Well...., I went bearhunting in Sweden last week. It was a four day deal. Had a stomack full of butterflies, but tried to keep my expectations down. We are only alowed to have to hounds at the bear at the time, so I've been training Pac's and Dina my spitzdog to run together. Dina had been in contact with bears alone before, but as far as I know Pac's had never met brown bears before and now the two of them togehter for the first time and nothing, but badgers for training...., the recepy for disaster I guess....
First morning was all about trying to figure out where the bears were at the time. None of us had or have rigging hounds that we could trust, so driving the logging roads looking for crap was the only way to go. We divided the raods amongst us to save time and me and Knut, my Plott running friend went together. After driving the first logging road with no result I said to Knut: "Lets open the doors on my mini van(no jokes about this boys, its only a two seater, so I can bring my hounds, NOT used to drive kids to soccer praktice after school) and see if we cant get some of these hounds to rig. I stopped the car and we opened the doors and drove off to the next logging road. We didnt get that far.... Doing 30 miles an hour, on our way over there, suddenly, like a flick of a swich, Pac's and Quickie(Knuts female Plott) just blew up in the back of my car. I feared they would blow the top of my car off, even with the doors open, with all their howling and I screamed to Knut "Son of a gun, they are rigging a track!!!(I must admit. Even if this was far far from how you guys do it for real, I felt a litle bit "American for a litle while there.) I turned the car out on the shoulder of the road and we jumped out looking for sign of a bear. We could not find any sign, but I told Knut that we had to let the hounds out, at least just to honnour them for rigging.
Here Pac's and Quickie is getting their tracking collars on after rigging.
When we let them go, they went 150 yards back on the road and took a 90 degree turn to the right. There was no doubt, they had a track! After 300 yards the track ende up in a swamp making the hounds have to work some to find the way out. After 2-3 minuter Pac's lined it out, but Quickie was still stuck in there, so I unleashed Dina and she took the short rute to Pac's. - Exactly as I've been hoping she would do. After a couple of hours this turned out to be a red fox, but it was a loads of fun anyways.
After regrouping and getting the hounds back, me and Knut went to the logging road we originally were going earlier in the morning. After a while Pac's started getting uneasy in the dogbox. Not rigging, but there clearly was somthing going on and after just a couple of yards more we found a night fresh crap on the road! Temperatures was starting to rise fast and the humidity from days of rain prior to our hunt was insane. We hurried and unleashed the hounds and Pac's line out the track.
Pac's, Dina and Quickie on the second turn out first day.
Sadly the bear had gone out of our hunting ground and on to the neighbour.
We freecasted for a couple of hours after, until the temperature became unberable, without any more action.
Around midnight it started to reign and let me tell you, it was like all hell gates opened up. From 00.00-14.00 we had 2 1/4" of rain comming down on us, deluting all scent from that nights tracks.
I didnt want to give in to the conditions, so I freecasted in a blueberryforrest area I believed in and Pac's and Dina found a track they started to cold trail. After four hours of real hard coldtrailing I pulled them of. The track was heading straight for the neighbours huntinggrounds and I didnt want them to use their power for nothing.
Late evening second day the rain stopped and we got a beutiful night, with a couple of beers, good stories from earlier hunts and a LOT of thoughts about bearhounds.
Here two of us are appriciating a nice night with good friends.
Third day I went out while it still was dark. We drove logging roads up and down without any signs of bear. I felt kind of down, I knew the bears were there somewhere, but could not find a starting point. After some consideration, I decided to go as far east in our piece of land as I could, with a plan to freecast westwards as far as I could get, before I had to give in to the temperature and the humidity. Another friend of mine Odd tagged along with his two young dogs, more or less just for the company.
We had to cross a huge logged slope at first, so I kept Pac's and Dina in the leash. Didnt want them to start a trash race on a moose, that could have been feeding there during the morning hours. 200 yards from the top of the slope Pac's winded a track. He went balistic, to say the least. There was no way I could restrain him. He smelled something he really wanted to catch. 3 yards into the forrest he put his nose down in a beartrack and if he wasnt crazy before, hes whent crazy at that time..... 94 pounds of pure muscle standing on his hind leggs using all his power to go in one direction is hard to handle
I had to put my knee in his back and squese him into the ground to get the leash off and when he was free he opened up in a 7 second long bawl!!! I must admit, the feeling I got there deep in the Swedish forrest, with a hound showing all that desire to go and catch a bear left me speechless......., I was so out of it that I forgot Dina, that still was in the leash. I could not gather my self before Odd asked me if Dina wasnt going to get into the fun and she was pretty eager to go to!
After about 600 yards, the hounds were at the jump and if that first bawl Pac's let out after beeing released was long, I swear the one that he howled out at the jump, seemed never to stop. After 400 yards Dina and Pac's had the bear bayed. Odd and I keept the pace up and soon was only 200 yards from it. We could hear both hounds and the bear, there was no doubt this was a nast bear. Growling and hissing from the bear and chopping from the hounds. I bet Dina was up to about 200 barks per minute! After 7-8 minutes something happened. I heard Dina squeal and everything went silent. I could tell by my garmin astro, that the hounds were still in the same area, but not making a sound. I sounded to me like the bear attacked the hounds or they tried the "badger method" on it, with not much luck... After about a minute Pac's sounded of again and the race was on.
They were going a bit north of two shooters we had put out there, so I contacted them on the short wave radio, telling them to move north. Not long after moving to where I told them, they could hear the hounds. Theywere approaching in a lightenning speed. Short before they came to the road the shooters were standing on, they bayed up the bear in a biggrown spruce section and the shooters reported that back too me. I told them to get the f... in there and kill the bear since I had 6-7 miles of knee deep swamp between me and the bayup. They started to close in when the bayup broke into a walking bayup nothwards into some nasty, leaf forrest shit with zero sight.... They reported again and once over I told them, with eaven tougher language, to get in on the bayup and kill the bear before my hounds got tired and lost consentration and by that might get hurt.
That was the last I heard. Tried getting them on the radio and everything, but all was silent.... I had a bad feeling in my stomack wading back to my car. After driving back, I met them were the bay up had been sitting in their truck, kind of pale. Their explanation to why they hadnt gone into the brush where the bay up was, and I quote: "There was no way into the brush...." That lit me up in a way I cant remeber I've been before in my short while. There they had been. Sitting in the cottage for three nights drinking whiskey and talking about their biggest hunting dream beeing shooting a brown Scandinavian bear bayed up by hounds and when it was handed down to them on a silver platter, they could not find a way throug the forrest......
- I told them right there and then to get the f... back to where they came from and go sit by their kichen window and shoot squirrels on their birdfeeder with their .22s and if that got scary they should buy a 18x scope and put their guns so they didnt have to get so close!
I didnt see them after that.... They rented a cottage outside the nearest town and next morning they drove home without letting the rest of us know. GOOD riddens if you ask me.
We later found Dina and Pac's at the far, far west side of our hunting grounds exhauste on a road. I guess they left the bear somewhere around there, after somthing about 6-7 hours on the bear. Mind you, their first ecounter togheter with a brown one.
Fourth morning arised with nice weather, but not to much to go on bearwice. After some loggingroad checking, I got fedup and went back to the area we found the bear the day before. I started out a bit north of where we found it earlier, hoping it had wandred back during night. After 20 minutes of cold trailing, I saw on my astro that Dina started out with some paste in a direction. Pac's was out in search to my right, but was left, so I just waited there expecting him to come over to my left and letting me know if there was something interresting. A short bawl ensured me that something was up. Pac's picked up paste and soon teamed up with Dina cold trailing. The problem was that they were on the neighbours ground..... After 20 minutes, with bawls from Pac's getting closer and closer, the jump bawl came and chills came down my spine again. What a wonderful feeling
The race was going with tremendeus speed for 3-4 miles before they bayed it up the first time. By now it was clear that this bear was never going to come back to us, so I went back to my car, drove closer, left my gun in the car and just walked closer to the bayup.
Here is some of the nasty shit they were bayed up in. You can see were they've been going through the grass.
The next four hours was a ever cange between bayups and walking bayups. The track told us that this was a pretty big bear in the 440-550 pounds range, so even if the houds couldnt keep him bayed for hours at on place, I was pleased with their actions, considering this was their second encounter with a brown bear. After four hours the bear had had enough and jumped in a big river, the hounds quit there and I was glad. Real bearhounds would probably kept on going, but the river was 70-80 yards wide with a real strong current and lots of big rocks.
I had a real good time over there. My hounds did far far more than I ever deared to dream of before the hunt and it was not their foult that we did not get any bear!
Thanks again Steve, for giving me the chance to experience such a hound as Pac's, he's just the real deal. The downside to this is that he should have been put in someone elses hands, someone that knew more about hounds and was able to hunt him all week year around and get all that he could be out of him....
Happy hunting,
Hans
K9/SAR MAN-HUNTERS BORN 7/3/11....check out my website link below for details 
