BY DAVE EHRIG LOADED FOR BEAR During the past two years, an October muzzleloader season for bears was held in Wildlife Management Units 2B, 5B, 5C and 5D. No bears were taken. In the general and extended bear seasons those same two years, Pennsylvania hunters harvested more than 5,600 bears. Twelve of them were taken with muzzleloaders. So to say this year's Oct. 19-26 muz- zleloader bear season will be an entirely new experience - even for veteran bear hunters and longtime muzzleloader deer hunters - is no exaggeration. While I've never had the good fortune to harvest a Pennsylvania black bear with a muzzleloader, I've taken more than a dozen Canadian black bears with flintlocks, percussion rifles, inline rifles - even a blackpowder .45-70 Winchester. Those experiences have made me WILL YOUR DEER SETUP DELIVER? OCTOBER 2019 57