The State of Alaska made an
unprecedented decision to cancel bear hunting and make it illegal do so. This
was done in response to “safety concerns” from traveling across the state to
hunt. You can imagine the outrage this caused among hunters, especially the
resident hunters of Alaska. Yes, we have a huge influx of hunters each spring
to hunt for trophy bears, and this was the true intent of the cancellation,
however, the Board of Game took it a step further by urging the state to not
only close bear hunting to nonresidents, but to close it to residents as well.
This was obviously political in nature since the Board of Game is composed of
pro-guide members and predictably acts in favor of guides (who non residents
must hire). Due to guides losing out, they weren’t going to allow residents to
get the whole share of the pie. This backfired. Residents were outraged. There
was so much backlash that the cancellation was quickly clarified to mean
non-residents only.
With the cancellation reversed,
bear baiting was a go. Unfortunately for me, I wasn’t sure if I could get the
time off to hunt bears. I couldn’t really make plans due to my demanding work
schedule. As such, I told Kevin that I wasn’t going to setup a bait station
this year. He understood and said I was more than welcome to hunt his if I got
some time off. I then offered to help him setup his on a Saturday that I was
likely going to be available.
Kevin and I were able to
coordinate a Saturday to setup the bait station. We decided to take Ashton too
to get him exposure to the process (and since the bears were still hibernating,
there was no threat of him being in danger). To our surprise, there was still a
bunch of snow on the ground near our site. Lucky for us, someone left the gate
open to the logging road. Instead of killing ourselves by dragging all the gear
through snow, we were able to drive the road, through the snow, and drop off
our gear near the trail head. This was the first time we were able to drive the
road and it was definitely a time saver (and likely prevented Ashton from
hating he setup process). We were able to setup the bait site in record time!
The only thing we had left to do was get milk shakes at Wildmans and head home.
As the bears started to wake,
Kevin made many trips to the stand to check on progress. One thing that became
apparent with COVID-19 is that many people had more time on their hands to hunt
bears. This was the first year we had other people baiting off the same logging
road. Not only that, THREE other groups setup stands along the road, and one
was within a couple hundred yards of us. We are generally picky on what bears
we shoot… selective shooting would be moot due to the others in the area.
The individuals in the stand
within a couple hundred yards of us shot many bears. We would hear gun shots
often. We talked to them a couple times and they were even bringing in family
and friends to hunt. This was extremely frustrating.
Kevin was dead set on shooting a
brown bear this year. He had many on camera and patterned them out. For some
reason, none of them would ever show up to the stand when he was sitting on it.
They would be there immediately before and after, but never during. He never
got a shot at one this year, but has a solid plan for next.
As for me, I was able to get a
couple days off to sit in the stand. Fortunately, I connected with a descent
six foot bear and refilled the freezer with bear meat.
The next couple years bear baiting will be interesting. Kevin will be setting up a stand in a completely different area (place to be determined) and my spot will likely be taken out from the construction of a new highway. Once the construction starts, I too will likely need to find a new spot to bait bears.
No comments:
Post a Comment