Flathead Lake Lodge

This is a real life story about les Averill being dragged out of his tent in his sleeping bag while at hunting camp deep in the Bob Marshall Wilderness. The event took place in the 1060’s. The story became a national headline in Outdoor Life Magazine and featured on the Chicago’s wildlife TV adventures.

The hunting camp consisted of about 10 people, hunters, cooks and wranglers. Each day they would break up in pairs and ride out in search of a herd or long bull elk grazing on a mountainside. When successful, the hunters would butcher the elk and return to camp with the meat. In camp the meat was suspended on a pole between trees, the meat rack where it would cool and age before being horse packed to the trailhead days later. The location of the wilderness camp was Bunker Creek, tens of miles of rugged trail from the end of the road trailhead at Spotted Bear, where the south fork of the Flathead River meets Hungry Horse Reservoir. There were no communications to civilization from the camp, a long days horseback ride to the trailhead. The Bunker was known for a high population of Grizzly Bears which were not protected at the time and considered a nuisance and dangerous predator to man and other wildlife and considered a prize trophy to hunt. Most hunters came from out of state and relatively inexperienced in being in a wilderness setting. The relied heavily on the knowledge and professionalism of the outfitter. Les was considered one of the best and had many experienced guides who lived in the Bigfork area and grew up hunting.

The camp was frequently terrorized by a large male bear  they named ‘raider’ on numerous occasions and the hunters were keen to shoot this bear. It had wandered into camp several times when the camp was vacant and destroyed the cook tent, food supplies, sleeping gear and equipment. As the bear became more bolden and aggressive it started coming into camp at night when the hunters were sleeping and stealing quarters of elk meat off the rack. The fresh meat was an attractand and easy meal for the bear, the quarter weighed about 100 lbs. After a few incidents of losing meat and the angst of having a bear marauding around the tents while you are sleeping, the hunters decided on a plan to stop the bear. In hunting camp, the outfitter always keeps ‘cow bells’,to put on the horses when grazing to help locate them in nearby mountain meadows by hearing the bells. The plan was hatched to tie the bells on the meat, so when the bear tore at the meat rack, the bells would wake the tired hunters, who would jump out of their sleeping bags and shoot the bear. Each taped a flashlight onto the gun barrels. Everyone attempted to slept a little light knowing a bear was coming. Hunting requires hard exercise, walking in the snow and cold over mountains, so keeping one ear tuned for a bear to arrive didn’t work as everyone was in a deep sleep when the bells rang. By the time the sleeping hunters shed their sleeping bags and grabbed their guns, the bear was long gone down the trail with another quarter of ek meat. After two nights of hearing the bells and too slow to get a shot, a new plan was created around the campfire. It was decided the bells were scaring the bear, causing  him to grab and run, thus why not forget the bells and tie a rope to the meat on the rack so not to alarm the bear. Brilliant, so when the bear tears at the meat rock the rope would tug, waking whoever was elected to hold the rope. Les asked the long-time wrangler and guide, Gay Thompson to hold the rope. Well, Gay didn’t get much sleep that night anticipating a Grizzly Bear would tug on the rope from 30’ away and awake him to muster the hunters to quietly get up to shoot the bear. Well, the first night the bear didn’t show, so Les asked Gay to hold it again the second night, again the bear didn’t come into camp.

The third night Gay was again given the rope duty. He had two sleepless nights and was having difficulty working all day with no sleep. The third night after Les went to sleep, Gay bunched up the corner of his sleeping bad and tied the rope securely around his bag. This night the bear arrived to steal another quarter of elk!

The bear tore the meat off the rack and headed down the trail at a run. The rope tied to Les’s bag pulled tight, popping the 220 lb. man off his tent cot, out of the tent, knocking over the corner tent pole, collapsing the corner of the tent on the sleeping hunters. Les was being dragged through the snow down the trail at the high pace of the bear, still in his sleeping bag. With Les shouting at the bear and hunters shouting and scrambling to get their guns out of the sagging tent, caused the bear to drop the bait and get out of camp.  The bear was likely as spooked as the hunters. It was a most unusual hilarious scene with everyone in long johns in the snow with rifles and flashlight trying to collect themselves. It was never told what Les’s might have assigned Gay for work duty the next day, but Les always having a great sense of humor, may have settled the score with something fun in camp with all the hunters. The bear went on to keep coming into camp and was later shot by Les at close range with another heart pumping encounter.  The bear mount hangs on the Main Lodge wall and was one of the oldest and largest Grizzlys ever taken in Montana. The bear was able to stand on it’s hind legs and jump to 13’ height to reach the elevated meat rack which the hunters went to special effort to try to hang out of the bears reach. It didn’t work and they were amazed the bear could reach such heights.

I remember as kids, we would go into the camp early in the spring with my dad and help set up for the hunters We rode into camp one time and that bear was just sitting there by the cook tent on his haunches. We had packed a bunch of large #12 cans or the tin one-gallon cans, and they would have fruit or different things in them that you could easily keep in camp. We stopped as we came into the opening of camp and there was the bear sitting off on the far side. He was enjoying our groceries by opening a gallon can by punching it with his claws and popping right through the tin, ripping it and then just lift it up just like a little kid drinking a glass of milk. It was fascinating.

We didn’t shoot the bear because dad said that grizzly bears were real trophies for the hunters to shoot. He didn’t want to shoot it when we were just sitting up the camp early. Dad thought if that same bear was a problem later, he or a hunter could shoot it.

We had lots of fun experiences in hunting camp, but my dad was happy to live through getting dragged out of his tent!