Arkansas Bear with SWAT
Sept 30, 2018 13:47:14 GMT -5
Post by sw on Sept 30, 2018 13:47:14 GMT -5
Arkansas’s archery bear and deer season opened on Saturday , Sept 22. The problem was that we got torrential rain Fri nite, Saturday with only moderate rain on Sunday.
Still being young and not going to let ANYTHING stop me from this year’s bear hunt, I drove the 157 miles to Mt View, AR on Friday (I’d baited the previous week and a friend did on Wed). I drove the 15 miles on Sat morning to my parking spot, put on my pack, rain coat over it and me, my SWAT with at trash bag over it, and walked the mile up and down the Ozark Mountains to my blind. RAIN!
Sat till 11 AM. Rain, turkey and deer all Over the 50 yard diameter food plot. Walked the mile back to my truck , got a huge bag of animal crackers, Oreos , 1/2 gal of honey, 20# of ‘Ol Roy, box of honey buns and a gallon of snow cone liquid. Put that all in a 55g garbage sack and finally made it back to the food plot and barrel. Pretty close to 50# of stuff to go thru the straight up and down trail for a mile in heavy rain. I’m only 71 1/2 so no problem.
Poured the snow cone liquid over the dog food and remaining corn inside the barrel. The Oreos , animal crackers, honey buns, honey on top of the barrel. Back in the blind.
Within 10 minutes the 10-11 deer are back and eating my animal crackers. Nothing touched my jar of Jif that I put on a log.
Deer and turkey all day.
Sunday morning, continued reading and finished , Paul among the People (Apostle Paul’s cultural environment) , and got quite a bit of Bible study done, siting in my blind while it rained outside.
At 3:45 the deer quickly left/
. I hoped I knew why and I was right.
About 4 PM , the beautiful bluish black bear walked across the food plot. Got to the barrel, 50 yards away, stood up facing directly away from me. I’ve studied bear anatomy ad nauseam. I took a heart shot right thru the back. Jerry’s Griz Trick tipped Spynal Tapp, hit right where I wanted and blood spurted right out the bear’s back.
I recocked the SWAT, placed an arrow in it, took my Ruger 357 (I know, a bit light for a bear), and went to the barrel. A trail of blood led me to the bear which only went 30 yards. That bear had massive ground shrinkage! It weighed over 500# when I shot it and was down to 225# at the processor. I guess it’s guts must have weighed 275# at least.
Since , I only even see a bear every 2-3 years, if it doesn’t have a collar, isn’t a cub, doesn’t have cubs, it gets shot.
The little SWAT performed perfectly. It is very addicting: just becomes a part of me.
Still being young and not going to let ANYTHING stop me from this year’s bear hunt, I drove the 157 miles to Mt View, AR on Friday (I’d baited the previous week and a friend did on Wed). I drove the 15 miles on Sat morning to my parking spot, put on my pack, rain coat over it and me, my SWAT with at trash bag over it, and walked the mile up and down the Ozark Mountains to my blind. RAIN!
Sat till 11 AM. Rain, turkey and deer all Over the 50 yard diameter food plot. Walked the mile back to my truck , got a huge bag of animal crackers, Oreos , 1/2 gal of honey, 20# of ‘Ol Roy, box of honey buns and a gallon of snow cone liquid. Put that all in a 55g garbage sack and finally made it back to the food plot and barrel. Pretty close to 50# of stuff to go thru the straight up and down trail for a mile in heavy rain. I’m only 71 1/2 so no problem.
Poured the snow cone liquid over the dog food and remaining corn inside the barrel. The Oreos , animal crackers, honey buns, honey on top of the barrel. Back in the blind.
Within 10 minutes the 10-11 deer are back and eating my animal crackers. Nothing touched my jar of Jif that I put on a log.
Deer and turkey all day.
Sunday morning, continued reading and finished , Paul among the People (Apostle Paul’s cultural environment) , and got quite a bit of Bible study done, siting in my blind while it rained outside.
At 3:45 the deer quickly left/
. I hoped I knew why and I was right.About 4 PM , the beautiful bluish black bear walked across the food plot. Got to the barrel, 50 yards away, stood up facing directly away from me. I’ve studied bear anatomy ad nauseam. I took a heart shot right thru the back. Jerry’s Griz Trick tipped Spynal Tapp, hit right where I wanted and blood spurted right out the bear’s back.
I recocked the SWAT, placed an arrow in it, took my Ruger 357 (I know, a bit light for a bear), and went to the barrel. A trail of blood led me to the bear which only went 30 yards. That bear had massive ground shrinkage! It weighed over 500# when I shot it and was down to 225# at the processor. I guess it’s guts must have weighed 275# at least.
Since , I only even see a bear every 2-3 years, if it doesn’t have a collar, isn’t a cub, doesn’t have cubs, it gets shot.
The little SWAT performed perfectly. It is very addicting: just becomes a part of me.
