After the encounter with that big bear, I was determined to kill it. Steph wanted to hunt that spot one time before we turned it into a bait site, so I agreed and chose not to sit there Friday morning. We both sat together Friday evening, the 7th, and boy did we find some wind. The forecast said winds out of the SSE at 15-20 mph with gust up to 40 or so. Well, they were off a bit. Once we were up in the trees (some of the only trees in the entire section), we were getting nailed by the wind. It was out of the SSW and switching to SW at about 30 mph with gust of 65+. Steph kept trying to convince me that the deer wouldn't move (or bear for that matter) when what she really meant was that she wanted to climb down. I don't blame her. Those winds were nasty. I've never been in a tree that's bent so much. So we climbed down at about 6:20 or so and took off.
The next morning, I picked dad up at the cabin and we brought a bait station sign and some apples and hunkered down for a morning sit. It wasn't quite as windy, but it was still about 15 with gusts of 30 from the SW switching to W. We sat until about 9 o'clock and checked the camera.. We drove up into town and got dad's chainsaw and picked up some rolled oats and corn mix to throw out on the bait pile. We dumped bait at about 6:15pm and there were 41 pictures on the camera since we were there that same morning! We were pumped and hoped that it was the bear, but it was just a buck we call HighRise. He came in three different times during the day: 10am, 3pm, and again at 5:30pm, basically until we showed up to dump bait.
Now this bear had grain and so we figured he'd stick around a little longer each time. Mom and Dad stayed up at the cabin again and I asked dad if he'd throw out some more bait on his way home. He said sure and he checked the camera just to see how many pictures were on it and there were 103 pictures in 24 hours. Nice! Now were getting somewhere. He didn't have a memory card with, so he left the one in there.
This morning, my friend Joe and I sat there with a perfect SE wind in hopes to have that lunker of a bear come in. I poured out the rest of the buck jam and checked the camera first thing. 188 pictures (36 hour total). Joe and I got settled in and browsed the pictures. The bear came in on Saturday night at about 12:30am and stayed for about an hour. He laid down in the oats and I got a bunch of great pictures of him. Otherwise, he did not come in at all on Sunday or last night.
My hopes were high that he'd stroll through while we were sitting. Nope. Joe and I dumped some more bait. We've only got 6 more days to kill this bear. The wind direction is becoming less and less important. Hopefully he starts coming back in during the day. Why didn't I just shoot him when I had the chance? Video, video, video!
The same two bucks - HighRise and "Twiggy" (Steph named the bigger 8 point Twiggy because his legs look like twigs in comparison to his body) came in multiple times in those 36 hours.
I'm still hoping an even bigger buck comes in. The more pictures I get of Twiggy the bigger I think he is. I think he will net P&Y and possibly 130". Both are great bucks for Steph and I'd be content to shoot Twiggy, but we'll try to give Steph a crack at them first. We'll have to kill this bear first now. Joe and I are going to try it again tomorrow morning.
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