How to hunt bears, no bait and no dogs?

[JARHEAD1371]

I'm still scouting areas some areas on base at Quantico, VA but I have found some bear tracks around. Base regs are very strict on not using bait of any kind, including liquids that can be sprayed onto something that is editable. I have also been warned about stalking/still hunting, even ground hunting, and having other hunters complain about you to the Game Warden.
Besides simple dumb luck, what other tactics can be used to hunt bears? Thank you for any info shared.

[bamboo]

predator call

[old_goat2]

Don't buy a bear tag!

[Doug_K]

Never hunted a military base before, but if you can find a good berry patch you can always watch that, as well as trails leading to and from.

Here it takes around 8 years to draw a tag, so I wouldn't concern myself with other hunters complaining about the way I want to hunt.

[Etter]

In north ga, we hunt them over white oaks (or whatever mast produced that year). I usually see a few dozen per year.

[Bill Carlsen]

Shoot a deer. Gut it out. Hang a tree stand. Wait. It won't take long.

[Bill from NJ]

PM sent.

[Roadkill]

Hunted Quantico for years-never saw a bear.  I guess with all the day and night training for OCS other formal schools, bears avoided it.  They seem to be making a come back all over the east now. Took many deer in area 9

If you go to the Boundary Waters in northern Minnesota on certain busy lakes it is quite easy.  Just stand in your campsite and bang two frying pans together.   You cannot bait, you cannot move, and you cannot use scent.  Calls are the only option beyond total crap shoot. Probably not worth the effort.

[RedShaft]

I have the same problems.
In PA we get 1 week. No bait, no scents, no dogs...
I got the tags. But you would really have to have one pinned down to get on it. They seem very nomadic.

[nek4me]

VT has a growing bear population and fairly long season (Sept 1 to middle of the Nov firearms deer season) but doesn't allow baiting either and limits dogs for self use only - no guides with dogs - which presents a challenge. As stated already, bears are all about food in the Fall so find a food source they're hitting, either hard or soft mast, and place a tree stand or ground blind or still hunt it. I haven't tried a predator call yet but may this year. The only caveat is when calling you are the food source which can be good and bad!

[DarrinG]

Find a good funnel area between two oak ridges, assuming you'll have a mast crop this year. A really good funnel between 2 hardwood ridges is a game magnet. I found one last winter on topo maps, then put boots on the ground and went and scouted it. Sign everywhere! Then this summer I put up a trail camera in the funnel/gap between the ridges. Wow! Every critter in the woods is using this funnel area like crazy. Deer, bears, coyotes,...its a game-rich hotspot. I'm hoping to bring deer and bear meat out of that area this fall!

[Birdbow]

I agree with those above who recommend finding a hot food source - mast, apples, berries, etc.
This year here, for instance, the beechnut crop looks strong so I'll concentrate on a couple ridges with lots of beech trees. Good luck!

[JoeM]

Beech nuts if you have any around, if not white oaks are good. Water if it's hot.

[nineworlds9]

Just fall in a vat of left over fried chicken grease right before you head out, tell the warden you were so hungry after yesterday's hunt and pigged out at a KFC the night before and that youre sweating KFC or pack a bucket of KFC for lunch that day.  He gonna cite you for what you brought for lunch and that you're a hungry growing boy?

             

[Pointer]

What Doug K said...I don't hunt bears but there's a berry patch in my deer woods that holds  more than a few if I ever want to. Always see them when I'd rather not lol.

[Roadkill]

Quantico is a small very busy military base just south of DC.  Very urbanizedalong the highway and the base HQ.  the training areas are well used and are bordered by rural Virginia.  The bears probably migrate as my hunting and teaching there never produced a bear sighting.  No doubt bears are resurgent back east these day