Here's some shots of Brown Bear hunting at Cold Bay Alaska as well as Caribou, Sitka Blacktail Deer and Delta Bison. I was lucky enough to draw two different bison tags different years of course, one to hunt in the Farewell burn along the Iditarod Trail in March Thats on the North side of the Alaska Range. We had to fly in and land in a light plane on skis. Another year I drew Delta Bison which was in the fall. Easy to get to by auto. Deer hunting was done in late winter. We used to take a gang on my seiner and hunt on the islands in Prince William Sound. Great fun as long as no one got seasick as the weather can change quickly.
Date(s): May 13, 2024. Album by John Stelling. 1 - 24 of 29 Total. 497 Visits.
1 This is Cold Bay, last bit of mainland on the Alaska Peninsula before the Aleutian Islands. That gravel bar is the landing strip so we had to work with tides....thats a salt water lagoon.
2 This is from the gravel bar looking at our hunting camp....just a two room cabin. That bridge in the background was built during WW II by the Army over a channel into the lagoon. Over the years and many winter storms the beach had changed leaving the bridge high and dry.
3 This was Steve Blacks operation. He was an electrician id worked with and was a good friend. He was also a guide and only had one client that year so I hunted in his area for free.
4 Brown Bears everywhere! They are well fed on Salmon.
5
6 This was Steves assistants plane. He had just finished recovering the fabric. Took him all winter and a bear liked the smell of the lacquer. This happened the night before I got there.
7 The bear pulled the trailing edge of the left wing down, bit a tire which didn't hole it, bit the prop, then walked around and bit the leading edge of the right wing on her way to walk across the tail stepping off on the horizontal stabilizer pulling the tail as she left.
8 Steve had a fold up quonset hut taken apart and stashed in different camp so we flew over and hauled it all back and set up this "hangar". He ordered some aircraft tube and gas bottles for welding from Anchorage which showed up so the job began.
9 They flew the airplane back to Kenai after the field repair. I saw Steve several years later and he said that fellow was still flying it looking just like that....
10 While we were working on the plane here came the same bear for another taste....So that became my bear. We skinned it at dusk with lights and threw the hide with the head in on that grass bank along side the carcass. The next morning we went to fetch it all and another bear had rolled the carcass off the cut bank and buried it for future and bit my trophy in the head and drug it off aways....while we were working on that bear we were being watched in the dark.
11 Not a big bear but I ended her mission. The game warden told us that bear had treed him up a piling several years earlier and he had to shoot her with bird shot so he could escape. When we caped her we found bird shot in her paws and ears that had been carried in her blood vessels.
12 That hide with the head musta weighted a hundred fifty pounds. Carrying it to camp to flesh the hide and turn the paws, eyes, ears, lips and nose to make the rug.
13 Nice Brown Bear
14 This is the bear the guided hunter shot....A real trophy! I believe they said it squared at 11 feet!!!!
15 They can't see well so they rely on the nose and hearing and they don't hear so well either. He's smelling us.....
16 Another resident of Cold Bay
17 Foxes used to be ranched on the islands all over Alaska. Some got loose.
18 Cold Bay moon
19 It'd be pretty exciting having that coming at ya!!!!
20 This was the start of the Farewell Bison hunt. We flew in in a nice early spring day. We spotted a herd of Bison on that hill behind us.
21 So we landed and set up camp. It's probably around 10 above zero. A nice late winter, early spring day
22 It's against the law to fly and hunt the same day so here they came the next morning. Right off the tail of the airplane. I asked the guys "should I take her?" and they said if I did the hunt would be over!!!! So I let them go. That was the last Bison we saw for three days.......
23 Then it turned cold!!! I saw minus 30F at 9 AM and we were camped in a tent!!! When I finally got the shot my gun was froze so I had to borrow Joels gun. The animals were in a heard milling about and with their breath vapor I couldn't get a good look at them so I got one in the clear finally.
24 Ken Fanning showing off....He was a guide and these trophies are mostly his clients. He let Lee Schlitz and I hunt in his area and stayed in his camps as long as we didn't interfere with his hunters. He had a sheep camp in the mountains and we hunted mostly caribou and moose in the low lands
