Samuel Wiltzius from Marquette bagged one of the heaviest black bears bagged in the state during 2022 seasons while hunting over bait in the Carney Bear Management Unit in the southern UP. The bear he shot certainly was the biggest entered in the annual Big Bear Award Contest sponsored by the Michigan Bear Hunters Association for its members. The bruin Wiltzius tagged in Dickinson County on September 16 had a live weight of 578 pounds and dressed weight of 503 pounds. The skull from the bear scored 20 12/16, qualifying for a spot in Boone … Read More
Red Black Bear Killed In U.P.
By: Richard P. Smith. Ed Groom from Saline has always been lucky when it comes to hunting. One of the first turkeys he bagged was a smokey gray gobbler and he got a bull moose in Ontario with antlers that had a 58-inch spread. Then, on his first bear hunt ever in the UP during 2020, he shot a black bear with a red coat while hunting with guides Susie and Roy Little. Almost all bears in the state are black in color, but there is an occasional bruin that turns up on which the … Read More
Rare (Michigan) Bear Behavior
By: Richard P. Smith. After more than 50 years of bear hunting in the UP, I experienced something I’ve never seen before during the 2021 bear season. Before discussing that rare event, some background information is important. I drew a bear tag for the third hunt in the Baraga bear management unit, as did some friends from the Traverse City area who I usually hunt with out of Lac La Belle Lodge in Keweenaw County. The group included father and son Amos and Doug Esman along with father and sons Kent, Shamus and Seth … Read More
Wolf Shot In Self-Defense !
By: Richard P. Smith. Brian Krupla from Newberry, Michigan has a good reason for wanting wolves in the Great Lakes Region removed from the endangered species act. Last summer, he was forced to kill a wolf to protect himself and one of his dogs and he’s concerned about the safety of his daughter. Krupla could have been the state’s first instance of a wolf attacking a human in modern times on August 2, 2019, if he had not armed himself before trying to rescue his dog from a wolf about 10:00 a.m. that morning. … Read More
How To Judge A Black Bear
By: Richard P Smith. After more than 50 years of hunting, photographing and studying black bears, I’ve learned a number of reliable methods for judging the size and sex of the animals that rely on the differences in body length and height as well as the proportions and positions of the ears on the head and front foot size. Obvious sex organs are important, too, of course. If you see a penis sheath hanging down in front of the hind legs on a side view or testicles from a rear view of a bruin, you … Read More
Michigan’s Bear Population Fluctuations
By: Richard P. Smith. During 2018, the DNR estimated there were 13,756 black bears in the state that were at least a year old on September 1, 2017. The estimate for the UP was 10,799 and 2,957 of those were in the northern LP. In 2019, the DNR estimated the state’s bear population was only 12,408 animals at least a year old on September 1, 2018, with 9,761 of those living in the UP and 2,647 residing in the northern LP. In other words, the population declined by 1,348 in one year’s time when the … Read More
50 Years Of Black Bear Research
By: Richard P. Smith. Dr. Lynn Rogers from Ely, Minnesota has spent most of his life studying black bears. Although much of his bear research has been conducted in Minnesota, he got his start in Michigan. Rogers is originally from Grand Rapids, Michigan. In 1967, Rogers got a job at the DNR’s Cusino Wildlife Research Station in Shingleton. The late El Harger was doing bear research out of Cusino at the time. “June 20th this year (2017) will be my 50th anniversary of handling bears,” Rogers said. “The first bear I handled was with El … Read More
Wisconsin Example of How Michigan Bears Could be Better Managed
By: Richard P. Smith. Wisconsin is a perfect example of how Michigan could better manage their bear population. During 2016, Wisconsin issued 11,520 bear licenses to hunters in the state and those hunters registered 4,682 bears, according to a report issued by the Wisconsin DNR. Michigan only had 6,896 bear licenses available in 2016, resulting in 1,636 bruins being registered by hunters. Wisconsin hunters harvested almost three times as many bears as Michigan and almost twice as many hunters (1.7x) had the opportunity to hunt bear in Wisconsin than Michigan even though Michigan has more … Read More
Michigan Bucks and Bears
By: Richard P. Smith. Do you want to see more bucks or bears in Michigan during the future? Before you answer that question, some background information about both species of big game is important. Due to the use of a method in 2012 to estimate the UP bear population that is prone to errors, the DNR thought bear numbers were declining and reduced bear hunting licenses by 32% from 2012 through 2014 to allow the bear population to increase. The number of bear licenses issued to hunters in the Lower Peninsula (LP) were cut back … Read More
The DNR Has Michigan’s Bear Count All Wrong?
By: Richard P. Smith. If 116 Michigan residents, many of whom were bear hunters, either saw or had trail camera photos of 1,000 black bears in the state during 2015, how many bears do you think were seen and photographed by the thousands of other hunters and nonhunters last year? If I had to make an educated guess, it would be more than 50,000. Some of those bear would have been seen and/or photographed by more than one person, of course, but certainly not all of them. So how many bears were there in Michigan … Read More
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