Bear hunting kicks off Monday, and the general season runs through Nov. 24, a three-month time frame that state officials have broken into a three-tiered structure, based on the chosen hunting tactic.

n From Aug. 27 through Nov. 24, fair-chase enthusiasts can take a stand over natural forage or game trails, still-hunt, stalk and call.

n From Aug. 27 through Sept. 22, hunters can take a stand over man-placed bait.

n From Sept. 10 through Oct. 26, folks can use dogs to chase bear, which often climb a tree to escape the canine pack. Hunters with hounds can also put out piles of bait to draw a bear and then pick up the scent later, but with or without dogs, no one can sit over man-placed bait after Sept. 22.

Sitting over man-placed bait in the season's first four weeks proves extremely successful. How successful? Hunters kill 80 percent of the Maine bear harvest with this effective technique, depending on the year.

In falls with bountiful wild forage, bears are less apt to visit baits. Because of that, the percent of the bait kill varies each autumn, but not much. Bears just can't resist a big food pile for many days in a row.

Through the first three-quarters of the 20th century, the majority of the bear harvest fell during deer-hunting season. Hunters still hunting or taking a stand over a game trail or natural bait would be targeting deer, and a bruin would come along -- a bonus for the game pole.

In the 1970s, Maine's bear-baiting industry took off and changed that statistic, practically overnight. In the process, the sport became an integral part of northern and eastern Maine's seasonal economy.

When sitting over man-placed bait first started as a major technique here, I remember a dreary July evening in 1974. I was walking on the north shore of the West Branch of the Penobscot River, heading downstream from the Big Eddy to fish around the mouth of the brook from Fowler Pond.

To reach my fishing spot, I had to pass an open dump that belonged to the Pray family, proprietors of the Big Eddy Campground and a sporting camps, store and lunch counter by Ripogenus Dam.

Much to my surprise, two men were sitting in a dump truck of all things, and one of them was holding a rifle between his legs, pointed upwards. I instinctively knew that they were after bear.

At dark, I was casting to a salmon when one of the men shot a bear. The rifle's bang sounded so loud under the dense clouds that it jumped me straight into the air like a rocket. I assume the hunter left his cushioned seat to step from the truck because it's illegal to shoot from a motorized vehicle.

In the 1980s, I hunted bears hard. I am too busy these days to drive the long distances or particularly to bait. Baiting requires putting out lots of food every day, and my tactics involved lobster heads for stink bait, oil of anise for additional attractant, big piles of fresh-frozen meat scrapes, fat and bones -- a big investment in time and money to compete with wild forage.

No one needs to bait or use hounds to shoot a bear, though. After all, in most of the United States, hunters are prohibited from baiting or using hounds and still tip over plenty of bruins.

And surely, throughout this state's history, a handful of skilled Maine hunters have targeted bear in the spring (before it became illegal), late summer and early fall, and they do well hunting without bait or dogs.

Granted, our dense woods make bear hunting tougher without bait or dogs, but some folks kill a bear most years while still-hunting or sitting over natural bait. A husband-and-wife team I once knew each shot a bear most late Augusts, sitting or still-hunting around raspberry patches

I've had experience with fair-chase tactics, and in September 1986, one was memorable:

During a swirling, near gale, I was sneaking beside a huge raspberry burn, looking toward the far corner above when a bear -- hidden in the canes 20 yards away -- stood up. The bear was so close that it seemed like self-defense to shoot, an exaggeration, but you had to be in my boots to understand the shock of sneaking so close to a bruin.

What do you do with a bear once it's down, an animal that most folks find a little disgusting to the palate?

Bear meat has heavy, marbled fat - quite delicious in a stew or as a roast. I have also taken half of a bear to a smokehouse and had the meat made into smoked hams and chops, a spicy, kielbasa sausage and scrapple. The bear kielbasa proved a gourmet treat.

The trick to finding a place to hunt bear successfully begins with pleasant strolls through the late August or September woods, looking for raspberry patches, wild-cherry trees, mountain ash, beechnuts, abandoned apple orchards and so forth. This is the most delightful month of the year for being in the Maine woods, too, so it's a joy to be out.

If bear feed on a particular forage, even casual observers cannot miss the signs. Large areas of raspberry cane will be flattened, and if food hangs on trees, limbs will be broken everywhere, nature's way of pruning.

If bear are hitting domestic crops like corn or oats, large patches will be knocked down, easy to spot from great distances.

In fall, bears binge so much on one food that the droppings often indicate the chosen forage. It may look like raspberry jam, apple sauce or pecan pie (beechnuts), a key to tell the hunter where to expend efforts.

Success comes to folks who poke or sit around forage areas, particularly in late afternoon, evening and particularly close to dark.

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Talk about global warming: This past week, ocean water temperatures in Rhode Island have been so high that boaters are taking mahi-mahi off South County's beaches. Mahi-mahi are often called dolphins off the Florida coast, but this isn't the mammal a la Flipper, but rather, a fast swimming, exciting game fish.

Ken Allen, of Belgrade Lakes, is a writer, editor and photographer. E-mail: kallyn800@aol.com