Posted 7/16/2012 11:20 AM (#571849) Subject: Bears!
Posts: 25
I was putting around the Eagle River chain for the first time on Saturday with some old friends. Left the musky gear at home with the heat and their general lack of experience.
Know it is not unheard of, but we saw a momma bear and her two cubs swimming across Voyageur after a somewhat heavy downpour with some booms.
We were just sitting there when my friend goes, "holy #*#*, is that a dragon?!" I looked and saw this big hump with two little humps behind it. Looked like Nessie. We motored closer (obviously not too close to respect their distance) and saw it was the three bears. One of the little guys was riding on top of the mom for a time.
Posted 7/17/2012 7:20 AM (#572085 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
We have at least a dozen different bears coming in to a bait station we have set a could hundred yards from the house for a friend to hunt this late summer. Two will easily break 550 pounds. Look like Buicks on the trail camera.
Posted 7/17/2012 12:50 PM (#572209 - in reply to #572085) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 1416
Location: oconomowoc, wi
sworrall - 7/17/2012 7:20 AM
We have at least a dozen different bears coming in to a bait station we have set a could hundred yards from the house for a friend to hunt this late summer. Two will easily break 550 pounds. Look like Buicks on the trail camera.
Posted 7/17/2012 1:11 PM (#572216 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 13688
Location: minocqua, wi.
i believe it's dog-training week so that along with the stifling heats brings em out to run around in the wide open either running from dogs or trying to get some relief.
Posted 7/18/2012 12:08 AM (#572378 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
Saw a moose and a calf a couple miles from the house tonight. Can't beat this area for near everything in the outdoors...
That bear was back in 5 minutes. This time I sent him packing scattering dirt clods on both sides with six well placed S&W 40s. No animals were harmed, and I scared him into running a tight circle at first.
Posted 7/18/2012 8:46 AM (#572406 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
The bird feeder stays. Not my call.
And I have no issue with 'gunfire', I kinda like it. The moose was on 8/47 down from the wayside. Big animal. A bull was killed by a car in that area a year or so ago, and the DNR thought there was only one bull in the area. Since the cow had a calf, there's obviously more than anyone thought.
Posted 7/18/2012 9:25 AM (#572416 - in reply to #572406) Subject: Re: Bears!
Location: Sawyer County, WI
sworrall - 7/18/2012 8:46 AM
The bird feeder stays. Not my call.
Fully understand that one !
sworrall - 7/18/2012 8:46 AM
And I have no issue with 'gunfire', I kinda like it.
Sorry Steve, I wasn't clear - gunfire hasn't been very effective for me in the past - the bear always came back. An air horn was effective for a while, but they grew accustomed to that too. Eventually the bird feeder came down (to the wife's dismay) and the bear didn't come back. Maybe I'll put it back up once the berry crops come in.
sworrall - 7/18/2012 8:46 AM
The moose was on 8/47 down from the wayside. Big animal. A bull was killed by a car in that area a year or so ago, and the DNR thought there was only one bull in the area. Since the cow had a calf, there's obviously more than anyone thought.
Very cool. I'd love to have a few wander further west....
Posted 7/18/2012 9:34 AM (#572418 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
Usually, the bears leave our feeders alone after the woods green up, but we have so many in this area now competition is pretty stiff for food. They have killed a couple fawns over the last couple years close enough so we hear the entire affair from the back yard. Heck of a ruckus, too.
My neighbor down the road east of here a mile has one that will go 600 trying to pull his charcoal grill of his deck a couple times a week. It completely ignores shotgun blasts now and continues to reach over the railing and yank on the grill handles.
Next time this boar comes back in our yard I am going to give it a bb in the nose. That pistol shoots bb loads slow enough so I can see the bb flying through the air, will sting but not do any real damage.
Posted 7/18/2012 9:58 AM (#572424 - in reply to #572378) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 4343
Location: Smith Creek
sworrall - 7/18/2012 12:08 AM
Saw a moose and a calf a couple miles from the house tonight. Can't beat this area for near everything in the outdoors...
That bear was back in 5 minutes. This time I sent him packing scattering dirt clods on both sides with six well placed S&W 40s. No animals were harmed, and I scared him into running a tight circle at first.
Posted 7/18/2012 10:22 AM (#572432 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
deal, Shep.
J Trizzle
Posted 7/18/2012 3:27 PM (#572507 - in reply to #571849) Subject: RE: Bears!
Now Steve... I like you and the website... but gotta give you a little ribbing. A pistol bb gun that moves so slow you can see it move in the air. You're gonna hit a bear in the nose with that?? Planning on holding the muzzle 5 feet from the boars nose??
Posted 7/18/2012 4:32 PM (#572523 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
'Hold out a 9 foot muskie rod. You're gonna shoot a bear in the nose from that distance sharp shooter??'
Umm, yes. I don't understand, you think that's tough or something? Easy shot from 25', but it will be no more than 10'. Hardly requires a sharpshooter, or the .40 S&W...I said the BB pistol was slow and therefore not going to do more than sting the bugger, not inaccurate. It dispatched quite a few pine squirrels before being replaced by a Ruger .177. That thing is nasty.
Homer, try getting treed by one and have it trying to get at you. Stupid boar did that to me while I was deer hunting a few years ago. My son came out at 9 PM with the 6 wheeler and chased him off, probably a 450 pounder, and flat mean spirited. it tried for a couple hours to get up a red pine and get at me, but the limbs were too close together at the base of my stand, and a poke with the broadhead in the nose backed him off, but didn't chase him away. I carried a a canister bear spray for a couple seasons, and never had it happen again. Not all that tame...actually, dangerous critters at times. Last year a 400 to 450 pound boar got pretty insistent he wanted past me into the garage one night; I went out because I heard a big crash, didn't realize it was a freaking bear tearing up Sue's 50 gallon bird seed canisters but took the pistol anyway. The .40 S&W kicking gravel all over his backside convinced him that was a bad idea. Scared the crap out of my daughter in law.
Beav sold me that handgun back a few years ago. I like it. Sold my .357 and .44 directly after getting that weapon. Nice round.
I would not ever 'wrangle' a bear. Those things stink.
Had a sow and a cub in the back yard today.
J Trizzle
Posted 7/18/2012 4:40 PM (#572524 - in reply to #571849) Subject: RE: Bears!
Never said it was a tough shot. Please take video of you shooting a bear in the nose with a bb gun pistol from 10' away.
Posted 7/18/2012 4:48 PM (#572527 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 1530
problem bears in ontario. i worked witha guy from quebec.his way was fill a 45 gallon drum with old greasy stuff and sit back with a case of ale. when the bear stiks his head in ,,,push the plunger. they used a stik of cil dynamo... problem solved.
Posted 7/18/2012 4:49 PM (#572528 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 8834
Samantha can knock a squirrel off her bird feeders out the kitchen window from about 75 feet. Can't imagine a bear would be any harder to hit than that, especially considering that most of the bears I see rummaging through trash cans up in Vilas just look at you like "what do YOU want..."
Posted 7/18/2012 8:21 PM (#572563 - in reply to #572560) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 238
Location: Rhinelander
Here is one of the big boys I'm after......I have a kill tag this year too. These pictures are in the back yard last year but have better pics of him this year about 10 miles away.
Posted 7/20/2012 1:06 PM (#572888 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
There's about 15 of 'em. That stuff is extremely expensive, too, and not easy to use without getting it all over yourself...not worth it unless I'm being threatened by one.
Posted 7/20/2012 1:30 PM (#572891 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 1039
Bears and Moose aplenty.
You see much in the way of wolves, Steve? And I gotta ask, how about Bigfoot??
We've only seen one wolf by our place in Conover. We've only come across one bear in 32 years, but our friends about three miles away have 5 bears around their house. No Sasquatch yet, though.
Posted 7/20/2012 2:19 PM (#572898 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 1039
You leave my uncle out of this Flambeauski...
Just two wolves, eh? I would have expected more. Is there a correlation between the two that anyone knows of? Higher number of bears equals less wolves? Just curious as I have no clue and the water is still too warm to fish down here.
Posted 7/20/2012 2:31 PM (#572899 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 13688
Location: minocqua, wi.
i saw a couple bears on the way from rhinelander to minocqua this morning ... no traffic on the road, so we got to stop and watch em a bit. 2 yearling cubs just out for a stroll ... #*^@, they are black!!
Posted 7/20/2012 2:41 PM (#572902 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 4343
Location: Smith Creek
Wolves don't like to be seen. I've still never (100 percent sure) seen a wolf in all my years up here and I'm surrounded by some of the biggest wolf packs in the state. Neighbors trapped one last year. CPR'ed.
The wolves and bears prey on each other whenever they can. But the guys running bear hounds say some of the best spots are where the wolf packs are.
Posted 7/21/2012 8:46 PM (#573078 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 2865
Location: Brookfield, WI
That Hodag infuriates me.
This thread is confusing. I thought it was about bears, then I'm reading about boar and sows, which are pigs. And a boar tried to climb a tree? I've heard the expression when pigs fly, but now they're climbing trees? My wife's uncle once killed a boar, or maybe it was a bear, with a knife. A pigsticker.
What the hell goes on up there in the wilderness, anyway? One thing I know is, I don't like sharks, and would not swim in the ocean unless shipwrecked. And then hopefully only long enough to get in a life boat. I saw a snake on the golf course the other day. It was slightly larger than a big nightcrawler, and I suspect it would have made a good walleye bait.
If you believe in using live bait. Which I don't because of the cruelty.
Posted 7/23/2012 9:45 AM (#573273 - in reply to #571849) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 32930
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin
Hopeful,
It's a crazy existence up here. We even have to worry about some goofy dehydrated meat eating furry thing that looks like a hippy on steroids and really hates practical jokes, at least it seems that way on TV. We don't have wild pigs up here much, so we call our bears by the same names so we feel like we have achieved the same social status as the South. It's a constant worry.
Posted 7/23/2012 10:28 AM (#573281 - in reply to #573273) Subject: Re: Bears!
Posts: 8834
sworrall - 7/23/2012 9:45 AM
Hopeful,
It's a crazy existence up here. We even have to worry about some goofy dehydrated meat eating furry thing that looks like a hippy on steroids and really hates practical jokes, [...].
Bears!
