Seminars among the features at annual outdoorsman show

WASILLA — With a table adorned with different baiting products, Ryan Judd explained each item and its purpose. He also covered a lot of topics beyond the bait, including general tips and tricks hunters can use on the trail.

It was all part of the 2019 Mat-Su Outdoorsman Show, and a variety of seminars offered within the meeting rooms at the Menard Sports Center in Wasilla. Judd, a Sportsman’s Warehouse fishing associate, led an introductory bear-baiting seminar with a room full of listeners.

Trail cameras are one of the common tools bear hunters use on the trail. Judd said they can be “super helpful” in helping the hunter get a clearer pictures of the bear’s pattern.

“Sometimes a bear will show up at two in the afternoon and two and the afternoon only. Sometimes he comes at 3 o’clock in the morning. It’s nice to know,” Judd said.

Judd said that hunters can set up their trail cameras about 20 feet away from the bait barrel to help get a good side profile of the bear. He said that he’s seen some hunters put install posts with cameras next to their barrel or marks on a tree, so if the bear stands up, they can get a good idea of how big it is.

“The trail camera is great for stuff like that,” Judd said.

Judd explained how to tell the difference between black and brown bears. He said that their tracks look somewhat similar at first glance but there’s simple ways to figure it out. He said that brown bear tracks tend to have the claw marks further out while black bear are closer together.

Judd said if a hunter wants to get an idea of how large the bear is based on the tracks, they can measure the distance across the width of the front pad in the track in inches, then add one to get a rough estimate of how big the bear will square in feet.

“It’s pretty accurate. I’ve found it’s like a pretty good rule of thumb,” Judd said.

There are plenty of places to hunt bears in the Valley. Judd said that Point Mackenzie, the Knik River and around Houston are the top three local spots he could think of. He said a common rookie mistake is picking the wrong location and not disguising their human scent well enough.

Bears try to avoid humans and will hide away if they know they’re nearby. Just because one cannot see any bears around does not mean they are not there. In fact, anyone in the Alaskan wilderness is never too far away from one, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s website.

“A lot of the times, even when you show up to bait and it’s been gone for a while, there’s bears within a couple hundred yards,” Judd said.

Judd recommended that anyone who wants to start hunting bears for the first time to start by taking classes led by the ADFG.

Many say that Alaska is bear country and you’d be hard pressed to find anyone who says otherwise. Alaska is home to all three North American species. The Valley has black and brown bears. A fair number of Valley residents are likely to have a bear story or two under their belt, especially if they hunt.

Local cartoonist and filmmaker Chad Carpenter manned his booth at the show, promoting his various works while sharing his usually playful banter with anyone who stopped by. He shared a humorous bear story that he ultimately used as inspiration for a Tundra strip.

One fateful night, Carpenter was at a cabin with his friend Jim Morris, about 40 miles past Sutton. He said that Morris went outside to use the outhouse, .22 rifle in hand. Carpenter, still inside the cabin, heard shots fire outside. He went to the window to see what was going on and couldn’t see the outhouse because it was so dark.

“I said, ‘Jim!’ and he says, ‘get the rifle, there’s a bear trying to get in the outhouse!’ He was just shooting outside the outhouse trying to scare it,” Carpenter said.

Carpenter admitted that he’s not particularly gun savvy. He said that he found a rifle but was he had trouble matching them to the correct bullets. The reason they were out at the cabin that particularly evening was because Morris wanted to test out several rifles. So, there were lots of rifles and lots of bullets but Carpenter was confused on how to make ends meet.

“I’m yelling out the window, ‘which gun?’ Meanwhile he’s screaming ‘just get anything!’” Carpenter said.

Carpenter said that he finally paired a rifle to its corresponding bullets and loaded it up. He said that he then took the time to wad tissue paper in his ears because he’s “very safety conscious” and knew it would be really loud once he shot from the cabin.

“I didn’t want to hurt my ears,” Carpenter said with a laugh.

Carpenter said that he eventually shot the rifle and he heard something crashing through the woods, away from the cabin. It was a black bear. He said that when Morris came back inside, he discovered wads of tissue and asked what they were. Carpenter aptly replied, “those are my earplugs.”

“And then he says, ‘you took the time to make earplugs while I’m out there?!’” Carpenter said. “He hasn’t taken me out since.”

Contact Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman reporter Jacob Mann at jacob.mann@frontiersman.com