Troutnut;
Good afternoon, I hope the day is behaving and this finds you and those you care about well.
Thanks for the photos of the well fed bruins, they're what we sometimes term "a freezer that sprouted legs" sort of bear.
When you've said it was 440lb, was that head, hide and internal organs included?
Bears to me are always a real nettlesome thing to estimate weight on since a "freezer that sprouted legs" that's 5' long will be considerably lighter than say a 7' version of the same thing.
The heaviest we processed here went 225lb hanging carcass weight if memory serves. It's head was 28lb so a pretty fair turnip on it for sure.
It was an old male judging by the teeth, just unbelievably fat - buddy rendered 2 coffee cans of lard from it - but it was 5'1" nose to tail so not a 600lb bear by any stretch.
We don't see bears much longer than 6' here and honestly I don't believe I've seen more than a handful of those.
As always, it's a fun topic and I for one enjoy seeing some of the bruisers from other parts of the continent.
All the best and good hunting.
Dwayne
