2008 May

2008 May: SW Alaska Brown Bear

May 6, 2008 found me back on the Alaska Peninsula for spring brown bear season. Dave Casten, IA, was back for a monster brownie. As always Dave and I had a blast together, and as we always have in the past, we had good luck once again. We spotted a lot of bears until finally on day 4 I spotted “Heavy.” It took about 3 seconds to judge the bear, and we were off. It was about a 1 ½ mile stalk. We had to move slowly the last 200 yards, as we were in the open. It played out perfect. We simply waited for the bruin to come to us for the last 100 yards. With 1 shot, “The Alaskan Assassin Dave Casten” dropped the bear in its tracks!! The bear had 9 ¾” front pads! The biggest I have ever seen! It squared 10’ 2” after we skinned it. It would probably go close to 10’ 6” after it was fleshed. We took pictures that evening, and came back to skin it and pack it to camp the next morning.

Dave flew out that evening. I stayed until another guide and hunter joined me in my camp on the morning of day 6.

Hunter Dave Newcomb, NM, and guide Sean Donovan had been seeing bears, but not as many as we had, so they choose to move. Dave was after a 10’ bear, so Sean had his work cut out for him. We hunted everyday where we could see. Some days we couldn’t see but a couple hundred yards, others the wind blew so hard that you could barely stand up. On the evening of day 15 the weather finally started to break. Sean spotted a MONSTER bear. There is no telling how big this bear really was. It looked like a giant woodtick with a swayed back. You could literally see the bear’s swayed back from 2 miles away through binoculars! It’s belly hung so low to the ground you couldn’t see daylight beneath it. We made about a 1 ½ mile stalk on the bear, but he went in the other direction and over another mountain.

We woke the next morning to more fog. We were able to spot a big boar as soon as it cleared. We made a 4-5 mile chase after the bear, but he managed to stay in front of us. We lost sight of the bear after he made a wide “U” turn and started heading back towards our glassing knob. We got back to our glassing knob as quickly as we could. As soon as we got there I spotted a nice bear just 300 yards below us. I quick stalk put us less than 70 yards from the bear. Dave did some off-hand shooting to put the bear down for good.

The bear had the most beautiful hid I have ever seen on a brown bear. It squared over 9 ½’. It was a fine trophy, especially when you consider it was shot on day 16 of a 10 day hunt! I actually think it was a different bear that we were originally after, as after reviewing the tape, the second bear was much lighter colored than the first bear, but it all worked out well.