Post by Roe on Mar 26, 2016 14:27:16 GMT -4
The Pungi Bear
I was already walking back to my truck when I heard the shots, three, in such rapid succession I assumed they could only come from Mooch’s Browning autoloader. Five hours had passed since I had dropped off each of the other hunters on the way to my bait, the farthest from our campsite. I hurried to the Chevy and fumbled with the keys in the gathering darkness. With the transfer case in “4-Low”, I began the sluggish ride down the muddy and overgrown track, first crossing the rocky stream that fed the Dishno. First up was Marv, his form silhouetted in the middle of the trail by the piercing beams of my headlights. He climbed aboard and asked if I had heard the shots, as I slipped the clutch and pounded through the next set of mud holes.
Marv had been hanging tough on a bait I was sure was dead. Three days ago, on opening morning, he had shot at and missed a very large bruin. I had, against my better judgement, dropped him off that morning just before first light. I watched him step off the old logging track in the glow of the taillights as I edged forward, hoping the gear whine of the truck would cover his entry into his makeshift blind, just a few yards off the narrow trail. Marv had paused after entering the woods, then as the sky grew brighter, got his bearings and made his way to the brush pile that was his hide. As he sat down he became aware of movement behind the bait less than 40 yards down the embankment. A big bear was just beginning a hasty departure. Marv threw up the borrowed Remington semiauto and snapped off a quick shot. A clean miss…but the bear stopped dead in his tracks! Marv yanked futilely on the trigger of the .30-06 before realizing the gun was jammed, the empty case hung in the ejection port. The big bruin quickly recovered from its confusion and renewed its escape, as Marv struggled to clear the rifle. His final shot splintered bark and burrowed deep into a tree as the bear passed behind. A thorough search found no sign of a hit and the educated bruin had avoided the bait ever since.
A mile and a half up the winding two-track we came upon Mooch, his dim flashlight visible as we crested one of the steep ridges. He was hunting the bait where we had left the road-killed deer. This bait had appeared very promising at first, but a trail timer was showing consistent hits between 12:30 and 12:45 AM. Mooch had stuck it out hoping this large night-feeder would come in during legal hours. As I pulled alongside my “So?” was answered with, “It was Keith who shot.” I just shook my head. Keith had moved to a nearby bait that very day, after abandoning his original one in a swale a mile north of camp. It was obvious a small bear was hitting this new bait and I had urged Keith to hold it in reserve for Marv, who had never taken a bear. Keith had taken a 200 pound bruin on one of our prior hunts and I was confident this bear wasn’t over 100 pounds. Mooch climbed in and expressed surprise that Keith could trigger three rounds from his Ruger 7 Mag bolt action so rapidly. I couldn’t wait to hear his story.
Ten minutes later we rolled up to the massive root ball that marked the entry to the bait. Keith was waiting on the road. As I exited the truck I asked. “How big is it?” “I don’t know.” was Keith’s reply. “It’s down, isn’t it?” was my next question. “I didn’t check.” he answered. I shook my head once again. Keith then told a tale of how the bear, after the first shot, had come up the steep hill at him, walking on its hind legs! As he continued to embellish his story, I slipped my side-by–side out of the truck, dropping two buckshot loads into the breech and tucking two more of the fat shells between the fingers of my left hand. With a couple of fresh flashlights, all four of us headed down the faint footpath that led to the bait. Nearing, I stepped up on a large flat boulder that, with the aid of the lights, offered a view of the bait. There lying on its side, nose almost touching the cover logs, was a very small bear. It appeared it had been knocked flat, its feet facing the blind. So much for Keith’s version of events.
I slid down off the rock, snapped open the shotgun, and dropped the shells in my pocket as I approached the bear, careful to avoid the dozens of sharp eight to ten inch spears protruding from the ground, remnants of the saplings we had cut to create an opening in the thick cover and a shooting lane. Pressed for time and a bit lazy as we created this bait, we had removed quite a number of the thumb-thick saplings with a long handled pruner, nipping them off at a 45 degree angle, without bending over to trim them off at ground level. We became aware of our folly when we returned to rebait and the ground had become slick with mud and fryer grease. Slipping and sliding in the muck, it quickly became apparent we had created quite a hazard for ourselves. Marv said they reminded him of the Pungi Sticks he encountered in ‘Nam.
As the others joined me at the kill, I couldn’t help but quip “Hey Keith, not big enough for a rug, but he’ll make a nice toilet seat cover!” Passing the shotgun to Marv, I tried to roll the bear over and found I couldn’t. Grabbing two fistfuls of fur, I lifted and felt him come free of whatever was holding him in place. As I flipped him on his back I looked down and saw one of those Pungi sticks covered with blood. I didn’t think much of it at the time, assuming it was just tangled in the bear’s fur. With little effort we hauled the small bruin back to the road and threw him on the hood of the truck, then continued the grind to camp and the promise of an ice cold beer.
After stoking up the campfire and satisfying our need for suds, Mooch suggested we weigh the bear before gutting it. We hung the scale and lifted the carcass to hang from the metal hook, the pointer stopping exactly at 90 pounds. I offered to do the field dressing as I was curious as to where those three rapid fire shots had gone, a cursory examination unable to find any obvious entry or exit wounds. Upon opening the chest cavity I was surprised to find things mostly intact. A boiler room hit with a 7 Mag at such close range usually turns everything to jelly. Instead, I found one of the lungs partially deflated. As the guys held the flashlights, I discovered a puncture wound, more of a tear, between the last two ribs on the off side of the bear. It tracked upward through the deflated lung to perfectly center the heart leaving a deep slit like a knife wound, it certainly wasn’t caused by a high velocity bullet. Then it dawned on me…the lethal wound was made by that bloodied Pungi stick!
Upon closer examination, we determined the only shot that connected has passed through the neck, in the loose skin and flesh above the spine, not even breaking that vital bone. Far from a deadly hit, it must have stunned the small bear enough to cause him to topple, impaling himself on that pointed stake. Death by Pungi! Truth truly is stranger than fiction. It would take Keith years to live this one down.
When the field dressing was complete, I slipped my hands under the bear’s armpits and stood him to drain the body cavity. His head only reached to mid-sternum on my six-foot frame. When, almost a year later, Keith told me he had the bear done in a full mount, standing on its hind legs, I replied, “Bet he looks good on top of your TV set!” Mooch urged him to take a similar sized bear on a hunt a few years later “so he could have a nice set of bookends”.
Roe
