mostof the bear shot here are on corn fields and apple orchards. You also get some during the deer shotgun season as they opened a third bear season to run concurrently with the two week shotgun season.

I have read, and re-read The Ultimate Guide to Black Bear Huning by Doug Boze who is a member here (Saylean). In the book he talks extensively about calling black bear in with preadator calls and I am looking forward to spending some of our early season using a caller.

Bob
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby OldMtnMan » Tue Jan 16, 2018 8:41 am

Horizontal Hunter wrote:
OldMtnMan wrote:If there's no hair or scat. How do you know it's a bear bed?


I feel it's a bear bed there should be hair there.

No baiting allowed here during the season and for 10 days prior to the opener. No burns either. For that reason mostof the bear shot here are on corn fields and apple orchards. You also get some during the deer shotgun season as they opened a third bear season to run concurrently with the two week shotgun season.

I have read, and re-read The Ultimate Guide to Black Bear Huning by Doug Boze who is a member here (Saylean). In the book he talks extensively about calling black bear in with preadator calls and I am looking forward to spending some of our early season using a caller.

Bob


Bob,

We have it even worse here. Too high an altitude to have crops. So, we only have natural food since we can't use bait and hounds. Other than the greenery which is more a spring/summer food. We have acorns and berries. Most of the berries are gone before bear season. Acorns are every other year and not all areas have them. Mine doesn't. I use a muzzleloader with iron sights, so I need to get close. That eliminates spot and stalk with long shots.

Calling is an option and has some success, but bears need to be in the area. They can travel for 20+ miles in the fall and we need some luck to call one in . My area has about 300 hunters and only one bear is killed each year.

I hunt for elk and deer for meat and bear for the challenge and a challenge it is.
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Horizontal Hunter » Tue Jan 16, 2018 9:34 am

OldMtnMan wrote:
We have it even worse here. Too high an altitude to have crops. So, we only have natural food since we can't use bait and hounds. Other than the greenery which is more a spring/summer food. We have acorns and berries. Most of the berries are gone before bear season. Acorns are every other year and not all areas have them. Mine doesn't. I use a muzzleloader with iron sights, so I need to get close. That eliminates spot and stalk with long shots.

Calling is an option and has some success, but bears need to be in the area. They can travel for 20+ miles in the fall and we need some luck to call one in . My area has about 300 hunters and only one bear is killed each year.

I hunt for elk and deer for meat and bear for the challenge and a challenge it is.


You definitely have it worse. No hounds here as well.

I have always just gotten the tag ($5.00 tag here) and figure if I see one great and if I don't that's ok too. I planned on focusing on them during the early season last September but I hunted very little last season as I am having trouble getting around. That's why I am focusing more on calling so they may come my way. If not I am always happy to take out a yote or maybe bobcat in season. I have had opportunities with bobcat but I haven't shot one. I enjoy watching them too much.

Hopefully this year will be better. Time will tell.

Bob
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby OldMtnMan » Tue Jan 16, 2018 9:53 am

What a lot of guys do here is sit on a gut pile for a bear. For some odd reason Colorado doesn't consider that baiting as long as you don't move the gut pile from the kill site. So, a lot of guys will use their elk or deer kill to bait a bear. I still consider it baiting, so I pass on doing it.

Different strokes and all that.
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Horizontal Hunter » Tue Jan 16, 2018 12:24 pm

OldMtnMan wrote:What a lot of guys do here is sit on a gut pile for a bear. For some odd reason Colorado doesn't consider that baiting as long as you don't move the gut pile from the kill site. So, a lot of guys will use their elk or deer kill to bait a bear. I still consider it baiting, so I pass on doing it.

Different strokes and all that.


Interesting. I wouldn't have thought of that.

This is the way the reg is written here. Pretty much covers it. I watch the bear bombs fly off the shelf of our Cabelas, BassPro, and DSG ; and just shake my head.

Bait means any natural or artificial substance, including but not restricted to, shucked or unshucked corn or other grains, apples or other fruits or vegetables, honey, molasses, anise or other spices, pastries or other breadstuffs, meat or fish products, or any other substances or products which may be fed upon, ingested by, or which otherwise constitute a nutritive attraction or enticement to bear......

....Baiting means the placement, exposing, depositing, distributing, or scattering of any bait or other substance so as to constitute for bears a lure or attraction to areas where hunters are attempting to take them.


https://www.mass.gov/regulations/321-CMR-300-hunting
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby OldMtnMan » Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:08 pm

I was born and brought up in Springfield Mass. I was just hunting for deer then. I was pretty young and hunted with my dad and brother. Me and my brother were being taught still hunting by my dad, so it was more training than hunting. Fun times though and i've stuck with the method.
I can't remember any of the laws now. Those baiting laws sound like Mass.
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Horizontal Hunter » Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:22 pm

OldMtnMan wrote:I was born and brought up in Springfield Mass. I was just hunting for deer then. I was pretty young and hunted with my dad and brother. Me and my brother were being taught still hunting by my dad, so it was more training than hunting. Fun times though and i've stuck with the method.
I can't remember any of the laws now. Those baiting laws sound like Mass.


Small world. I'm just outside of Springfield.

Mass is pretty messed up. The penalty for possessing a Bumpfire stock is a minimum of 18 months and up to LIFE in prison.

Bob
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Bearpawon » Sun Jan 21, 2018 2:27 am

This may be a dumb question but let's say I go out scouting for bear beds. To find them means to pretty much walk right into them, but if I do that will the Bears get spooked when they come back and smell me and then abandon the bed?
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Re: Black Bear Beds -VS- Buck Beds

Unread postby Mike Foss » Sun Jan 21, 2018 3:15 am

Have not read all the posts on here about bear beds. I am talking Wisconsin here... the only time I have found a bear bed when that specific bear used it over and over again is when there was a food source nearby (mostly a bear bait station or someone placing food for bears at there residence) otherwise they are wanderers and will camp where ever they please. Years ago I did find where a monster bear consistently would hide and sleep, the bears impression was etched in the forest floor.


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