[pct-l] canisters in the Southern Sierra

[mark at verber.com (Mark Verber)]

> I think it is stuped to requie them they should have a test
> and see iof you know what the hell your doing

Time has demonstrated that the general public can't be trusted to handle
their food and deal with the bears in an appropriate way. So the rangers
can't "trust you".  Would you be willing to pay for your "certified hanger"
permit, because it would cost money to admin the prograM which can
distinguish between people who have the appropriate skills, and those who
don't.  Of course, even those will skills can be lazy.  I have the requires
skills, but I can remember one night many years ago after hiking all day in
the rain not having the energy to hang my food.  Nothing happened that night
which I consider luck.

As much as I hate carrying the extra weight, when I am in sierra bear
country I carry a cannister.

> I can hang my food and one bear one  get it. I have been
> around bears and in bear country all my life with no
> problims.

My experience has been the Yellowstone bears are reasonably skilled at going
after hanging food (in the Rockies I think the Yellowstone bears are the
worst)... but I have never lost food in the Rockies (and nearby mountains).
The Sierra bears are simply amazing... and brazen.  I have watched someone
lose food which was hung appropriately.  The bag was over a branch that was
almost 25ft high.  A cub was sent up, crawled out on the branch, and nawed
all night and into the next day before the branch finally snapped.  Throwing
rocks, yelling, etc didn't frighten them off.

> I have also seen bear caisters get ttested
> and riped apart

I suppose that's why you test canisters before approving them.  To filter
out those which aren't up to the task.  In the sierra's, cannisters which
have made it through the approval process, and then survived for a year in
the field have yet to be "ripped apart" as far as I know.  There was maybe
one exception.  Some idiots cooked in a bearikade repeatedly which slowly
weakened the bond between the base plate and the side.  I don't know if this
seam failed or not, but I assume something must have happened because it's
approval status was pulled.  But even in this case, I doubt the bearicade
was "ripped apart" because it was still approved with a minor retrofit.  The
canisters which are currenly approved have survived in the field for
multiple years with fewer than 2 failures.  e.g. they are not prone to being
ripped apart.  I have heard of no failures of the currently approved
canisters.  I would love to see real documentation (pictures would be cool)
that Garcia Machine or a non cooked in Bearicade has failed.  I just don't
believe these would have failed.

--Mark