All About Bear Hunting In The Queen Charlottes

I recently had the chance to hunt the Queen Charlotte Islands for black bears, and it was one of the best bear hunts of my life. The Queen Charlottes, part of the Canadian Province of British Columbia, lie about 100 miles off the Canada coastline. There are two major islands, and more than 100 small ones, stretching about 100 miles north to south. I'd wanted to hunt the QCs for years, but could not locate an outfitter, and was repeatedly told that the islands were best known for salmon fishing. Then I learned that the rights to hunt the entire territory were purchased by outfitter Kevin Olmstead three years ago. He is the only outfitter there, so if you aren't a British Columbia resident and you want to hunt the Queen Charlottes, you must hunt with Olmstead. I immediately got in contact Olmstead and started planning a hunt. Turns out he has spent a lot of time and effort exploring remote islands and areas and lining up the necessary air and boat service to hunt them. It was on one of these remote islands that I took my first bear . The roughly 15-by-20-mile island had been logged-over years ago and was abandoned, leaving an underhunted Mecca where big bears die of old age. Olmstead had barged a vehicle to the island, and established a tent camp. There were at least 100 miles of drivable logging roads on the island, plus other roads that had been deactivated. It was along the latter that I found most of the bears. I simply hiked along one of these roads, looking for bears. There was exceedingly lush clover and grass along the road, plus fresh bear droppings everywhere. My first bear was an honest seven-foot-one-incher, shot while he munched on grass. Part of the excitement here was the solitude. We had the whole island to ourselves. No other hunters could possibly have competed with us because there were no other vehicles on the island.

My second bear came from one of the large islands, where we........(continued)