First....proper location. Probably one of the best baits is used deep fryer grease from a restaurant. This is a bait they can't carry away , stands up to rain, and smells great to them. Pour on logs and even around a rock exposed to the sun to help heat it up to get extra scent in the air. Depending on where you are hunting, avoid fish. Bears in the western provinces or Alaska tend to go for fish but majority of bears east of the Rockies turn their noses up to it. Avoid anything rotten. Grain such as oats or corn sweetened with molasses works great. And don't forget the donuts.
Hard to get grease now, restaurants now sell their old cooking oil and it is considered a special waste that can not be disposed of in a landfill or dumped.
We use trail mix and spray liquid smoke around and up onto branches close to the bait site. That least the air currents carry the smell a little farther. Save your bacon grease and put on there. Doesn't take much. And who doesn't love bacon?! Sent from my SM-G920V using Bowhunting.com Forums mobile app
Check the regulations to see if you can but a honey pot works pretty dang good. Only problem is you have to find metal coffee cans. Take a large coffee can half fill it with charcoal, light it up and let it get hot. Take a smaller coffee can and half fill with honey put it inside the bigger coffee can. The honey will boil over and drip on the charcoal and smoke. It will draw any down wind bears.
I don't bear hunt but I'd bet dinner scraps or leftovers pulled out of the trash would work.... The bears down by a place I hunt are a bunch of dumpster divers. But that may not be legal.?.
Go to local restaurants and bakeries and get all the used cooking/frying oil and the old/stale cookies and donuts they are going to throw away anyway. Mix this with oats and grain or a already mixed "trail mix" and you'll get them in! I also throw some honey and molasses on top and around the bait site as well. The oil is a great thing as it gets on their pads and they then track that oil sent all over the woods, in turn drawing more bears in. Good luck!
