First Bear on Public Land – A Journey of Grit
Hunting is a strange pursuit. It comes with more failure than success, yet it keeps you coming back. That’s the draw of it...time in the wilderness, testing yourself, and learning with every trip.
This season in California’s B Zone, after a three-year dry streak, I finally harvested my first black bear. It wasn’t just a kill, it was the culmination of years of sweat, patience, and the stubborn drive to keep going when there’s nothing to show for it but another long drive home.
The Pack In
The hunt started at my buddy Hendrik’s ranch in St. Helena. We loaded donkeys, a horse, and all the gear Thursday night, then rolled out before dawn Friday morning. By mid-day we were hiking into the Yolla Bolly Wilderness. The plan was to push ten miles to a mythical spot called the Frying Pan, but steep vertical climbs had us spent. Dan and I were dragging. Instead, we found a perfect campsite by a small lake with plenty of grazing for the animals.
True to form, Hendrik packed real food, steaks, bacon, and eggs instead of freeze-dried pouches. Around camp that night we laughed, ate well, and tried to rest up for opening day.
Opening Day
At first light Hendrik hiked deep toward the Frying Pan while Dan and I hunted near camp. We tried calling with a Bear Buster deer call but had no luck. By afternoon the rain was pouring and morale dipped. Hendrik’s advice echoed in my mind: “Go deep in the dark timber. That’s where bears like to hang out.”
I had just picked up a new Sig Cross rifle with a muzzle brake so loud it blew your ears out. To manage it, I wore new Walker Bluetooth ear buds. They were comfortable but kept picking up random country music through my phone, which was half funny, half maddening. As daylight faded around 5:30, I sat against a big redwood trying to sort the Bluetooth issue when I caught movement in the corner of my eye, a chocolate-colored black bear wobbling through the timber.
I steadied behind the scope, took a few deep breaths, and remembered a friend’s words: “Take your time.” The bear stepped perfectly into my shooting lane. One shot and it dropped.
The Recovery
Ecstatic, I hustled back to camp whistling. Dan met me on the trail, and when I told him I had a bear down, we celebrated right there. After tagging the bear, we tried dragging it uphill but soon realized it was hopeless. Dan rigged a makeshift backpack by tying one arm to a leg and carried it to camp. Not long after, Hendrik returned—packing a nice 2x3 buck and news that he had seen a bear himself. That night we feasted like kings.
Lessons in Work
The next day I spent hours skinning my first bear, a whole new challenge that cost me every knife I had brought. We bagged the meat, then turned attention to helping Dan try for a buck. We never saw a legal one, so after a couple days we decided to pack out.
That first mile was chaos, the donkey and horse turned it into a rodeo, bucking off panniers and fighting the packs. Once they settled down, we ground out the seven-and-a-half-mile hike back to the trucks. Every step I kept thinking, I can’t believe I finally got myself a bear.
Full Circle
Back home I validated the tag, processed the meat, and salted down the hide. About twenty pounds of bear now sit in my freezer. The hide will be tanned into a rug, the skull cleaned into a Euro mount. Every part of the animal is being used.
This grin in the photos isn’t about killing. It’s about the grit. The countless empty hunts, the exhaustion, the sweat, the education that only comes from being out there. A grip-and-grin is more than a smile for the camera. It’s proof of time invested, lessons learned, and a connection to the wild that only hunters truly understand.