bear402

After you set that 30 pin, try a a 20 yard shot ! Most likely you'll still be in the kill zone assuming your bow has average speed... Train yourself to aim two or three inches low on those 20's and you'll be spot on..Even if you forget to aim a little low in the heat of the moment , you'll still be in the vitals. Good luck with the December, January Hunts

I set my first pin at 30 yards . Then in 10 yard increments from there. 30 40 50 60 70. It all depends on what you can keep straight in your head under pressure . It's 10 yard increments for me with 5 yard split gaps. Bow speed will effect what your gaps need to be too.

Nice Video ! Looks like there's some kick in that arrow . Better retune that Omen..

Awsome pictures in the Gallery ! The monsoon and the milky way are way cool as are the rest !

Some of the OTC archery seasons, do overlap certain Draw units and seasons. Another words, you may be hunting with a limited number of rifle hunters that drew the hunt unit and time period that you are eligible to hunt with an OTC bow tag. As stated by 123456, read the regulations for OTC archery seasons and the corresponding open units.

Nice story and Photos I love that Colorado High country. Congratulations on great looking Buck.

I believe thermal imaging is only reasonable in areas that the critters are wearing Ghillie suits and have been issued bullet proof vests !

That dude is heavvvvvvY ! Nice Job !

Wow , ya got 61 inches before your first point or circumfrence measurement. He's a Goodun' Congratulations on a really great Buck !

Great looking bear. Congratulations on an awsome solo bear hunt.

The picture says it all ! "One happy crew " Congratulations to your daughter and you on that first buck !

Good looking bear ! What's a bear rug mount going for these days.? I may want to have one done in the future.,

Can't complain about the end results of that hunt ! Geat looking Bucks , congratulations to both of you.

That would be a great Archery Trifecta ! I believe it's doable with a little luck ! It's gonna happen ,

Our archery bear season opened Saturday August 18th. After pre-scouting I knew where a good population of bears were hanging out in the local Sierra Mountains around the 6500 ' elevation mark. I loaded up the Tundra and quad trailer Friday morning with 4 days of hunting supplies My quad and my hunting buddy Marc's Trail 90. I pulled the rig out of Bakersfield around 10:30 A.M. An hour and thirty minutes later I was headed up the old forest service road towards our bear camp with Marc scheduled to meet up with me Friday evening. 2 miles and 50 minutes later I had eased the trailer up to the camp with only 2 broken ratchet straps on the trailer ! After off loading the 90 and my quad and setting up my limited camp arrangement, I jumped on gthe quad and rode the 4 miles of rough road up to take a quick look around for Saturday mornings opening hunt. Needless to say I was pleased with what I saw . The only tracks on the old dirt road were bear tracks and plenty of them. I saw mutltple tracks that were easily verifiably different bears along with a few piles of scat. Marc showed up at camp around 6:30 Friday evening and set up his tent and camping arrangements before the sun set. We discussed the quick run I had made up the hill and the tracks and scat that I had seen. After an evening BS session we hit the sack around 10:00 P.M. with an alarm time of 4:15 A.M. Morning came quickly and after slamming a quick cup of coffee and taking care of other business, we fired up our bikes in the dark and rode the 4 miles up the hill to the hunting area. Marc and I agrreed to a 10:30 A.M. radio check in and parted ways . I was going to hunt the lower part of the mountain, concentrating on the sugar pines and creek bottoms while Marc rode on up the mountain another mile to hunt the mansanita and berry patches. After stashing my quad in the bush , I headed up the hill to an area that I have encountered and taken bears from in previos years . In still hunt mode I slowly worked my way up with the breeeze in my face, looking for sign as I went. A half mile up the hill I found bear scat which I tested for freshness with my foot. ( That's an old bear hunters trick that ensures freshness and also makes a nice cover scent.) Working on around the hill, within short order I came upon more scat where a nice saddle was formed by two ridges coming together with two steep ravines playing off the center of it. With lots of greeenery in them, I was sure that the ravines would lead down to small creek bottoms where the bears like to hang out on hot August days. Well, I'd seen enough . It was time to plant my rearend for a little sit, to see if "MR Bear" might show up and hang around this obvious "hangout spot". I worked up the rocky ridge on the hill that I had come around to the saddle on, to try and get a higher point of view so's I could see as much of the area as possible. Finding a likely spot I peeled my Badlands sacrafice pack and my extra quiver of arrows off and set them down. I really couldn't find a comforatble rock to fit my south end so I moved up the hill another 10 yards where I found a reasonably shaped sittin rock to settle in on. After setting up I looked to my left and noticed a nice concave bear bed at the base of a large pine down below me. I thought to myself , "Don't think I will find a more likely spot than this one ", " I better sit here as ,long as I can stand it , cause this looks really realy Good !' After getting set up around 7:00 A.M. I sat and listened to the pine squirrels , jays and falling pine cones for a couple of hours with no bear movement that I could pick up on. At 9: 00 the lack eating breakfast started to knaw on my belly a little , so I slipped the arrow off the arrow rest and put it back in the quiver and worked back down to my backpack . I rustled around in my pack pulled out a turkey sandwich , set my bow down and proceeded to chow down. Had that sandwich half eaten when I heard a twig snap off my left shoulder right behind me, I rubber necked my head around and to see what it was and there stood a bear 20 feet away eyeballin me and my sandwich. I'm thinking" oh crap, he sure caught me with my pants down", as I slowly set my sandwich aside and reached for my bow . That bear stood there and watched me put an arrow on the rest, hook up my release and slowly start to raise my bow. Just about then he got nervous and turned around and skidaddled around the trunk of a big pine and disappeared. I'm thinking well, that's that, I was caught off guard and it isn't happening. I go ahead and stand up thinking I'll skip around that tree trunk and see if the bear stopped over there somewhere ." I take a couple of steps towards the tree and suddenly the bear pops out between two trees 15 yards above me . I'm already hooked up with my release and slowly come to full draw. I'm trying to settle the pin on a good vital shot and all that bear is showing me is head , neck and chest. As I contemplated the shot with hesitation, the bear decided he needed a little better view of that strange looking critter below him. He took another step and put his nose up in the breeze and sniffed a big Ol' sniff. That's all I needed to put the pin tight on the front leg for the slightly quartering to shot . The arrow smacked him instantly from 15 yards followed by him wheeling around and running back the way he had come from. I heard him run quickly around the hill and a weird kind of sound like he had jumped in the brush or something followed by dead silence. I gave it a few minutes and listened for any other activity , but stiil nothing but silence. I pulled out my GPS and fired it up to set the coordinance of the shot. I strapped on my pack and extra arrow quiver and headed up the hill to where the bear had been standing. As my eyes search his escape route I spotted my arrow ten feet down the hill in a small depressin in the dirt. I went down to pick it up and as i did , I saw a nest of meat bees ( Yellow Jackets ) start coming to life and buzzing towards my face. Well my mamma didn't raise no fool , so I ran out of there licky split with just a few of the bees on my tail. They seemed satisfied with my retreat and started calming down a little as they buzzed around my arrow. I walked a circle around the nest and slipped in from below and grabbed my arrow and retreated again. Luckily none of those yellow jackets nailed me , cause from previous experience , I know that they can really ruin your day Examination revealed that I had good blood on my arrow , but the broadhead was completely gone, snapped off at the ferrel, right at the insert. I went back up to the tree that the bear was standing by and saw a little chunk of meat on the bark. A closer look showed that my Wasp Boss was buried in the tree. The search for blood began and to my disappointment all I could find was a single splotch about the size of a nickel and nothing else . Searching carefully , I skirted around the bees and followed the trail away the direction the the bear ran. I still could find no blood sign , but as I cleared some brush there he lay. He had only made it about 40 feet down the trail before he dropped dead in his tracks. Here is a picture of my boar as he lay followed by another with the The "Killer "Hoyt Element. This is the entrance wound from the "Wasp Boss" 1 1/8" fixed head The bear and I. The 3 fingers is a sign that I finally accomplished for the first time in my life what i call a "CA Trifecta" ( Two Bucks and a Bear in the same year with archery gear on public land in CA, DIY. ) After assymbling a make shift "drag" out of paracord and a nice pine limb for a T handle , I proceeded to drag the bear down hill to the quad. At 10:30 A.M. Marc and I made contact and as I told him I was dragging my bear to the quad he said that he also had killed a bear , but needed my assistance dragging it up to the road. After dropping and hiding my bear near the main road, I rode up the hill and hauled Marc's bear out on my quad on a old steep fire road. Marc had watched two bears feeding in the tall berry patches from 6:30 A.M. until 8:00 A.M. with them being as close as 7 yards in the brush with no shot. Finally one of them broke out on the old fire road and presented a shot. Here's Marc and his sow. We hung and skinned out our bears , loaded up all the parts and pieces on my quad and made it back to camp around 4:00 P.M. We were a bit tuckered out so we spent the night . After loading every thing up we were Outa there early Sunday morning and headed home . Here's a few more random Pictures of our bears. It was a Good Hunt ! 8) My bear on the Quad and Marc smiling ! My bear on the quad with Marc's in the background.

Man o Man , That's a dandy ! Congratulations ,

Thanks, Ive been at it quite a few years . I still Learn something new every year ! Thanks for the positive comments Guys . I appreciate It !

Congratulations on your first bear ! You sure dropped her in her tracks . How are you having the meat processed ? We do mostly ground and a little stew meat for the freezer. Makes great tacos , spaghetti, burritos and bear helper ec ect. Bear Sausage is pretty tasty too ! Love that bear hunting , Our archery bear opens Saturday morning . No prickly pears here , so I'll be concentrating on the Sugar pine crop and the very few berries that produced this year. The bears really like these Sappy cones. Probably won't shoot mine from quite as far away as you did !

I've got the MP-6 and it works well. Love that time lapse feature !

I hit one of their sales and I believe they were about 25.00 for the top and 25.00 for the bottoms. So 50 Bucks ! I don't know what the current price is, but a search on cabelas website for base layers should bring something up.

Hope it's a Goodun ! Do something you enjoy !

I use the Dead down wind products. They seem to workl well. I also wear the lightweight long underwear that has the silver weaved into the material. Most of the sets I have are cabelas brand. I even wear that stuff in the summer when it's 110 out . It wicks moisture and really isn't hot as long as you wear light clothing over it. I'm a beliver in it's scent reducing capabilities..

No , not a bit of damage to his velvet on the tumble down the hill. This buck has the best velvet of any of the bucks I have taken during archery. It is a really a beautiful grey color , not to wet undereneath and in just really superb condition.. A hunting buddiy of mine took a nice coues down in the 36's in August and the velvet was a little ratty . When he had the mount done he had it stripped and done with the artificle velvet.. When I saw the mount I thought that the velvet looked to good , kind of phony.. This bucks velvet looks just about like it.. As a side note, the buck is really great tasting. Must be the sage & juniper berry diet he was on !!!

Haven't posted in a while , but I wanted to share my experience with you guys and Gals. This is a Pacific Hybred area, so it's got mule deer and blacktail mixed together. I'd rather been huntin AZ Coues Bucks but tis the season here ! I wrapped up my first deer hunt of 2012 on Sunday afternoon . The weather was hot , but not as hot as normal. High temps topped out in the Mid 90's, a real cold snap compared to the normal temps that I usually get to hunt in which run 105 -110. After running a couple of trail cameras earlier this month that confirmed that the deer were using a little cattail spring that I frequent I headed over Friday mid day to set my blind up inside a Juniper tree that gives me a nice view point and good wind. Because of wind considerations and the openess of the area around the spring , the best setup that I have is 50 yards from the reeds. It's a long poke , but after a few years of getting busted , it's the best setup that I have been able to come up with. Looking back from the spring the blind blends in well with the semi centered Juniper Tree in the next Pic. It's a little hard to see but it's the darker spot in the medium Juniper half way up the hill I can get away with quite a bit of movement in my hidy hole as long as i"m quiet. Looking out of the shooting window That I formed, there is nice view of the Cattails that the deer and other critters slip into for some liquid refreshment. Saturday Morning I hiked the 1 1/2 miles in to my setup and settled in around 5:30 A. M. at first light. My Trail cams had indicated that action generally started up a little after 6:00 A.M , but very seldom would any bucks show until after 7:00 The brief history from the cam Pics I had, showeed that a Small forked horn showed up daily at around 7:30 A.M. and would hang around quite a while hogging the water hole as does and spikes stood back waiting their turn. Other bigger bucks would come in at random times in the A.M. , but with no regular pattern and some days not at all. Having 2 tags in my pocket , I was semi prepared to shoot the first buck that met my requirements ( legal and made of Meat ) so's I could put some venison in our freezer that seems to have a rapidly dwindling supply. That decision was made for me as no forkys showed as scheduled ! The first action happened around 6:15 with a doe slipping in for a drink followed by a doe with a spike in tow about a half an hour later. Random deer filterd in an out until about 8:00 A.M. with a head count of 8 . Still no legal bucks had showed as a trio fed up the the hill after taking their turn at the water hole. As I watched them feed off I caught movement on a ridge that runs down to the reeds . I slowly swiveled my line of sight to the ridge line and spotted a Buck that was surveying the situation below . He stood there quite a while locked up , as he picked the area apart with his gaze. I waited until he finally made a move and as he disappeared behind some brush I slowly reached over to my right and retrieved my Bow. I sat still and waited what seemed like an eternity as the Buck finally popped out from behind a juniper about 80 yards out. He took his sweet time working his way on down to a flat spot just above the Spring. He was nervous as as a cat in a room full of pitbulls as he danced around on the flat over looking the spring. He acted like he was expecting to see the boogey monster jump out at him at any moment ! I was starting to get mighty nervous myself as I watched the tap dance going on below . I hooked up and slowly started the draw cycle on The Hoyt Element and and when I got to about two thirds draw , the buck stopped dancing and locked onto my movement. I stopped right there in "no mans land" as the buck stared me down. I waited until I couldn't hold the spot any longer and eased ever so slowly on back into the "Wall" Ah! sweet relief "Let off" I guess I moved slowly enough and got away with it because it wasn't long until the buck turned his attention back to the water below. As I held my draw the buck made a couple of steps down towards the reeds and stopped again. I made the decision to make the shot as I considered the distance in my mind. I had pre range the cattails at 50 yards and the buck was standing right above and just on the other side of my mark. My muddled mind said 55 yards as I split the 50- 60 pins and settled on the center of the lungs just behind the front leg. Making sure I had the sight ring centered in the peep as I checked the bubble level and buit in no-Peep on my IQ sight. I held as steady as my excitement would allow and pulled through the shot to a surprise release. My Gold Tip 75/95 XT tipped with a 1 1/8 " Wasp "Boss" 3 blade , zipped across the void to the buck as he spun a 180 to escape. My old eyes didn"t really see what had happened as the arrow arrived, so I wasn't sure of a good hit or as far as that goe a hit at all. He took off up the side of the ridge at a dead run and I was unable to tell by body language whether or not my arrow had found its's mark. At 25 yards I thought I saw a little waver in his step as he crashed through a small Juniper . He did a pretty nice stumble , but recovered quickly and headed on up the hill and as he did I got a broadside view that showed he was painted up pretty good in red on the lower third of his body. At thirty yards his legs turned to noodles and he went into staggering mode , followed by a radical backwards roll down the hill crashing through Brush and Junipers . As he disapperared from sight all went slilent . At that point all I could do is sit there and review what had just occured and let my heart rate slow down. I was pretty stoked and thought to myself. " Wow that was Awsome " I waited a few minutes , and there stiil was no sound or movement and I knew that the buck was done for . I must have waited a whole 10 minutes until I couldn't stand it any more , and then , I put on my pack , picked up my bow and headed up look at my arrow. The arrow lay Just passed where the Buck had been standing and had a bent blede from striking a rock, I took the opportunity to range back to my blind from where the buck had been standing and it was 57 yards . I was 2 yards short on my guess. I had good blood on the arrow and on the ground. It was Time to follow out the blood even though I knew where the Buck went down . There was no way I was going cheat myself out of the track , after the preparation and work I'd put in. 2nd blood. 3rd blood Last Blood My first look at the the downed Buck He took a pretty good tumble down the hill. Through the heart The The Elements's first Buck. 4x3 and Me . The Buck on the Covert Cam Before the Hunt. After the photo session of the Buck and the buck and myself with the camera self timer , I drug the buck away from the spring several hundred yards, parted him out with the gutless method , then gutted him , pulled the tenderloins , heart and liver , and packed him back to the truck. I put him on ice and had lunch. About 4:00 P.M. I headed back out for an evening hunt until last light. I had small a forked horn, some does and spikes come in and water but didn't fill the second tag . Another hunt Sunday morning until about 10:30 A.M. and I headed on back home . My deer is ceartainly no Giant ,but he's a pretty decent buck for public BLM land on the Ca Coast Range where I hunt. The Genetics don't generally produce huge deer over there , but there are a few biguns around. I still have one tag left , so I'll make a couple more excursions over later in the season ! I'd like to tag out early so's I can concentrate on the upcoming Archery Bear season In August.

Thank you all for the comments and a Big Thank you to Amanda for providing this forum for learning & sharing ! I read and enjoy many posts on here on a regular basis .