For about 10 years, Diane and I never missed bear camp. We worked hard at maintaining bait sites, erecting tree stands and putting in our time when the season opened.

During that time, Diane shot one medium-size bear. The meat was superb, and she had the head mounted. In that 10 years, no shots were taken by me. A sow and her two cubs kept me entertained while feeding at a bait site. Another time a young boar gave me a good laugh while he intermittently munched on pastries with one eye on me. The gun never made it to my shoulder.

It was after a few years at bear camp that we admitted to ourselves that the passion we held for bagging a deer was not quite as strong when it came to putting a bear on the game pole. We once joked that the most successful bear hunts were those when we came home without a bear. You guessed it. It was everything else about the bear hunt — the trappings — that really held the allure.

The warm, lazy September afternoons sitting still in a tree stand with great expectations. The solitude. The big meal early in the day. A slice of Diane’s blackberry pie made from berries we picked ourselves not far from the bait sites.

Bear or no bear, bear camp was a place of good memories.

Time passed with no bear hunts on our busy dance card for a number of years. But then the whole idea tugged at me once again. My nephew and I teamed up for a do-it-yourself bear hunt this fall. Diane stayed home.

My nephew and I rotated the baiting chores and took turns sitting in the “active” stand. Action was slow, no doubt attributable to the bountiful wild blackberry crop. (If I were a bear, plump, juicy blackberries would hold my attention more than stale old donuts.)

One day, when it was my turn in the one active stand, I got a sudden hankering for a slice of her pie. The berry patch was most cooperative: berries big and plentiful. Talk about low-hanging fruit. Back at bear camp the berries were converted to a homemade blackberry pie, which I fashioned with a little guidance from Diane via cell phone.

As the pie cooled on the counter top, filling camp with a delicious aroma, I donned my camo duds and headed out for the afternoon hunt. Purely by happenstance, the active site was where we had put up the highest and most comfortable tree stand. It has a foam seat backrest, and safety rail: ideal for seniors with skinny butts, lower back issues, and tendencies to nod off.

A textbook perfect afternoon for a bear vigil it was. No wind. Overcast and not too warm. At 5:30 p.m. sharp, a young boar pussy footed into the bait from stage left. He sniffed around and then commenced to slap the bait bag and liberate a few doughnut pieces to the ground. The first thing you do is try to determine the bear’s size. This is not easy to do, unless you are a veteran bear hunter. Clearly, this guy was a young’un, not a shooter, as they say.

As always, however, this bear was great entertainment. He would eat a while, scamper off and then return for another run at the doughnut bag. This went on for all of 40 minutes. During his final visit, he threw caution to the wind and decided to finish off the remaining donuts in one gluttonous probe with his snout into the bait bag. Standing up on his back legs, huffing and gulping, he cleaned out the bag, licked his chops, and then skedaddled.

At dusk, walking back to the truck, I mused over a wonderful day in the bear woods.

For a hunter, especially one with some years on him, there can be satisfaction in simply knowing that, in a way, you outfoxed your quarry  — whether you took the shot or not. He was there for the taking. Low-hanging fruit is optional. You don’t have to pick it.

Back at bear camp, that slice of blackberry pie, topped with a scoop of Cool Whip, was as good as I knew it would be.

The author is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal. He is also a Maine Guide and host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network. He has three books. Online purchase information is available at www.maineoutdoorpublications.com.

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