Location, Hunting Method, and Stand Setup

The location for my bear hunt will be on a 40-acre parcel of privately-owned hunting land in Marinette County, Wisconsin.

There are two predominant ways to hunt black bears:
1) by use of hunting dogs which chase down a bear by following a scent trail and 'tree' the bear, and
2) by use of a bait station to attract a bear to a particular location where the hunter is waiting.

A 40-acre hunting parcel is too small to hunt bear with hounds.  This style of hunting is better suited to large tracts of land such as those found in the national, state, or county-owned forests.  A 40-acre parcel (a square chunk of land that is 1/4 mile on each side) is perfect, however, for baiting black bear! 

Neighboring properties are all privately-held hunting land without permanent homes - and this is true for at least a mile in every direction. 

We know that black bear are in the area even without baiting activity.  We see them, their tracks, their droppings, and their territorial markings on trees.  And, because we know the neighbors in the area, we know roughly what kind of hunting pressure the bears see.  The hunting pressure in our immediate area has been very low in the past five years.

(In 2007, my Uncle and Dad both shot a black bear off this same 40-acre parcel.  They were hunting over bait.  To our knowledge, no bears have been harvested within a 1/2 mile in any direction since then.)

The method I'm choosing to hunt bears, as mentioned, is over a bait station.  Bear hunters have their choice of weapon for a bear hunt.  This can be either a gun or a bow.  I will start my hunt attempting to shoot my bear with a compound bow from an elevated tree stand.  Should I find that bears are not coming into the bait while I'm on my stand, or if I find that they are just to wary and smart to offer a shot opportunity, I will make the switch to a high-powered bolt-action rifle from a permanent blind (in a slightly different position around the same bait station...slightly further away, at a higher elevation, and offering better visual cover from an approaching bear).

The old saying of "a picture tells 1000 words" is very true in this situation, so here's an artistically-crafted rendering of my hunt setup:

As you can see, the tree I will be placing a climbing stick and hang-on treestand in is about 17 yards from the bait - a perfect distance at which to shoot a bow for an accurate, humane shot.  The tree stand will be ~16 feet in the air.  Given the lay of the land, I will be about 18 feet above the bait station and in a location that favors the prevailing winds that come from the northwest (my scent will be above the bear and not pushed towards the bait station by the wind).  Bears should, in general, be entering the bait station from the cedar swamp to the south of the bait station.  The rest of the cover/habitat around the bait station and blind consists of hardwoods, poplar, sparse conifers, and a heavy 'underbrush' of ferns and small poplar (this property was logged in the winter of 2009-2010.

Here is a photo of the bait log looking back at the large red-oak tree that will have the bowhunting treestand in it:

And here is the elevated permanent blind as seen from the bait log (the red oak that will have the bowhunting treestand in it is about 15 feet out of frame to the right of this photo):

So, that's the hunting setup!  Future posts to include info on what I'm baiting with, the equipment I'm using, and more of the preparation efforts that go into a bear hunt!