Black Bear Hunting Success Rates

Summary of 2010 Spring Bear Hunts

We had an unusually early spring and the bears were very active and hungry before we started baiting for our hunts.

Our Trappers Camp was very successful with every hunter harvesting bears. We had a high number of bear sitings and several record book bears were harvested with two making the B&C book. It was also a good spring for colored bears.

Our Remote Fly In Camp was a great success. The float plane ride in; the landing on our small lake and tying up to the dock; the camp and the active bear baits made this a success. We found more bears than expected in this new area with several hunters seeing over 30 bears. We had a limited number of hunters this spring as this gave us time to set up the new area and really get the baits fired up. Our first hunter harvested a P&Y bear and a good cinnamon boar with his recurve bow. His buddy also got a good bear with his bow. We also had an outdoor writer from Denmark who saw 32 bears and now has many more stories to write. Our last week we had the Muzzy Bad to the Bone TV crew in camp. They harvested two good bears with a big boar over 8' with a 22 1/4" skull. They wanted to try a different hunting method. They sat on the ground about 4-8 yards from the bait against a tree with no cover. The camera man captured all of the adventure and close encounters. They saw 21 different bears in three days using this method. Definitely not recommended for everyone! Try not to miss this show.

Summary of 2009 Spring Bear Hunts

The weather experts advised that this spring was about 2 1/2 to 3 weeks delayed. This did not hurt the bear activity at the bait sites, although we did see more bear movement once the leaves and green grass started to emerge. We split our operation between our main camp and our two remote spike camps again. We had 2 to 3 hunters per week in our main camp and two hunters in each of our spike camps.

Our 31 hunters harvested 39 bears in total with 8 of these making the record book and a good blonde/cinnamon colored boar that scored just under 20 inches. Contact us for our complete hunter list from the season. We are confident that our hunters will tell you about their many bear encounters, the adrenaline rush that bear hunting gives and the trophies they harvested.

We used about 15 trail cameras this spring and found that there was a lot more bear action at the baits than we thought. These have proven to be a very valued tool and plan to use even more of these next spring.

As we prepare for the 2010 season we are again making some changes. We are relocating our main camp to a trappers compound at the Firebag River. This we are calling our Trappers Camp. We are changing our spike camps to a remote fly-in camp and expanding our area further into virgin territory. This fly-in camp will offer our hunters a 6 day hunting adventure in a remote wilderness area with a good bear population. Our expectations again are high for the 2010 season.

Summary of 2008 Spring Bear Hunts

This spring was a very tough one for us. It was an extremely late spring in our area with several feet of snow still on the ground. We could not bait our sites with 4 wheelers like we usually do and had to employ snowmobiles and a tracked argo. When our first hunters arrived on May 4th, we could not access the bait sites without endless winching with four wheelers. But the bears were out at the baits and hunting them in the snow may have had some advance.

We had a good number of bears but the sightings were down at our bait sites. Many of the bears we harvested were extremely thin with no fat reserve. There was some though that the bears may have suffered from a winterkill, since there was no berry crop last fall and the winter was extremely long. However, the authorities are suggesting that it appears the bears did not travel too far from their den sites for most of the spring because of the lateness. We did start to see more bear numbers as the season progressed which is encouraging.

Overall, our 41 hunters harvested 40 bears. Again, several good P & Y trophies were taken. Our colored bear numbers were down this year but we did take a good blonde/cinnamon color that scored just under 20".

We were unable to get our spike camp set up and operating as we would have liked. We found it difficult to get the bait sites set up properly and maintained with the deep snow, followed by unusually high water. The creeks were running high and the swamps were very wet. We used two argos but found the travel very slow.

We did enjoy some success but not up to our expectations. We found that even in this virgin area the bear sightings were low. However, in early June we did start to see a lot more bear movement and plenty of good bear signs, which look positive for 2009. We will be fine tuning our spike camp operation over the summer, working on improving our access and trails. We will be following up with our pre-baiting in the late winter on the ice roads in early April.

We are excited about our 2009 season as we can see good bear signs in this new area and know the history of our main camp.

Ralph and Vicky Cianciarulo hunted with us again this year and only hunted in the spike camp. We did struggle with accessing the various bait sites, but Ralph did manage to take a good P & Y bear. Vicky never filled a tag. She advised us that this was the first time she has not filled a tag in Alberta. She did pass on some nice bears. In fact, she elected to have one of their Posse members shoot a good bear that she could have easily taken. They will be returning in 2009 to our new and improved spike camp area to once again enjoy the excitement of the hunt.

We are excited about next year as we look forward to seeing many of our repeat clients and old friends along with the new hunters full of excitement for those close encounters with our black bears. We will again try our best to meet each of our guest's expectations.

Summary of 2007 Spring Bear Hunts

Again 2007 was another really great year. We limited our hunters to only 15 this season as we had a major oil company doing extensive exploration in some of our hunting area. We were unsure of the impact this would have at the time and in order to ensure that we still provided each hunter with a high quality hunt we limited the numbers. We found that the exploration impact was minimal and we are now preparing for 2008.

Our 15 hunters harvested 21 bears with 3 over 20" and another 4 that will make the P&Y record book. We also had 4 colored bears.

Spring was late this year and the bears came out of their dens in a very fat condition as they had a record berry crop in the fall of 2006. This slowed the activity at the baits somewhat but as spring progressed, they started to devour our baits again as usual.

Probably one of our highlights was to have Ralph and Vicky Cianciarulo in camp from Archer's Choice Media. They had a tremendous hunt with us and harvested some great bears. They had two large black colored bears over 20", a very large chocolate boar at 19" plus and a blonde bear. They were filming for their TV series and for their new Bear N Down 7 DVD. Their hunt was so good that they are planning on returning next year. Perhaps the best way to find out about their hunt would be to go to their website: www.archerschoice.com

For 2008 we are looking at offering a remote spike camp option in a new area that has not been baited before, along with our regular area. Check our website for all the details on the spike camp options.

Summary of 2006 Spring Bear Hunts

We had a great season with 35 hunters harvesting 51 bears.

Spring came quickly this year and the bears were out of their dens and hungry in early April, about 3 weeks ahead of normal. By mid-April we had temperatures in the low 70°F and the snow had long melted. We started hunting on the 7th of May and could have successfully started several weeks earlier. On our first evening our 7 hunters took 6 large bears with 2 being colored.

The weather stayed warm and the vegetation grew very lush. In early June, we started to see the bears leaving the baits in favor of their natural foods, and we were seeing some severe rubbing. Hunters reported seeing bears that appeared to be half naked from rubbing at this time. Out came the mosquitoes and bugs, but again the thermacells saved the hunt.

We used about 44,000 lbs of bait at our 48 remote bait sites and traveled just over 25,000 kms on our nine 4 wheelers. We used about 300 barrels (55 gallon drums) of freshly popped popcorn. The bear's voracious appetite for popcorn shocked us. We could not keep it in the barrels and we eventually reduced the hole size in the 55 gallon drums to 1". It was amazing to watch the bears flick the popcorn out of this small hole with their tongue.

As in the past, we took many good bears that would qualify for the P&Y record book. One of our highlights was a young fellow with cerebral palsy who had returned with his father to hunt with us again. Using his crossbow and a specially designed tripod, we put Chris in a ground blind. On the first night, with the guide sitting next to him, we had a medium bear push his nose against the window netting just inches from Chris' face. Then the bear woofed several times and walked over to the bait.

Sitting in the same ground blind two nights later, Chris made an excellent shot and harvested a good mature boar in the 19" plus size (about 7'2" in length). Surely a hunt of a lifetime for Chris with an ultimate adrenaline rush.

This year we also had numerous lady bowhunters in our camp. Each of them went home with 2 very nice trophies and an experience to talk about.

We encourage you to check out our complete hunter list and contact some of our many hunters from this season. We are confident that all of them will tell you about their many bear encounters, the adrenaline rush that bear hunting gives and the trophies they harvested.

We had a number of hunters that have hunted black bear before in other parts of the country and did not see any bears on the entire hunt or a very limited number. They were very surprised at our bear numbers.