Worldwide Trophy Adventures covers all species and styles of bear hunting. Seeing a big boar, often identified by his swaggering walk and deep muscular part down the center of his head, on his own terms is an amazing experience. Furthermore, hunting dangerous game adds a whole new level of intensity. "This has been a perfect year for heavyweight bears.Bears roam much of the North American continent and hunting this cunning predator can be quite humbling. "When there's plenty of natural food around the bears don't respond to bait," Means said. Ironically, last year's harvest of 288 bears was a record low number, not because of a lack of bears but because abundant food kept the bears in the forest and away from bait stations. "Every berry crop hit a bumper crop this year so the bears had a lot to eat." "We've had the best mast crop (acorns and berries) that we've had in a decade," Means said. Southeast Oklahoma opened a bear season six years ago and northeast Oklahoma is considering opening a season."Īs for Mize's bear, Means described the big bruin as "a good-sized bear" but nowhere near the size of some others taken this season, including a 530 pounder and a 638 pounder. "I have no doubt they're getting some bears from Arkansas up into the Mark Twain National Forest," he said. Missouri researchers currently are tracking bear numbers in the state. It's very likely that some black bears have crossed the border into Missouri from Arkansas. "We have a quota system where we harvest 10 percent of the estimated population from each region," Means said. When bear hunting was reopened, Means said there were approximately 1,800 black bears in Arkansas and that number has since grown to more than 5,000 today.Īrkansas hunters typically harvest 400 to 500 bears a year from seven managed "bear regions." "It's hard for us to be known as the bear state if we didn't have any bears."įrom 1958-1968, Arkansas reintroduced black bears, bringing them in from Minnesota and Canada. "By 1927, the Arkansas General Assembly made it illegal to kill bears because the population had dropped to less than 50 bears," Means said. "In Arkansas, it has been the most successful reintroduction of a large carnivore, not just in the United States, but in the world," according to Myron Means, bear program coordinator with Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.Īrkansas reopened bear hunting in 1980 following a highly successful effort to rebuild the state's bear population, He said Arkansas used to be known as the "bear state" and had more than 50,000 bears living in its dense forests before the region was settled. Conservation researchers are monitoring Missouri bears and estimate there currently are around 300 in the state.īut if the state's bear population grows the way it has in Arkansas, bear hunting might happen. "That's the way we were raised."Īcross the border to the north, Missouri doesn't yet have a hunting season on black bears. "In my opinion if we don't eat it we don't kill it," she said. Jenay emphasized she and her husband are not trophy hunters. The Mize freezer is now filled with a number of bear roasts, steaks and stew meat. I made a big roast with it and cooked it well done. "It tastes similar to deer but is not quite as gamey tasting as deer. "I had never eaten bear before, but we did eat it and it's actually very good," Jenay said. The bear's meat also will provide many family meals, Jenay Mize said. The bear was skinned and yielded a large pelt, which Mize has in the freezer until he decides whether to do a full taxidermy mount or a bear rug. "There were not that many around here when I was growing up." "I never really thought that would happen, me getting a bear," Mize said. Putting bait out to attract bears is legal in Arkansas if done on private property, and it didn't take long for the big bear to show up within range at the corn bait near Mize's tree stand. "This year we put feeders up again and he came through and tore up a couple of them," Mize said. Mize said a black bear first showed up on family property three years ago and tore up a corn feeder they had set out for wildlife. I was OK taking the shot, but after he laid down, that's when the shakes set in." "He went about 25 yards then laid down and died. "He was 10 to 12 yards from us and turned just right for me to make a clean shot," recalled Mize, who has been a hunter since age 12. With wife Jenay in the hunting blind next to him, Mize, 60, made a perfect shot with a 150-pound-pull crossbow on the big male that measured 6 feet 5.5 inches from nose to tail, with an estimated weight of more than 400 pounds. Kenneth Mize considered a trip to Maine or Canada to satisfy his desire to hunt a black bear.īut he only had to go as far as his family property in northcentral Arkansas to bag a huge black bear Oct.
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