Also got the bear hide out and thawed, long story on the hide but wished I had done a better job skinning it, we were 3 1/2 miles in at 11,000 feet in tough terrain and wasn't planning on keeping the hide, we were planning on keeping the head but our main concern was getting the meat out and wanted to do it in one trip out. well when went to check it in 2 days later they told us we didn't have to bring the meat out but had to bring head and hide, NOW that make no sense to me , meat way more important to us than the hide,dumb law in my opinion but never the less it is the law,
we should have read the regs better so our fault for sure,
We knew we had to bring the head but missed the part about the hide.
anyway they said they couldn't check it in without the hide, so now 40 miles from camp on our way to Tennessee we had to go back to camp, change cloth , get our pack and hike back in and get the hide, 7 mile round trip on a tough trail, the good news is it hadn't been bothered and didn't even stink,we finished the skinning and packed it out in record time, got back to the check station at 4:30 and they close at 5 , if we hadn't of made it by 5 we would have had to stay another day and our camp was in the trailer packed up,wouldn't be the first time I spent the night in a truck I guess, anyway all was good , just if we had known we had to bring it out anyway I would have done a lot better job skinning to tan and save. It's ok but I got a little rough with in in spots, lesson learned, guess that's what memories are made of.
:)I will look it over good and see how it goes. I did lay it out and measure it and it prefect 6 foot square , so it was a big bear, and would have made a beautiful rug. The lady at the check station said it was the biggest they had checked in 2 years and was between 7 and 10 from checking his teeth, big bear for that part of the country for sure. That's it for the weekend , hope yall had a good one also. Life is Good.
Pappy
