Question - Trash management

[ckent323]

Bill D,

Did you have food or eat in your tent? Bears have a highly developed sense of smell.

Relative to Bears, the sight and/or smell of food trumps urine and pretty much any other deterrent. I strongly recommend not to eat or take food in your tent or (horror) in your sleeping bag in Bear country.

Nothing like an oversize burrito for a nice wilderness dinner. ;-)

Here is some advice I was given by Park Service Bear experts (Biologists):

avoid direct eye contact.
Walk nearly parallel but slightly angling away from the animal and do so in a non-threatening "I'm just looking around here I am no threat" manner.

If attacked by a Black Bear fight for your life and do not play dead - else be eaten.

However, for a Grizzly Bear do not fight or run - cover your vital areas by curling up in a ball and play dead.

As you learned once a Black Bear locks on to something they want, it takes a fight to fend them off .

I have seen a Black Bear walk right into a campground, with many people banging pots and waving arms (instead of rapidly putting food away in a secure bear box), and go right past them to the food on tables etc. This is because the Bear had obviously learned the people will back off and the Bear can get to the food. Once they have the food it is theirs and no amount of rock throwing or pot banging will change that outcome but could cause the bear to attack.

They are very smart and nimble - I cannot stress that enough.

I suppose that is enough on this.

Regards,
Craig

 

[Bill D]

Bill D,

Did you have food or eat in your tent?

No, I didn't have food in my tent. He must have wanted some BBQ'd Billy.
I actually recall asking myself if the bear maybe came sniffing because I had urinated around the tent.

It was in a campground on Vancouver Island (by Port Alberni). I was on the edge of the campground as far away from everyone else as possible. It was about 4am. I got up and started a fire after the bear left.
At 5:30-6 am people started to get up, so I went back to bed. Because it was a campground perhaps this bear had a few easy meals in this campground in the past.

My GF is not careful of bears. I can't seem to get through to her how careful one must be with cooking water, garbage etc.
I wish she'd be careful. Currently she is pretty careless.

I will never forget the sound of that bear sniffing my head. It was 15 years ago and it's 100% burnt in my memory, just like yesterday. I can't even begin to imagine how someone must feel if they had to fight a bear.

We see them all the time in Jasper. Grizzlies too. I really like them, I just don't want them at my door at night.

We are going hiking in Jasper in 1 week and this will be the time of year when they wake up hungry and have babies.
We will be going just before the long weekend, so not too many people will be around. I'll try to be extra careful.


BTW, to remain on topic. We usually camp in campgrounds and I always put the garbage in the bear proof garbage cans in the campground each night before we go to bed. We don't cook inside the FWC, we just boil water.

 

[ETAV8R]

Wow these bear stories are scary. One reason I try not to camp in terrorist bear areas. I always have my 5gal bucket with a bag in it for trash and dump it at every occasion. I'll have to try the urine tactic though. In the camper there is an orange nalgene which is used for nighttime relief. Sadly my bladder is pretty big so I bet depending on camp size it would only take one or two fill ups to encircle the camp.
Lots of good info here.

p.s.
The one bear story I have is from the Lake Sabrina campground. First night had no issues and I stowed almost all my food in the bear box. Kinda hard to put the fridge from the truck into the bear box. Morning after the 2nd night there was one sandy print on the bear box and two on the passenger side of my cab. Oh man. If those were Yosemite trained jihadi bears my truck would have been opened like a tin can.

 

[Smokecreek1]

Yep, heard that about fighting a black bear and playing dead with a griz too-until he licks you, then you need to fight or become meal! Still believe in the pee camp protection method and still alive after all these years !

Smoke

 

[N'kwala]

One of the things I've long wondered about was whether bears have a different concept of food than we do. I suspect they do. I've always been careful about keeping food out of tents, etc., but one day I realised that my boots were waterproofed with a mixture of goose grease and beeswax...sounds yummy, dunnit? So I added my boots to the suspended bear bag. But no doubt my socks were scented with this stuff Ditto talcum, which I've used against blisters when hiking. Not to mention, just me. I'd guess after a few days in the bush I'm quite fragrant. And I gather bears like well rotted dinners...

I've camped a fair amount in bear country, and been lucky enough to only once have an episode. I'd set up camp late and really tired in my VW van and neglected to empty the grey water bucket. (Dumb!) And sure enough about 1 am, there was a stomping and snuffling and something scraped the bucket. (Dumber, I'd brushed my teeth, so there was no doubt a nice sweet minty scent in the bucket.) It was in the Interior of British Columbia just after the Province had privatised its provincial campground management and the garbage bin (nominally bearproof) hadn't been emptied recently. Snarl. It was quite niffy. Two lessons: 1. Never leave a grey water bucket out at night (duh). 2. If in a campground, don't camp near the garbage bins even if they're bearproof--they're almost certainly an attractant.

Oh yeah. I yelled, "F--- off," and pounded on the camper wall, and the bear did, but I didn't sleep well for the rest of the night. And yes, it was a bear--the tracks were there the next morning.

 

[ckent323]

N'kwala, et al,

Bears are omnivorous and are opportunistic feeders. They will sample anything that smells like it is edible. Black Bears love honey as well as grease from food. My guess is that beeswax could be an attractant.

Here is a useful article on Bears and food from REI (it is familiar information and I think they got this info from the Park Service).

https://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/food-handling-storage.html

One caveat, counterbalancing has been shown time and time again to be a poor method to keep food from Bears. There are plenty of documented cases where the bears get the food when this method is used. Even bear poles and bear wires have been defeated and bears have gotten food. While these three techniques would be unusual for a person in a camper to use the fact that Bears have defeated them underscores how cleaver and nimble Bears can be.



Regards,

Craig

 

[Happyjax]

I have seen some footage of electric fences for bears. While it may seem extreme, if I was going to be in bear country I would think about using one as an extra layer of protection, on top of the measures spoken here.

 

[Bill D]

I normally camp in campgrounds. My method of protection is to camp next to someone dumb.

 

[highz]

Our local Fish and Wildlife guy recommends putting out a pan of ammonia. He says it irritates their sensitive noses. That would be in conjunction with keeping a clean camp.

 

[Bill D]

putting out a pan of ammonia. He says it irritates their sensitive noses.

So not only does Windex repel the girls, it repels the bears too

On a serious note, this is good to know. Instead of using a scented Lysol wipe that might be attractive to a bear, using Windex as a cleaner is probably a good choice.
Perhaps somebody else can chime in as to what they use as a sanitizing cleanser.

 

[N'kwala]

Craig, thanks for the good article. I gather bears are figuring out how to open "bear-proof" garbage bins and I've seen video footage of at least 2 instances of them opening doors to pickups. In one instance it was particularly unfortunate because Bruin couldn't figure out how to open the door from inside and got locked in. So of course he had to smash his way out. Probably on reflection better than finding a bleeped off bear locked inside your truck...but not a great thing to happen.

All this notwithstanding I quite like bears but really get impatient with people who set them up for trouble.

 

[ski3pin]

Edited the title from "Question of the Week" since that passed awhile ago................................................

 

[Yukon]

I made my own bracket from 1/8 steel. Bent it into a round shape. Welded flat bar to each end. The basket is just below the sink making it easy to toss egg shells, etc. It does not get in the way. You can clip any kind of bag (paper/plastic) to the metal rim using those office type paper clips. Works great. I try to dispose of trash frequently so large bags not needed.
Chris

 

[Bill D]

I like your idea Yukon. Is it collapsible? It looks like it is.

I've only had the Hawk for over a year. So far we've been using small kitchen bags etc. and hanging them from one of the climbing steps on the outside of the camper and disposing of the garbage each night before we go to bed.

If we produce any garbage inside the camper we typically throw our garbage in the sink and then dispose of it in the morning. Not elegant, but it's what we've done for the past year.

Perhaps this thread will inspire me to come up with something, but I really hate garbage hanging around.
At home I don't have a garbage in the bathroom, bedrooms for the same reason.

 

[Yukon]

Hi,
Our metal ring in that picture is not collapsible. It is not really quite as large as it may appear. We don't bump into it.

Chris

 

[jackattack]

BTW: When backpacking I carry one of the light weight Bear canisters my company makes (I am refraining from plugging my product here but the backpackers among you will know it as the light weight carbon fiber and Aluminum Bear canister). I also carry one when car/tent camping in Bear country where I will not have access to a Forest or Park service Bear box in a campground. Black Bears, in particular, are very intelligent and more nimble than a cat. Once they get rewarded by obtaining food they can become relentless and very destructive in their efforts, As a part of the development of the Bear canisters I interviewed a number of Bear experts in the Forest and Park service as well as tested our products with Grizzly and Black Bears - I learned a great deal about these animals and I have a healthy respect for them.

If it's the Bearikade, I've used them before. It's great product and a great rental program! Highly recommended to anyone who is planning on spending time in bear country.

http://www.wild-ideas.net/rent-a-bearikade/


Sent from my iPad using Wander The West

 

[ckent323]

jackattack,



Thanks,

Craig