“Get Close Before You Shoot!” Old-School Lessons from a Grizzly and Goat Hunting Adventure

This story, “Hides and Horns,” appeared in the March 1951 issue of Outdoor Life.

“So I snapped the safety off my .375 and dropped him in his tracks with one shot at 275 yards” — or was it 286 or 372 yards?

You’ve read more than one hunting yarn with that or a very similar statement in it. You won’t find it in this one. I don’t believe in long-distance shooting at heavy game. On my late-September hunting trip in the southeastern corner of British Columbia I stuck to my experience-tested system of using powerful glasses to pick out trophies I really want and then getting in close to my game before I open fire. And I came out with everything I had gone in after.

Usually I specialize in bears, but on this trip I was just as anxious to get myself two mature male mountain goats.

I knew I had come to the right place to do it when I got a chance at a billy the first day I hunted. That was the fifth day after Nick Gravelle, George Phillips, and I packtrained it away from the outfitter’s ranch near Flagstone, B. C. — which is across the border north of Eureka, Mont. (Nick was my Flathead Indian guide; George is a veteran horse wrangler, camp cook, and handy man.)

The second day out we had been storm-stayed in an abandoned ranger cabin, and in the next three we had traveled a total of only about forty air miles — but we weren’t traveling by air, and on the ground our almost constant switchbacking up steep slopes almost doubled the distance. We had gone up the valley of Wigwam River to Ram Creek, and then followed the Ram to its headwaters. The going had been so tough that each mile had seemed like ten to me.

What with the horses climbing over big boulders and jumping fallen timber, I thought the seat of my pants had been worn off clear up to my neck, if you know what I mean. But late in the afternoon of the fourth day we had made our camp about 6,500 feet up in the Rockies. On our way in we had seen a lot of elk, moose, mule deer, and white-tails, and plenty of bear sign, and from our base of operations we were within climbing distance — pretty near straight up — of goat and grizzly country.

Next morning Nick and I pulled out of camp as soon as it got light enough to see, and climbed the north slope through heavy spruce and fir timber, the plenty of it that was down adding to our troubles in getting up the steep grade. I hadn’t got used to the altitude yet, so I soon was lathered and winded, but Nick gave me a breather whenever he saw that I had to have one or else.

It was raining, and Nick thought that we might run into a goat in the timber. Mountain goats hate rain, and in wet weather often leave the high open places to take shelter under overhanging ledges or in caves, or down in the timber. We saw goat tracks, but no goats. Finally we got up to timberline, came out on a breakneck slope at the foot of a towering cliff, and kept on climbing. There was plenty of crusted snow on the shale up there, and it was noon when we had made it to the top.

Brother, what a sight! You can’t really see a mountain until you get on top of it. Some of the cliffs were 1,000 feet high and just about straight up and down, with 45-degree shale slopes, well studded with boulders, tapering off from the cliff base for 2,000 feet or so down to the basin floor. From the tops of the cliffs you could look down into and out across the barren basins, some of them miles wide. Nick strolled along the edge of the cliff as if he were half goat, but every time I went over to take a look down I did it on all fours.

Well, getting back to our hunting, we worked slowly along the top, stopping every few minutes to look over the cliffs and ledges, and to sweep the basins with our glasses. We hadn’t gone far when we spotted, about a mile ahead of us, a band of nannies that had four kids with them. A brace of billies was what I was after, so we didn’t bother these, but kept on along the ridge and saw several other small bands of nannies. Billies and nannies look and are horned about the same, but the billies are quite easy to identify because they are larger — a good one weighs 300 pounds — and because their snow-white coats usually are stained a dirty yellow around the hips and belly.

About 3 o’clock, when it was time for us to be starting back to camp, we came out onto a high, projecting ledge. Nick strolled casually over to the very edge of the 1,000-foot drop-off.

He stepped back suddenly and pointed. “Goat!” he whispered.

Wishing that I had suction cups on my knees, I crawled to the edge and took a dizzy look. There stood my first billy, nearly opposite me on a point of rock. He was looking Nick and me over as if we were something straight from Mars. Chances are that he never had seen a man before — which goes for most of the game in that high country.

I had my old reliable Model 99 Savage .300, veteran of many a hunt, and was shooting Remington Core-Lokt ammunition with the 180-grain soft-nose bullet. I must have wiggled around all of a minute trying to get the rifle to my shoulder without rolling off the ledge. Finally I got the sights lined up and gave him one back of the shoulder.

You would have thought that a locomotive had hit him. He gave one kick, and down the rocks he went. That was the last we saw of him for several seconds, but we heard a series of dull thuds farther and farther away as he hit ledge after ledge. Then we saw him again, rolling down the shoulder at the base of the cliff, with boulders rolling with him. At last he came to a stop, a good 3,000 feet below us.

“He’s gone!” Nick growled. “Only grizzly feed now!”

During our downhill scramble back to camp he embroidered on that disheartening thought. He’d seen a goat break off both horns in a fifteen-foot fall, he said, and the terrible tumble my billy had taken was sure to have ruined him as a trophy.

For once Nick was wrong. When we found my goat the next day he was jammed between two boulders with both horns anchored to his head and not even chipped, although practically every bone in his body was broken. The bullet had gone straight through his spine and come out on the other side. He was a prime five-year-old with heavy horns measuring 8¼ inches along the outside curve — not in the near-record class, but a mighty nice trophy.

While we had been up above, George had gone out and downed a young mule deer for camp meat. Man, did that venison hit the spot when we staggered in well after dark!

It rained and snowed most of the next day, so all we did was to find my goat, skin it out, and bring in its cape. The following morning the weather was better, so we started early for the high places. This time we got on top quicker. I was hardening up.

Kinship With a Grizzly

Near timberline Nick spotted a grizzly digging for roots, or maybe for nuts stored by squirrels. When we looked him over with the glasses we agreed that his fur was pretty thin and badly worn in spots, so we left him in peace to finish his project of digging holes. He reminded me of someone I knew, and after a while I realized that it was myself — getting into hole after hole!

We worked along the rim for a couple of hours without seeing any goats except a band of nannies. Along in the afternoon we noticed, maybe 600 yards ahead of us, what at first appeared to be several patches of snow on a ledge some forty yards below the top of the steep-pitched north slope. Swinging the glasses on them, we saw five billies lying sunning themselves, all set for a restful afternoon.

The wind being in our favor, Nick figured that our best approach was straight down the ridge. Keeping back from the edge, we began our stalk. After we had covered half the distance we crawled over to the edge for another look. The billies were still there in a group, apparently holding a union meeting. Three of them were better than average. The two others appeared to be three-year-olds with spikes about five inches long.

We went on as quietly as we could. Nick thought that he could put me within seventy-five yards of the goats — which was as far from them as I wanted to be when I started shooting.

When we were about that distance from them there was a startling clatter of stones. Then one of the billies came over the edge of the rim. He was angling toward us on a dead run. The others were coming up from the bench plenty fast and well spread out. What had spooked them I’ll never know.

The leading billy had his throttle wide open. By the time I had got my eyes pushed back into my head and had collected my wits he was past me. As he was making a sharp-angle turn in full stride he saw us — and then he really put on a burst of speed.

Down for the Count

Dropping to one knee I swung the rifle, picking him up in the Stith Bear Cub scope and squeezing off my shot as I followed through. The bullet took him well back on the ribs and angled up through and out his right shoulder, breaking it. His momentum carried him twenty yards after the slug smacked him, but then he went down and stayed down.

I stepped off the length of my shot — forty-seven paces. This goat was a six-year-old in fine shape. He had five-inch chin whiskers, and his spikes, very heavy at the base and extremely sharp at the point, measured eight inches along the outside curve. Nick and I skinned out the whole hide and packed it down to camp.

Then, with my limit, I hung up my gun on goats.

As I’ve said, I usually specialize in bears, so with my two goats safely anchored I devoted the balance of my time on the Ram to trying to get a real good grizzly.

After supper that night we got to talking about bears and guns for them. Outfitters and guides usually think that for hunting the big bears you are undergunned if you aren’t using one of the large-caliber rifles firing a Magnum load, which are talked up so much these days. I don’t agree with them, because I know of a number of hunts that ended with the hunter or his guide going home in a plaster cast or a rough box because the hunter with a supergun insisted on using a grizzly as a target at 200 yards or more. Plenty of the long-range boys can hit a bear at that distance, time after time. But at 200 yards mighty few of them can be sure of hitting it in a vital spot — hitting it hard enough to knock it down and keep it down. Often the result is that a wounded bear goes into the timber plenty mad, and the guide and his long-range client have the nasty job of trailing it, with the bear having the advantage of being able to back-track and jump them at close quarters if he happens to be in a fighting mood — as a wounded silvertip usually is.

So, in hunting big bears or any other big game I believe in doing what the good elephant hunters do — getting in close, as far inside 100 yards as I can, before I start shooting. If you do that you don’t need a heavy-caliber rifle and a Magnum load to make a clean kill. At close range a standard medium-caliber gun such as my .300 Savage, whose 180-grain soft-nose bullet will penetrate a foot of solid pine and has close to a ton of striking power at 100 yards, will shoot right through the biggest grizzly. If you can’t whack a bear in a vital spot at fifty yards or so — then, brother, you have no business to be shooting at much longer ranges with a “souped up” gun!

That’s the way I feel about it anyway — and it listens like good common sense, doesn’t it?

Somewhat to my surprise, Nick felt the same way. “Why should any hunter want to shoot 200 yards and up on heavy game?” was the way he put it. “If he’s lucky and downs it, he’s still got to go in close to skin it, ain’t he? Then why not go in close in the first place?”

So far I haven’t said anything about the bear sign we saw everywhere we went. At the place where we camped the valley of the Ram has narrowed to a canyon only fifty yards wide, with heavy timber and dense underbrush covering its sides up to timberline. In this gorge we saw lots of grizzly sign that had been left in the spring, when the big boys had come down from the snow field. The bark of hundreds of trees had been ripped off down to solid wood where they had dragged their long claws downward for four or five feet. Some of those claw marks started more than ten feet above the ground, indicating that quite a bear had made them.

We started working the slopes of the valley’s south wall along and above timberline. We saw lots of bears’ diggings, some old and others recent. But we didn’t see a bear all day.

We went back at it as soon as it got light the next morning. About noon our glasses picked up an old grizzly sow with two spring cubs. They were a mile away across the basin and we didn’t try to get closer. If we had killed the sow we would have had to kill the cubs too. They wouldn’t know enough to feed themselves or to den up when the cold weather came.

Later we came across a track, several days old, that had been made by a real “he” bear. I put both my boots in it without filling it for length or width. “An old boar,” Nick said. “Probably crowding 1,000 pounds.”

That’s the king-size grizzly I’ve been hunting for years. Such bears are few and far between, but I haven’t given up on it. It wouldn’t have made sense to try to track this one. More likely than not he was thirty miles away by then. Grizzlies like to keep moving, and this fall they were moving more than usual. Hard summer frosts had ruined the berry crop, and they were hunting for food to put a little fat on themselves before denning for the winter.

So we wound up another hard day with nothing for our efforts except our appetites. But that’s hunting, and next morning we were on our way up the south slope as soon as we could see. When we got close to timberline we started working eastward among stunted, scattered trees. We saw a lot of fresh digging, and Nick thought that the bear that had done it might have bedded down near by. So we took our time and kept our eyes and ears open.

Too Busy to Eat

We were starting to eat our lunch when we heard the rattling and crashing of stones rolling down the steep slope — a good indication that a grizzly is on the prowl. Forgetting that we were hungry, we headed in the direction of the commotion, but worked up above it for better observation.

When we got to a high spot we saw the bear 500 yards ahead of us. We watched it through the glasses for a few minutes and decided that it looked good enough to be worth closer checking. I always do that; there’s no percentage in stalking a bear that isn’t worth the trophy fee you’ll have to pay on it.

The wind was in our favor. Our approach through the scattered timber was easy. When we were within 200 yards of the grizzly we hid behind a clump of evergreens and watched it zigzag toward us, digging a small hole here and a big one there. Nick said it was an old sow, in excellent condition because she was without cubs. Her hide was a deep copper color from the neck well back toward the hips, while her head and legs were deep chocolate. As sows go she was big — around 600 pounds, Nick guessed — and in view of the fine color and excellent condition of her pelt I decided to take her.

I checked the Savage just to be sure, and we waited motionless as she worked slowly toward us. At what later proved to be fifty-two paces she started to dig out a big shrub root. She was broadside to us when Nick let out a “woof!” As she jerked up her head a bullet already was on its way from the muzzle of the old .300. She grunted once and collapsed into the hole she had dug.

Nothing more was needed to finish the job, and a couple of minutes later we were looking her over. The slug had gone clean through her, breaking both shoulders and leaving a hole the size of a half dollar where it came out.

From the long, silky hair of the ruff on her burly shoulders to her long claws she was every inch a grizzly. We skinned her out and started for camp. Before we got there we were soaked through by one of those sudden storms that come up in the mountains. But I didn’t mind it a bit!

The one unchecked item left on my shopping list was a good brown bear, which is the same animal as the black bear only of a different color.

We decided to head back to the Wigwam River area, where chances were better for a brown than in the real high country. Next day we worked down the Ram and camped alongside the Wigwam. Here the altitude was about 3,000 feet, and the slopes not so steep as up above, and well timbered in places. Blacks and browns are plentiful in this country, but as I was going to be choosy, and the leaves still were on the brush, I expected I’d have to do some hard hunting to get what I was after.

The next two days we worked the slopes and the ridges, from which we could see anything on the move down below. We spotted five blacks and some mule deer, but we didn’t see a single brown.

It was from a ridge overlooking a burned-over area that, on the third day, we saw two bears far below us. They were about the same size, and were having a picnic feeding on grubs that they got at by breaking open rotten down timber. One was black, the other brown.

I was interested in the brown, which was a two-tone job — milk-chocolate color on his back and shoulders and a darker brown on his flanks and legs. Through the glasses he appeared to be in prime, so we went down for a closer look. It showed him well furred, and I decided to make a try for him.

Nick, who is one of the best stalkers in the business, checked the lay of the land and the direction of the air currents. Then he pointed to a ridge a quarter mile away. We climbed it, sat down on a log, and hoped that the bears would continue to feed toward us.

They did. When they were inside 100 yards the brown turned so that it was angling away from us.

Two Slugs Did It

I let him have a bullet in the ribs back of the shoulder. It was too far back to knock him down. With a loud grunt he started down the slope at express-train speed. Before he had taken five jumps I gave him another shot, farther forward. This bullet cut through his lungs and went out in front of his right shoulder. He didn’t need another one.

The last I saw of the black he was heading for the Wigwam plenty fast, and for all I know he’s still running.

The brown weighed about 350 pounds, and its pelt squared six feet. It made a handsome trophy.

So I came out with everything I had gone in after. My hunting notes read:

One goat, killed with one shot across a narrow gorge.

One goat, killed with one shot at 47 paces.

One grizzly bear, killed with one shot at 52 paces.

One brown bear, killed with two shots at 80 paces.

Read Next: The Best Bear Cartridges

Four really worth-while trophies killed with five shots from a medium-caliber rifle. Convincing evidence, to my way of thinking, that it pays off big in horns and hides to get in close before you shoot!