| Bear Essentials - Page One | |
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Some of you will, no doubt, have read a previous article I wrote and published on this site, covering some of the more interesting experiences I'd had with black bears here in Florida. Well, the two years that have elapsed since then have been fraught with still more bear encounters, the most recent of which occurred just two days hence. I thought some of these experiences would be worth sharing with you.
During the 2000-2001 deer season, over a year ago, I headed back to an area I'd hunted before. I'd spotted a doe while hunting from the ground the previous morning, and so I'd set up a climbing tree stand in there that afternoon. The following morning, I was walking in along a dim trail, when the world exploded.
I looked to my right, and there was a young bear. He panicked at the sight of me, and hustled up a pine tree. Then I saw something else move... another one! He walked up to the pine tree, then spotted me. That's all he needed -- he left in a hurry, crashing through brush as he went. I was wondering if mama was around, grateful that I was toting a semi-automatic carbine in .44 Remington Magnum.
Their mother never did show, thankfully. I spotted some movement in a tree out about sixty yards or so, and there was the second bear, or a third one, up a spindly little oak tree. I guesstimate their weight at around seventy-five to one hundred pounds.
What I consider the most interesting thing about this encounter was the high-pitched noise which the first bear, treed in a pine near me and unwilling to climb down, kept making. I guess the best word for it is "keening." That bear kept it up until I'd moved on down the trail and climbed my stand, a good seventy-five yards from him and well out of sight. Bear sign has long been evident in these woods, and even before this encounter I knew that bears roamed in there - I just hadn't seen them.
Early in the 2001-2002 deer season just past, I set up my climber nice and early one morning, slipping through the brightly moonlit woods near the river. Within a couple of minutes -- it was still too dark to shoot -- the squirrels were up and at 'em. Before ten minutes had passed, I heard something coming. I started tentatively congratulating myself on picking this spot, because here comes a buck! (I hope I hope.)
Turns out, this buck had no antlers, was all black except for some dark brown on his snout, and looked a lot like a bear! I decided he probably wasn't legal game. He weighed around one hundred pounds or so.
He strolled on over, making more noise than any other non-human critter in the woods has a right to, making a beeline for me. I started wondering if I was going to have a replay of the bear which wanted to climb my tree a couple years ago.
He got directly underneath me (I was hanging on an oak tree at the time). I leaned to the right so I could see him, and there he was, sniffing at my backpack, which was lying there on the ground next to the tree. He must have liked when he smelled, because he started to open his mouth - he was about to chow down on my pack!
I moved my right hand, holding the .44 carbine pistol-style, over the side of the stand so that I could deal with him should he get belligerent. I thought I might have to holler to get his attention and run him off, but he saw me move, looked up, and the look in his eyes said "Holy crap, he's got a gun!" Then he ran off about forty-five or fifty feet and stopped.
He stood there for thirty seconds or so, as if he'd forgotten what he was running from, then moved a little closer to me again, in a spot where he had a nice clear view of me... and he gave me the once-over. Then he decided whatever he liked in the pack wasn't worth getting too close to me, and he left. Oddly, the backpack compartment that he was so interested in contained a can of bug spray, which hadn't been used in over a year, and which was capped.
Page Two - Wrestling and Tooth-popping
