A few friends of mine (father &son and son is fairly new to hunting)
They were hunting up in NY adirondacks. So they split up at day light with plans
to.meet up for lunch.
lunch comes and goes but son does not come out. Dad assumes son is on deer and decides to wait for him.
after abiut an hr with no shot dad starts. To get real worried.
Some more time passes and here comes son out of the woods
jacket open shirt open and white as a ghost.says dad. Well turned out he got to his spot
rested his gun next to the tree and settled in ( for what must have been a long winters nap)
Well when he wakes up there is a very large bear 500lbs ish.
about 10 feet from him foraging through the leaves and eating an apple core that he had finished and tossed.
now the story from the son was when he woke from his deep sleep and saw the bear he actually thought dor a minute that it was his dads black ford ranger and thought to himself where the hell am I.
until he realized it was a bear. Then he remembered that his gun was not in his lap and still next to the tree.
his option was to reach for the gun (a muzzle loader) and risk startling this big bear or close eyes and pray that he goes off on his own. So needless to day after about a half hr the bear wandered off on he's own.
And my friend went to find his dad. He actually was a little afraid of the woods after that and missed a season.or 2.