Long Range Bear Hunting

+1 on the difficulty of bear judging especially at long range. I killed my smallest black bear last year at nearly a half mile. I would have sworn he was a bigger bear due to his mannerisms. Nonetheless, he fell off the mountain with one well placed shot from my 338 Edge.

In regards to his size, I just say it made the shot more challenging.
 
It was hard to judge size but when we seen a big one it was obvious to me. He was a pig.
 
I have had the chance to take one bear here in Eastern NC, home to some of the largest black bears in the US. Mine was shot at maybe 40 yards with a 7 STW. No long distance for sure. He weighed in at a even 500lbs. on the state scale. A few years ago, I had one come out just before legal shooting time was over. He ranged at 543 yds. I just did not feel comfortable enough to take the shot, and I have witnessed and tracked a wounded bear in NC that was shot by someone else. That bear was lost and it did take a hard hit with a 338 at approx. 276 yds. When that bear was hit, he went down and back up before the shooter could rack the action for the second shot. I hope to get the chance someday to shoot another bear.
 
Well this is going to be slightly off topic in a way as I was "in the day" one of "those guys" that started talking about setting up shooting benches up on the "Continental Divide" up in Wyoming and sandbagging in .50 caliber sniper rifles for shooting elk at what we shall say was across valleys on other mountains as we aged. Now, I know the stories got around and laws were passed that made such things illegal and the facts were that I and no one else that I personally know of ever did such a thing. It was just an exercise in what if we did this what would it take to make it feasible type of thing. Many of the guys I knew shot at over 1000 yards so it was not unfeasible with the right equipment, spotters, etc. and we had huge expanses in Wyoming being the most unpopulated state in the USA to practice in.

In the end we all decided against it because the variables were just to great and we did not want to wound any animals. The odds of following up on a wounded animal from such great distances were abysmal and we all agreed the animals came first!
 
Well huge expanses of land don't necessarily equate to being the most suitable for long range hunting. Ive been to Wyoming quite a few times, including a few times for hunting Antelope. As far as (long range) hunting goes, the areas I hunted cant compare with N C PA where there are steep ridges and shots are taken from side hill to side hill across valleys. I realize that Wyoming and other western states have lots of those type areas as well, and those are the places more conducive to that type hunting. Note that im not claiming that PA is better for hunting, but I am saying that some areas of that state has the type terrain that would be hard to beat for long range hunting. With the proper type terrain,
and the right people with good equiptment, very few animals go off someplace to die.
 
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