Montana Spring Bear 2025 Start to Finish

[bigbassfish]

Figured I would start this thread off to keep track of my planning and eventually turn it into a live hunt report when the time comes. I am in the process of planning a Bear hunt with my girlfriend next Spring. After dedicating 2023 to a bucket list goal of mine, bowhunting a public land Arkansas black bear, we were fortunate enough to harvest a beautiful male bear our first year and we have the bear hunting bug now.

We haven't really settled on an area yet, we both have flexible enough schedules to be able to take off on short notice, looking at probably 10 days sometime end of May- first week of June depending on weather. I spent a summer in Ennis, so I am somewhat familiar with the SW corner of the state. From what I have gathered, the NW corner will have higher density of both flavors of bear, but is also much thicker country. Ideally, we would like to be able to glass and feel like we are not just hunting the thick timber back home. Is it a reasonable assessment that we may have more success in the NW corner, but more opportunities to glass down south?

I am fairly early on in the thought process here, but it would be my thought that we would likely camp at the truck, and then backpack in for a night or two at a time to try and be as mobile as possible, returning to the truck camp every couple of days or even every night as the situation dictates. Originally I was thinking we would pack in somewhere for the week, but I'm not sure that's the best use of our time.

Still working on getting a bunch of our gear together, we have always been day hunters and its been years since i've been a backpacker. Really looking forward to continuing to provide updates as we work through all of this!

 

[Geewhiz]

Is it a reasonable assessment that we may have more success in the NW corner, but more opportunities to glass down south?

Yes

 

[bigbassfish]

While i haven't really looked into draw odds at all, it would be a bonus if we could bear hunt somewhere we could feasibly draw a Mule deer or Elk tag, and possibly scout the area some while we are there.

Sounds like regardless were we go, we can probably plan for all 4 seasons of weather, and the chance for plenty of rain. I will probably pick up a Seek Outside Cimarron for this hunt, and after just getting back from grouse hunting in CO and getting rained/snowed on in the mountains for 12+ hours, my girlfriend is now willing to buy and pack the stove lol. Is this going to be overkill? Never hot tented before, but it sounds like a nice luxury to have.

 

[Timplant]

A buddy and I basically did the same thing in 22' we've been successful every spring since. Drive out there, be willing to move locations. lots of driving and lots more walking, we havn't found a "zone" we love and will spend our entire two weeks in yet. BUT we are getting close!

go out there, don't be scared but respect the big brown ones. be willingto walk and willing to move, also, you very well could drive around and shoot one of the road if you had too. we didn't but you could.

ITS A BLAST

 

[Timplant]

feel free to PM anything specific, I'll share what I can.

 

[bigbassfish]

Thanks for the offer! Are you planning on this year as well? I'll shoot you a PM with some questions on towns....

This may depend on where we end up going, but I would like to get some vehicle recovery stuff together. I have bad luck on our NF roads, i've gotten something like 4 flats in the past year so I always carry a tire patch kit, air compressor, bottle jack and blocks, along with a shovel. I know I should probably take a chainsaw, what other things should I be taking? Tire chains are a big one in question, what about a Jerry can? My truck has the 36 gallon tank and average anywhere from 18-20mpg so not sure if this is needed.