Bear Baiting

Back in 1974 we were constantly running out of bait for baiting bears. We came up with a reliable source, just was lots of work. Now we have our secret ingredient that is GUARANTEED to work. I'll give the ingredients here.

Okay waiting..... don't need the ingredients but like a story with an ending... :)

Attachment 29696We bought 30 bags of popcorn kernels at 55 pounds each bag. Takes us 3 weeks of standing behind our commercial poppers. You thought I was a sitting on the internet all day when I was actually working making bait.

Below the corn is 3500 lbs of assorted licorice and outside I have 5800 lbs of crushed cookies.

Ingredients are strawberry jello, brown sugar, restaurant grease and lots of labour!!


Gotta mix the restaurant oil in to the corn first to get the jello to stick. The jello will keep the kernel from shriveling in the rain. Bears will devour 5 gallons of this bait in 20 minutes.

Fatri, had to find the folder with the pictures.

I find that this bait is great for setting up bait stations in remote areas. It's light to carry in.

That looks like a lot of work....
How many baits are you running and are you fairly successful?

I'll have about 70 baits to run by the end of July.

You have to put filler bait along with the mixed popcorn because even though they love it, it isn't enough to keep them at a site for long as it goes right through them. That's why I use licorice, gummi bears, cookies and home made granola to fill them up.

wow Chris tell me your a guide. 10950 pounds of feed for a few hundred pounds of meat seems disproportionate for a recreational hunter. Don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong with working hard for your sport but man that's hard core.

Because of the blue berries we don't use meat for fall bear. We use all sweets in the fall. It's a lot of work, yes, but we enjoy it.

Nice thing about all the bait we use, the bear has to eat it all right in front of the hunter. Cant grab a mouth of popcorn and run with it, it all dribbles out of his mouth.

We will ultimately still run out of what we got by Sept 1rst. We have more arriving then.

We hang all our baits in trees so the guys can sex the bear before he shoots. Also the hunter can weed out the little guys with this technique.

Will take about 10 days to mix popped corn (1600 lbs kernels) with ingredients.

Popcorn is the answer over here in Nipigon too Chris.They love it.Took a 510 lb ( live weight) boar last year with popcorn mixed with a little fryer grease and they hammer it.I like the weight of it too for the carry into bait sites.

Anyone who needs bait for recreational bear hunting or guides, you can get all kinds of candies, cookies, cookie dough etc from a place in MN. You can google "lucky seven bear baits" or try "Otter Lake Outfitters", from Wis.

I get the corn from Sam's Club in Eau Claire Wi. for $23.00 a bag of 55 lbs. In Winnipeg it costs $58.00 for a bag of 50 lbs.