How do I find the first bear I killed?

[Ubermensch]

I'm placed at Desolation Point, I managed to shoot down a bear and it bleeded out, I do know it died because of mi jornal told me so. The thing is I've been looking for it a couple days ago and still find nothing, I've looked for it in it's cave, all around where I shoot it and it's just like if it dissapeared. 

Will it's body dissapear if I leave Desolation Point? 

Please give me ideas of how and where to find it, thanks a lot.

[cekivi]

Unfortunately, the animal starts to decay once it dies. If it's been a few days already there may no longer be a carcass to find...

When the animal is shot, it will start bleeding out. The only sure fire way to track it is to follow the blood drops from where you shot it. Since the animal panics after it is shot the path it follows is random so it is hard to predict where it will go.

[Scyzara]

@cekivi is right, bear carcasses despawn after a few days, even if you don't harvest them. I think it happens after about four days, but take this info with a grain of salt. It might also be three or five days, I've never paid much attention to the despawn times to be honest.

The only advice I can add (besides following the bloodtrail right away as cekivi has already suggested) is thus to seek bear carcasses immediately the next day after they died. Bleeding out takes between one and 8 hours depending on where you've hit the bear. (One hour for an arrow to the head, four hours if you've hit the belly or back and eight hours for a shot to the foot.) Depending on the time of day it's thus also possible you can already start seeking the carcass on the same day.

Another useful tip is that bear carcasses (as well as deer and wolf carcasses, btw.) can often be found in close proximity to the animal's usual territory. A bear living in the lower falls cave in PV will e.g. most likely be found somewhere in the area between farmstead, pensive pond, radio tower and heartbreak bridge. It doesn't happen very often (any more) that they really die at the other end of the map.