Do you know?
I didn’t. So many animals have great names for their groupings. Like there’s a murder of crows, an army of caterpillars and a gang of buffalo.
A group of bears is called a sleuth. A perfect name for how good they are at finding things. Sounds like they might be ambling around, investigating and sniffing things out!
This is one of the reasons that approved bear resistant containers are required in so many areas. Bears can smell things up to 8 miles away (even if in an ‘odor proof’ bag.) There is nothing odor proof when it comes to bears.
Mamas and babies are starting to come out of their dens in the upper mountains. If you see them on your excursions, give them lots of space. I’ve gotten to see lots of mamas with her babies on my outings, but luckily they were always on the same side of me. If you find yourself caught in between a mama and her cubs, slowly back away, so she has space to run to her babies, without you getting in the middle.
What do you call a group of entrepreneurs?
Crazy!
So few people know the amount of effort that goes into having a bear resistant container created. It’s why there are so few. It costs thousands and thousands of dollars due to all the testing required.
As one bear biologist told me, “if you’d ever had to shoot a bear in the head because he was becoming a ‘nuisance’ bear, you’d understand why we require there to be so much testing before allowing them in the wild.”
This testing is essential to having bear resistant canisters out there that we know bears can’t get into. Once a bear has had a snippet of human food, they will start seeking out easy sources. They are intelligent and will quickly connect easy food to humans. It makes it more dangerous for all of us. I’ve seen some bear bags come on the market that aren’t IGBC and WMI (Black bear test) approved. And worse some say they are when they are not. Make sure you check the IGBC website: https://igbconline.org/programs/bear-resistant-products/
There are so many new people to the outdoor world, that some newcomers may not know the importance of having a tested product. They often just look for inexpensive and readily available. I think it’s all our responsibility to share information and keep people informed.
The outdoors isn’t just our playground, it’s home to thousands of species of wildlife and we need to do what we can to protect them.
Just the thought of having to shoot a bear for no other reason than he’d become accustomed to human food and didn’t see why that was a problem, brought me to tears.
Hopefully you’ll never have to deal with a bear in your camp. After 40 plus years of backpacking, I never have. But even before bear canisters became a thing, my dad taught me how to keep food so we weren’t feeding the wildlife. There were fewer people outdoors then, so bears and wildlife tended to keep their distance anyway. But he never let us be lax in making sure we weren’t causing any unnecessary problems. I’m forever grateful for his wisdom and conscientiousness.
I’m sure you’re all as excited to get back out on the trails as we are.
What’s your favorite thing to do to make sure you’re not inviting wildlife into your camp?
Have fun, be safe and Be Kind, leave nothing behind (™).
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