Bears early season !
 

Wow Its been a while that the snow was gone this early in the year .
If the grass and clover come out early ,we could have a early start on bears !

From my experience in all the different areas I have bear hunted you may get a few moving early with an early spring but things don’t get cracking till after the first week of May. I also hate early spring for bears because it means there is more food available to them causing them to spread out over a larger area

My best years have been late springs and have taken majority of my bears mid to late May

This is just the way it has gone for me anyway

If you want a Bear for the hide then you are going to need to be out much earlier this year. The bears will rub much sooner than usual. Bears are being seen in the Slave lake area for the past 2 weeks already. Hunting over bait makes it easier to assess hides but if you are doing the spot and stalk thing you may want to take a good spotting scope along if you are hunting after the second week in May.

Worst is the monkey face (basically bald face) bears that is often a result of mites well still in the den.

Always have to watch for rubbing even early spring but you are 100% the later in the season the more likely rubbing becomes

We need warmth, haven't seen much of that so far.

Grizz

Everyone seems to forget the April blizzard we get every year. As a matter of fact, I see one right now.....

Once Black Bears come out of the den they don't go back into hibernation from a few sporadic snow flurries or even extended ones.

Nope...just makes them miserable as hell lol.

But they don't move around much either.

Grizz

You are spot on. Bears move for two reasons, breeding and food. Problem with this time of year and the lack of heat is there aren't a lot of green shoots up yet and we aren't in prime breeding season. Trick right now is to find some south facing slopes near water. That is where stuff starts to green up the fastest and it is where the bears will be hanging out, they will have moved away from their den sites to find food. Once the sows start to come into heat in late May the Boars will start wandering over large tracts of land, typical range is 7-10 miles in diameter, looking for them. This is when you see bears all day long as they search for receptive females.