Couzer

Nice bear!

Very nice!!! Good job

Little trash around the base! Nice buck!!!

Wow that bear I want hanging on my wall!!! Love the light blonde half!

Awesome, another giant falls!!!

Sending PM over!

Great Pics!!!

Wow that is a good looking bear, and I think I would of shot it as well instead of the solid black one!!! Good shootin and getting it done!

I keep lookin to see if someone actually buys it! :-)

I am getting ready to smoke a Bear Backstrap here in a few hours and was wondering if anyone had ideas of a good recipe whether it was for elk, deer, or anything else. I have done some looking around and found that when the internal meat hits 160 degrees for 5 minutes (to kill trichinosis if present) its done. I'm planning on smoking it at 225 degrees, but I do have higher settings and one lower one at 185 degrees. I did prep the backstrap in a sweet BBQ rub in a food saver bag last week, then had set it in the freezer for 5 days. I took it out of the freezer to unthaw yesterday morning and now it is ready. Questions- Do in need a brine? Brown sugar? any other spices? turning it over every so often? Thanks

When I lived in Brasil I was in a area that had the most brown recluses in the world. I killed 5-10 a day if I wanted to. That does not look like a brown recluse that I have seen.

Amazing! Defiantly love the meat! Different than elk and deer, the backstrap held a lot of moisture and was not dry at all.

Well all I can say is wow, tasted amazing! I could definitely taste the hickory smoke along with the bacon juices that had penetrated the meat. I ended up cooking the meat to 165 degrees for at least 60 seconds just to be on the safe side. I now have lunch meat for my sandwiches for a few days if it last that long.

Holy Bearzilla!!!! Nice job calling him in!!! Great JOB

Testing out the ol'smoker as I speak, Ill let you know how it turns out.

Ok not a lot of info out there on Bear Backstraps, but found a lot on deer. The meat is pretty lean so I wrapped it with Bacon, can't go wrong there? Probably have way to many tooth picks, oh well.

Sounds like archery is the way to go!

If I was going to buy another it would be the tika 7mm. I wouldn't go with a a Remington or savage if I was going to buy a stock rifle, if custom then a savage or remington

I've read and respect your content here on CWT but I'm interested in how that makes you "lucky" instead of just sounding selfish? Are dogs not allowed off-leash on the public land you're trapping on? Do honest accidents not happen from time to time at trap locations? Public land?

I was told that you can bait to take pictures but no baiting for hunting? This is what the big game specialist told me. Wrong not sure??? Few years back we baited bear traps with fish to get them to come in for AZGF. I was told a few cams were put up as well.

Dane bonecollector, what a pig

Awesome! Looking good

Thanks guys for all the kind words. I had gone over to the Mesa G&F office today to check him in. Dustin down there with G&F is a great guy and rough aged him 7-8 years, but will know for sure when the results come back. I dropped off the hide to Jim over at SW Taxidermy (CW Sponser) and we laid the bear out and rough measured him at 6' 1". Jim has a awesome shop, looks busy with all the mounts he's working on, definitely pleased with his customer service. For now I am going to do a rug mount, and if I can convince the wife to do a life size in the next 6-7 months that would be awesome! (High Hopes and lots of flowers for the next 6-7 months) I took my meat over to SW Processing in Queen Creek (CW Sponsor as well) and having ALOT of sausage, chorizo, and a few roast done. I kept the backstraps, planning on smoking those here at my house! I wonder if I'll wake up from this dream? Couestracker- I'll admit a was pretty darn scared walking down that wash, especially not seeing any blood or sign. My headlamp was not the brightest in that pitch black overgrown wash. My buddy Chad said the only thing he was worried about was walking up on a rattle snake, 5 mins laer he almost step on one of the biggest rattler I have seen in the wild. Good thing it rattled before he got to close, he let it live since it warned him before getting to close. That's why you always let your buddy walk in front

For some reasone the rain or clouds never came over us giving us shade, they got close. Here is pic of that control burn at four peaks

Here is a better pic