California bears suddenly disappear?

[brycejohnson]

Alright, I have one question.

I am new here to Northern California. Before last summer I hadn't had much contact with bears. This last season I saw twelve different bears in my deer zone. (I don't run them, but God willing I will a few times next season) I spend lots of time in the woods, and have some cameras out to help with scouting. I have allot of good pictures of allot of good game. The cameras went out in August, and are still up today. From August through October I was getting a picture of a bear real often, sometimes daily. Including cubs I had 8 regular visitors. Around the start of November they all became camera shy. The weather didn't change, and hunter traffic did not really pick up. Not only did they disappear from the cameras but so did their tracks, scat, ect. I haven't checked them since late December. But at that point I still had no new bear pictures. Anyone have any thoughts towards the reasoning on this?

Thanks,
Bryce

[Dale T]

probably either dened up or moved on to better feeding grounds. JMO

[brycejohnson]

Would they den up that early? It was about 3500 ft elevation so some days were still pretty warm. And do they change their habits that much when winter comes? The deer didn't seem to migrate to lower elevation for another month.
Thanks for the input.

[slowandeasy]

i'm not an expert by a long shot but i think the length of days has alot more to do with everything wildlife does. not just how cold or warm it is. temp may spur things along, but they are going to happen regaurdless. will be intresting to see what others with alot more education think. take care

[radar]

Give it a few years of doing that and may be see if they have a pattern. The black bears get there walk on...don't know if your new to the north or new to cali but it seems like no game like to hang out for very long here. except the turkeys!!!

[brycejohnson]

A new thought, today I headed up and checked the cameras. There was about six inches of snow on the ground, no pictures, and no tracks. However, I hiked into a new area, about a mile away and towards the river. I saw four bears. A nice boar I had never seen, and most interesting of all a sow and cubs that I have around 20 pictures of. (Some of the ones a talked about earlier that I stopped getting pictures of back in November) They were below the snow line completely. Just interesting to me.

[brycejohnson]

And radar, thanks for the input. I did not know if they would move up and down like the deer do in this area. It was cool to see them today close but at a lower elevation. I learned some stuff about them while watching them on this trip.

[kickemall]

Bears are feed dependent and will move hundreds of miles to find it if they need to. They probably ran out of feed in the first area and went looking somewhere else. Often they'll come back to den and that may be why your seeing them come out in the same area. Any moving a bear does involves feed and older ones often have established areas they check first (acorn patches, creeks with fish, clover in the spring) and they have to keep moving to find it.

[lepcur]

They probably moved to the river canyon for acorns, I know around here about november they drop off in the canyons for the acorns.

[brycejohnson]

Thats a good point about the acorns, because where I saw them yesterday was all in the oaks, where before I had seen them up in the pines. Thanks for the thoughts so far. Anybody elses opinions would be interesting as well.

[radar]

If theres a boar in the area and the sow's got cubs, she'll move on, too keep the cub protected.

[wanapasaki]

Betch ya a million bucks I know where you hunt bryce. On my way up there tomorrow to run the poops lol

[brycejohnson]

Haha got luck with that Ryan. I'm talking about up here in Sac. But I know where a 500lb boar lives right in your hunting grounds, and your gunna miss out this season when I use my tag on him come this winter.

[wanapasaki]

Haha got luck with that Ryan. I'm talking about up here in Sac. But I know where a 500lb boar lives right in your hunting grounds, and your gunna miss out this season when I use my tag on him come this winter.

LOL! I know where he is, my dogs were on him today!

[brycejohnson]

Ha ya right. Keep it up and I wont even show him to you come season!