The 10-12 mi. trip back upstream to camp took about 90 minutes. A shorter one in two days would take 2.5 hours as the river was full of alligators (entire spruce trees) floating down and required a diligent effort to avoid them and keeping our one boat motor alive (the other had totally lost its prop; we had an add'l prop, but not the nut to keep it on).
Bear carcasses look a lot like a human when their fur has been removed. As does their paw/hand.
Man to be home and leave that some place as a gag...and get a whole police investigation started I suppose. (A story in Barry Wensel's book Once Upon A Time confirms this in hilarious fashion). The woods here look somewhat open from up in the tree, but on the ground it's usually close to impenetrable. Here is a relatively open spot while blood-trailing, a rarity indeed.
Day 4 found me in the same stand as Day 1 (wolves) where the bait was getting cleaned out and there was a big bear seen there on camera the week prior. Shortly after getting set, from up the hill I could hear 16-20 very loud hisses/heavy breathing/whatever you wanna call it. A bear clearly didn't like something. I was hoping he was just warning off other bears, but he may have been letting me know he didn't like me there. So I sat for about 8 hours hoping, but he never came down despite two other series of maybe 4 to 6 of these noises in the hour to follow his first vocalizations.
It was on this day Mike killed his wolf, but our guide was too far upstream (working on a wolf blind for fall) to hear him on the radio. So Mike got to watch his wolf laying dead on the far bank of the river for about 5 hours without being able to go claim it. They are a stinky SOB though, when you do finally get to hold one. Just reek. And BIG-arse animals.
Meanwhile I'm running out of time and the river is rising fast (it'd come up about four feet in 24 hours) and full of logs. We decide to run halfway downriver to a bait that had some bears on it the week before, though nothing huge sighted.
Mid-afternoon, here came a bear. Not big enough to really want to kill, but big enough to make it interesting. He was extremely tentative which can mean a bigger bear is around.
He grabbed a goodie from the bait and walked off 20 yards to eat it--another sign that he's not real comfortable here (or else is spooky about the hunter). It did not seem to be the latter and maybe 20 minutes later a bigger bear came on the same trail. This one was hard to judge. Very leggy but with a decent head and great hide. I was debating. He went up to the bait and made himself at home. Over the next 20-30 minutes the other bear circled the bait, paced back and forth, etc. The bigger one greeted him on one of these sojourns and both stood nose-to-nose making an ape-like "woo-woo-woo..." noise. Very agitated. They exchanged some blows. By now I'm switching my camera over to video. And I'd eventually get maybe four decent clips of bear activity and all kinds of vocalization, most of which sounded like that deep "gluck....gluck" sound of a rutting moose.
The subordinate bear was really getting worked up at being shut out. He paced back and forth, stood and grabbed small trees and shook them, walked over small saplings again and again (intimidation and scenting I assume). When he got too close, all heck broke loose. Luckily I had my video running, as what occurred next was short but violent and intense. The bigger bear stood up, back arched like a cat, walked sideways at the other bear which suddenly found himself without an obvious exit and paused for a second...the big bear was on him IMMEDIATELY with a cat-like pounce that is impressive on the video. He bit the other repeatedly, mostly on the upper rear leg, perhaps near the private area, and shook his head. Lots of moaning by the other bear which found itself on its back being attacked quickly and repeatedly. After maybe 8-10 seconds of fighting (during which time A LOT occurred) the smaller one scrambled up and began a hasty retreat right at my tree with the other on his tail.
THIS VIDEO IS POSTED ON
http://www.brycelambley.com under 'Latest.' It's worth your effort to see it.
This photo taken earlier, explains why I might have good reason to be worried at this point.
There were old paw print scars up a nearby aspen to at least 20 feet. Fortunately, the bear chase went at least 60 yards and probably much further over a rise and out of sight. Wow.
It was my next to last evening and I was talking myself into taking this bear. When he came back 20 minutes later, and laid down facing completely away from me, I decided if I got a good shot, I was going to take a shot. The other bear inexplicably returned and again was pacing around, but not at 20 yards like before but from maybe twice that distance. I figured to throw a cookie from my lunch over the top of the bear to make him think the other bear had gotten close, hoping he'd stand up and present a good shot.
My cookie actually went right into the other barrel, the bear immediately pounced up and stared away from me, quartered away at a pretty nice angle. At 17 yards my arrow drilled him perfectly, exiting just in front of the opposing front leg, somewhat disabling it and doing damage to the bone. He did a quick semi-circle in front of me, slowing to a walk after 20 yards and laid down and died after 35 yards, giving the common (but not always occurring) death moan repeatedly. I can't immediately get Donavin on the radio, but there is still good light for photos so I get down to take some while I can and when my feet his the ground, the other bear is on the bait. I start talking to him and he apparently does not understand English. Or maybe not Nervous English. I'm not liking this much, but I nock and arrow and take a couple tentative steps toward the bait to see what the reaction is. This bear is equally not as thrilled and retreats a hair. I take a few fast steps toward him, and he retreats more. So I charge the bait and he ambles off into the brush, but making that moose sound which has me on edge.
Fortunately at this time the guide catches my message and is there shortly and we get some good pics although forget to remove the rifle from the background, but that accentuates that we were dealing with aggressive bears and you could never take things for granted.
A couple days later the Caravan arrives, and we are on our way back to Ft. Mac with lots of stories and a looooong drive ahead of us back to the Cornhusker State and some unfinished work at our place of employment. Before we left we stashed the boat downstream for the fall or next spring, and discovered tons of wolf track within 150 yards of camp, several days worth. Another reminder we weren't in Kansas (or Nebraska) anymore. A very good trip, and what a delight to have no concept of time, cell phone, email or care in the world--well except for angry bears.
Topic: Alberta bear action (Read 377 times)
