My Last time out was 2 weeks ago and was a total cluster #$%@. Debilitating gout, unplanned clothed swim, blown trailer tire, blown trailer leaf springs and got busted by my target bear. So Thursday I headed back in with the canoe (5 km each way for 10 km total paddle) to re-bait ahead of the weekend. Trailer was still busted so hence the canoe. Paddle in was not too bad as the wind was at my back but the paddle out was brutal. 5 km of 30 to 50 km/hour head wind with the occasional cross wind thrown in. Solo with an empty 17 foot canoe made it interesting. Only sheltered portion was at the put-in:
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On Friday I decided i wanted to fix the trailer so spent the day tracking down parts and getting it trail ready. Figured it wouldn't hurt to give the bears a day to get back on the bait as it had been completely empty for 2 or 3 days.
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Saturday i headed out in the boat (beautuful day out) with the climber and headed to the bait. I'll be honest - I have never used a climber before in my life and this one was still in the box after 7 years in the garage. It is a Summit Viper and once i got the hang of it I quite liked it. Very comfortable, safety harness was also comfortable and enough room for me. I kept the gun case up there with me and it worked nicely as a table to eat/drink, put the thermacell on it, also worked better as a shooting rest than the cross bar on the climber. I also hoisted my knapsack up and hung it beside me in an adjacent tree. Spent 7 hours in that thing and was never uncomfortable (although pissing was a bit of a challenge).
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The gun case table (orange/black thing is my SpotX satellite texter/emergency beacon - makes the wife happy when off-grid solo):
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Pack in adjacent tree (totally accessible from climber):
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So sat in the climber from 230 pm to last light. At 520 pm a juvenile came in solo and spent about an hour working the bait. At about 700 pm momma and the 3 cubs came in for an hour. Momma is a tank and if i see her next fall she may come home with me. I watched her and she was comfortably eating bait off the top of an upright 55 gallon drum without having to raise her front feet off the ground. So no bear this spring but just submitted my report and over this years spring hunt i saw 7 bears (3 of them were the cubs). Time to start planning for the fall.
