What do you know about Bears?

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by wayner

How many of you glossed over this without reading it?

A GOOD LAUGH

It's an old joke, but still funny.

[Dantilla]

Bear repellant:

An uncle had a bear hanging around his wilderness cabin.

Plastic bag filled with ammonia
Place plastic bag inside burlap sack
Smear bacon grease on burlap
Hang from eave of cabin.

The bear has to stand on his hind legs and swat the burlap to knock his treat down, but gets a face full of ammonia.

Never saw the bear again.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by aigel

That's the bear? It has a big scar on its back section. Have to wonder where that is from?

G

After a lifetime of get shot with 22s, rubber bullets, and fireworks, not to mention the pepper spray and martini glasses, a bear is bound to have a few scars.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by IROC

We rent cabins in the Smokies pretty often since they are less than an hour from our house. Bear sightings are common, and bears have gotten somewhat comfortable with people being around, but do not for a minute think they are harmless. I would specially be wary of young ones with a mother around. A black bear will ruin your day.

Also...welcome to East Tennessee!!

I appreciate your welcome. I get it from my wife every time we come down here. She was born and spent her early life in this area. She's says she feels like she's home when we cross Jellico Mountain.

[RonDent]

Everything I know about bears I learned from the Far Side!

[Craig T]

I wasn't going to post, because it might anger Baz, but I had an ugly experience with a black bear. Did a remote fly fishing trip in Alaska. Dropped off by a tundra plane with five days of food and gear. The guide warned us that a rogue black bear had been giving people trouble in the area and told us to bring a pot and pan in the tent with us. If we heard the bear getting into our food we were to bang the pots and pans. Sure enough, there he was breaking into our cooler. The pots and pans just made him growl at us so the guide fired a shotgun onto the air and he scampered off. The stupid guide tells us to bring the food into our already too small tents. He says the bears won't come into the tents with people there. WRONG! One hour later I wake up to the bear tearing open the door to our tent, then another shotgun blast. I hadn't been there 8 hours and there's a dead bear in the camp. I felt bad for the bear, but not as bad as I would have felt eating nothing but berries, grubs, and salmon for five dates until the plane came back.

[flipper35]

^ Sounds like a not as smart as they should be guide here.

[scottmandue]

I'm a city boy and even I know to never bring food inside the tent (well, okay I was a Boy Scout).

As Motion points out if you go out in the wilderness there are a lot of critters that can/will eat you, bears, mountain lions, wolfs.
And lets not forget poisonous snakes/spiders/scorpions that can mess up your day.

If you are afraid of the wilderness... don't go there.

I hike the central coast... mountain lions and rattle snakes are common... one time I came across a pile of mountain lion scat... kept walking saying "mountain lions are nocturnal... mountain lions are nocturnal..."

[not sharp]

Carry a small fog horn, for a boat, that size or smaller. a shrill whistle will work , as well.

[flipper35]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

I'm a city boy and even I know to never bring food inside the tent (well, okay I was a Boy Scout).

As Motion points out if you go out in the wilderness there are a lot of critters that can/will eat you, bears, mountain lions, wolfs.
And lets not forget poisonous snakes/spiders/scorpions that can mess up your day.

If you are afraid of the wilderness... don't go there.

I hike the central coast... mountain lions and rattle snakes are common... one time I came across a pile of mountain lion scat... kept walking saying "mountain lions are nocturnal... mountain lions are nocturnal..."

They may be but the one we saw back in the 80s out bow hunting was in the middle of the morning. Two weeks later we saw her and her kit during gun deer season in broad daylight. Of course the Wisconsin DNR had to tell us that the ten in our group did not see one because they do not live in Wisconsin. Later they saw them on game cameras when the cameras started to become affordable. We have black bear as well as wolves and coyote but the 'yotes stay away from humans pretty well, even when you step on one they run away.

[Aerkuld]

You know they can read, right?

"Coleman", "Playmate", and "Igloo"


I've had some experience with bears on backpacking trips in the Sierras. Never lost any food as we were sure to hang it up in the trees.
The trick is to find a branch that's high enough, and far enough out from the tree that the bear can't reach it. You also have to make sure it's a thin enough branch that the bear can't climb along it, but not so weak that it can bend it from the trunk. You then need to get a length of rope up, and over the branch.
All the food goes in the stuff sack to your sleeping bag which you tie on one end of the rope. Before settling in for the night you hoist the food up the tree and tie off the other end of the rope somewhere off the ground, and away from the tree with the food.
If you tie your cooking pan and mug around the bottom of the tree it serves as an 'early warning' system. Every bear we've ever encountered would run away if you make a lot of noise, make yourself look as big as possible, and throw sticks if needed.

On one particular trip we were warned by a Ranger about a particular bear in one area which would find a camp, then wait until people had sat down to eat. It would than wander in to the camp, and rear up on it's hind legs. That made most people drop their food and run. The bear then polished off the nice cooked food. Apparently, if you stood your ground, made a noise, waved a big stick around, then the bear would high tail it out. If I recall, the Park Service were trying to catch it to relocate it to less frequented areas.

[tcar]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

... one time I came across a pile of mountain lion scat... kept walking saying "mountain lions are nocturnal... mountain lions are nocturnal..."

We have a bridge here (Scott Lancaster Bridge) near Idaho Springs.

Named after a jogger that was killed by a Mountian Lion... during the day.

[Dantilla]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

... kept walking saying "mountain lions are nocturnal... mountain lions are nocturnal..."

I've hiked a few times where kitty-kat left tracks inside the tracks I made earlier in the day!
Only time I actually saw a mountain lion, a momma and her tiny cub, was very early in the morning, but still bright daylight. I was still driving the Jeep up the Forest Service roads to the trailhead.

[JavaBrewer]

Originally Posted by Dantilla

I've hiked a few times where kitty-kat left tracks inside the tracks I made earlier in the day!
Only time I actually saw a mountain lion, a momma and her tiny cub, was very early in the morning, but still bright daylight. I was still driving the Jeep up the Forest Service roads to the trailhead.

Same for me. Late afternoon hike in the hills above San Marcos. Mtn Lions are spotted there every month or so. I was alone on a trail and once around a bend in a more isolated part of the mountain I got a strong sense I was not alone. Decided to turn back and about 200 yards later picked up a couple rocks and threw them into the brush and yelled to get away. A bit further back down the trail I gathered a couple more and noticed the tracks alongside my prints. Dropped the smaller rocks in favor of a couple big ones and walked past go no stopping to trail head. I was seriously spooked. Happy to drop those rocks and get inside - we lived 100 yards from the trail head.

Bears are sneaky fast for their size. We were driving in Banff Alberta and stopped at the roadside where others were pulled over. There was a medium sized black bear down the embankment ~ 30 yards walking and taking glances at us humans on the guardrail looking down. The bear suddenly made a move up toward us and in like 3 steps was 5 feel from the guard rail. I still remember this guy jumped back and cleanly tearing the extended side mirror off a car towing a trailer. The bear stood there for a moment, I guess laughing under his breath, then wandered back down toward the forest and disappeared. That was 40+ years ago, left quite an impression on me.

[Cajundaddy]

This was a little discovery one morning on a trail in Yellowstone a few years ago. It was early November, it had only stopped snowing an hour earlier so we knew this bear was pretty close and probably hungry. Judging by the quarter placed alongside the tracks I guessed a 300 lb griz. We decided we had enough of that trail and moved back to our car with bear spray in hand, regularly checking our six.

[KFC911]

Yabba dabba doo doo ...

[sammyg2]

[Evans, Marv]

As a follow up on JavaBrewer's post, a mountain lion killed a lady hiker on the back side of Mt. Cuyamaca (San Diego County) in 1996. They thought it was probably in a starving state. There is a bench with a memorial plaque on it near the location she was killed on the fire road going up to the top. I found out a couple of sounds that seem to scare bears. This was years ago and sort of by chance from making the sounds as kind of a reflex when a bear was near. I tried to make a rattling sound to imitate a rattle snake using my tongue. They ran every time I did that. The other sound I used (only once) was a "harrumph" sound sort of like an irritated bear. I did that as kind of reflex thing one night when I was awakened by the crunching of twigs near my sleeping bag. I sat up and made that "harrumph" sound and heard the bear take off running away. I thought that was pretty cool at the time. I wouldn't try to depend on these things to deter a determined bear though.

[Por_sha911]

Originally Posted by KC911

Your math is a bit off imo...
.22 x 2 + mag + luck

I guess you didn't read my second post:

Originally Posted by rusnak

A Black bear is every bit as dangerous as a grizzly. They are eating machines and very intelligent. A .22 pistol would not even slow a grown bear down..

Originally Posted by Por_sha911

I was waiting for someone to throw me the straight line.

You can't outrun a bear. You shoot your friend in the leg and outrun them...