Alaskan Bears

[bigbrother]

3 of the HuntChat prostaff just returned from an unbelievable week hunting with Dale Adams of Adams Alaskan Safaris. This is the second time we've hunted with Dale aboard the "Surveyor". He runs boat based hunts in SE Alaska for both Brown and Black bears in the spring season and fall. OlSpark's bear was a freak! Squared a true 7'6", had a perfect hide and made B&C. John's bear was a great bear as well taken on the first night. Apart from the unbelievable bear hunting, we saw whales, killer whales, harbor porpoises, seals, sea otters, wolves, bald eagles; caught Halibut, sea run trout, crabs, and a shark. While I don't have enough room to give you all the details, here's a couple of pics:

[Larryjk]

Great looking trophies and memories that will never fade.

[wrenchman]

cool you need to post picks and storys

[bigbrother]

Thanks guys. As far as some stories, with a hunt like we had there are lots of them for every day. I can't really express how nice of a hunt and how great of an outfitter that Dale Adams is. While I did not shoot one (my choice), I saw more than my share. I passed on a 6 1/2 footer on my 4th night that I could have easily taken with the bow. It would have been a great bear pretty much anywhere else but where we were.

On the first night, John and I were guided by Alex, Spark went alone with Dale. About 2 hours into the hunt, we spotted what looked like a good bear about 2 miles down the shore line. We hopped into the boat to close the distance but before we could gain ground on it, it disappeared into the rain forest. After that, we motored out around another inlet and spotted another bear, again from about 2 miles. We closed to within about 3/4 mile and beached the boat. We glassed the bear for about 10 minutes and determined it looked good enough to get closer. In order to get the wind right we had to run around the bottom end of a bay and close in from the south on the same shore that he was feeding on. With the tide out, it was quiet but trying to run in the mud with hip boots on was quite the chore.

Soon we were within about 300 yards of where we thought the bear should be but we couldn't find it. We went from the high of the excitement from the stalk to the low everyone feels when you think you blew it. We were standing there discussing what to do next when he popped back out onto the beach and was feeding toward us. We were on the wide open beach with nothing to do but lay down and take a rest of off Alex's pack. The bear was a little over 300 yards but was working toward us....slowly. We layed in the mud and waited. And waited. For about 1/2 and hour for the bear to finally close to within 200 yards. Alex did not want us to shoot further than that. When the bear reached 209 we said close enough and John sqeezed the trigger. The bear ran to the woods and came a little closer at which time John shot again and the bear disappeared. At this point, darkness was coming and we couldn't find any blood as we had expected. John felt that both of the shots were good but we decided we would wait until morning to follow up.

The next morning found all 5 of us back at the scene and it wasn't long before Dale found blood....lots of it. We followed it for about 50 yards to where the bear had bedded. Unfortunately, there was no bear. We started through the brush trying to find out where it went when Dale found more blood, but the freshness showed that we were in the thick stuff with a very much alive bear. After about 30 yards Dale and John came upon the bear at mere feet and when it got up to leave John put a final finishing shot into it from behind. We were all a little perplexed as to why the bear was still alive but upon skinning we found that John's first bullet was slightly high and did not take out the lungs, his second shot went through the shoulder but was too far forward and again did not hit anything vital. The bear had lost a lot of blood but the final shot was the one that did it. Needless to say, we had lots of excitement and John got to shoot for 2 days! John got the pleasure of carrying out 6'+ of bear hide.

[bigbrother]

Day two is when Olspark hammered his GIANT. He and Dale looked over 7 different bears on day two before seeing his beast with a rubbed up sow. Upon beaching the boat, they stalked a little on foot to get within range. At about 130 yards spark hit him with the 300 Ultra shooting 200g Accubonds at about 3100fps. The bear took the shot and turn to run. Spark hit him twice more before he reached the woods. Just when things started to calm down, the bear stumbled back out onto the beach to their right where Spark hit him for the fourth time and he finally fell. As mentioned earilier this beast was a truly once in a lifetime bear. 8' across the paws, 7' from nose to tail, and a skull that measures 20 10/16. The hide was as if it just came from the barber it was so perfect. Oddly enough Dale felt this bear was still relatively young at about 5 years and would have gotten even larger. He said it was just a "genetic freak". Both John and I were happy that they left it on the beach for all of us to check out in the morning.

[bigbrother]

As for me....well like I said, 44 different bears and did not shoot one(including this one that I couldv jumped on out of the boat). I almost hate to say that as I don't like it to detract from the awesome experience. Just as last time, we all got to bait, place and check crab pots. Needless to say we ate the BEST Dungeonesse crab you can ever have. We fished for Halibut 30' from where we slept and caught a number of 15-30 lb fish. Plenty to eat on the boat and bring back a bunch that we froze.

While I was chasing bears, Spark and John went fishing with Alex where John landed a 3' Shark!

If any of you have thought about it, dreamt about it, whatever....Dale Adams of Adams Alaskan Safaris is worth the saving and dreaming. Yes, he's the same guy Bob Foulkrod has hunting with multiple times for different tv shows. Bob himself has taken black and brown bears with Dale. But more than that, he's a great guy who serves on the Alaskan Professional Hunters board and makes sure everyone who hunts with him has plenty of memories.

I will go back because I have some unsetlled business with bears of South East Alaska.