How to make salmon eating black bear taste good???

[dmdude]

I read a lot about how fall black bear is not desired at all for eating. I'll be hunting black bear soon on Prince of Wales in SE Alaska. Is there a way to prepare the meat to be edible? For example, with bloody fish meat, I can soak in milk and it helps pull the blood out and clean the meat. Is there a trick like this for black bear? I highly doubt I'll find a berry eating bear on an island with salmon in walkable distance for them.

 

[Mykolaivka887]

I'll be hunting black bear soon on Prince of Wales in SE Alaska .... I highly doubt I'll find a berry eating bear on an island with salmon in walkable distance for them.

You're right about that, that's for sure.

 

[jhm2023]

The best way I find to prepare black bear meat to taste good is by preparing for a hunt where there aren't salmon.

 

[z987k]

The best way I find to prepare black bear meat to taste good is by preparing for a hunt where there aren't salmon.

Yup. No reason to hunt one except for a hide if there's salmon available.

That said, fall salmon are the best. AFTER the salmon are gone.

 

[Bear_Hunter]

I have heard that the nastyness is concentrated in the fat, so I'd remove every bit of fat as possible. Then I'd plan on making sausage products with the meat, adding pork fat, and maybe increasing the seasoning by about 50%. It'll probably still taste off though. Good luck and if you get one, let us know if you managed to make it edible.

 

[Mykolaivka887]

I have heard that the nastyness is concentrated in the fat, so I'd remove every bit of fat as possible. Then I'd plan on making sausage products with the meat, adding pork fat, and maybe increasing the seasoning by about 50%. It'll probably still taste off though. Good luck and if you get one, let us know if you managed to make it edible.

It'll taste more than just "off". Merely cooking it, it'll run you out of the kitchen. Think of it this way; dead herring that's been laying on the beach a couple weeks (lol).

 

[dmdude]

Meateater crew should do a black beer episode on "pardon my plate". Haha, man, I want to find a way to make it edible so badly.

 

[z987k]

Meateater crew should do a black beer episode on "pardon my plate". Haha, man, I want to find a way to make it edible so badly.

Black bear tastes amazing. You just have to shoot them in the right places and time of year.

 

[gbflyer]

Not sure about salvage requirements on POW. Do you have to salvage meat? If not leave it. Nothing goes to waste in nature. Inedible things in the freezer go to the landfill.

 

[AKDoc]

Spring black bear meat is pretty good, but I've not salvaged bear meat in the fall because areas where I hunt there are salmon run rivers/creeks that are part of their feeding routines...I leave the meat in the field, and I am confident that it is consumed as part of the wildlife cycle in that area. I've honestly gagged a few times when removing the hide from the skull and front paws of a couple fall grizzlies that had been eating salmon for months since the first run.

I've seen some huge black bears when black-tail hunting on POW...best of luck to you for a great adventure....

Below is an excerpt from the ADFG current hunting regulations regarding salvage requirements. BTW, POW is GMU-2.
-----------------------------------------------
Black bear salvage requirements
= Sealing required, skull must be salvaged = Sealing not required

Units	Jan 1 - May 31 *Evidence of sex must remain naturally attached to the hide.	June 1 - Dec 31 *Evidence of sex must remain naturally attached to salvaged meat or hide.
1-7, 14A, 14C, 15-17, 20B	Meat, Hide*, Skull	Skull AND Meat* or Skull AND Hide*
9-13, 14B, 18-19, 20A, 20C, 20D, 20E, 20F, 21-26	Meat	Meat or Hide

26 2022-2023 Alaska Hunting Regulations effective July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023
---------------------------------------------

 

[JeffRaines]

Black bear tastes amazing. You just have to shoot them in the right places and time of year.

Me and a buddy were talking about this the other day - alpine black bear meat is better than everything, except for maybe elk. Notice I said alpine... I wouldn't chance a garbage/fish eater.

 

[dmdude]

Black bear tastes amazing. You just have to shoot them in the right places and time of year.

"pardon my plate" a fall black bear is what I meant.

 

[dmdude]

I don't have to harvest the meat, skull/hide I do though and take to a sealer. I was hoping to utilize as much as possible, and find a way to make the meat worth taking. @gbflyer & @AKDoc you make good points that nature will use the meat and its pointless sitting in a freezer and never being eaten.

I was hoping there was a way, anyway possible, to make the meat edible. Thank you all who replied helping me!

 

[Mykolaivka887]

I don't have to harvest the meat, skull/hide I do though and take to a sealer. I was hoping to utilize as much as possible, and find a way to make the meat worth taking. @gbflyer & @AKDoc you make good points that nature will use the meat and its pointless sitting in a freezer and never being eaten.

I was hoping there was a way, anyway possible, to make the meat edible. Thank you all who replied helping me!

Brine it and see what you come up with.

 

[Marbles]

I have heard nothing makes it palatable from friends who have tried. You can find berry bears on POW, you just have to get into the alpine. It will be the smaller bears that are trying not to be lunch for the big bears eating salmon. If you want an alpine bear to eat though, you are better off going somewhere else to hunt.

 

[z987k]

I don't have to harvest the meat, skull/hide I do though and take to a sealer. I was hoping to utilize as much as possible, and find a way to make the meat worth taking. @gbflyer & @AKDoc you make good points that nature will use the meat and its pointless sitting in a freezer and never being eaten.

I was hoping there was a way, anyway possible, to make the meat edible. Thank you all who replied helping me!

Ya, the best way as said above is to hunt somewhere else. I'd never hunt coastal bears unless I was going to go way up a mountain after salmon are more or less done.

 

[z987k]

Me and a buddy were talking about this the other day - alpine black bear meat is better than everything, except for maybe elk. Notice I said alpine... I wouldn't chance a garbage/fish eater.

I'd agree. I want to see lots of seeds in bear crap before I consider hunting them.
Berry bears are so prized people will trade a lot of stuff for really good fall berry fed bear meat. It's very good. Especially the fat. Oh man rendered bear fat is right there with pork.

Moose is better though. I'll take moose over everything but prime beef. Even elk becomes very secondary to moose.
I've stopped hunting elk, deer and caribou because moose is just so much better tasting. I'll take a bou on the last day if we've come up empty on moose but are swimming in bou. But that's about it.

 

[Z71&Gun]

Personally, I just don't shoot anything that eats from the ocean. Snow geese, sea ducks, etc. I don't like the meat, so I don't hunt 'em.

 

[Marbles]

A little morbid, but I eat a lot of salmon and wonder if my meat would be found less palatable to a predator as a result?

 

[Kobuk]

I really enjoy the early spring bears we shoot in Prince William Sound. I was with a buddy that shot one later in the year, late August if I remember correctly, and it was pretty nasty. You know that smell when the tide is down and the beach is covered with dead pinks? That is exactly what that bear smelled like.