By Dan Pence

The third week of May 2004 I hunted black bear with Emile Burnouf of Burnouf's Wilderness Outfitters. Bait sites were located along the forest margins of Lake Kazan, a large natural lake near Ile-a-la-Crosse in northwestern Saskatchewan. We stayed in a cabin on a small island. All travel was by boat.

I first saw the jet-black boar on the third afternoon at a bait site near the portage to the road from town. He was smaller than what I normally consider to be a trophy-sized black bear. I had passed up two similar bears on another bait yesterday. So, I had no second thoughts about waiting for a bigger bear as this boar walked back into the forest.

I hunted different baits sites the next two afternoons. After five days of hunting and discussions with the outfitter and guides I was convinced that bears here do not reach the extraordinary size that they do further south in SK. This far north the winters are long and cold. The lake had only thawed about two weeks prior to my arrival. Probably, a 400 pound bear would be exceptional. But, there was an abundance of 300-350 pound boars. I already had seen three in five days of hunting and two of these were color phase bears!

On day six I returned to the bait by the portage where I had seen the jet-black boar. As we approached the site, Guide Don Morin noticed two small cubs in a spruce tree. Fearing that a sow was nearby, he cautiously beached the boat. We located my climbing tree stand in a small aspen near the water's edge 40 yards from the bait barrel. Then when he went to add fresh bait to the barrel, Don saw a dead bear lying a few feet from the spruce tree that the cubs had climbed. This must be the cub's mother. Don dropped his bait bucket and hurried back to the boat, remarking, "I'm out of here. There are too many bears here for me! I hope you get the bear that killed that sow". Obviously, Don believed that a boar had killed her. I had no way of verifying this. I knew that boars often kill cubs, but I had not heard of one killing a sow.

I could only see the bear's outline above the muskeg depression where she was lying. She was a dark cinnamon color phase. One of the cubs was the same color. The other cub was black. Obviously, the sow had been killed within the past two days. Was a dominant boar on the bait site the culprit that killed her and orphaned the cubs? Could it have been the jet-black boar I saw when I hunted this bait site three evenings previously? How could I be sure?

These issues were partly resolved by the actions of the same jet-black boar when he returned to the bait site late that afternoon. The 5 gallon bucket full of meat and oats that Don had dropped was soon found and carried to the base of the spruce tree holding the cubs. His presence sent them scurrying to the very top of the tree, teetering in the small branches.

After eating, the boar stood on his hind legs, looked up the tree at the cubs, and clicked his teeth. Subsequently, he walked to the sow's carcass, stood on her chest with his front feet and bounced up and down. I heard the air escape from her bloated body. Then, he pulled a mouth full of hair from her side.

After watching this, I thought that maybe he had killed the sow. Regardless, he would surely dispatch the cubs at the first opportunity. And, they could not stay in the tree forever. So, I raised the Krieghoff Classic Double¨ side x side .30-06 rifle and fired. The bear ran 30 yards straight toward my tree stand. He collapsed less than 10 feet in front of me as I was about to pull the trigger for the other barrel.

The boar was 6-8 years old, weighed 300 pounds (Hackiewicz scale), measured 67 inches long, the skull green scored 18 12/16 inches (B&C scale), the front foot pad was 43/4 inches wide, and the hind foot was 7 inches long. A perfect pelage made a nice trophy. But after taking 24 bears over the past 25 years I ordinarily would not have harvested another 300 pound boar. However, under these extraordinary circumstances I was glad I did. He would be a trophy to remember!

The next day Emile led a party to retrieve the cubs. They felled the spruce tree, but only captured the black cub. The cinnamon cub escaped. Shortly, the captive cub was drinking milk supplement and eating solid food. He will probably spend his life in captivity. But unlike his unfortunate littermate, this cub will not perish for lack of a mother.

For an exceptional opportunity to harvest a 300-350 pound color-phase boar in northern SK at Burnouf's Wilderness Outfitters contact Bob Lozinsky at World Wide Wilderness, #1-75 Lenore Drive, Saskatoon, SK, S7K 7Y1, Canada; tel. 1-306-657-5006; fax 306-657-5010; mobile 306-230-6151; e-mail bob@wwwdi.com; web site www.worldwidewilderness.com.

Species: Black Bear Location of Hunt: Canada Outfitter: Burnouf's Wilderness Outfitters Weapon: Kreighoff 30.06 Rifle Equipment: Swarovski Binoculars, Swarovski Scope, Doc's Treestand, Doc's L.L. Bean Boots