[pct-l] bear poles vs bear cans, bear vs bear

[Suzanne Courteau]

Hola hikers!

Compared to the Great Smokies National Park experience, lugging a bear
can is nothing. (You know, the "designated sites only" camping and the
chain-link-fence-enclosed shelters. Mmm, fun. Wouldn't you love to see
that in Yosemite?)

Funnily enough, I stayed at a shelter in Pennsylvania that had a bear
pole...and the local raccoon had learned to climb the pole and get
itself some hiker chow. The night I was there we all rigged
contraptions over the top of our food bags to keep the raccoon out,
but some guy rolled up late and, even though we'd warned him, just
tossed his food bag up there. Sure enough, after dark we heard the
raccoon going up the pole and the guy jumping up and chasing it off,
over and over until the raccoon succeeded. And did it eat his oatmeal
and ramen? No, it ate his pop-tarts.

About Sierra bears vs PNW bears? A cursory googling revealed this, as
well as so many other goodies:

http://www.nps.gov/archive/yose/nature/wlf_bears.htm

Landscape Analysis of Black Bear Distribution Patterns in Olympic National Park
[keywords Black bears, GPS radio telemetry, salmon restoration]
http://tinyurl.com/346owv
Principal Investigator (s):
Gerry Wright
gwright at uidaho.edu
Dept. of Wildlife and Fisheries Resources
University of Idaho
Moscow, ID 83844-11
I'm sure you could write to Gerry and get the scoop

Black Bear Food Habits at Yosemite National Park
[keywords black bears, diet, foods, human foods]
http://tinyurl.com/3bhrtd
Principal Investigator (s):
Gerry Wright again!
The final report is available as a pdf download from the url listed


> I don't remember that bears were a big issue on our 2002 CDT trip. The NPS
> assigned campsites and insisted that we hang our food from the poles in the
> sites. If we carried a bear canister, we still had to hang our food from the
> poles. Same rules in Glacier. The poles were tall metal poles placed away
> from other tall objects. Each pole had several arms with a chains attached
> for raising food sacks.
>
> I am no sure why the California bears are so much smarter about getting
> food. And I wonder if the bear poles used in the other parks would work in
> California. That would eliminate the bothersome carrying of bear canisters
>
> Ken