WEBVTT - Beginners Guide to Spring Bear Hunting 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:02.800 The Sportsman's Nation podcast network is brought to you by 0:00:02.960 --> 0:00:06.359 on x hunt, bringing you the best GPS mapping software 0:00:06.400 --> 0:00:09.520 directly to your smartphone or desktop. On x offers you 0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:12.960 the ability to see property boundaries, mark way points, track 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:16.360 your location, and so much more. Visit on x maps 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:19.000 dot com or you can download it directly from your 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:23.040 app store today. Save off of your purchase by using 0:00:23.040 --> 0:00:27.400 the code Nation twenty at checkout. That's capital in Nation 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:36.599 followed by the number twenty. My name is Clay Nukeleman. 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:40.200 I'm the host of the Bear Hunting Magazine podcast. I'll 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:43.080 also be your host into the world of hunting the 0:00:43.479 --> 0:00:48.640 icon and the North American wilderness. Prepare. We'll talk about tactics, 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:52.239 gear conservation. Will also bring you into some of the 0:00:52.320 --> 0:01:02.840 wildest country off the planet Chasing Bare. We're continuing on 0:01:03.160 --> 0:01:07.040 with our giveaway. If you give us a review on iTunes, 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:11.440 take a screen capture, send us that screen capture through Instagram, 0:01:11.480 --> 0:01:15.240 Private Message, Facebook Private Message, or email us at info 0:01:15.360 --> 0:01:17.880 at Bear Hype and Hunting dot com. We'll send you 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:21.399 out some Northwoods bear products. What do you guys have 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:23.479 in your hands? Brent? What you got in your hands? Man? 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:27.280 Gold Rush bear attracted. It's liquid form, and I got 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:30.920 some gold dust all here from Northwoods. You can can't, 0:01:31.160 --> 0:01:33.199 can't What is it? What does it smell like? Ryan 0:01:33.840 --> 0:01:37.399 butterscotch concentrate form. You use that stuff a ton, don't 0:01:37.400 --> 0:01:42.200 you all the time? What is is that? I've heard 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:44.760 you say that the gold Rush mixed with friar grease 0:01:45.360 --> 0:01:47.680 best stuff you do for attracting bear. Yeah. I mean 0:01:48.400 --> 0:01:50.280 I would probably use this and not even putting in 0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:53.840 baiting my barrels. So yeah, yeah, it would bring bears in. 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:57.920 That's what you're saying. Good stuff. And the gold dust 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:02.600 smells like the gold Rush. It's just empowered form, which 0:02:02.680 --> 0:02:05.520 is it's cleaner, it's a little easier. I don't think 0:02:05.520 --> 0:02:07.760 it's as potent, but it's a it's so it's not 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:10.400 as substitute for the gold Rush, but it's just an 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:13.280 addition to it that you can sprinkle on any kind 0:02:13.320 --> 0:02:17.520 of bait that you have. Yeah, so that's some good stuff. 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:21.320 So check out our buddies at Northwood's Bear Products. Leave 0:02:21.360 --> 0:02:23.600 a review and all the guys that have left reviews 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:28.160 in the past are still entered into our contest. You're 0:02:28.160 --> 0:02:30.560 gonna put that in your coffee yeah, well, I've got 0:02:30.560 --> 0:02:33.040 some honey in there, but it says right here on 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:36.040 the label it's five times sweeter than sugar. Put it 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:39.359 in their coffee, Splash a little bit on your neck 0:02:39.400 --> 0:02:54.080 and your wife met gentlemen, Welcome to the Bear Honey 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:58.000 Magazine Global Headquarters. Good morning, Brent Reeves. Good morning, sir. 0:02:58.639 --> 0:03:02.840 Here we are again. You're reporting in from Central Arkansas. 0:03:03.000 --> 0:03:06.840 Central Arkansas. It's a two hour and fifty eight minute 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:13.240 drive if you follow them speed recommendation. That's a long walk, 0:03:13.520 --> 0:03:16.200 it is. Did you ride your mule up here? I 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:21.280 did not know Flashy mete for me yet. Mr Ryan Grab, 0:03:21.320 --> 0:03:23.799 good morning, Good morning. You got me off the lake 0:03:23.919 --> 0:03:27.360 and got me to come up the mountain. Yes, yes, 0:03:27.600 --> 0:03:32.160 Ryan's got a freezer full of croppy but uh so 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:36.720 he's been crappie fishing, right. I introduced you last time 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:39.920 on the podcast as a guy that was killing bears 0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:43.880 while my mama was still wiping my nose, and uh, 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:48.000 I'm going to continue on with that. So Ryan Grab 0:03:48.120 --> 0:03:51.600 is uh a good friend of mine. For several years. 0:03:51.720 --> 0:03:54.520 Ryan's hunted with me all over Canada and and we've 0:03:54.600 --> 0:04:00.200 hunted together here in Arkansas. And uh Brent has end 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:03.560 with me all over Canada as well. And what we're 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:06.480 gonna talk about today is spring bear hunting. What I 0:04:06.560 --> 0:04:09.119 want to do is I want to take somebody from 0:04:09.240 --> 0:04:13.320 zero to hero about spring bear hunting and about forty 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:15.840 five minutes to an hour. I want to talk about 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:20.400 all the relevant issues that revolve around spring bear hunting 0:04:20.520 --> 0:04:24.440 that have to do with timing, When do you go, 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:28.359 where do you go? Because there are there are states. 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:32.560 There are nine states that have spring bear seasons. They're 0:04:32.600 --> 0:04:37.200 all the Canadian provinces except for some of the northern 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:41.720 provinces that you know, like none of it and uh 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:46.520 uh Nova Scotia are the only Canadian provinces that don't 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:49.280 have spring bear seasons. So I want to talk about that. 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:54.040 I want to talk about Canadian bear hunting outfitters and 0:04:54.080 --> 0:04:56.240 how guys can go up and hunt, and like talk 0:04:56.279 --> 0:05:00.320 about costs because people are like how much does it cost? Um? 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:02.320 I want to talk about a crossing the Canadian border 0:05:02.720 --> 0:05:06.320 because you know, there's all these limitations that guys think about. 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:08.680 Do you remember that guy's name, do you remember the 0:05:08.720 --> 0:05:12.560 guy that Marvin or do you do you remember he 0:05:12.600 --> 0:05:14.720 asked us about I want to tell the story about 0:05:14.760 --> 0:05:16.640 what he asked us about. Do you not remember his 0:05:16.720 --> 0:05:22.080 name is right? No, it wasn't markin Pierre, wasn't Pierre. 0:05:22.680 --> 0:05:28.800 It was about the Canadian border officer. Yeah, it was 0:05:28.880 --> 0:05:32.400 something No I remember exactly. Okay, So we're gonna we're 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:35.200 gonna talk about a crossing the Canadian border with firearms 0:05:35.240 --> 0:05:38.279 and Bosner's and what you need to do. Um, We're 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:41.720 gonna talk about. What we're trying to do is answer 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:44.800 the frequently asked questions, because I get questions all the 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:47.479 time from guys that have never been up there, and 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:51.400 they just have questions, Can you eat spring bear meat? Okay, 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:55.200 because there's a lot of things that in times past 0:05:55.680 --> 0:05:58.800 bears have been managed in such a way where sometimes 0:05:58.839 --> 0:06:00.599 you didn't have to harvest the meat, and it made 0:06:00.600 --> 0:06:03.080 people think it was bad. But so we're gonna I'm 0:06:03.080 --> 0:06:04.600 not gonna tell you whether you can or not. You're 0:06:04.600 --> 0:06:07.320 gonna have to listen, but we're gonna talk about that. 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:11.400 We're gonna talk about, uh frequently asked question, is our 0:06:11.560 --> 0:06:15.320 spring bear hides rubbed out after a certain point, by 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:18.800 rubbed out meaning you know, it is to hide any good. 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:21.040 We're gonna talk about that we're gonna talk about how 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:24.080 you get hides and meet back from Canada. We're gonna 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:28.200 talk about do it yourself options in the Western United 0:06:28.240 --> 0:06:32.440 States for spotting, stock hunting primarily, and bait hunting. So 0:06:32.440 --> 0:06:35.279 we're gonna talk about outfit and stuff, but also about 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:40.520 do it yourself stuff timing for that. Um, those are 0:06:41.440 --> 0:06:43.440 those are some of the big ones that we're gonna 0:06:43.440 --> 0:06:48.160 talk about. So zero to hero, zero to spring bear 0:06:48.240 --> 0:06:51.600 hunting hero in fort or five minutes with Brent Reeves 0:06:51.720 --> 0:06:58.279 Ryan Grab at the Global Headquarters. Um, Brent, first time, 0:06:59.240 --> 0:07:01.159 first time you ever went with me to Canada was 0:07:01.200 --> 0:07:03.839 in Saskatchewan. That's right? Is that right? That was on 0:07:03.920 --> 0:07:08.280 the on the on the trip, the boat trip where 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:10.360 I was singing the record the Van fits Gerald when 0:07:10.360 --> 0:07:12.600 we finally got off of it. Do you know the 0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:15.560 words of that song that you can sing now? Uh, Well, 0:07:15.600 --> 0:07:18.920 it's like a nine minute it's like the Canadian version 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:24.120 of Freebird. It's like twelve minutes long. We've got time forever. 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:27.640 You're able to lose listeners over that. But I do 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:31.160 remember the line that I said when when we stepped out, 0:07:31.160 --> 0:07:34.320 when I stepped out of the boat finally nobody knows 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:37.400 where the love of God goes. When the waves turned 0:07:37.440 --> 0:07:43.400 the minutes two hours. I remember saying that to you, 0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:45.440 and you looked at me and like, I know you've 0:07:45.440 --> 0:07:47.760 never heard that song. But he looked at me like, 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:52.960 did that dude, just make that up? Oh my gosh, 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:56.160 I was scared of that. But spring bear hunting, Yeah, 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:57.640 that was the That was the first time, and that 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:01.240 was the time. It was summertime man far as hunting 0:08:01.280 --> 0:08:03.360 in Arkansas? Was it? It was? It was the last 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:06.000 week of June. So what we're gonna start off with 0:08:06.280 --> 0:08:10.960 is when do you go? Okay, let's start off with 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:13.320 when do you go? And then we'll talk about where 0:08:14.040 --> 0:08:16.240 we went the last week of June and on that 0:08:16.320 --> 0:08:19.120 particular hunt. A little bit of background. We're hunting with 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:25.560 outfitting far northern Saskatchewan, and we rode fifty five miles 0:08:25.560 --> 0:08:29.440 on a boat and a giant Canadian Northern lake which 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:34.960 is almost like an with a about a horse crappy 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:39.760 boat and uh, we were coming out of the water 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:43.840 about six ft a couple to No, no, not that much, 0:08:43.960 --> 0:08:47.000 but it felt like it. It felt like it. But 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:50.840 all the more, all the more adventure we had because 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.840 of how far we were back in hundred and sixty 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:57.800 three miles south of the Arctic Circle. Yeah, because I 0:08:58.040 --> 0:08:59.839 plotted it and checked it when we got back home. 0:08:59.880 --> 0:09:01.719 I thought he was gonna say, a hundred sixty three 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:06.959 miles by boat. It was that far off from that. 0:09:07.000 --> 0:09:12.800 We rode that much in the boat that week, and 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:15.240 then every day we wrote, y'all rode as much as 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:18.440 twenty miles one way in a day, did you not? 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:21.559 You probably you may have gone. I think they went 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.960 each day there and back just hunt. So you probably 0:09:27.040 --> 0:09:28.840 rode three hundred miles in a boat and yeah, there's 0:09:28.880 --> 0:09:31.920 no telling. Yeah, you know what, I would do that 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:37.400 again at the heartbeat. Oh yes, yeah, just probably for 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:40.400 the fishing more than anything. That was a world class 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:44.040 We didn't know at the end, but yeah, it was 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:46.160 one of the first times that we had had access 0:09:46.200 --> 0:09:49.280 to just fishing right out from camp, and I mean 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:53.840 we were just catching fish like a big pike lake trout. 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:58.079 There was h it was and we kind of thought 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:00.600 everywhere else we go was gonna be like that, and 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:05.160 it was not even in similar waters. I don't say 0:10:05.200 --> 0:10:11.160 there's fish everywhere, but not there were and they were 0:10:11.240 --> 0:10:13.640 hungry and it was every third. I mean, you could 0:10:13.679 --> 0:10:17.160 have averaged out. I promise you I would take the 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:19.560 oath right now. It was every third or fourthcast you 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:27.280 were catching colds. Do you remember how well you wouldn't remember, Brent, 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:31.160 Do you remember how nervous I was when I lost 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:37.400 Ryan Diamond Diamond spinner diamonds wouldn't know what it was. Yeah, 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:41.920 I was using his rod without permission. And these these 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:45.679 these big old spoons cost like nine dollars a piece. 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.240 I don't know that was what that was. That was 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:52.120 debait that everybody said, you got to have this or 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:54.240 you cannot. Look You look at it and you think, 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:58.000 I just novelty. You know, you don't catch nothing on that. 0:10:58.400 --> 0:11:02.520 And no, that was it was. You caught fish up 0:11:02.559 --> 0:11:06.040 until the point when I lost yours. Yeah, but we 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:11.560 had we had more. I remember I was legitimately. I 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:16.560 was like a little kid, like, hey dad, remember that 0:11:17.200 --> 0:11:20.400 Remember that bait that you let me. That's what I 0:11:20.440 --> 0:11:24.680 felt like, Oh man, okay, when to hunt. We're gonna 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:28.400 get down to business. When to hunt. So if you 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:31.640 didn't know anything about springbear hunting, you hunt in May 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:35.560 and June. That is that is pretty much when you 0:11:35.640 --> 0:11:41.000 hunt some of the some places actually opened their bare 0:11:41.120 --> 0:11:45.640 seasons in April. Actually, a lot of the Canadian provinces 0:11:45.679 --> 0:11:48.440 open in April, and some of the western states opened 0:11:48.559 --> 0:11:51.880 in April, and even as much as April first, Okay, 0:11:52.800 --> 0:11:57.240 but the bulk of bear hunting is done in May 0:11:57.280 --> 0:12:00.520 and June because that April hunt is risky or snow 0:12:00.600 --> 0:12:03.560 when you're hunting in the northern latitudes, and pretty much 0:12:03.679 --> 0:12:05.920 you can only hunt spring bears up north. There's no 0:12:06.000 --> 0:12:10.800 southern state that has a spring season. Arkansas, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, 0:12:10.800 --> 0:12:13.520 West Virginia. I mean, none of those guys have spring seasons. Okay, 0:12:13.840 --> 0:12:17.520 So you're hunting up north, and so what you're biologically, 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:21.960 what's happening is these bears have dinned for the last 0:12:22.840 --> 0:12:25.800 you know, hundred twenty days or even longer than that. 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:27.840 I mean a lot of times bears are up north 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:32.440 or going into the dens in October. And uh, you 0:12:32.440 --> 0:12:37.360 know what, when we hunted Manitoba, Canada, Southern Manitoba, Canada 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:41.400 the first week of November, we have seen bears every 0:12:41.480 --> 0:12:45.960 year out of their dens first week in November. Ye, 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:49.679 But but it's not common and they're not coming out 0:12:49.800 --> 0:12:51.800 very far from their dens. But let's so let's just 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:54.560 say bears are going into their dens around the first November, 0:12:55.160 --> 0:12:59.920 so November, December, January, February, March, April. They've been in 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:03.360 it then for six months. They come out of the den. 0:13:04.559 --> 0:13:07.959 Their hair is long, at its peak length because they 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:12.280 have grown the longest there possible to be insulated. Their 0:13:12.360 --> 0:13:16.080 claws are sharp. Their their claws, its claws are just 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:18.680 like fingernails. I don't know if it's keratin or whatever 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:21.720 it is, but their their their claws have been growing 0:13:21.840 --> 0:13:25.000 and they have not been walking around without use. Claws 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:29.359 are sharp. They come out of the den on favorable 0:13:29.440 --> 0:13:33.080 days in in most places of the black Bear range, 0:13:33.240 --> 0:13:36.360 bears will be coming out in April and might even 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:39.880 be coming out in snow. Like you know, if you 0:13:39.880 --> 0:13:43.199 didn't know much about bear biology, and and I didn't 0:13:43.360 --> 0:13:46.400 years ago, you would be like, well, does it bear 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:49.880 wait till it's just like super warm to come out, 0:13:50.200 --> 0:13:53.800 or does he come out when there's snow on the ground. 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:56.640 They absolutely come out of their den, sometimes in the snow, 0:13:56.920 --> 0:13:59.880 and it's like a progressive state of awakeness. Like the 0:14:00.120 --> 0:14:04.120 first time they come out. They they might not go 0:14:04.880 --> 0:14:09.320 fifty yards from their den. Yeah, and then a week 0:14:09.400 --> 0:14:12.400 later they might range out further and it's almost like 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:15.000 they're they're going out to try to find if there's food. 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:17.719 And basically when the food win there is a legitimate 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:21.920 food source, then they will start eet that food source 0:14:22.240 --> 0:14:25.920 release their fecal plug, which that's a biological process of 0:14:25.960 --> 0:14:29.960 bear doesn't a bear den to conserve energy, and you know, 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:36.360 they don't urinate or or defecate in general. I've personally 0:14:36.400 --> 0:14:39.240 seen bear scout outside of a bear den in Arkansas 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:43.080 in the middle of the winter. So, but the in general, 0:14:43.160 --> 0:14:47.600 bears do not urinate or defecate for that entire time 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:50.440 in the den. They come out, they've got a they've 0:14:50.440 --> 0:14:53.560 got a plug that they have to release, and that 0:14:53.720 --> 0:14:58.000 only comes after they ingest more food. Brent's grinning over there. 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:00.640 He's trying to think of a j trying not to 0:15:00.640 --> 0:15:07.120 say he's grinning like the fifth grade for my whole life. 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:12.360 But let me ask you this, is it more time 0:15:13.320 --> 0:15:17.040 or temperature that's the trigger for that when they're waking 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:22.440 up food source like they a bear does not then 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.400 because it's cold, it's not like he gets cold and 0:15:25.440 --> 0:15:27.040 it's like, oh man, it's cold, I want to go 0:15:27.080 --> 0:15:29.320 it inn He goes to bed because the food source 0:15:29.440 --> 0:15:32.320 runs out, and so he wakes up when the food 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:36.320 source comes back. Maybe their metabolism is so that's what 0:15:36.360 --> 0:15:40.400 I'm saying. They've taken digested as much as they can 0:15:40.440 --> 0:15:44.120 go and they need to get up and right. So 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:47.120 that's when they start rambling. Yep. And it probably has 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:51.400 to do with you know, daylight period. I mean, all 0:15:51.440 --> 0:15:54.800 the animals are working off you know, the amount of 0:15:54.880 --> 0:15:57.280 daylight to understand what time of year it is. In 0:15:57.320 --> 0:16:02.280 biological processes they're going on and stuff. But it's primarily 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:06.440 driven by food. And so if you have an early spring, 0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:08.360 and that's why we're talking about timming, if you have 0:16:08.400 --> 0:16:11.320 a if you have an early spring, win in northern 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:15.120 Idaho on April one, it's sunny and getting in the 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:18.000 fifties and snow's melting off the top of the mountains, 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:23.200 which does happen Bears are gonna be rocking and rolling earlier. 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:27.000 And so you might go to a Northern Idaho on 0:16:27.120 --> 0:16:31.640 a do it yourself hunt on April the tenth, and 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:35.280 I'm pretty sure Idaho opens early and have a great 0:16:35.360 --> 0:16:38.040 hunt and see bears, and then the next year you 0:16:38.120 --> 0:16:41.040 go back out there and there's not a bear to 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:43.520 be found in the places that you were hunting are 0:16:43.520 --> 0:16:46.600 covered in snow and the bears are still denned up. 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:50.960 So that's the risk inside of April. And that's why 0:16:51.160 --> 0:16:54.360 most bear hunting takes place later in the spring, because 0:16:54.400 --> 0:17:00.240 it's it's a more for sure, guaranteed deal. Percentage is 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:05.000 of going mid to late May would be prime time 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:09.000 and after that's right pride. If if you were just 0:17:09.080 --> 0:17:11.760 to say what is prime time for spring bear hunt, 0:17:11.920 --> 0:17:15.080 I would say from May the tenth to June the tenth, 0:17:16.040 --> 0:17:19.920 that would be prime time. And here's why. Um well, 0:17:20.560 --> 0:17:23.040 let me not get too far ahead. Let me describe 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:26.760 what's happening. Most Canadian outfitters start outfitting the first or 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:30.840 second week of May, and what you find inside of 0:17:30.880 --> 0:17:35.680 that time period is that, let's say from May one 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:40.119 to May, let's categorize that as early spring, okay, and 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:45.400 the big boars are gonna be feeding. They're not They're 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:48.120 gonna be keyed in on just getting resource into them. 0:17:48.280 --> 0:17:51.640 They're not worried about the rut. So you can if 0:17:51.680 --> 0:17:53.800 you have a board at a bait or if you 0:17:53.880 --> 0:17:56.440 have a board located on the hillside on a spot 0:17:56.520 --> 0:17:59.960 and stock do it yourself hunt. He's gonna be really predictable. 0:18:00.440 --> 0:18:03.280 It's gonna be close, and he's gonna be close, that's right. 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:05.840 Who's gonna stay close to that food source, that's right. 0:18:06.119 --> 0:18:10.920 And so that is actually why I prefer early spring 0:18:11.160 --> 0:18:16.320 for a spotting stock hunt, because spot and stock hunt. 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:20.440 If I go to Montana and I'm hunting, I might 0:18:20.600 --> 0:18:23.639 spot a bear from a mile and a half away 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:27.199 on the side of a mountain. If you spot that 0:18:27.280 --> 0:18:31.080 bear on May the first, there's a pretty darn good 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:33.560 chance that tomorrow he's going to be in that exact 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:36.679 same spot, or at least on that hillside. If you 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:40.840 spot if you're hunting in Montana on some of the 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:43.520 seasons in Montana go through the middle of June, you 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:48.520 spot that bear on June tenth in Montana could be rutting, 0:18:48.960 --> 0:18:51.480 the sales are in season. He could be forever away 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:55.760 from there, that's right. So that's that's a general idea 0:18:55.760 --> 0:18:58.320 of what's happening. So it works the same way with 0:18:58.320 --> 0:19:01.840 a bait though you go in those first weeks of 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:05.320 May on a bated outfitted hunt or do it yourself. 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:10.480 Baited hunt in Idaho. Uh, you you're not gonna see 0:19:10.520 --> 0:19:13.200 as many bears, but if you find a big one, 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:17.480 you can probably kill him. So second part of the 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:23.760 spring would be, let's say, from May the tenth tell June. 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:28.440 I'm gonna call that prime time kind of mid spring. 0:19:29.280 --> 0:19:31.359 You're not gonna have to worry about weather as much. 0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:34.200 There's a less chance that you're just gonna be snowed in. 0:19:35.119 --> 0:19:37.480 You know, my buddy Brian Strickland hunted last year the 0:19:37.480 --> 0:19:41.359 first week of May in in Manitoba. He ended up 0:19:41.400 --> 0:19:45.679 killing a big for the kind year after, but he 0:19:45.800 --> 0:19:49.879 set through snow. In his video there's snow in the background. 0:19:50.680 --> 0:19:53.840 He didn't see as many animals as he would have later, 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:55.640 but he ended up killing a big bear first week 0:19:55.680 --> 0:20:01.720 in May, Manitoba. The the So what happens on about 0:20:01.800 --> 0:20:05.320 the twentye of May, though, is the rut starts to 0:20:05.400 --> 0:20:09.760 kick in. Um. There's not a lot of data or 0:20:10.119 --> 0:20:13.960 general information about the bear rut that I have seen 0:20:14.040 --> 0:20:16.400 published or media talked about. You know, like the white 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:20.320 tail rut is like the most understood breeding process of 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:23.439 probably any game animal in the world. Now, is that 0:20:23.560 --> 0:20:26.600 date that you're talking about when the rut kicks in. 0:20:26.720 --> 0:20:32.119 Is that for every latitude or is it diminish as 0:20:32.160 --> 0:20:37.200 you go. Well, here's the way it works is that bears, 0:20:37.560 --> 0:20:41.320 boar bears and female bears whenever they get out of 0:20:41.320 --> 0:20:45.200 the den and they have about a month to feed 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:49.240 and build their processes back up, then stuff starts to happen. 0:20:49.840 --> 0:20:52.160 Because of the bear rut is not like a white 0:20:52.160 --> 0:20:54.520 tail rut. So a white tail rut is based upon 0:20:54.640 --> 0:20:58.320 the actual conception date has everything to do with fawn 0:20:58.600 --> 0:21:01.560 arrival in the spring. So they need those fonds to 0:21:01.600 --> 0:21:03.600 be born a certain time. So they've gotta breed at 0:21:03.600 --> 0:21:06.639 a certain time gestation period of a doe, deers tunter 0:21:06.760 --> 0:21:09.240 days or something, So they gotta breed tunter days back 0:21:09.280 --> 0:21:11.960 from the prime time period of that time. In the 0:21:12.000 --> 0:21:15.440 southern United States, that window would be super wide because 0:21:15.440 --> 0:21:19.840 our winners aren't that long or hard, and so in 0:21:19.880 --> 0:21:23.280 the southern US you have a longer rut. But we 0:21:23.400 --> 0:21:26.480 up in the northern Latin Tunes, like in Manitoba, those 0:21:26.520 --> 0:21:28.080 fonds have to be born at a certain time. You 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:30.480 got this really fine rut. The bear rut is not 0:21:30.640 --> 0:21:34.960 like that because of delayed implantation anytime there's a lull. 0:21:35.000 --> 0:21:41.640 On the podcast, I talked about bear reproductive processes. My 0:21:41.720 --> 0:21:52.760 favorite topic, No delayed implantation, head delayed implantation. It's fascinating 0:21:53.680 --> 0:21:58.800 because basically bears are a low dense the animal, so 0:21:58.840 --> 0:22:01.679 that means they're a herd animal like a deer that 0:22:01.680 --> 0:22:04.679 are just everywhere like so a salth bear has to 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:08.359 have this elongated period of time when she can be 0:22:08.400 --> 0:22:11.920 bred so that she'll bump into a boar because there's 0:22:11.960 --> 0:22:14.040 such a low density. And it doesn't mean that there's 0:22:14.040 --> 0:22:16.160 not a lot of them, it just means that spatially 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:20.440 there's there's gonna not be forty bears per square mile. 0:22:20.880 --> 0:22:23.440 It's just not gonna happen anywhere. It's just not natural. 0:22:23.880 --> 0:22:27.439 So they have this elongated period of time when they 0:22:27.440 --> 0:22:32.520 can be bred. So when love, when love happens brent 0:22:33.400 --> 0:22:37.280 uh and they meet perchance Romeo and Juliet in the 0:22:37.320 --> 0:22:43.120 mountains of Manitoba or the Ozarks, and something in the 0:22:42.840 --> 0:22:49.720 in conception happens. Okay um. The the egg is fertilized, 0:22:50.640 --> 0:22:53.600 but it does not attach to the uterine wall until 0:22:54.440 --> 0:22:59.600 sixty days before gestation in November. That's when gestation starts 0:22:59.640 --> 0:23:02.520 after the bear has gone through the fall. Her body 0:23:02.600 --> 0:23:05.760 is determined if she can rear young egg attaches to 0:23:05.800 --> 0:23:08.840 the uterine wall, gestation starts. Bear cubs are born sixty 0:23:08.920 --> 0:23:12.440 days later in the dent. So all that to say 0:23:12.520 --> 0:23:16.439 that there's not this like pinpoint conception date like a 0:23:16.440 --> 0:23:19.879 white tail because of delayed implantation. Could you make a 0:23:19.880 --> 0:23:27.040 diagram of that? Give me the chug boards. When a 0:23:27.160 --> 0:23:31.720 boy bear loves a girl bear, we're taking up, We're 0:23:31.720 --> 0:23:37.560 taking a turn. Uh No, but that makes so there's 0:23:37.600 --> 0:23:40.359 this bear can be bred any time of the year 0:23:40.960 --> 0:23:44.880 like she could. She could be bred in early May. 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:47.280 But the research that I've done on a couple of 0:23:47.320 --> 0:23:52.760 different research projects showed that pete conception date was around 0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:56.480 mid June for at least a couple of these bear 0:23:56.520 --> 0:24:01.760 populations that they had really tested. So Pete pete conception date, 0:24:02.400 --> 0:24:06.119 breeding date was like mid June. So I compare the 0:24:06.119 --> 0:24:08.760 months of May in June to the months of October 0:24:08.800 --> 0:24:14.240 and November for white tips. So late October stuff is 0:24:14.240 --> 0:24:19.359 gonna be happening. Um, have you seen rut activity the 0:24:19.440 --> 0:24:21.960 last week of May? Or have you hunted? We have? 0:24:22.000 --> 0:24:25.560 We hunted much in last mostly just June. Okay, you've 0:24:25.560 --> 0:24:30.800 mainly hunted in June with well, I have seen um, 0:24:31.000 --> 0:24:36.640 for sure rutting going on in late May, I mean bears, 0:24:37.160 --> 0:24:40.800 boar bears with sous. I've also seen boar bears following 0:24:40.840 --> 0:24:47.320 sALS in early May. Uh. But so that last week 0:24:47.359 --> 0:24:50.960 of May. That's why that's such a hotspot is because 0:24:51.359 --> 0:24:54.680 the bears are still fairly predictable. Like if you find 0:24:54.680 --> 0:24:56.119 a boar in a baby, he's probably gonna be there 0:24:56.119 --> 0:24:59.280 for a while. But there also might be cruising boards 0:24:59.320 --> 0:25:03.320 that find you right you get into mid Gin and 0:25:03.359 --> 0:25:05.240 it's like hunting the white tail rut. That's what I 0:25:05.280 --> 0:25:07.000 was gonna say. If you know a hunter is on 0:25:07.040 --> 0:25:11.879 a bait somewhere and they're not getting pictures of what 0:25:11.960 --> 0:25:16.080 they're considering shooters, it's just like a white tail buff. 0:25:16.119 --> 0:25:19.639 When that ruts kicked in, any day, there could be 0:25:19.760 --> 0:25:25.720