Bear?

[versa-06]

Anybody seeing or killing any bear this year? Hearing very little around here.

[Driver33]

Been a few killed around here in the first season. My buddies have ran several just couldn't get ahead of them to get a shot. Most of what they have treed have been small or had cubs

[quilbilly]

Just plant apple trees and let the apples fall. If like here, they will beat a path to them. We can't use dogs or bait in this state legally. As a result, we are awash in both bears and lions in my neighborhood (literally). We have a young bear denned within 100 yards of the house right now.

[versa-06]

I figured Marcopolo would jump in, He almost always gets a bear.

[Tripplebeards]

He hasn’t sent me any pics if he did!

[BLAHUT]

My land up north is in one of the top bear counties in Minnesota, saw no bear sign this year when up for deer hunting...No bears on the trail cameras, just wolves, bob cats, coyotes and one deer ??

[megasupermagnum]

It was a horrible year for bear hunting. It was a super wet spring around where I hunted, but it had dried off to a normal level by the September season. Acorn crop looked good. Berries looked good. It was a bumper year for natural forage. I got a couple pictures on trail camera on one bait site, zero on the others. I don't think I heard any shots that I thought were bear hunters on opening day. That's ok though. Bear hunting was so unreal last year they deserve a year to recover. I think hunter success was about 50% in Minnesota in 2021. I don't think they have finalized the report, but I doubt MN's hunter success for 2022 will be much over 25%. Unfortunately I'm in that 75%. I lost all my vacation days due to an injury. I knew no bears were hitting the bait consistently, but I had to hunt when I could. That's the way it goes sometimes.

[725]

I have a cabin in western Maryland and we had problem bear stake a claim to our spot out there. Tried to push the outhouse over last year and this year it bit and damaged the cabin. Must be a big boy as his teeth marks and missing wood went as high as I could reach. Discussion with DNR indicates this is a marking behavior. DNR went to go as far as establishing a temporary electric fence around the cabin to zap him when he came back. They left it up for two weeks and it seems like it worked. No evidence of a return. Over the last 30 years, the deer activity seems to have decreased and bear activity has increased. Maryland does bear hunting on a lottery system and even though we (co-owners of the cabin) have gotten a few tickets over the years since they opened bear hunting back up, we haven't had any tickets the last couple years. Not hunting them for a couple years, I can't say what the volume might be other than we had "an incident" happen to the cabin.

[marshall623]

I'm along the Blueridge we usually see them behind the house but nothing for the past 2 years . In Virginia they have had a bout with mange and parasites that has worked on them .

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

[armoredman]

Any bears down here are scrawny and hiding.

[versa-06]

Very few reports on bears this year. ????? wonder why?????

[white eagle]

not this year but last I was a lot of black bear and killed one
I went two weeks though the first was dry no sightiings at all
but the second I was seeing bear ever trip out
I was however moved around not staying in the same stand more that once
hunted bait and hunted with competant guide
seems as though a lot of the bear guides round here are interested more in money

[NEKVT]

I have two cameras at different points on the same trail through my 10 acres in N.VT. set in 10 sec video mode and got 7 or 8 different adult bears on them and one sow had an additional three cubs. There was a video of a sow with two cubs but the third could have been off camera or possibly it was another group. One camera is about 50yds from the cabin.This was during the summer into apple season (have about 25 apple trees with most along the road) and then activity dropped off as expected. Surprisingly, most were out during daylight hours. I had a tag but didn't hunt them and that will likely change next year but will probably try with a recurve or longbow first. Bears are notorious fawn killers but I had two sets of twins and a single fawn on video that made it to Fall although all use the same trail including coyotes and bobcats.

[megasupermagnum]

Very few reports on bears this year. ????? wonder why?????

I think I covered it pretty well. I'm guessing most bear hunters on this forum would be hunting in Minnesota, Wisconsin, or Michigan. Conditions for natural forage were ideal, hunter success rates were extremely low. I have no idea how conditions were farther north in Canada, and there are not very many members from Alaska as it is.

[William Yanda]

My wife's cousin and his son shot a big bear on my bil's property in Allegany Co., NY. He said he got 5 gallons of bear fat and the head scored well enough to make qualify for inclusion in Boon and Crocket at 20 3/8 inches.

[versa-06]

All-Right!!! Finally a good report of success. We don't have many bears around this area of Va. But I've put in a lot of time on the ridge. Today is the last day & it's supposed to rain off & on all day. That's why it's called hunt'n & not kill'n. Maybe next year. But maybe it will clear this afternoon for a little while & today may be the day. Maybe?

[csatrustburg]

Versa I too am from Virginia fish up at the lake all the time, I know of 27 bear killed from Gladys up to goshen and north towards cville I haven’t talked with my buddies that hunt Amherst area to know what they killed

[versa-06]

Which Lake?

[Scorpion8]

Bears coming into the neighborhoods in my area were down this year, I think because none of them got their last stimulus checks. I expect that to mean an increase in neighborhood visitation this year, so may have to put one into the freezer.

[csatrustburg]

Smith mountain but I mainly hunt Amherst County

[dverna]

Good season this year. The Maestro, guy who runs the local bear hunters, and his team got 5 within a few miles of where I live and 6 or 7 in the UP. They run dogs and are good at it.

[Beaverhunter2]

My land up north is in one of the top bear counties in Minnesota, saw no bear sign this year when up for deer hunting...No bears on the trail cameras, just wolves, bob cats, coyotes and one deer ??

You have wolves so you'll have little else. I have friends that hunt Michigan's UP. 3 guys spent 80 hours in the stand each this season. They saw 3 deer total. And now we're hearing the wolves are dragging bears out of their dens and eating them. If the idiots in Washington DC think wolves are so great, Michigan's sportsmen would be glad to send them a few packs so they can reintroduce them into their neighborhood. We'd like to put a few in Lansing and Ann Arbor too.

[Planeguy]

We have plenty of wolves here in East Central WI but I had at least 6 bears hitting my bait. The problem is with 30 acres of soy beans and tons of buck thorn berries maturing just in time for fall season, the bears disappear just when you need 'em to show up. We have some monsters in this area. A first time 12 year old hunter bagged big one that went over 700# 2 years ago. A couple of the bruins I have on camera are in excess of 500#. I won't have a license for 4-5 years now because of our lottery system.

[dale2242]

We had the big game biologist for the ODF&W speak at our last Oregon hunters Assoc. meeting.
Bears have to be checked in at the local office to remove a front tooth.
He said that right at 500 had been checked in in 2022.
There were over 500 bear damage complaints.

[Tripplebeards]

I’m on the SW boarder in WI. I have 12 years of points but no place to hunt accept for the public forest. Waiting till I find private property again in the “old A/A1” area of 25 years ago. Always a 3.5 hour or longer drive one way for me so it’s a lot of gas and lugging bait over the summer. Had a buddy that we use to rotate driving up and baiting. Then his uncle lived in the area and baited for us. We just had to deliver the bait and he’d bait the stumps. At the cost of current cost of fuel for me running back and forth its more practical, and cheaper imo, to hunt Canada. I remember back in the late 90’s it was $900 to $1200 for a guided hunt….I’m sure it’s way up from those prices now but probably still more economical than making 30 plus 7 hour or more round trips to bait up north. Hopefully I find someone with property in the area. Last time I hunted that area I had access to private property. The time before it was the Chequamagon Nation Forest Winter area. We ran dogs in that area. It was very productive but only small bear. Those guys have all gotten rid of their dogs and retired from bear hunting. How I miss the the love of bear hunting! I would give up deer hunting for bear hunting every year if I had the chance. Bobcat have finally moved down to my area in the last dove years to see them regularly. I’m sure bear will eventually do the same instead of an occasional sighting in our county every couple of years.