Manitoba Bear Hunt Semi-live Reports with Steve "Bear Magnet" Frantz

2015 Manitoba Canada Bear Hunt with Don Smith of Turtle Mountain Outfitting

By Steve 'BearMagnet' Frantz

Day 1

Arrived at Blue Lakes Resort about 3 PM and the outfitter told us to get ready, because the bear were really hitting the baits. Jim Rothermel, Steve Rothermel and Steve 'Bearmagnet' Frantz are with Turtle Mountain Outfitting to hunt black bear in the Duck Mountains of western Manitoba, where a large number of color-phase black bears reside. Any hunter, who has seen a color-phase bear, wants to hold out for one or a record book black bear. The non-black colors of the bear here can be blond, cinnamon, light brown, chocolate and red. Today, the weather required us to wear our regular PA winter weather clothing, with 20 mph winds and temps down in the low 30 degree range.

Outfitter Don Smith, who is nursing a sore right knee, but still can walk and climb a tree like a world class olympian, needed to get the hunters onto the stands, that don't require lots of hiking to get to them. Lake Bait, Old Dump Bait and Junction Stand fit the requirement. and we all were placed into stands before 6 PM.

Jim Rothermel was first to see a bear at 7:40 PM on Junction Stand, and Jim was evaluating the size of the bear, and pondering if shooting an approximately 250 pound black bear should be taken the first night of the six day bear hunt was the right thing to do! He chose to pass on the first bear seen.

About 8-10 miles away on Lake Bait, Steve Frantz, had to wait until 8 PM to see his first Manitoba bear of the hunt. The approximately 250 pounder, fed on the bait for about 10 minutes before disappearing into the woods, directly behind stand. Only five minutes passed, before another totally black bear appeared on bait, having entered from the left side. This bear only stayed five minutes and left. Steve passed on both blacks on day 1, and passed the rest of the time on stand watching a loon swim/float from one end of the lake to the other end, and then take off flapping wings onto the water for the first 100 feet and flew to the other end, only to repeat the process four more times over the next hour and a half. The stand has the hunter on one side of a two acre lake watching the bait 104 yards away on the other side of the lake-a beautiful view in the Manitoba mountains.

Steve Rothermel, on his second Canadian bear hunt, had to wait until 9:25 PM to see his first bear, a mere 35 yards away. He also voted against taking a 200-250 pound black bear on his first night. Steve is hunting with a Remington 30:06 Model 7600, and took his first Manitoba bear last year, while hunting on Grumpy Sow Bait.

Later, after returning to the cabin and eating supper at 11 PM, a light rainstorm moved into the area. Just before going to bed, a glance out the window, revealed snow falling- a wonderful sight on May 10th. Stay tuned, with more action to come from the mountains of Manitoba.

Day 2

Weather is beautiful here, with temps in the low 30's at night, and climbing to about the mid 50's during the afternoon.  Because we are hunting so far north, the daylight hours are much longer during the early summertime, with daylight starting about 4:30 AM and lasting until 10 PM in the evening.  We have been going to stand about 2 PM, and leaving stand about 9:30 PM.  No problem with black flies or bugs so far, so we haven't fired up our Thermacel bug repelling devices.

We have had some problems with our transmission of the field reports up to now, due to technical difficulties, but those have been resolved, thanks to outfitter assistant, Lee Frieson, from Boissevain, Manitoba.  Our outfitter, Don Smith, operates Turtle Mountain Outfitters, with his wife, Lynn, out of Killarney, Manitoba, and  they guide for whitetails, bear, and waterfowl throughout the province.  Members of our hunting party have hunted with Don for bear and deer for over five years.

Well, back to the field report!  Big Jimbo Rothermel was the winner for bears sighted on this day, with five bear seen.  A sow bear with a chocolate colored cub fed on bait for almost an hour on Junction Bait.  Three individual bears came into the feeder at different times throughout the evening, with sizes in the 200 pound class range.  Jim passed on all the bear, but one was unique, because it had an all white muzzle.  While walking out, Jim flushed a ruffed grouse and passed a whitetail grazing along the trail.

Meanwhile, Steve Rothermel, was positioned on the Lakeside Stand, where Steve 'Bearmagnet' Frantz, had seen two bear on the first day of our hunt.  That stand is a pleasure to hunt, even if you see no bear.  The waterfowl are always coming and going, and the beaver have a house built along the lake, with lots of activity from the beaver dragging logs and sticks into the beaver dam  on the lower end of the lake.  Steve had only one bear come into stand about 8:50 PM and it stayed about half an hour.  The bear was smaller than Steve wanted and he waited for another day.

Steve Frantz travelled east about 10 miles to Pavements End Stand, where he has seen massive bear numbers in the past, with one past hunt presenting 12 different bears in one day.  The Bearmagnet is hunting for either a color phase bear or a very large black bear.  Day 2 hunt was  a long sit, with only one snowshoe rabbit seen, an American Bittern bird heard (very reclusive bird), and no bear.

Weather expected to be great for Day 3, and rain projected for Day 4.

Day 3

Patience and Perseverance are admirable traits in life, and those who exhibit both those traits in hunting, are generally successful.  If a person comes to Manitoba just to shoot a bear, Don Smith usually can accomplish putting a bear in front of a hunter the first or second day of the trip.  For the hunter who has a goal of a good sized bear, or a color phase bear, the guy or gal must maintain both of the aforementioned traits.

Second year bear hunter Steve Rothermel spent the third day of our hunt on Lake Bait Stand, looking for a good sized bear that was spotted from that stand on day 1. Unfortunately, the bear didn't cooperate, and Steve occupied his time watching a beaver surf boarding on a log, with a total of 12 beaver swimming around in front of him throughout the night.  A raven made a effort to fit into the small barrel opening to get at the pieces of beaver meat inside, to no avail, but he was entertaining!

Bearmagnet Frantz was placed at Grumpy Sow stand, which is a ground stand overlooking the bait 103 yards away.   For 35 minutes Steve held a very nice male in his scope sights, but never took the safe off, and at 5:30 PM, the bear walked away.  Two hours later, a huge female wandered toward the stand, with the smallest bear Steve ever saw in the woods, scampering past the Mom, but suddenly, the Mother Bear must have smelled the boar's scent from earlier, and immediately spun around and left the bait with her one or more cubs.  The last event of the evening was watching a fisher getting an oil bath in the cooking oil barrel.  The little guy jumped onto the edge of the barrel opening, balanced himself on edge, and drank the nectar for a few seconds.  It must have been good, because after leaving, he returned a second time for more, which should have surely cleaned his pipes.

 Big Jimbo Rothermel, at 75 years young, loves hunting in Manitoba.  He is an excellent shot, uses a Springfield 30-06 rifle and shoots 220 grain Federal shells.  So far in this hunt, Jim has been the bear magnet, having seen 8 bear on stand and passing on all of them.  Day 3 was Jim's day, scoring on a stocky, large headed sow weighing over 250 pounds.  The bear fell with one shot to the shoulder at 65 yards, and the hunt came to a successful end.  Don retrieved the bear on his Polaris 6 X 6 ATV, which saved many backs from carrying the bruin out of the deep Manitoba forest and swamp.  As a sign of good things to come, Jim kicked out a huge stag while walking into the stand, and the rest is history.

Day 4

The morning after report on Jim's bear, according to taxidermist Mel Nemetchek of Boggy Creek Taxidermy, was between 15-20 years old, and was a barren female.  Jim is planning on a nice bear rug for the thick coated bear.

Weather continues to be rather cool, and today was no different with heavy hunting clothes necessary for the long afternoon stands.  Today was cloudy with off and on showers most of the day, but no real periods of rain, where rain wear clothing was required.

Steve Rothermel was positioned in Grumpy Sow Bait, where Steve 'Bearmagnet' Frantz had seen the very large black bear the night before at 5 PM.  Steve had to wait until 6:45 PM when the action started, and the first bear seen was a shooter, so Steve let it rip from his Remington Model 7600 30-06 caliber and 220 grain Remington Core-lok bullet.  The shot ripped into the right shoulder of the heavy framed bear, knocked him down, and he spun around and ran into the thick underbrush, before Steve could fire another round.  Steve walked to the pick up spot and outfitter met him at 8:25 PM,  After describing what had happened the two returned to track the wounded bear into the swamp.  The blood trail was heavy and headed into the swamp and then into heavy cover, at which point the two backed off until tomorrow morning.  To be continued!

Steve Frantz, who is hunting hard for a color phase, moved back to Pavement's End stand for the evening hunt.  This stand is where he missed a red color phase bear several years ago, by hanging upside down from the safety harness to shoot backwards through the woods behind the stand.  The stand is deep in the forested swamp, and the bears seem to like the heavy pine forest.  Not much action early, but at 6 PM, a nice 250 pounder walked within 15 yards of the treestand on his way to the bait station.  He fed only ten minutes and departed.  About ten to 8 PM, a small bear appeared near the bait, only to stop in his tracks, look in the direction behind the bait, and turn a 180, running full speed past the treestand (ten feet away) and off into the forest.  Steve knew something bigger was coming to the bait.  A heavy bodied 'Fat Boy Bear' strolled into the bait, only to stop, look backwards and sprint away.  How big was the next bear behind him?  A long neck bear, which Steve nicknamed 'Nasty Long Neck' walked toward the stand.  Both of these bears are normally shooters for anyone, but just plain torment for Steve, because he wants color phase.  For the next hour the two bears moved in and out of the bait area, with no real good shot, for someone who was hesitant to shoot either of these BLACK bears.  At 9:05 PM, both bears left the scene.  Steve walked out at 9:30 PM.

Day 5

The tracking of the bear hit at the end of Day 4, began with tremendous blood trail for 150 yards to a spot in the mud, where the bear rolled around.  It amazes us as to how an animal, which has never been shot before, knows how to plug a bullet hole in it's body. The bear has loose skin/hide and lots of fat over its body, and when it rolls, the fat moves and plugs the bullet hole, and the hunter has nothing to track.  That's what we were faced with about 250 to 300 yards into tracking Steve's bear, and we spent an hour looking for a blood trail, that had disappeared before our eyes.  

Day 5 weather was cloudy, but still cool, with the heavy coats necessary once again to be comfortable in the stands.  Don Smith maintains a concession area in the Duck Mountains of over 150 square miles, and in nearly one week, the three hunters only heard two shots in the distance.  This is the place for solitude of the hunt, without competition from others, and not to mention, we have seen many, many bears!  Don allows a hunter one unsuccessful retrieval of a hit bear, so Steve Rothermel moved forward to try again on Perch Lake Stand. 

Steve was positioned on a hang on stand overlooking the bait the trail cam revealed some large bear feeding over the last few days.  It didn't take long for action, when a smaller bear, with a white tail, yes, a white tail, wandered into the bait.  It had been the same bear seen when he walked into the stand, and he would continue to hang around the entire evening.  Later, about 5 PM, a larger bear appeared and Steve took a shot at the neck!  He missed high, and the bear ran away!  Back came the white tailed bear, again!  We never saw bear come back after a shot, but this was just the beginning.  Fast forward to about 8:30 PM, and something distracted the small bear, and he walked off the scene, to be replaced by a different shooter bear.  The shot rang out about 8:45 PM, and the bear exited quickly off the side of the bait area.  Even after two shots, another small bear entered the stand within ten minutes-unbelievable.  The shot-at bear was left for the evening, to be tracked the next morning.

Meanwhile, Steve 'Bearmagnet' Frantz went back onto Pavement's End Stand, where he was seeing many BLACK bear!  About this time in hunt, a good black bear will do!  Action started  40 minutes into the hunt, with a small bear on bait, and then nothing until 8 PM.  Nasty Long Neck and Fat Boy entered the scene, but they were distracted by something behind the stand, and even ran away at one point, only to return.  Steve checked on the hides, and Fat Boy was tremendous, while \Nasty had some rub spots on it's hide.  A neck shot presented itself, and the Remington 7600 30-06 barked 220 grain lead, and the bruin crumpled at the spot.  Suddenly two other bears were visible, and Steve wondered if he had shot the right bear.  Upon a closer look through the Leupold scope, the right bear was down, but wasn't retrieved due to darkness until Friday morning at 6 AM.  The thick furred beast was a beautiful animal, and we had seen no  shooter color phase in person or on trail camera all week, so this trophy was just fine.

Back to the tracking of Steve's Perch Lake extravaganza, complete with white-tailed bear, who happened to be on the bait, as the tracking party or Don Smith, Lee Friesen, and Steve Rothermel arrived.  The bloodhounds had their noses to the ground, and pressed on through swamp, insects, thorny thickets and quicksand like bogs.  Again, this hit bear, was easy to track at first, but then the telltale sight of the bear rolling around was evident, and the trail extended into heavy swamp.  After the fourth spot, where the bear rolled, the bloodtrail ended and hope for a retrieval came to an impossible ending.  

We leave for home tomorrow with many wonderful memories of our hunt, hope for good health for both ourselves and our outfitters until we meet again.  Success should not be measured in size of trophies, but in our life lessons learned and the great friendships, that are forged in memorable hunts in our lifetimes.  Don Smith of Turtle Mountain Outfitting can be reached at (204) 523-8721, for bear, whitetail, and waterfowl hunting at its finest.

Share this post