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Moose hunt 400lb black bear, or the 25-06 for bear defense.

7K views 7 replies 8 participants last post by  charles p 
#1 ·


This proud hunter was sitting at the end of a beaver dam, behind a small tree for cover and to get out of the ferocious wind that day.

He could see for two hundred yards out in the mash below the dam, and figured he had it well covered.

I was dogging the bush ooooowwwwww!

He hears a little noise, and right in front of him, ten feet away, this monster bear appears climbing out of the mash from behind his screening tree.

I think he pretty much crapped his drawers.

The bear let out a woof, and he fired his rifle at black hair, all he could see in the scope. He hit the bear in the neck, and he quickly fired twice more, but it turned, and jumped in the water above the dam.

the scope is a 4X20 with a 50mm objective. I didn't ask him what he had it set at.

Where after a couple of side strokes, it died.

He was using the mighty 25-06, with 120 grain Nosler Partitions, at better than 3000fps, or so he said.

Recovery was lots of fun, and he radioed for a few of us to help.. We have an old trappers boat at the cabin, and he used that to go out and tie a rope to the bear. That was much more fun that you might expect, as the boat is small, and both he and the bear are large. He had quite a time getting a rope on it in the freezing water, while the wind pushed him further and further upstream.



He finally succeeded, and after we pulled him and the bear to shore, we used the ATV to get it up the bank.

After gutting, we found that four of us could not lift the big ####er on to the trailer, and we had to winch him on with a second ATV.

Post skinning analysis indicates that the neck shot was fatal. One shot blew the right front leg to bits, pretty much ruining the entire quarter. The other slid into the fat down the side of the bear doing no visible harm whatever.

Hundreds of pounds of fat and hide later, there really wasn't that much meat considering his massive bulk. But then he did wreck that one quarter.
 
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#5 ·
nice bear. Reminds me of a bear I shot about 10 years ago. It too weighted just north of 400 lbs. I had a buddy hunting up the road with me and hes a big boy like me. It took us about an hour to get it in the back of my pickup. Sure aint like loading a deer. Not only did it weight 3 times as much but theres no good place to grab on. even the legs are to fat to get a good grip on. By the time we got it in the truck I was questioning ever shooting another one. Thankfully ive never shot another one that big. If I would have been by myself that bear would have rotted before I could ever get it in a truck! Even with a ramp I doubt I could have done it. The two of us had to drag it about 50 yards to the truck and even that I could have never done alone. Congrats though. A 400 lb black bear is a real trophy. At least around here. Most go closer to 150.
 
#6 ·
One way to load them in the truck. I used this set up last year for a doe and it worked nicely.




Thanks, Dinny
 
#7 ·
I could see that method working for deer, but not so much for a big bear. At least not alone... As Lloyd said, there is no good way to grab them and even getting them close enough to the truck to try that contraption would be nearly impossible alone. That's what they make buddies for anyway! And beer for the payment...
 
#8 ·
I loaded a nice buck once by using similar wooden ramps, a rope though an eye in the truck, and a four wheeler. I would put a hard strain on the rope, got off the ATV and pulled the deer a few inches up the ramp. Repeated a few times and the deer slid into the bed.
 
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