Bear podcast

The Beast’s of the North woods. Behaviors, Hunting Stories, Pictures, Tactics, Q&A.
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Bearman13
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bearman13 » Tue Jun 27, 2017 1:44 pm

I think Bernie is implying just using one type of sweet bait like candy of some sort.

I've never had Bears sugar out. I always have a good mix of bait and switch up weekly.


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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby dan » Tue Jun 27, 2017 9:22 pm

Bear Magnum wrote:
BassBoysLLP wrote:
dan wrote:
Bernie also mentioned something I've never ever read on the hunting beast.... He said something about not wanting to give the bears too much sugar. I wonder how many grams of sugar per 5 gallons of bait would be considered over "sugarring"??? As Bernie calls it.


That would be news to me... I give them lots of sugar and never noticed any ill effects. Mike or Jim, do you guys have concerns about to much sugar?


It was the first time I heard of the sugar thing as well. A lot of the big time guys by me switch to trail mix later in the season because the sugars draw lesser than the nuts. Bernie is primarily hunting northern MN and perhaps he is referring to a reduced preference of sugar baits vs. nut baits. Kinda like a glass half full or half empty argument. Do the bears move to the trail mix because they are sick of sugar? Or do they go to the trail mix because they prefer the trail mix?

I do like the natural food piece. I mix in a lot of apples later in the season as they are free and plentiful.


I'm not 100% sure this is what Bernie is referring to, but the year I shot my first bear, I was using strictly cookie dough. The bears would show up, engorge themselves, and then disappear for up to 3 days. There was bait left, so they weren't cleaning me out and moving on. I still got my bear. The next year I switched to granola/trail mix and haven't had the same problem since.

Cookie dough in large quantities is probably hard for them to digest. Its like grease which is not sweet, to much of it gives them a gut ache. I have great success with grease as long as its not soaked into all my bait, and I have great success with cookie dough mixed into my bait... I think Jim nailed my thoughts on variety. Be interesting to hear Mikes thoughts...
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bearman13 » Tue Jun 27, 2017 11:52 pm

I've never had much luck with cookie dough, except in small quantities. It had to be clumps mixed in with other stuff and even then it would be laying in the bait uneaten. I use a lot of fryer oil and I mean a lot. Probably close to 5 gallons a bait. I don't put it on my bait. On my cover logs, the ground and all over the trees and vegetation.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby BassBoysLLP » Wed Jun 28, 2017 12:30 am

You guys have some picky bears. :lol: I always bait 10 gallons. This time of year, I often have kitchen scraps and moldy food in my filler. It always gets eaten in a couple days. They do get bit pickier later in the season and I need to switch to all premium bait. Perhaps this is a seasonal shift that applies to the entire Great Lakes region.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bearman13 » Wed Jun 28, 2017 1:23 am

I'm taking other people's hard earned money I can't risk using table scraps or moldy stuff. I only get two weeks to bait. It's all about quality here. If I could bait 5 months, yeah I'd throw anything down.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby BassBoysLLP » Wed Jun 28, 2017 1:38 am

Jim Wallner wrote:I'm taking other people's hard earned money I can't risk using table scraps or moldy stuff. I only get two weeks to bait. It's all about quality here. If I could bait 5 months, yeah I'd throw anything down.


Same here at the end of August. I have a lot of time and effort invested at that time. It's time to lay down the best and often so you can hopefully tag out early.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby dan » Wed Jun 28, 2017 4:24 am

I have seen bears stop hitting a bait when bread molds in it... Jim, I heard what you said about cookie dough once before and it kinda makes me scratch my head... I did not used a lot of it, it was 50/50 in my cookie barrels, so each bait got 1/2 a bucket of dough (bucket was 50/50 cookies dough, and they certainly favored the cookie dough at my baits, cameras would show them hitting that 1st... The bear Bighunt shot went strait to the cookie dough chunks when he shot it. Wonder if you had a different brand or something... Its surprising the same area and differing results with the same bait. But looking at different barrels of cookies and cookie dough from different bait suppliers and you see a lot of differences in the smell and look.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bearman13 » Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:02 am

I got a tote and 2 barrels from Proden. The majority of the bears did not respond well to it at all.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby BassBoysLLP » Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:37 am

Yeah, I'm definitely surprised at what the bears eat this time of year. Macaroni, horseradish, stale funyuns, pickles...gone.

On the cookie dough part, they've historically preferred it by me as well. They'll stop hitting the granola in the later in the summer, but will always eat the big cookie dough chunks. My biggest issue with cookie dough is that it pulverizes to dust.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bearman13 » Wed Jun 28, 2017 5:48 am

As far as granola. It has to be a fruity granola, chocolate chip granola works also. But, they do get sick of that after awhile. The berry flavored granola they never do.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby BassBoysLLP » Wed Jun 28, 2017 6:32 am

:lol: That is funny because it was the berry granola.

I'm not seeing a consensus anywhere in this thread. :lol: just need to keep up the variety and figure what is working best with your local bears.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby dan » Wed Jun 28, 2017 7:01 am

Jim Wallner wrote:I got a tote and 2 barrels from Proden. The majority of the bears did not respond well to it at all.

I got mine from Bobs bait... I used to go to Proden but have not in many years. Have not used cookie dough from him, but his cookie doe pellets worked well, but were way over priced.
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby john1984 » Wed Jun 28, 2017 9:56 am

I rented a bait site 3 years ago from a young guy.
He told me bears will vomit the moldy bread.

Last year was the first time I tried used cooking oil. I'd screen it out and would sometimes just mix it with only cracked corn. The sow and cubs would eat it.

But as far as corn is concerned, ,,, last year when I started baiting in August, the first big boar I got a trail cam seemed to try and toss the cracked corn aside and seemed more interested in the other stuff I had in the pit. He was the only big boar I had come in daylight. He showed up for 3 days in a row in late August but never showed up after that. I had another bigger boar show up just one time later in Sept but at 2am. That night I had 2 dozen very fresh store bought quality donuts on top of the bait, ,, He opened the bait, just ate the donuts, and never returned.

He has a big but.Image img
http://i771.photobucket.com/albums/xx35 ... yzcgjz.jpg

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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby Bear Magnum » Wed Jun 28, 2017 3:06 pm

BassBoysLLP wrote::lol: That is funny because it was the berry granola.

I'm not seeing a consensus anywhere in this thread. :lol: just need to keep up the variety and figure what is working best with your local bears.


Yeah this!!! :lol:

My UP bears prefer my homemade granola blend (Containing all or some of the following: oats, frosting, molasses, pie filling, gummy candy, Bait Em 907 sweetener powder, dried fruit, and cookie crumbs), bread, donuts (wolves love donuts too, so I don't use them much anymore), and trail mix/nuts. After September 15th or so though, the bait will start slowing down significantly unless I am using nuts or trail mix. They will almost stop eating everything else. They will keep hammering nuts through October.

The bears in Ontario, well they devoured everything, ever the plywood covering my bait hole...... :shock:
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Re: Bear podcast

Unread postby mjk » Thu Jun 29, 2017 11:53 am

BassBoysLLP wrote:You guys have some picky bears. :lol: I always bait 10 gallons. This time of year, I often have kitchen scraps and moldy food in my filler. It always gets eaten in a couple days. They do get bit pickier later in the season and I need to switch to all premium bait. Perhaps this is a seasonal shift that applies to the entire Great Lakes region.



I have often seen that what bears eat in May, June , and early July, they won't touch after that. We used to use yogurt base. Bears would eat the lemon flavor early, and then would totally ignore the Lemon flavor in late summer while they still hammered the other flavors. Gummy bears were the same way. Bears did not like them after mid July.

In regards to being picky, we used to get the outdated chips from the local Frio Lay guy. The bears would sort out the flaming hot cheetos, and they would be laying next to the stump, while the rest of the chips would be eaten. Happened time after time.


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