BLACK BEAR

Once more, I was at the Richers' place for the hunting season...

Raymond, the owner, has over 70 working baits in the spring season and an abundance of bears. Practically all of his clients are rifle hunters. Raymond is also a bowhunter who knows what is necessary to provide a successful bowhunt. A high percentage of his hunters see bears but whether they get one or not depends upon their proficiency.

In September, on a rainy afternoon, I spotted a large bear munching down blueberries in one of the many clearcut areas. He was unaware of my presence and as I was able to approach him to within 40 yards, I put a Bear Super Razorhead through his lungs. This bear made the Pope and Young requirements with a little extra to spare -18 3/16 inches, and his weight at 300 pounds.

Even though I was well pleased with this trophy, Raymond told me he had seen tracks of a much larger bear. The next spring Bear Hunting Season found me back at the Richers' place with high hopes of finding the oversized bear. Maybe I could find a real whopper!

I hunted for a week and I saw five bears. They were not record book material. But... it was almost 7:00 PM that day, when my solitude was suddenly broken by a movement about 100 yards away at the edge of dense woods. The largest black bear I had ever seen walked right into the middle of the road. He raised its massive head, sniffed the air, and then moved slowly towards me. As he advanced, he reminded me not of a black bear, but of a grizzly. The only thing missing was the shoulder bump. He was BIG!

The bear then moved slowly towards the bait, and when he was not more than five feet from the drum and broadside, with its head turned slightly away from me, I made my move. I came to full draw and located the 25-yard sight pin a smidgen high just behind the bear's front leg. Following him along with the sight pin held on the proper spot, I waited until his nose nearly touched the logs at the front of the bait barrel, and then released an arrow. In the silence of the next half hour I worried, wondered and waited. My arrow had penetrated almost perfectly, hitting the right lung and stopping off at the shoulder.

I had the skull measured for the Pope and Young record book. It scored exactly 21 points, which puts him high in the hiearchy of records. It also qualifies for Boone and Crocket and should be placed within the top 10 in the SCI book with 21 1/16 points.

Biologists estimate my bear was 21 years old and weighed 500 pounds. We have also checked all available records an found that this "giant" of Lake Echouani is the largest scoring bear ever taken in the province of Quebec - gun or bow.