A British Columbia Bear & A Half

Russell’s huge bear skin dwarfs his guide and cameraman in front of their spike tent camp.

Off to my right, at the edge of the ravine, I heard a twig snap.  From my perch in the pine tree, 25 feet above the ground, I craned my neck in the direction of the sound.  What I saw stunned me.  It was the largest black bear I had ever seen.  He was chocolate brown with a wide, yellow chevron emblazoned across his massive chest.  This was not the bear I was expecting, but he would certainly fill the bill!

Shuffling along slowly, he stopped every few feet as if he were thinking things over.  His massive head bobbed up and down like one of those toy dogs you see in the rear windows of cars.  His lower jaw hung open in a silly looking grin.  He was right on the trail leading from the ravine to the edge of the winter wheat field that passed within a few feet of my treestand.  My heart was doing a tap dance in my chest as I watched the huge bruin inch his way toward me.  If he stayed on the trail, he would walk a mere nine yards from my tree.

Still at a distance of approximately 25 yards, the bear did something totally unexpected.  He flopped down on his belly like a big dog, facing the wheat field through the timber.  He was within easy bow range except for one problem: There was a small pine tree between us and, naturally, it was blocking a clear shot at his vitals.

“So close and yet so far,” I thought as I watched his huge form laying there below me.

Meanwhile, 100 yards away on the far side of the winter wheat field, nestled behind a large boulder and a small bushy pine tree, my guide John Blackwell, and my camera crew, Bill Skok and Ray Jackson, were wondering what on earth was going on.  We were there to try to film a bowhunt for black bears for a video project entitled “Bowhunting the  Monarchs of the North.”  We had seen a medium-sized black bear feeding in the field the evening before, and now we were set up to film my taking of the bear if he returned.  I had climbed into my stand at 5 p.m. and it was now 8:00.  I was supposed to signal the camera crew if I saw a bear approaching so Bill could power up the video camera.  I had waved to them as soon as the big chocolate bear rolled into my view.  Now they were on red alert and wondering why they couldn’t see the bear.  I could see them hunkered in hiding, peeking out between the boulder and the tree, obviously wondering what was happening.  I had no signal to describe what the bear was doing, so all I could do was point silently and hope they would understand.

Time dragged on and the bear just lay there studying the winter wheat field.  I began to fidget internally, wondering if this bear was indeed going to come past me, or if he had just happened along and decided to stop here for a rest.  What if he didn’t follow the trail past my tree?  Would this episode end in a coincidental peek at such a monster, with no opportunity for a shot?  All these unanswered questions tormented me, but there was nothing I could do but wait for him to make his move.

The more I watched the massive bruin, the more impressed I became with his size.  For years  I had guided black bear hunters up on the Peace and Smoky Rivers in northern Alberta, and some of them bagged bears in excess of 400 pounds.  But this animal was in a class of his own.  I “guestimated” him at well over 500 pounds, perhaps as high as 600.  Blackwell had told me that a friend of his reported seeing a huge, brown-colored black bear in that area.  He said it was as large as a good-sized grizzly.  But bear stories, as a rule, lean toward exaggeration, so Blackwell hadn’t taken the story very seriously.  There was no doubt in my mind that this had to be the same bear.  At a glance he could easily be mistaken for a grizzly!

Over half an hour passed and I spent my time watching both the patient bruin and my comrades across the field, waiting and wondering what was happening. 

The wind was perfect, blowing in their faces.  The bear, if he ever decided to cooperate, would never know of their presence.  I kept pointing at the bear to assure them that it was not over yet.  In the meantime, a rainstorm blew in and fell in torrents upon Blackwell and the camera crew.  The old pine tree in which I was sitting acted as a natural umbrella, so I sat in relative comfort while the others bit the bullet and got soaked.  I believed the bear was waiting for dark before he came out to feed.  In British Columbia, daylight hangs on until 10:30 at night during the month of May.

My emotions ran the gamut while the wait dragged on.  I would find myself beginning to shudder and shake uncontrollably, and it wasn’t because it was cold.  I’d literally have to talk myself back down.  I vacillated between relative calm and internal hysteria for what seemed like a lifetime, and finally the bear stood up.  My heart and my breath stopped in unison. 

I glanced at my watch; it was 9:10 p.m.  At first he just stood there, lower jaws still agape and head bobbing.  For all the world it appeared as if he were trying to decide what to do next.  I held my breath as I waited for his decision.  Finally, he turned toward me, grunted and began walking toward the field.  In seconds, he was right beneath my stand, but there was one misplaced branch that prevented me from taking a shot.  The bear stopped and again seemed to be thinking matters over.  I glanced nervously over my shoulder at the crew and I could see Bill’s face glued to the camera.  I knew he was already filming.

“He must be wondering what I’m waiting for,” I thought as I looked back at the giant bear.  After an agonizing wait of probably no more than a minute, the bear took another calculated step forward and began sniffing the ground where I had walked to my stand.  I knew he was on to the fact that a man had been there.  I had an arow on the string and waited in electrifying suspense for his next move.

After a long examination of my tracks, he swung his huge head away from me and stood still, offering me a broadside view of his ribs.  That was what I had been waiting for.  I quickly drew and placed the top pin in the center of his ribs, behind his left shoulder, and let the bow string slip through my fingers.

The bear bellowed and instantly bolted sideways at the sting of the arrow.  The shot was perfect, as well it should have been at a mere nine paces!  The broadhead penetrated his left lung and passed through his heart as it angled downward.  The big bear made a sudden dash into the winter wheat field and then looped back toward the timber from which he came.  His legs were buckling as he hit the tree line and he piled up about 20 yards from my tree, not more than five or six seconds from the time the arrow found its mark.

I sat there, stunned that it was all over and that the huge bear was now mine.  Blackwell and the camera crew arrived just as my feet hit the ground.  We stood in silent awe over the bear, each man knowing that this was no run-of-the-mill black bear.  I was congratulated for being the luckiest bowhunter in British Columbia, a fact that I could not deny.  But that’s the way hunting goes.  So often the greatest trophies are simply gifts and have no bearing on the hunter’s ingenuity.

The four of us did our best to lift the bear into the back of my truck, but we couldn’t even get his head as high as the tailgate.  He was indeed an awesome creature.  His hide was as prime as could be, without so much as a single rub.  It had been unusually warm in the Quesnel area and we were worried that the bears might be rubbing early as a result.  But not this one.  He was perfect.  After the skinning was done, we measured the hide.  From nose to tail he measured eight feet and seven inches.  Across the back, from front claws to front claws, he measured an even eight feet.  Blackwell, who is well known for the huge grizzlies he had produced for his hunters, estimated the live weight of the bear at 600 pounds, plus.  After the required 60-day drying period, the skull was officially at 20 11/16 inches, 2 11/16 above the minimum score for the Pope and Young Club (only 5/16 of an inch short of the B&C minimum).  According to the Big Game Records of British Columbia, my bear was the number one bow and arrow kill in the province, surpassing Peter Halbig’s 20 8/16 black bear taken on the Queen Charlotte Islands in 1960.  It ranked number 12 in the British Columbia book among all black bears, most of which were killed with firearms.  Oddly enough, it is the only black bear on record in the B.C. book from the Quesnel area.  According to the third edition of the Pope & Young records, my bear tied four other black bears at the number 69 position.

I must add one intriguing comment as a footnote.  The same man who told John Blackwell about my huge chocolate-colored black bear also told him of a black-colored black bear in the same area, even larger than the one I killed.  He was right about my bear, so no telling how big that other bear must have been.  If he was appreciably larger than the one I killed, he must have been a true giant.