This is two stories that become one. Four weeks ago we got a used chicken tractor and five chickens, two that are a year and a half old layers and three pollets. Right after,we contracted COVID and didn't get a chance to put up an electric fence. Two weeks ago we are awakened by our 8 year old American terrier at 5 am who has taken up residency recently in our extra bedroom, on the bed, that faces the coop, near our flag pole that is illuminated year round. We keep the blinds open.
I wake up in our extra-extra bedroom, as my my wife and I are both going through COVID and as not to keep each other up coughing all night, I'm in an unfamiliar environment. I get up trying to put my pants on, newly acquired Duluth Trading fire hose cargo pants, to replace my 5-11's I've had for ten years. I stand stumbling to get them on, as they are slimmer, muscle memory is fighting me as they won't go on in the dark. In the pockets, I have a Smith 340 PD with 187 grain NOE cast boooits with a max charge of 300MP and a Streamlight Polytac X. (Btw for those interested, I've never fired the NOE maxed out in the 340 only 158 XTP'S AND Lee 160 FP's with the bevel base removed, powder coated at max charges. It cut me during that session and I feel having fired tens of thousands of rounds through j-frames point shooting with boot grips muscle memory would serve me. it's only there to keep in my pocket and walk to the shop and back in the remote chance a grizzly would be around.)
So I decide to just grab the flashlight and see what is going on as it has always been a skunk or deer in the yard. Especially this time of year when the bucks are chasing does around the house. The skunks are dependant on our ability to control rodent populations which we have become adept at. And she hates skunks! And we hate that she hates being wrestled down to be washed with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda to get the stink out of her. So, I go to the kitchen window and shine my light out towards the coop, I see a black bear standing up on the nesting box portion of the coop. I estimated his height based on the coop at 6' and weight close to 300#, which is big for the woods here. I believe it's the same bear I saw two months ago a quarter mile from the house. Pretty sure it's the same guy as you don't see many black bears over 150#'s here, most are smaller.
I say, "Bear." My wife is coming down the hallway as I pass her going for the Benelli Nova with slugs. I return to the kitchen, give her the flashlight and tell her to shine it on the coop as we go out the door towards the coop 20 yards away. She doesn't have her glasses on, keep in mind we both just woke from COVID haze too. I'm certain my chance to take a bruin and be the hero of our five person valley is upon me. She's can't see and is shining it everywhere but the coop. We have a moment. No one cried but she ends up handing me the light and I pick him up as he disappears into the wood line running. I fire a shot over him and I'm I awake for the rest of the day.
Reviewing the engagement I decide the kitchen screen needs to come out of the window and a rifle needs to be there to take him when he comes back. I choose my Ruger 77/357 with 187 NOE. I drilled grabbing the rifle, sliding the window open, taking a rest on the sill, leaning over the kitchen sink and taking the shot. I wake up many times over the next several nights checking the coop. No joy.
Fast forward to yesterday. I'm on the phone with another veteran and my wife comes up whispering and pointing for me to follow her towards the kitchen. I peek outside the window and see the buck in the wood line, staring towards the house, from 40 yards beyond the chicken coop. I had no thoughts of taking a deer this year, with everything going on but decades of hunting and having drilled this window shot- instincts took over and before I knew it the heart lung shot was taken. I gave the deer ten minutes and he didn't go 20. 😉
As an afterthought, I called our neighbor, who lives a mile away by road, to tell him about the bear. He said, that morning, at two he heard something under his cabin. He said it raised so much noise and seemed so large that he jumped out of bed and started stomping and jumping on the floor to scare it out. Although he didn't see what it was, he said he heard it leave. Next day he found his wooden trash storage bin ripped from the wall in his shop and two bags of trash thrown about.
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DougGuy
