Bear in camp

[jmez]

Bear. We stayed!

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[Where's Bruce?]

I lock my big cooler in the cab, crush up a chlorine tab in a heavy ziplock and sprinkle it around my campsite (whether truck camping or backpacking). Keeps everything from rodents to bears away, one whiff and they are bummin' hard. For camps that will be up for a season we use a combination of chrlorine dust and pebbles that last longer, even in rainy seasons. Learned this from an old guy in Utah who parked his truck at a trailhead (Wasatch) and used chlorine. When he returned three cars are destroyed by bears but his truck wasn't touched. They can't smell your food if their nose is on fire.

In the backcountry the groceries always hang high.

 

[Anello]

This is one of the most interesting and entertaining threads I have read in a while. Thanks to all for the stories. Some are f-ing insane!

I've had several issues with black bears when Elk hunting in Colorado. Had a mom and 2 cubs come in on me when I was quartering a bull. As a p-ssy Californian, I yelled and made a scene, and thought that they left. They didn't. Just walked back about 50 yards and laid down. Then a second bear came in and they had a fight that scared the holy living hell out of me. The sounds were unlike anything I've ever heard. Did a sprint back to camp with some girl screams and I managed to lob out a myriad of unintelligible threats (I'm sure the bears were unimpressed). My CO buddies had a good laugh at me. I'll likely never live it down. No sidearm and no bear spray as I was a bowhunting "purist" at that point in my life (I carry a 10 MM now).

I've caught more big sharks than I can count, had my hand bit near in half, and I can swim with sharks no problem with zero fear, but for some reason Bears in tall underbrush or at night scare the bejesus out of me.

So, my hat is off to you guys and gals who are calm in the presence of those bastards. And thanks for sharing.

 

[Where's Bruce?]

That's funny! I was scared outta the water by a very large tiger shark while spearfishing the Revillas in Mexico. That ages me...they closed those islands decades ago. I was there jumping in ahead of porpoise looking for blue water tuna pushing this big Riffe gun around when a voice ordered me to "TURN AROUND NOW!" Ten feet off my swimfins was this striped submarine, mouth open, all teeth headed right at me. In a spasm i pointed my gun at it and it turned away and sunk out of sight. The next 15 minutes were pure horror as i attempted to wave in the boat to pick me up while spinning in the water looking for its gaping jaws to rise under me. Pretty sure it was the brown stain in the water that saved me. Tried repeatedly to get back into the water but the experience was never the same, always heard cello music after that. Eventually took up fishing and then bow hunting. I still thank God for alerting me that day but took it as an omen. I spent decades spearfishing prior to this...at least when bow hunting you might have a bit of warning...sharks appear outta nowhere with a scent or a sound. In the woods I always have a sidearm & bear spray.

 

[Salmonchaser]

To answer your question, my GSPs generally can smell bears that are over 1/2 mile and over a ridge from our lodge. When they are inside lying by the fire. Grizzlies on Salmon stink. Yes a black bear can smell your dinner1/2 mile away.
20 years guiding on the peninsula I don’t bother with warning shots. Like sourdough says you live among them you’ll have an awfull lot of contacts.
always fun to be under the truck changing oil and have one walk up and start checking out the truck.

 

[AK Troutbum]

I’ve had black bears in camp on multiple occasions but never had any issues with them and they always scared off very easily. Had two brown bears in camp on Kodiak, three nights in a row, and we finally killed them both on the third night. That whole ordeal was most definitely the scariest experience of my life.

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[Nick Muche]

That would be nuts Greg....

 

[Salmonchaser]

From a guiding perspective the most dangerous thing about a bear in camp is having inexperienced people in tents with guns. This guy was pushing his nose into the tent, .375 took out the back of his head. There were no other tents to worry about.

 

[Salmonchaser]

To answer your question, my GSPs generally can smell bears that are over 1/2 mile and over a ridge from our lodge. When they are inside lying by the fire. Grizzlies on Salmon stink. Yes a black bear can smell your dinner1/2 mile away.
20 years guiding on the peninsula I don’t bother with warning shots. Like sourdough says you live among them you’ll have an awfull lot of contacts.
always fun to be under the truck changing oil and have one walk up and start checking out the truck.

Sister in law taking pictures of a bear in the drive way, didn’t know I was changing the oil in the suburban.

 

[Deplorable77]

I'm thinking you didn't have to track that one very far

From a guiding perspective the most dangerous thing about a bear in camp is having inexperienced people in tents with guns. This guy was pushing his nose into the tent, .375 took out the back of his head. There were no other tents to worry about.

 

[Salmonchaser]

I'm thinking you didn't have to track that one very far

Nope, had to climb over him opening the tent door.

 

[Islandchanel]

Restless at night for sure

 

[Nick Muche]

From a guiding perspective the most dangerous thing about a bear in camp is having inexperienced people in tents with guns. This guy was pushing his nose into the tent, .375 took out the back of his head. There were no other tents to worry about.

This is very true, whether guiding or not. When I take new folks into camp that are not used to having bears around, I am VERY specific with them when it comes to this. It can get very dangerous, very quick. Good point and thanks for bringing it up.

 

[TheGDog]

Go buy some pool chlorine tabs and spread them around your camp perimeter. When they get a little ineffective, you can take a piece of sandpaper to them. It is a good idea to put them underneath your truck also. I put one at each corner of my truck on the undercarriage. It works great. But the tabs will become ineffective after a couple weeks, but that light sanding perks them right up in effectiveness. For my pack in camp, I take one in a ziplock bag and break it into pieces and spread in around the perimeter of my camp; only reason is because I had 2 camps slightly torn up. Once by a 400+ pound bear (I harvested him) and the other by cubs. Damn curious creatures.

That'd be a damn good repellent for Bears... or just about anything else actually. I have a pool, so you're always having to top-off that little floating dispenser, and when you have to crack open the bucket full of those chlorine tabs, you better be sure you've held your breath!

Hey Bubble, so is that 400Lbs bear you mention the one that the reDONKulously thick Humerus bone came from that I took back home with me? If you'll remember I found that one right nearby the camp. That thing is easily 4+ inches in diameter!

 

[TheGDog]

Mostly just definitely make sure you've taken ALL food out of your pack!

On this one trip out into AngelesNF, more in the beginning of me starting to hunt, I just had packaged foods with me. Some dehydrateds, and then other packaged/wrapped stuff. And... I always store the wrappers immediately into a ZipLoc if I opened something to eat it. I looked at that situation and thought "Well... it shouldn't make a smell. It's all wrapped... should be fine."

Not having a Bear Canister... I'd even taken the packaging of the dehydrateds I had used already... and walked them over a good 70yds and shoved them deep into the leaves/quills of a Joshua bush. (Should go without saying, but of course I gathered them back up when leaving.) Or at least I think that's the name of those bushes.

This is an area where on previous trips we'd had two face-to-face encounters in one day. Then on later trips back in there, while exiting the area after shooting light was done, we jumped a black bear who was bathing. Man! That'll get your heart rate going! The sound of him bursting outta the water, Whoo!

So anyhoo... back to the food thing. So dummy me with my food not stored elsewhere... on the same day, while I was on my sit overlooking the waterway, had a Bobcat stalk in along this cliff I was on to within 25ft...not yards...ft...from me... I had been checking behind me and to the sides every 3 minutes or so... man that made my heart rate shoot up! Because for a split second my brain was like "Ah! Cat = Mountain Lion!" so I was already kinda weirded out by that encounter. (Snarled like a dog at him. Didn't move. Turned .30-30 to point at his face. Didn't move. Had to begin lumbering back up onto my feet to show him my size before he decided he needed to flee).

So there I am... asleep in the tent... then in the middle of the night (3am it turns out) I got woken from sleep by "The Funk"! A smell that wafted over and overtook the tent! I've never actually gotten close enough yet to *smell* a bear, but I feel pretty certain that's likely what it was.

The creepy thing was I grab my pistol and light, unzip door and pop my head out... do a quick 360.. then several more slower 360 pans.. and NOTHING! NOTHING! Not even sounds. Like you pause and remain still for a good solid while, but nothing.

Man... I didn't sleep for beans that night! Everytime I was starting to drift back into sleep, my mind was like "WTF are you doing!? Boy you better wake your butt up! There's a Bear Out There!" and I'd snap back out of the sleep state. And then..ya know.. ya got the Owls sounding off... and it's LA, so then ya got Jet Planes occasionally passing high over head. So the rest of the night just repeated that cycle of dozing off... realizing you dozed off.. and snapping back out of it.

Ugh... the hikeout the next day was just horrible. Was super hot, no sleep. The certain dehydrated meals had ingredient contents that didn't sit well with me, so "backstage" wasn't happy. And the path outta there is mostly not shaded at all, so if it's still within daylight, it can be pretty brutal. But ya know... once you've mentally flicked that switch of "I'm over this" then you don't care... it just becomes a sort of heads-down "get to the car" and don't stop mode.

So anyhoo... DEFINITELY do the keeping the food seperate thing. Apparently even with still sealed products, they're still gonna smell it.

 

[Nick Muche]

I keep all my food and usually all my meat in the tent with me. At least I know it won't be stolen by a bear.

 

[TheGDog]

always heard cello music after that.

ZOMG dude... I just laughed my a$$ off reading that line right there!

I got two stories like that.

So the summer that Jaws came out in the Theaters.... let's see.. I think that was 77 so I'd be 8yo. My GrandMa had a small place down in Ensenada in the property owned my Hussong's nextdoor to Quintas Papagayo.

Every morning, part of my GrandMa's ritual was the make up and taking out the curlers routine. And that's usually be before or around 7a everyday. So you're eating breakfast or whatever and looking out over the bay in this cove. And there is this natural Volcanic-Rock Jetty that's maybe less then 100yds from the house.

The Jetty has this last rock... that you could only see in low tide. Which it tended to be that time in the morning. So I'm sittin' there lookin' out... when... I sh*t you not.. a freakin' Orca... bursts out of the water, doing a Free-Willy style jump... over that last rock!

Dude... it was WEEKS before I could finally muster up the courage to get back out into the water right there in front of the house and surf and boogie-board and what not. This was just after having seen that movie for the first time too!


The second situation:

Every once in awhile the fam would make a trip over to San Felipe. On this particular trip... a strong Chubasco wind was churning up the Sea of Cortez. Bunch cactus pieces...and sharks pieces... were washing up onto the shore! You walk along the shore...now mind you, these weren't big sized shark pieces, but still. You're seeing head of shark...tail of shark... side hide of shark. Obviously stuff dumped over from a fishing/netting boat somewhere off shore. But you know, you're a kid, but you can still do that math. If there are shark heads here washing up on the beach, that means they came from there in the water!

So at some point, I think the next day, the Chubasco calms down a lil bit. There's a catamaran or two anchored just off the shore a bit. My oldest brother wants to go swim over and check it out. (Yeah, you can see where this is going). So he goes to ask my Mom if he can go swim out (with his surfboard) to go checkout the boats. My Mom... in her <sarcasm>great wisdom</sarcasm> tells him, ok, but take one of your brothers with you. The other one didn't want to. I was the youngest, so it defaulted to me.

So he puts me on top of the surfboard, and he's swimming beside it pulling/pushing it along. Meanwhile... I'm over here with Jaws Fear all up in my mind... and I'm looking down into the water intensely... and I'd swear I'm seeing swirling shapes down there!

We make it to the boat alright. Don't remember much about that, was concentrating on looking down into the water at all times! And... we made it back to shore fine.

Fast Forward multiple decades later... I'm sitting there talking with the older bro, I mention that event, mention thinking I was seeing swirling dark shapes down below in the water, and he goes..

"Oh yeah... there were Hammerheads down there... swirling below us... that's why I got up on the board with you for the trip back in."

 

[Where's Bruce?]

Go buy some pool chlorine tabs and spread them around your camp perimeter. When they get a little ineffective, you can take a piece of sandpaper to them. It is a good idea to put them underneath your truck also. I put one at each corner of my truck on the undercarriage. It works great. But the tabs will become ineffective after a couple weeks, but that light sanding perks them right up in effectiveness. For my pack in camp, I take one in a ziplock bag and break it into pieces and spread in around the perimeter of my camp; only reason is because I had 2 camps slightly torn up. Once by a 400+ pound bear (I harvested him) and the other by cubs. Damn curious creatures.

Gee...I wonder who taught you that trick.

 

[Bubblehide]

Gee...I wonder who taught you that trick.
View attachment 234392

Gee, I wonder if I somehow managed to teach you anything. But thanks for that one.

 

[Where's Bruce?]

Gee, I wonder if I somehow managed to teach you anything. But thanks for that one.

Humility.