Coach Potter
Life of the Party
Idaho has a couple of spring bear units that stay open until July 31st. Most of the time they aren’t accessible until early July so it seems fair that they stay open a month longer than the rest of the units. I have always wanted to give it a go but normally by the time July rolls around, I’ve done a couple of big hunts and I’m solidly into fishing season for a few minutes.
A few years ago I started doing some hunting with a kid I had coached. He was an ok football player but a stud of a human…great family, good student, the full meal deal. Fast forward a couple of years and he’s turned into a full-blown degenerate hunter. He was a pre-med student when we did our first backpack hunt a couple years ago. Now he’s about to graduate with a forestry degree and has completed a 3-week guide school in Montana. He has no intention of ever using his degree in forestry as he’s going to work for an outfitter as soon as he graduates. He’s going to live the life I wish I’d lived, and I couldn’t be more excited for him. His dad is thrilled as well.
He spent 3 weeks living in the back country while completing guide school and the first thing he did when he got home was pack up and head back out for the final week of the Idaho spring bear season. Oh, to be a kid again!
Wednesday, the 29th he sends me an Inreach message, “Coach I found a pile of bears, you gotta get up here”. There were only two days left in the season, and I had work plus in-laws in town. I told him I was less than 50/50 but send me the pin just in case. By Wednesday night I had figured out that I could leave after dinner on Thursday and hunt the final day on Friday. I sent Christian a message Thursday morning letting him know I would be leaving C’da around 8:00 pm.
I had never been in this unit before. All I had was a pin and a message that the road was rough. He and I had a talk about the definition of “rough” when I rolled into camp at 12:45 am and had only driven 105 miles. Holy smokes! The last 20 miles of that “road” was nothing more than a side by side trail. My Tacoma is now solidly pinstriped
. Christian’s dad was along for this one and they planned on rolling out at 4:00 am to get into position for a shot on a bear that gave them the slip that night. He asked me what I wanted to do in the morning. All I wanted to do was get some sleep!
I got up with those guys at 4:00am and they had all kinds of options for places that I could go. I had slept about 7 hours in the previous two days and wasn’t in any condition to be making decisions. They were fresh and in a hurry. I felt like I was holding them up so I told them to go do their thing and I would fend for myself once I cleared the cob webs. Christian told me I would be able to see the basin they would be shooting into from the cliff we were camped at. It would be 1,000 yards away but I’d be seeing what they were seeing. I told them I’d stay in touch via Inreach. He was all kinds of geeked up so I wished them good luck and they were off.
After they left I decided I was going to make some coffee, setup my tripod and glass, grab my camera and photograph what was likely to be a killer sunrise with the smoke. We were at 6,400 feet and above most of the heavy smoke that settled lower over night. It was a windy night on the top of that mountain and it was a little chilly but it felt good. The glow of the sun was starting to pop and I was getting an idea of the view I was about to have…it was amazing!
I was taking pictures and feeling pretty fortunate that I’d stolen some hunting time that wasn’t on my radar a few days earlier. Every minute that passed revealed a little bit more of what I was about to see. It became really clear to me that there wasn’t any “shootable” areas from where I was perched and I was totally ok with that. I filled my jetboil with water and sparked the burner, what an amazing place to have a cup of coffee!
To my left there was a little crease in the terrain that appeared to be in range. I had lost my range finder on a previous hunt so I didn’t know for certain how far that was but it looked to be under 400 yards. It was a postage stamp in relation to everything around me but I would check it every once in a while as the morning progressed. It was really starting to glow now as the sun was starting to break the horizon. I was looking through my glass when I heard my water starting to boil. I came off the glass and was digging in my pocket for my coffee packet when I looked over to my left where the small closer patch was. On the tree line I could see the bright orange color of a deer and with my naked eye it appeared to be a buck. I assumed at that elevation it was going to be a mule deer. I rotated my glass on its tripod to take a look. I was pretty surprised to see a really nice white tail buck standing there facing away from me. I immediately came off the glass and grabbed my camera. I don’t have the lens to take a good shot at that distance but I shot some pics anyway. It was a real stud of a buck and it stood like a statue for several minutes as I swapped back and forth between glass and camera.
I was pretty excited to see that buck and flipped open my small display screen to see what he looked like. As I zoomed in on the picture I felt like I was winning. After examining the picture for a minute or two I looked back up to see him still standing there like a statue. It had been several minutes and he hadn’t moved a muscle. I looked down hill in the direction he was staring and saw a black spot I hadn’t noticed in the previous 10-15 minutes. I got back on the glass and rotated toward the black spot just to ensure it wasn’t a bear…but it was! He was buried in some huckleberry brush and some other taller vegetation and as he emerged he got big quick.
I’m in Croks and sweats. My gun is in my truck 50 yards away. I’m not in hunt mode at all! The only smart thing I did in the next 5 minutes was to kill the fuel to my Jetboil. I sprint to my rig and grab my rifle case. This is a brand-new gun. I have run 20 rounds though it to date. It shoots amazing but I’m about as familiar with its workings as a freshman with his first bra.
I’m struggling to get rounds loaded into the clip. I’m fumbling with attaching the bipod which I eventually abandon for my pack stuffed with sweatshirts. I was a real mess but I finally had a loaded gun and my pack for a rest so I sprint back to the first spot I can that allows me to get prone. The bear hasn’t moved far and he’s in the wide open now, broadside. He’s a super nice bear. One of the bigger bears I’ve seen in a long time.
I’m absolutely guessing on the yardage and arguing with myself about dialing my scope to an imaginary distance or using Kentucky windage. I had my ballistic chart on my phone and quickly referenced the drop of my bullet at my estimated 350 yard shot. Right or wrong I opted not to dial for the shot. Instead, I made a judgement on the hold based on my ballistics. I had a super solid rest and that felt good. I haven’t done much trigger work with this gun and my old gun had a heavy trigger. I started to put pressure on the trigger when the gun went off. I heard the smack of the bullet as my right ear simultaneously rung like a bell…shit…I forgot to put my ear pro in! The muzzle break makes that gun loud! The bear spun around as he bit at the bullet and he started to roll down the steep clean hillside.
I got up to my knees immediately in an attempt to track his roll. He was headed down hill fast right toward a small sliver of timber and taller brush. My glass is still on the tripod back at the cliff edge so I can’t use it to see into the timber. I stand up and listen intently for any sound, hoping to hear the death moan that signals success. I can see about two thirds of the timbered area he rolled into. I know the rim of this entire bowl is a cliff but the way that timber sliver lays it gives the appearance that there might be more timber than there is. It’s probably been a minute or two when I see a bear standing on his feet in a tiny opening at the bottom of that timber.
My initial reaction was that I was seeing a second bear. Christian had been seeing 2-3 bears feeding within viewable proximity in the previous days, so it wasn't out of the question. I considered taking a rip at the bear I was looking at. I had a second tag, so if it was a different bear I was legal, but something in my brain held me back and just like that the bear was gone. Christian and his dad heard my shot and sent me a message asking if I had shot one in camp and did, I need help. I replied that I had shot one from camp, but I didn't need help and they should finish their morning hunt. After 10-15 minutes had passed, I headed back up to my rig, got dressed and prepared my pack for the recovery. I really enjoy breaking down animals and packing meat. It's such a satisfying process!
It takes me about 15 minutes to get over to where the bear was standing when I shot him. I didn't immediately see blood at the impact site but that wasn't surprising at all. I spent a few minutes griding back and forth but didn't pick up any blood. This isn't my first rodeo, so I expected the terrain to look different when I got over there, and it did look different. One of the things I noticed right away was the ground was very hard. It wasn't any steeper than the places I have hunted in the Frank Church or the Selway, but the ground is mostly soft in those areas and that makes the slop a little more manageable. I was having a really hard time getting any solid footing and I slipped several times. After poking around for a bit with no blood I decided to go down to where I had seen the "other" bear to confirm it wasn't my bear. There was a very distinguishable landmark, so I made my way right to it. As I was approaching that spot, I could see blood, lots of blood.
I could see where it was going but rather than following it immediately, I decided to back track the blood to see where it started and how much. I have been in on more bear recoveries than I can remember and most of my experience has been that I didn't find a lot of blood until I got right to the animal. The amount of blood I was seeing was shocking to me. It was coming out both sides, all over the brush high, and on the ground. I was very encouraged by this, so I decided to go back to where I had seen it last. It was on a downhill path into the only thick brush left on the cliff and I assumed he was piled up in that brush. The ground was so hard and so slick! I was regretting having left my micro spikes at home. I made it down about 15-20 feet of the chute I was in when I slipped and slid another few feet. It was the type of slide that spiked my adrenaline as I realized I wasn't in control of my decent. I was able to grab some brush and climb back up to the last flat spot that had blood. This wasn't something I should be doing alone so I climber back up to the ridge and made my way back to camp to wait for help.
Around 9:00 am the boys made it back to camp. I showed them some pictures of the blood trail, told them where he'd gone and described the severity of the slope. Christina's dad (Josh) was a recon Marine and had done a fair amount of mountaineering in his past. He actually had quite a bit of gear in his truck that he keeps in a "just in case" kit. He told me he would strap me up and put me on belay so that he could help me control my descent if need be. I told him to bring that stuff, but I thought I needed moral support more than anything. When we got to the spot where I had slipped earlier, he immediately said, "you're not going down there without being tied off". I took the order and he got me setup. I was thoroughly impressed with how knowledgeable he was with what he was doing, and it gave me great peace of mind as I started heading down the slope.
Following the blood trail was very easy but it was slow going as the footing was terrible. I made it down about 20 yards when the blood took a sharp turn to my left, and out onto an open ledge that appeared to wrap around the face of this cliff like a small terrace. I could see the blood but couldn't see around the corner. The ledge he was walking was only 3 feet wide and I immediate regretted not taking Chrisitian's sidearm down with me as he had offered when I left my rifle and pack with him. I didn't expect to find him alive but if he was and he decided to take my path back he would knock me off that cliff. I wasn't thrilled about the position I found myself in. I yelled up for a little more rope so I could walk out the ledge he was on. As I turned the corner of the pace I could see that there was only another 10 feet and beyond that was 500' of air. I could also see blood everywhere on that ledge, like triple homicide axe murder blood and my heart sunk. He had died on the edge of that cliff and in his final throws rolled off into oblivion. I yelled up to start taking slack and climbed up out of there totally dejected, but relieved to be back on semi-stable ground.
We humped back to camp and got on our phones to see if there was a way to go around and get to the bottom. It was going to be about 5 miles of nastiness and based on the terracing with intermittent trees, it seemed pretty likely that he would be hung up somewhere along the way. The recovery was over. Over the years I have seen bears shot cross canyon and tumble forever, but l had never lost one that way when on the same side. The next few hours were filled with "what if's" and I "wish I would haves" but nothing was going to change. My biggest regret was not taking the second shot. Impossible to say that would have changed the outcome, but it wouldn't have made it worse. I also had the thought that had I waited for him to get close to the top of the slope, maybe he'd have died before getting to where he did. He only went about 70 yards from where he was hit to where he went over the cliff. I had Christian range my shot that I estimated to be 350 and it was 341 so that was really close. If you hunt long enough, losing an animal is going to happen but it always sucks!
I spent that evening hunting with my camera. We found another bear and it was close but way too small to consider shooting. The lights went out on the season with the three of us watching that young bear gorge himself on berries. It was an action packed short 36-hour adventure that I wouldn't have experienced had I stayed home for the final day. I drove longer than I hunted but it was worth every minute of it.
A few years ago I started doing some hunting with a kid I had coached. He was an ok football player but a stud of a human…great family, good student, the full meal deal. Fast forward a couple of years and he’s turned into a full-blown degenerate hunter. He was a pre-med student when we did our first backpack hunt a couple years ago. Now he’s about to graduate with a forestry degree and has completed a 3-week guide school in Montana. He has no intention of ever using his degree in forestry as he’s going to work for an outfitter as soon as he graduates. He’s going to live the life I wish I’d lived, and I couldn’t be more excited for him. His dad is thrilled as well.
He spent 3 weeks living in the back country while completing guide school and the first thing he did when he got home was pack up and head back out for the final week of the Idaho spring bear season. Oh, to be a kid again!
Wednesday, the 29th he sends me an Inreach message, “Coach I found a pile of bears, you gotta get up here”. There were only two days left in the season, and I had work plus in-laws in town. I told him I was less than 50/50 but send me the pin just in case. By Wednesday night I had figured out that I could leave after dinner on Thursday and hunt the final day on Friday. I sent Christian a message Thursday morning letting him know I would be leaving C’da around 8:00 pm.
I had never been in this unit before. All I had was a pin and a message that the road was rough. He and I had a talk about the definition of “rough” when I rolled into camp at 12:45 am and had only driven 105 miles. Holy smokes! The last 20 miles of that “road” was nothing more than a side by side trail. My Tacoma is now solidly pinstriped
. Christian’s dad was along for this one and they planned on rolling out at 4:00 am to get into position for a shot on a bear that gave them the slip that night. He asked me what I wanted to do in the morning. All I wanted to do was get some sleep!I got up with those guys at 4:00am and they had all kinds of options for places that I could go. I had slept about 7 hours in the previous two days and wasn’t in any condition to be making decisions. They were fresh and in a hurry. I felt like I was holding them up so I told them to go do their thing and I would fend for myself once I cleared the cob webs. Christian told me I would be able to see the basin they would be shooting into from the cliff we were camped at. It would be 1,000 yards away but I’d be seeing what they were seeing. I told them I’d stay in touch via Inreach. He was all kinds of geeked up so I wished them good luck and they were off.
After they left I decided I was going to make some coffee, setup my tripod and glass, grab my camera and photograph what was likely to be a killer sunrise with the smoke. We were at 6,400 feet and above most of the heavy smoke that settled lower over night. It was a windy night on the top of that mountain and it was a little chilly but it felt good. The glow of the sun was starting to pop and I was getting an idea of the view I was about to have…it was amazing!
I was taking pictures and feeling pretty fortunate that I’d stolen some hunting time that wasn’t on my radar a few days earlier. Every minute that passed revealed a little bit more of what I was about to see. It became really clear to me that there wasn’t any “shootable” areas from where I was perched and I was totally ok with that. I filled my jetboil with water and sparked the burner, what an amazing place to have a cup of coffee!
To my left there was a little crease in the terrain that appeared to be in range. I had lost my range finder on a previous hunt so I didn’t know for certain how far that was but it looked to be under 400 yards. It was a postage stamp in relation to everything around me but I would check it every once in a while as the morning progressed. It was really starting to glow now as the sun was starting to break the horizon. I was looking through my glass when I heard my water starting to boil. I came off the glass and was digging in my pocket for my coffee packet when I looked over to my left where the small closer patch was. On the tree line I could see the bright orange color of a deer and with my naked eye it appeared to be a buck. I assumed at that elevation it was going to be a mule deer. I rotated my glass on its tripod to take a look. I was pretty surprised to see a really nice white tail buck standing there facing away from me. I immediately came off the glass and grabbed my camera. I don’t have the lens to take a good shot at that distance but I shot some pics anyway. It was a real stud of a buck and it stood like a statue for several minutes as I swapped back and forth between glass and camera.
I was pretty excited to see that buck and flipped open my small display screen to see what he looked like. As I zoomed in on the picture I felt like I was winning. After examining the picture for a minute or two I looked back up to see him still standing there like a statue. It had been several minutes and he hadn’t moved a muscle. I looked down hill in the direction he was staring and saw a black spot I hadn’t noticed in the previous 10-15 minutes. I got back on the glass and rotated toward the black spot just to ensure it wasn’t a bear…but it was! He was buried in some huckleberry brush and some other taller vegetation and as he emerged he got big quick.
I’m in Croks and sweats. My gun is in my truck 50 yards away. I’m not in hunt mode at all! The only smart thing I did in the next 5 minutes was to kill the fuel to my Jetboil. I sprint to my rig and grab my rifle case. This is a brand-new gun. I have run 20 rounds though it to date. It shoots amazing but I’m about as familiar with its workings as a freshman with his first bra.
I’m struggling to get rounds loaded into the clip. I’m fumbling with attaching the bipod which I eventually abandon for my pack stuffed with sweatshirts. I was a real mess but I finally had a loaded gun and my pack for a rest so I sprint back to the first spot I can that allows me to get prone. The bear hasn’t moved far and he’s in the wide open now, broadside. He’s a super nice bear. One of the bigger bears I’ve seen in a long time.
I’m absolutely guessing on the yardage and arguing with myself about dialing my scope to an imaginary distance or using Kentucky windage. I had my ballistic chart on my phone and quickly referenced the drop of my bullet at my estimated 350 yard shot. Right or wrong I opted not to dial for the shot. Instead, I made a judgement on the hold based on my ballistics. I had a super solid rest and that felt good. I haven’t done much trigger work with this gun and my old gun had a heavy trigger. I started to put pressure on the trigger when the gun went off. I heard the smack of the bullet as my right ear simultaneously rung like a bell…shit…I forgot to put my ear pro in! The muzzle break makes that gun loud! The bear spun around as he bit at the bullet and he started to roll down the steep clean hillside.
I got up to my knees immediately in an attempt to track his roll. He was headed down hill fast right toward a small sliver of timber and taller brush. My glass is still on the tripod back at the cliff edge so I can’t use it to see into the timber. I stand up and listen intently for any sound, hoping to hear the death moan that signals success. I can see about two thirds of the timbered area he rolled into. I know the rim of this entire bowl is a cliff but the way that timber sliver lays it gives the appearance that there might be more timber than there is. It’s probably been a minute or two when I see a bear standing on his feet in a tiny opening at the bottom of that timber.
My initial reaction was that I was seeing a second bear. Christian had been seeing 2-3 bears feeding within viewable proximity in the previous days, so it wasn't out of the question. I considered taking a rip at the bear I was looking at. I had a second tag, so if it was a different bear I was legal, but something in my brain held me back and just like that the bear was gone. Christian and his dad heard my shot and sent me a message asking if I had shot one in camp and did, I need help. I replied that I had shot one from camp, but I didn't need help and they should finish their morning hunt. After 10-15 minutes had passed, I headed back up to my rig, got dressed and prepared my pack for the recovery. I really enjoy breaking down animals and packing meat. It's such a satisfying process!
It takes me about 15 minutes to get over to where the bear was standing when I shot him. I didn't immediately see blood at the impact site but that wasn't surprising at all. I spent a few minutes griding back and forth but didn't pick up any blood. This isn't my first rodeo, so I expected the terrain to look different when I got over there, and it did look different. One of the things I noticed right away was the ground was very hard. It wasn't any steeper than the places I have hunted in the Frank Church or the Selway, but the ground is mostly soft in those areas and that makes the slop a little more manageable. I was having a really hard time getting any solid footing and I slipped several times. After poking around for a bit with no blood I decided to go down to where I had seen the "other" bear to confirm it wasn't my bear. There was a very distinguishable landmark, so I made my way right to it. As I was approaching that spot, I could see blood, lots of blood.
I could see where it was going but rather than following it immediately, I decided to back track the blood to see where it started and how much. I have been in on more bear recoveries than I can remember and most of my experience has been that I didn't find a lot of blood until I got right to the animal. The amount of blood I was seeing was shocking to me. It was coming out both sides, all over the brush high, and on the ground. I was very encouraged by this, so I decided to go back to where I had seen it last. It was on a downhill path into the only thick brush left on the cliff and I assumed he was piled up in that brush. The ground was so hard and so slick! I was regretting having left my micro spikes at home. I made it down about 15-20 feet of the chute I was in when I slipped and slid another few feet. It was the type of slide that spiked my adrenaline as I realized I wasn't in control of my decent. I was able to grab some brush and climb back up to the last flat spot that had blood. This wasn't something I should be doing alone so I climber back up to the ridge and made my way back to camp to wait for help.
Around 9:00 am the boys made it back to camp. I showed them some pictures of the blood trail, told them where he'd gone and described the severity of the slope. Christina's dad (Josh) was a recon Marine and had done a fair amount of mountaineering in his past. He actually had quite a bit of gear in his truck that he keeps in a "just in case" kit. He told me he would strap me up and put me on belay so that he could help me control my descent if need be. I told him to bring that stuff, but I thought I needed moral support more than anything. When we got to the spot where I had slipped earlier, he immediately said, "you're not going down there without being tied off". I took the order and he got me setup. I was thoroughly impressed with how knowledgeable he was with what he was doing, and it gave me great peace of mind as I started heading down the slope.
Following the blood trail was very easy but it was slow going as the footing was terrible. I made it down about 20 yards when the blood took a sharp turn to my left, and out onto an open ledge that appeared to wrap around the face of this cliff like a small terrace. I could see the blood but couldn't see around the corner. The ledge he was walking was only 3 feet wide and I immediate regretted not taking Chrisitian's sidearm down with me as he had offered when I left my rifle and pack with him. I didn't expect to find him alive but if he was and he decided to take my path back he would knock me off that cliff. I wasn't thrilled about the position I found myself in. I yelled up for a little more rope so I could walk out the ledge he was on. As I turned the corner of the pace I could see that there was only another 10 feet and beyond that was 500' of air. I could also see blood everywhere on that ledge, like triple homicide axe murder blood and my heart sunk. He had died on the edge of that cliff and in his final throws rolled off into oblivion. I yelled up to start taking slack and climbed up out of there totally dejected, but relieved to be back on semi-stable ground.
We humped back to camp and got on our phones to see if there was a way to go around and get to the bottom. It was going to be about 5 miles of nastiness and based on the terracing with intermittent trees, it seemed pretty likely that he would be hung up somewhere along the way. The recovery was over. Over the years I have seen bears shot cross canyon and tumble forever, but l had never lost one that way when on the same side. The next few hours were filled with "what if's" and I "wish I would haves" but nothing was going to change. My biggest regret was not taking the second shot. Impossible to say that would have changed the outcome, but it wouldn't have made it worse. I also had the thought that had I waited for him to get close to the top of the slope, maybe he'd have died before getting to where he did. He only went about 70 yards from where he was hit to where he went over the cliff. I had Christian range my shot that I estimated to be 350 and it was 341 so that was really close. If you hunt long enough, losing an animal is going to happen but it always sucks!
I spent that evening hunting with my camera. We found another bear and it was close but way too small to consider shooting. The lights went out on the season with the three of us watching that young bear gorge himself on berries. It was an action packed short 36-hour adventure that I wouldn't have experienced had I stayed home for the final day. I drove longer than I hunted but it was worth every minute of it.
