How do you do it?

[Doc]

Ok, so let's say you are lucky enough to get a bear.....If you hunt by yourself and the bear is a fair-sized one, How on earth would you get it back to your vehicle. It seems to me that it would be like trying to drag a big bag of jello with no handles. Is there trick to it? Is it legal to cut them up in pieces and drag out a piece at a time? If you had access to an ATV I could see that as a possibility but if you wanted to save the hide, dragging it out would ruin the fur. And trying to lift a bear up onto the ATV racks by yourself would have to be nearly impossible.

Just curious.

[wolc123]

That may have been an issue 20 years ago, but no problem these days, thanks to cell phones (unless you are hunting a spot that don’t have reception).  I only hunt by myself up at my in-laws place but my phone is always with me.  My father in law can be in most places I hunt up there in minutes with his loader tractor or atv. I think his new tractor has a lift capacity of over 2000 pounds. He had to upgrade a couple years ago, to handle his new snowplow.

 

If I was way back, where it was difficult to get an atv close for the drag, I would skin the bear first and drag just the hide out, leaving the head and paws attached.  That would be the toughest (and most important) haul.  
 

Next, I would go back for the 20-40 pounds of edible meat on my second trip (assuming the bear weighs 200-400 pounds live).  
 

That will likely be my plan anyhow, unless the temperature is predicted to be below 40 degrees at the time of the kill and for the next several days.  With bear in warm weather, it is very important to get the hide off fast and get the meat cool. 

I know for sure that my best chance of getting a bear will be as a “target of opportunity” while I am deer hunting during the northern zone early northern zone ML week.  Global warming has made that week very warm, the last 10 years at least.  That is surely not going to change anytime soon.  Keep your knife sharp and you have nothing to worry about.

Edited February 25, 2023 by wolc123

[ANTLERS]

I’ve gotten 6 bears off my property in Sullivan county in 25 years there. 3 of them by myself. The easy way for me was to use the metal cargo hitch off my Jeep. With the bear secured to it I picked up one end and dragged it.

[Doc]

Here is how I would try to do it:

Bear in mind that I have never done it. I would take a heavy duty plastic tarp. roll the bear onto it and grab the tarp and drag it. That should save the hide from dragging it on the ground. It also gives you something to grab onto.

I doubt that I will ever have to worry about it, but I do know that trying to figure it out when you have couple hundred pounds of bear laying at your feet is a bit late.....lol.

[airedale]

I have eaten Bear meat a couple of times and did not really care for it so it would depend a lot on where it was killed and how big it was, how far it had to be dragged to a vehicle. 

Many of the hunting shows I have seen on Bear hunting, especially wilderness hunting a long way from their vehicle or camp, hunters will just skin them out with head and claws intact, roll the hide up and strap it to a pack frame. Some will take the backstraps and maybe some other what they consider choice cuts and pretty much leave the rest of the carcass. Or just hike back in and carry more out but as for me I would not be inclined to break my butt dragging out a whole Bear that I was not going to utilize. Probably why Bear hunting never really appealed to me.

Al

[CharlieNY]

My son and I have both taken black bear in Maine. The terrain there is forested mountains like the Adirondacks. The Outfitter uses jet sleds to drag the bears out of the woods. We hunted when there was no snow on the ground and the drag was still relatively easy. Using the sled will result in no damage to the hide and we both had half body mounts done on our bears. Here is a sled like the one we used.