Ontario’s Cozy Camp sends Wisconsin bear hunter, angler home happy
With 9 years the average wait for a Wisconsin bear tag, some local hunters are going to find other options until that harvest permit finally arrives. Meet Ontario, Canada.Meet Cozy Camp.Meet Dick Henske.
Henske is a legitimate field nut. He hunts and he fishes, and then he hunts and he fishes; Wisconsin, the Dakotas, different provinces of Canada.Where ver it flocks, runs or schools, he’s chasing it. He retired at 52 like everyone says they’re going to retire. It took him about five seconds to transition from being a Wisconsin elementary principal in southeast Wisconsin to Manitowish Waters to hunt and ….well, you know. As you read this he’s on his way to the Galapagos Islands with his wife Mariel. He’s got nothing on Mariel. She can paddle the kayak or run the 5-K better than most.
Usually, as summer wanes the 78 year old Henske is either baiting his own bears or taking care of it for some lucky friend who drew the tag. For about 20 years….since Dick is my father in law and I can keep tabs on his travels….I’ve been labeling this group of never-say-die Wisconsin sportsmen the Not-So-Over-The-Hill-Gang and writing about them. This summer, Henske didn’t know anyone who needed baiting assistance…but there was no way he was staying home.
With buddy Jeff Krans, also of Manitowish Waters in Vilas County, Henske made arrangements to hunt bears and fish mostly walleyes for just four days before returning to northern Wisconsin for final preparations to Milwaukee and the Galapagos. Although Canada often has the feel of a distant paradise, these boys from northern Wisconsin were less than 500 miles from Ignace, Ontario and Cozy Camp.
“It’s about a nine hour drive from Manitowish Waters,” Henske said.&nb; &ldquoIgnace is on Highway 17 west of Thunder Bay. It’s short mileage, no traffic, and beautiful scenery along the Minnesota border and north into Canada on Highway 17. We travel through Duluth and crossed the border at Pigeon Forge. There’s no volume crossing there and you go right through. Type in the ‘Sunset Area’ and many outfitters will pop up from this area.”
Most outfitters in this “Sunset Area” of Ontario (Google it) he said, offer moose, bear, grouse, waterfowl hunting and smallgame, with walleye or lake trout fishing often the either-or primary targets. Most outfitters will also have the “other” species within easy travel distance, for example lakers, available on another lake where boats on shore are also waiting for their guests.
“Some lakes have both primary species,” Henske said. “You can purchase a weekly conservation license which allows you to take two or four fish per day for $30 or $40 dollars. I buy a yearly license for $78 because I go back several times each year. This is the English River. I like fishing the widening of the river and the area lakes. You can’t fish out this huge river system and they say the fishing is better here now than it was 40 years ago. I wasn’t baiting at home and there was no one fishing. I decided to come and hunt bears and fish here. It’s hard to beat.”
With Jeff Krans of Manitowish Waters, Henske chose Cozy Camp full-service outfitters Dan and Ann Burkholder. Bait stations were prepared since July, and 4-wheelers were available for game retrieval as well as well as meat lockers and freezers for storing butchered bears. Henske usually pays about $600 for one week of fishing with cabin and boat and motor and paid about $1500 for the bear hunting fishing package at Cozy Camp.
“I didn’t think that was bad,” Henske said. “He charged a little more but I knew we were going to have good solid bait stations going, in great locations and hopefully with multiple bears. When you have a full service guide you know what to expect.”
The hunters drove up on August 13, two days prior to the August 15 bear season opener so they could become acclimated with the bear stands and help bait. On the first evening, they fished and enjoyed a walleye dinner.
“We had 15 hp 4-stroke outboards that were really stingy on gas with 15-foot boats that were just perfect. I brought my own locator which is important. We brought a five gallon bucket of frozen, salted minnows. You can’t bring them live. You can bring night crawlers packed in paper, not soil based, and no leeches unless you buy them in Canada. But gulp worked and I used twister tails instead of a plain jig. We were targeting walleyes but caught a lot of big northerns too as incidental catches. On the two fish per day license you have to consume the fish you catch first, you can’t keep leftovers”.
On August 14th the Wisconsin hunters baited, and put up their own treestands that they had brought from home. Henske would use a .35 caliber rifle, and worked the wind as necessary with his stand. Krans also used a rifle.
“We preferred our own stands because of the wind,” Henske said. Dan gave us all the suggestions that we needed to be successful. How much bait, what bait, the time of day to take a stand. On Thursday afternoon August 15th we went out to hunt at 2:00 pm.”
About four minutes after Dan had dropped off Henske and driven his truck out of hearing range; a big bear appeared and checked the wind cautiously before coming into the bait.
“He came in, turned broadside and I could see that his head was as big as the bait hole. I knew it was a big boar. They don’t have good sight, but their sense of smell is great and if they just hear a click, despite those little ears, they’re gone. Dan believes in his bait and wants you to keep using that, and natural scent. He put all out hunting clothes in a pine bag outside the night before we hunted. We smelled like Christmas trees.”
A small price to pay for a very big Canadian bear. The boar came in slowly with nose to the winds but never winded Henske. The .35 caliber round was well placed moments later and the bear traveled only 15 feet from the bait.
“The fur, head and paws weighed 128 pounds with an estimated field weight of 300 pounds,” he said. Dan will skin and process the bear, anything you ask. I cut up my own with knives and a sharpener that I brought from home. I think it’s part of the hunt. I de-boned the carcass and stored the meat in the Cozy Camp freezer.
Henske finished out the final two days on the water catching more walleyes and northern s than any man deserves, even a Wisconsin man, while Krans continued an unsuccessful quest for his own bear. A sow and cubs were his only visitors.
“I’ll be back,” Henske said. “Cozy Camp did a really good job with the bear hunt, and the fishing was excellent. We were in and out in four days. It’s so close.”
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Thanks for connecting with On Wisconsin Outdoors. Our September-October issue will be on the streets late next week. Shoot straight.
Dick Ellis