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]]>Photos compliments of AHS
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]]>Spring bear season is in full swing here at Icy Bay. So far the Alaska Hunting Specialist crew is batting a thousand three bears over seven foot and the rest over six foot six. I’m working some stories on individual hunts, but with one computer in camp and seventy eleven people needing their daily facebook fix it hard to get much computer time. Plus it has been a busy spring and it’s going to be a short summer for me. I head home on the Alaska ferry on the 8th of June then turn around and head back to Icy Bay for fall moose and brown bear in mid August. Not much time for work on our new cabin and firewood. Oh well I’ll have some hunting storie and lots of pictures soon.
Later Chuck
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Actually there weren’t any lions or tigers just bears, lots of bears. Alaska Hunting Specialist spring black bear season here at Icy Bay started out with a bang. Our first group of six bear hunters took six bears in four days ranging from a not so shabby 6′ 7″ to largest a whooping 7′ 6″ with some bigger ones still running wild in the streets. So far our top skull measured 20 14/16 green, all topped 18″ mark.
I’ll be doing some blow by blow on our more interesting hunts along with some the highlights of the season. We bait a little different from the typical bait station. Instead of using a barrel for holding bait and shooting from a tree stand we hunt from the ground and the bait is scattered in a fairly large area. to keep the bears coming back we use scent balls and a grease ball, an invention of one of our guides. The grease balls are old floats that wash up on the beach. We drill a 1/2″ hole on the top to fill the float with grease then a smaller hole the bears can suck the grease from. the float is attached to a tree with a piece of chain. by hunting from the ground the hunter has the freedom to move around the bait site. It also allows the guide to get hunter in close to the bears. Many of our bears are taken at less the 20′ which makes for a more memorable hunt than shooting a bear from a stand while it is eating from a 55 gallon drum. It is common to have several bears working a station at the same time. More than once I have been surrounded by bears that were only a few feet away. Before each hunt hunters are given a short course on the do’s and don’ts around bears and what some of the more basic bear postures mean to help keep every one safe and have a fun memorable hunt.
Our first and so far largest bear was taken by Jeremiah. Jeremiah and outfitter/guide Garrett Cox loaded up 4- wheelers on the second night of the hunt and headed out the Little River bait station up the gulf coast from our main camp. The trip to Little River takes you down a couple of miles down a bone jarring boulder infested dry river bed that could be used for an ATV proving ground, then five miles of sandy beach along the Gulf of Alaska to recover.
The arrived at the parking area dynamic duo where they started their one hundred yard stalk to the bait station. Waiting for them at the bait station was Bandit a small six footer who calls Little River his home. Bandit is a little short of our target for harvestable bears so he gets to keep his job as keeper of the bait for a couple more years. While the intrepid hunters baited the site several more bears came to dinner bell sound of banging plastic buckets. It’s common to have bears come in to a station and eat while a site is being baited. Several shooter bears came in during the first few minutes but since it was still early Garrett and Jeremiah decided to wait to see what else was out there. This time of the year we have good shooting light well passed midnight. However the boys didn’t have to wait that long. About fifteen minutes into the hunt Garrett spotted a black blob making its way through the alders to the bait. Garrett has an uncanny ability to judge bears by just seeing some of the body features. Garrett knew at first sight this one was a monster but it wasn’t coming out in the open, at least not right away. The hunters watched and waited as the huge bear check out things from the cover of the thick alder. The bear that was later named Big Nasty (I’ll explain that one later) didn’t get big by being careless. Big Nasty taunted Jeremiah by moving through the alder but not giving him a clear shot. For the next several minutes watched and waited while Big Nasty tested the air for trouble. Then it happened Big Nasty satisfied all was well he stepped out of the alders, right into Jeremiah’s 45/70’s waiting sights. The shot they were waiting for was here now it was up to Jeremiah to do his part. When Big Nasty stepped out of the alders he was so close Jeremiah could have kissed him. The first shot did it’s job both of Big Nasty’s lungs were turned to jelly. The follow up shot just hurried Big Nasty’s demise. Even with two big chunks of lead in him Big Nasty wasn’t going down easy. He headed back to the safety of the alders where he rolled himself into a lifeless ball in a depression under a very large Hemlock log. Now the boys had to get Big Nasty out of the hole and up a few feet to get him over the log. If you have never moved a deadbear up and over anything try to imaginelifting an equivalent size bag of jell-o.
After nearly three hours of hacking brush then pushing and pulling they finally got Big on top of the log. Now all they had to do was get the foot trail from the parking area widened for the four wheeler so they could get it as close to Big Nasty as they possible. Fifteen minutes of adrenaline and gallons of sweat Big was loaded and on his way to the taxidermist.
Big squared out at a whopping seven foot six inches with a green skull measurement of 20 14/16’s. He was the equivialent of a 370 lbs bag of jell-o.
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]]>The post The Continuing Saga of the Iconic Wolf appeared first on The Last Frontier.
]]>Opportunistic predators come in many shapes and forms; there is a two legged variety who preys on the worlds kind hearted. Living in his high rise Walter Mitty doesn’t get out much his main form of excitement is watching TV and reading Rudyard Kippling. Walter knows the wolf is wise and caring, after all Rudyard wrote about him in a book so Walter knows this to be true. As a child Walter sat enthralled watching the Walt Disney Show where all animals lived in peace and harmony. Now the two legged predator knowing how Walter believes in all gia worship spewed from Hollywood sees an opportunity. Kind hearted Walter might part with some of his hard earned dollars to help out the wolf. First he had to come up with a villain, one who could be perceived as an oppressor of wolf. The self serving hunter who takes food from wolf’s pups to feed his own greedy family and the rancher who refuses to share his cattle and sheep with wolf would fill the bill just fine. Now that our two legged friend has created the problem and its villains, it’s time to go to work on Walter. Walter I know you would like to help wolf feed his pups but the evil hunters and ranchers are taking his food and forcing him from his home. If we work together we help correct this inequity. I could take the bus to Capital City and convince the law givers to make laws the would protect wolf. All I would need from you is some money for bus fare and a little for food and lodging while I’m in Capital City.
Hence the birth of animal rights, the protectors of the hapless little balls of fuzz. Now to create a little public awareness a few Hollywood biologists were recruited to explain the plight of the predator to all of Walters caring but uninformed friends. Walters friends were more than happy to help the wolf so the dollars poured into two legged’s coffers. As they became “informed” Walter and his friends began to disseminate to positions where they could help the poor wolf assume his true roll in the order of things. Some produced videos for Defenders of Wildlife on YouTube to bring about awareness. Others sought gainful employment by becoming conservationist. Still more made their contributions by seeking appointments to the judiciary. However the wolfs crowning glory came when he was canonized by the priest of gia. Saint Wolf was no longer a scheming blood thirsty rogue he was now a patron saint of mother earth holding his rightful place in society. It is now the hunter who hunts for “sport” and the greedy rancher who are the scoundrels and must be purged.
All of this brings saint wolf to where he is today. Saint wolf has worked hard since he was canonized not only has he flourished himself; he has also helped the plight of all predators. Walter and his friends haven’t been sitting around either. They have lobbied the law givers to create bureaucracies like the Endangered Species Act to protect all predators. They have turned the tables on hunters who no longer hunt to feed their families but hunt for “sport”. Ranchers and farmers no longer raise food to feed the world they are greedy land grubbing capitalist who pillage mother earth.
The Saga of the Iconic Wolf will Continue
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]]>The post Alaska’s Lone Ranger Congressman Tells It Like It Is. appeared first on The Last Frontier.
]]>I’ve had my disagreements with Don Young Alaska’s only congressman, but the other day he did something that should make every Alaskan proud. A while back he was given an award by the Humane Society of the United States for his work in his Marine Mammal Assistance Amendments. Even though the amendments fail muster the HSUS decided to honor him with their Humane Award, which Congress Young promptly turned down HSUS calling them (HSUS) the hypocrites that they are. HSUS has been Young’s nemeses for the better part of Young’s stint in congress. Congressman Young has been an avid supporter of consumptive use of wildlife his entire career. Congressman Young recognizes Alaska’s rich traditions of hunting, fishing, and trapping a stance that has put him at odds with many animal rights groups like HSUS. You got to love a politician who is willing to take a stand against the gia worshiping folks and back those of us who live closest to the resources. If the other 534 members of congress had Rep. Young’s tenacity America’s resources would be the better for it.
The Anchorage Daily News article.
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Baiting black bear has got to be one of the most fun ways of hunting black bears. It not only gives you a way to look over your trophy, if you are lucky and get several bears working your stand you can watch how they interact. It also gives you an opportunity to get some really good pictures. For me half the fun of baiting is experimenting with different scent and bait combinations. However the game management unit I live in have a very low population of moose so black bear is one of our main sources of meat. Given that and black bear don’t have all that much meat on them so it takes several to get us through the winter. I don’t have a lot of time to do a much experimenting if I want to get a years worth of meat in. I had to come up with a way to get in as much meat as I can in a short period of time. I should mention I live in an Intensive Management Unit, so I am able to get all the black bear I want. Which brings me to Baitem907 they have an extensive line of scents and lures for black bear. I went into Baitem 907’s web site to look around and I got to tell you that place is a candy store bear baiters. Jesse has a full array of black bear baiting supplies. Whooping 8lb scent balls that come in every flavor from maple, peanut butter, marshmallow, bacon with estrus not to mention the standby’s like anise, honey and blueberry.
Eight flavors of small gel scent ball to scatter along trials leading to your bait station.
They have cover scents, scent powders to enhance the smell of your bait, liquid stuff for drags. They even have a burn formula they call Attitude Adjustment for spooky bears. Going through Baitem 907’s site brought me back to the days when I used to stand in front of the glass fronted case at the local candy store wondering how to invest my nickel. What to do? What to do?
After checking out Jesse’s web site and an online forum she is active in I decided to get a couple of big scent balls. I bait in an area with both black bears and brown bears so I don’t use much meat or meat smells, so that left out the bacon with estrus. I don’t use anise much either, mostly because everyone else does and too many bad shots have educated to many bears. I have my best luck with sweet smells so I got a blueberry and marshmallow. I live on a remote Alaska homestead so I only get mail a few times a year. So when the plane came in with my order I was waiting at the lake for it. As soon as the pilot opened the door you could smell the bait balls. The big test would come in the spring at my bait station. How would it last hanging in the wind and rain? They not only made it through both spring and fall seasons without losing potency. When I cleaned my bait stations up last October for what ever reason I left one hanging at one of the stations. In December while out hunting spruce hens I went passed the station and I could still smell the blue berry. They are both in plastic bags in one of my caches now and in just as good a shape now as they were last year. I figure they will both survive both seasons this year. For me that is very encouraging to many times lure are loud out of the bag but by the time the season starts a bear couldn’t smell them if he was sitting under it. I don’t know what they use but they have done their research the smell are natural and they last. One of the biggest advantages I found to 907’s bait balls was I didn’t have to haul bags of bait out everyday. In the past I would have to haul bait to my stations everyday whether I was hunting them or not. Now if I don’t go hunting for a few days even though the bait is eaten up the scent kept the bears working the stations. Judging by the products I used I would highly recommend Baitem 907 to anyone who baits black bear. If you hunt hogs according to Baitem 907’s site many of their bear baiting products will work equally as well on southern hogs. Try them you’ll like it I did.
I’ll still do a lot of my own experimenting just because it’s something I enjoy doing. But when it comes to serious bear hunting I’ll be using Baitem 907 stuff.
All pictures complements of Baitem 907
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]]>Mid-winter is my family’s favorite time of the year the highbush cranberry and alder is covered with a few feet of snow so we can go almost anywhere. Eight months out of the year they are so thick you have to hack your way around, with several feet of snow covering them we are free to explore and wonder anywhere our feet take us. Our favorite way to do it is on snowshoes so at least one day a week we put on our snowshoes and head out. Last Saturday was clear with the mercury in the thermometer headin’ south toward zero after several warm snowy days. With more warm temperatures and snow in the forecast we decided it would be a good day for a walk about. We suited up, loaded a backpack with an old pot, cups and some cocoa mix then headed out for the hundred acre woods. The boys took the lead and broke trail while ma and pa brought up the rear, they go five miles to our one mile. It’s amazing watching them as they grow; it just seems like yesterday they wouldn’t get more than a few feet from either Jenny or me. Now it’s hard to keep them both in sight they are always in the exploring and learning mode. They make more discoveries in a few yards than Henry Hudson and Capt. Cook did in their entire lives. Each new discovery they run back and tell us about it in five hundred words or more. If they are not telling us about something they are asking about something their curiosity is without end; Why did that tree grow crooked? Why do squirrels eat spruce cones and how come they left half of it on that stump? Our boys at seven years know almost every plant in their backyard, if it is edible, if it has medicinal value, if it makes good fire starter or what ever if it has a use they know it. In the spring Jenny can send them out to pick wild salad greens and not worry about picking something that will do us in. That’s for another day though I’m getting off on a rabbit trail here anyway back to last Saturday. After a couple of hours wandering around exploring and taking pictures we ended up where I had been cutting firewood a few days earlier and had left piles of spruce branches.
The boys and I gathered branches while Jenny got a fire going to dry gloves and fix some hot chocolate. For the next hour or two we sat around the fire getting smoky and drinking hot chocolate while we listen to the boys recap our latest adventure. When the chocolate runs out and the fire dies down we pack up and head home. Winter time explores and hot chocolate has become one of our family traditions. A tradition that will make the memories Jenny and I will have of the boys in our old age. One, hopefully, the boys will carry on with the next generation when their kids are breaking trails and doing the exploring.
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]]>If it weren’t fifty miles to the nearest road I would head to the local Mom & Pop for an espresso-IV to give my brain some motivation. After I get the fire going again I figure work is a lost cause so I close down the laptop and grab an old Louis L’amour novel while I sit by the stove to enjoy the last bit of quiet before it’s time to start rousting the everyone out for the day. When it is time to get everyone else up I put on a CD then start cooking breakfast while the crowd is getting dressed. All goes well I get breakfast going I didn’t burn anything, at least not to bad. Now it’s time to go to work for the day. Today I planned to get some firewood in for one of our neighbors who has a vacation cabin over at the lake. I always love getting their wood in every single tree on their place is on a hillside. So I load up the snow machine with snowshoes, chainsaw and gas and head out their cabin is only about half a mile of alder away. This year has been a low snow year so far we have only had about eight or nine feet. I know that sounds like a lot to you folks down in Georgia but it takes a good fifteen feet to cover the alder patches up here. Fifteen feet will usually translate to about seven feet on the ground after it settles.
After weaving my way though the alders I get to the neighbors back yard their cabin is in a little bowl on the lake surrounded by hills. On one side the hills are about a sixty degree incline the other side are less radical they are closer to thirty degrees. So they are the ones I use to get to the top. Thirty degree slopes usually aren’t to bad even with a foot or two of powder on the crust. I pick out one that looks like a clear shot to the top and blast off. About half way up one of the ski’s finds an alder that wasn’t buried nearly as deep as it should have been. I left my sled with my snowshoes setting back at the cabin a couple of hundred yards away. So now I’m wading through four feet of snow going back to the cabin to find a shovel (I left my shovel at home) and my get the snowshoes. The only shovel I could find was a tiny #2 round point so I grab it and my snowshoes and head back to my buried snow machine. After an hour or so I finally get the snow cleared enough to cut all the alders wrapped around the snow machines ski’s but I’m still no better off than I was an hour earlier. So it’s back home to get a come-a-long and a good shovel. I load everything on a plastic sled and go back to my snow machine. Another hour of digging a hole the size of Rhode Island I’m able to start maneuvering my seven hundred pounds of machine around, thank heaven for reverse. When I finally get it turned around headed down hill it’s four o’clock I’m soaked with sweat, yes your sweat glands work in the cold. I figure it’s time to pick up and call it a day. Today’s is another day and it’s time to get the rest of the clan up and going.
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