Author, Kevin Farron

“Can’t you hunt black bears like ten minutes from your house?” my friend asked, semi-perplexed. “Why are you driving all the way to Oregon and paying for an out-of-state tag?”

 

“Fair question,” I smiled. “And yes. I can. But please, don’t point that out to my wife.”

 

My desire to hunt black bears in a draw unit two states away had little to do with hunting black bears. I’m drawn to the challenge and the solitude found in the deepest river gorge in North America. It’d been nine years since I’d last been there, which was long enough for me to forget the pain and discomfort, but the rewards from hunting the grueling country of the Hells Canyon Wilderness were still palpable. I needed to get back.

 

Three of us jetboated into our camp along a swelled Snake River. We were hoping to catch bears riding the green wave of forage as winter gave way to spring at ascending elevations.

 

Karl, the AARP-eligible hunter in our group of three, was a big reason we were here. He introduced me to the addictive challenge of backcountry hunting, and gave me my first exposure to Hells - a weeklong archery elk hunt in 2015. Karl’s enthusiasm for hunting is contagious, and he makes it a point to welcome new hunters to the sport. He did this with me, a friend, and now I was watching him do it with his nephew, Owen, who was joining us for his very first bear hunt. I was no longer the newbie, but fully prepared to be humbled by the canyon once again.

 

The steep hillsides, carpeted with neon green grass, exploded with a flowery mix of Indian paintbrush, phlox, bluebells and arrowleaf balsamroot. As we ascended the canyon, the scenery simultaneously dropped our jaws and raised our chins. But by now, in early May, the tidal line of fresh grass and forbs was much higher than we envisioned,about 3,000 feet above our camp, making for some long, punishing days. My tracker says we did 10-13 miles four of the five days, climbing (then dropping) between 3,000-4,000 feet between sun up and sun down. It’s hard to say if the uphill scrambles or the shaky leg descents were more challenging. Would depend on when you asked, I guess.

 

The unit we were hunting is capped at 440 spring bear tags. Only 5% of these, or 22 tags, are available to non-residents like myself. In 2023, nearly double that - 786 hunters - applied for these, so we all felt fortunate to have bear tags downloaded on our phones.

 

Karl is a retired fire captain and in impeccable shape for his age, and he hunts this country often. Yet the last bear he killed was in 2016. According to ODFW's2022 statistics, bear hunters in our unit had a 20% success rate.It was slightly lower in 2023, just 18%. So we figured if one of us connected with a bear, we were doing pretty well. Above average even. These low kill rates were common in demanding, roadless country like Hells Canyon. We knew this wouldn't be a walk in the park. Still, as hunters are prone to do, we arrived with high hopes and hungry intentions.

During the first afternoon, as we were daydreaming about stalks and situations during the heat of the day, I asked Owen about his effective range. “So say there was a bear in that parallel ridge,” I said pointing across the canyon. “Would you be able to shoot him?”

 

He scrunched his face and thought about it. “How far is it?”

 

I pulled my range finder out of my pocket. “Three fifty,” I told him.

 

“That’s probably too far,” he sheepishly responded. “I was only able to practice out to two hundred yards, so anything more than that I’m not really comfortable.”

 

I nodded in silence. I respected Owen for being honest about his range time and corresponding comfort level, but as I looked at the country we were in, my confidence in our ability to get him his first bear dwindled. As the success rates suggest, in Hells, seeing a bear and killing a bear are two completely different things, and his self-imposed limit widened that gap even more. This isn’t gonna be easy, I thought.

 

Hours later, my eyes wandered up the drainage. A bear was feeding out in a clearing above the treeline where the ponderosas and Douglas firs provided cover. “Bear.” I exclaimed with audible confidence, and muted glee.

 

“Where?” Owen asked. “Is it a shooter?”

 

“It’s out in the open, no cubs.” I said calmly as I looked through my binoculars at the blond bear. “Doesn’t appear to be a monster, but it doesn’t look tiny either. It’s a shooter in my book.”

 

We pointed the spotter for a closer look, and took our time sizing up the bear. I even got my phone out and recorded some, acting like we had all the time in the world. Most feeding bears I’ve encountered stay put; I didn’t see the urgency. Owen, who was first up, was less patient, understandably so.

 

When we finally decided to pack up and move, the bear was nearly a thousand yards above us, and lumbering higher. We were never able to catch up. It climbed faster than we could, ducked out of sight in the timber, and we never laid eyes on it again.

 

Humbled by the terrain and the effortless speed at which the bear meandered out of view, we sat and glassed and wondered aloud how long the descent down the to our river camp would take, and if the longer creek bottom route with an unknown number of crossings - where Karl was - or the ridge we hiked up would be more challenging. Neither was appealing. We stuck with the devil we knew, and headed back down the steep ridge.

 

Hiking down, we could see an impressive but incalculable number of the 216,981 acres that make up the Hells Canyon Wilderness. The Idaho side of the Snake River looked just as rugged, though 61% of the wild lands designated in 1975 are on the side we were hunting. Outside of the river, motorized use isn’t allowed in the Wilderness, a great equalizer for hunters and the hunted alike. Protected from development forever, these lands provide habitat for wildlife, sustainable recreational business for river and hunting outfitters, and countless opportunities to humble anyone willing to strap on a pair of boots and venture into the canyon named Hells for a reason.

The morning of day two, we all felt it. “You boys have a good hunt today,” Karl said before water was boiled for our camp coffee. “I’m gonna sit this one out and rest.”

 

Looking up at the moonlit canyon walls above us, crawling back into my sleeping bag sure sounded good at the time. Nah, I can take a dirt nap on the mountain, I thought. But I really didn’t want to climb that steep rocky face again.

 

“Owen, let’s take the creek this time,” I suggested.

 

“Sounds good,” he responded eagerly.

 

Perhaps it's the young father in me, maybe it’s a progression that every hunter goes through, but the only thing better than me experiencing this wild country again for myself was watching Owen get to live it for the first time. The polish of the canyon had perhaps worn off a bit for me. The plants were thornier and the hillsides steeper than I remember last time. My legs and back hurt more too. Owen didn’t seem to notice. He was wide eyed, his attitude positive. On multiple occasions he let out an audible ‘whoa.’ I smiled each time he did. I know the feeling, kid.

 

The creek was raging. It was just wide, deep and fast enough to prevent us from jumping or rock hopping our way across. And the narrow canyon trail was primarily used by horses, not hikers; there were no foot bridges. Our only option was to throw on hip waders and use trekking poles to keep our balance.

 

 

This wasn’t a big deal for the first crossing. Or the second, or the third. But by the twentieth fjord in three miles, Owen and I were over it. “Now I see why Karl didn’t recommend this approach,” I said.

 

“Yeah, this sucks,” Owen responded. “Though I’m still not sure what is worse: this or the ridge?”

 

As we stopped to put on hip waders yet again, so wet and covered in mud now from our boots that it was tempting to cross without them, I thought to myself that Karl sure picked an interesting place to take people on some of their first hunts. There’s gotta be an easier way to hunt, I remember thinking. Yet for how uncomfortable the canyon country can be, the challenge was addictive and forgotten quickly, while the little victories were immensely gratifying and memorable. I wondered how many times Karl had gone through this cycle of in-the-moment misery, followed by the endorphins that lasted years. Maybe he knew something I didn't know about how to hook a new hunter. Maybe I was proof.

Midafternoon on day three, this time with all of us glassing together, Owen spotted a bear a half mile up the canyon. A different bear, this one jet black, but once again, no cubs, out in the open. “Let’s move,” I said, not wanting complacency to get the best of us twice.

 

We hustled to get set up across the drainage, as close as we could get from our parallel ridge. I clicked my range finder. 440 yards. Way too far. Owen and Karl backed out, tucked below our ridge and climbed higher before cresting out of view, dropping back down, crossing the creek and climbing once more to get well above the bear. Not wanting to let this boar get away, and not needing all three of us to accomplish the stalk, I sat back and kept tabs on our quarry.

 

Alternating between my binos and watching with the naked eye, I had front-row seats to a dramatic show starring the hunter and his uncle. They hugged a rimrock canyon above the bear, playing the uphill thermals perfectly, and crept along until they laid eyes on him. Seeing both the predator and the prey, I was filled with nervous anxiety. All I could do was watch. Suddenly, they froze. Karl stretched his arm out to point. Then Owen slowly took aim.

 

Through my binoculars, I watched the single shot punch through the boar’s chest, the exit hole emitting a lethal vapor. I knew it was a dead bear, even before the echo of the gunshot reached me. The bear quickly spun, ran a few steps, tumbled and rolled to a stop, not 20 paces from where it had been browsing just seconds before. The college student executed a textbook stalk ending with a 77-yard, one-shot kill. The kid did it!

As we hiked down that evening, hands bloody and packs heavy, we enjoyed yet another captivating sunset. I - for just a second - forgot about the cacti in my butt, the loose scree on the descent, the poison ivy, oak and sumac at the bottom, and the cumbersome load on my back.

 

Hundreds of shades of greens and browns flowed down ridges and folds and cliffs, all seemingly exposed but I knew they hid so much. It was clear that I had changed in the last decade, but the canyon had not. The curved skylines went on for eternity.

 

Watching Owen find hard-earned success that day, along with the assurance that this wild place will remain untamed and unforgiving, ready to inject reverence and humility into anyone who accepts the challenge, made the decision to take a rest day the following day an easy one.

 

I’d gotten what I’d come for. And more. From then on, everything else was just a bonus.