Do you need Bear spray?

I got close to a bear 6 years ago, did not see it but was close enough to hears it "huff" at me. The next year I purchased a $40 can of bear spray. since then I have not seen or herd one. I know their out there I have just not seen one. Does anyone else use it. The reason I am asking is that my can said it was good for 3 years. It has been 5 years now so I dont know if it is good or not. You only get a 7 second spray so I dont want to waste any on a test. I like the holster for extra water bottle or a trail mix bottle. Do I really need one? I dont want to spend another $40-50 on a new one if I dont need it.

I guess it depends where you are hiking. At lake Colden and Marcy dam, some of the shelters have little piles of rocks in them. Hard to figure out why at first, but then when the "visitors" come out at dusk it is easy to see.

It is my understanding that most black bears will run away with noise, and they really just want your goodies so if you drop your pack down they should go after that. I have personally never confronted a bear, other than staring at one from the shelter, and he ran away very quickly after he saw me.

Now if you are going to Alaska, thats a whole other story.

-percious

We were discussing this in another thread. It would seem that the spray is of little use. Chances of an attack are small.
The spray might not reach the bear. The wind might blow it back at you. Guides in Alaska carry BIG HANDGUNS, not spray.
You'd be better off spending the money on a bear canister and watching carefully how you handle your food and trail snacks.
If an experienced bear charged me or my tent/lean-to for my pack, I doubt I'd have the presence of mind to draw, aim and fire the spray, anyway.
I'm looking forward to my first encounter to see how I do.

percious said:

It is my understanding that most black bears will run away with noise, and they really just want your goodies so if you drop your pack down they should go after that.

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Unfortunately, dropping your pack will teach them to become "mugger bears".

They are not stupid--if something works once, it is worth trying again.

Doug

DougPaul said:

Unfortunately, dropping your pack will teach them to become "mugger bears".

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Brutus, the Pemi problem bear from several years ago, became a expert at that. It eventually cost him his life. But it's hard to use that reasoning if confronted with an agressive bear.

-dave-

Chip said:

Guides in Alaska carry BIG HANDGUNS, not spray.

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A friend of mine lived on Kodiak for year volunteering for the Fish and Wildlife service. Before she was allowed to out on to the refuge (even w/ others, I think but it may have referred to overnights) she had to qualify on the shotgun. It was not a simple how to shoot, hip shots, kneel and shoots were all covered.

Anyway, she mentioned, if I recall correctly, the guns were configured as cracker shot, cracker shot, and then slugs. I'll check with her when she's back in town and post to this thread if it's still active but I think that was the configuration.

I try to avoid trouble areas rather than carry pepper spray and I've never really considered it. I found a good loud whistle was enough to scare away an ADK bear.

For about twenty minutes.

Warren said:

configured as cracker shot, cracker shot

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I worked in a gun store for 10 years in sales/repair and have done lots of shooting of many different firearms. Never heard of "cracker shot". Are we talking about buck shot or something else?

David said:

It eventually cost him his life.

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I believe that Brutus was taken during normal hunting season. Not removed because of attitude but, I am not positive of that.

Keith

In Alaska, with a charging grizzly or big brown, that would go "cracker shot, cracker shot, crunch" as the volunteer loses consciousness.
It's just as easy to make noise with slugs by shooting high.
Locals are better at knowing if and when to fire, but I doubt the first 2 would be blanks, as that may be all the time one has.

I was told that a cracker shot was basically firecracker type projectile charge (not a blank). Non harmful intended to spook. And yeah, I doubt my memory on the first two being that way instead of just the first. I'll check on it. I don't think one would use buck shot, wouldn't buck shot have a high chance of creating a wounded in pain animal problem?

As an aside, folks living on Kodiak it being a remote island had pretty big boredom issues. One hobby taken up was year round surfing, the climate of the island is wet and temperate. One thing that made surfing interesting was that on occasion you would attract the attention for the bears who sometimes swam out and pursued the surfers. Don't know if it's a second hand tall tail or not but I always found the image funny.

Warren said:

I don't think one would use buck shot, wouldn't buck shot have a high chance of creating a wounded in pain animal problem?

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Absolutely. Buck shot would be a definite no for grizzlies. It would probably be effective on Blacks but I still wouldn't use it. Slugs on the other hand at less than 50 yards would be very effective even on grizzlies. There are only a few handguns, very few, that I would consider effective on grizzlies, and most of them require considerable practice with to be effective. Shot placement on a grizzly is critical and even then you have no guarantees that he is going to drop before doing you serious harm. They are a very tough animal.

Keith

SAR-EMT40 said:

Shot placement on a grizzly is critical and even then you have no guarantees that he is going to drop before doing you serious harm. They are a very tough animal.

Keith

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I agree. My cousin’s great uncle lives in Alaska and survived a grizzly attack while he was moose hunting. He unloaded a 45 into the animal and it never slowed it down. The bear finally ran off after the attack and was never located.

pepper/bear spray

I considered carrying some sort of bear deterrent when i hiked the NP Trail, and decided against it. I figured(hoped, actually) that any bear contact would most likey occur at nite in the lean-to, not an attack while hiking. I agree with the poster that said unless you are within close range, the spray is likely useless. And if i am that close to a bear, i can't guarantee i can or will think about reaching for the spray.

As it turns out, we saw no bears. Lots of "evidence", but no bears.

I did bring along a few firecrackers/jumping jacks to deter them should they arrive at my campsite. Didn't need them either.

RVT

Call me dumb.....

About 3 years ago I was camping at the first lean-to at the Flowed Lands. About 5pm the first evening we were there a big black bear emerged just behind the lean-to. He must of smelled out dinner My buddy and I banged pots and pans together and then charged the bear. He turned and ran away. About 45 minutes later he came back and we chased him off again. HE still came back about an hour later so we just gave up.

We hung our food that night and used the "tie the bag between two tree routine" and the damn bear still got our food. We still hiked our scheduled hike the next day and left that night and hit a Mc Donalds on our way home.

Back to your question.....I would not waste my money on bear spray if your hiking in the Adirondacks

Adam

Warren said:

A friend of mine lived on Kodiak for year volunteering for the Fish and Wildlife service. Before she was allowed to out on to the refuge (even w/ others, I think but it may have referred to overnights) she had to qualify on the shotgun. It was not a simple how to shoot, hip shots, kneel and shoots were all covered

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Likewise, a biologist friend of mine who did research in Alaska had to qualify. She still has the paper target with bear's body and bull's eye over the heart on the back of her bathroom door.

In the northeast, I'd prefer to rely on wits than on devices that can backfire.

Yes, depends where you hike

To the best of my knowledge, the only places you find grizzlies is the northern Rockies and AK. In the Rockies and in AK, bear cannister policies have been in place for a long time, and there are few, if any, habituated problem grizzlies. Grizzlies prefer to eat roots and berries, although they are opportunistic. The vast majority of maulings (of which there are VERY few per year) with grizzlies occur when a person or very small group (1-3) either surprises a bear by accidentally sneaking up on it, or inadvertantly comes between/near a mother and her cub. Even then, attacks are very rare, particulary if it is a group of 4 people or more. The Kodiak brown bears are quite different, as they eat mostly salmon, and the protein diet makes them very large, say 1200-1500 lbs, (grizzlies weigh in around 400-500 lbs). Interestingly, the browns are generally much less aggressive than the grizzlies, as they are constantly hanging out together near the river to catch fish, and they socialize better. The grizzlies don't have quite the same manners because they must maintain a much larger territory in order to get enough food. Consequently, they have a reputation for being more aggressive. The long and short of it is, however, that browns/grizzlies probably aren't going to look at you as a food source, and you'll only need bear mace for the very rare surprise encounters.

Almost all "problem" bears are black bears. In Yosemite they have learned to break into cars if they smell food. Unreal. Although black bears are much smaller than browns/grizzlies, they have become habituated to human food sources to a much greater extent, and consequently they are a much bigger problem. If you consider the damage that a large, mean dog can do, an animal that's 3 times that size can certainly inflict plenty of damage if it wants. The problem took many years to develop, and it's going to take many years to fix, probably several generations of bears. The solution is for people to be careful with their food, and not leave a mess. Bears in CA will need to be retrained to seek out their own food, and this is going to take a long, long time. In the Northeast, there isn't a problem yet, and maybe now is a good time for a bit of an educational campaign if bear sightings are becoming more common.

As for firearms, I think there are very few places where you can legally carry one into the back-country (it is illegal in Denali NP and Glacier NP), and the idea of buying titanium utensils in order to shave half an ounce, then packing in 10 or 15 or 20 lbs of shotgun and shells is just weird. Kind of like getting 3 Big-Macs, a large fry and a diet Coke. Personally, I prefer to find a way to hike safely in bear country, minimize my chances of a negative encounter, and accept that I'm not the biggest, strongest thing in the woods. I'm comfortable with that.

ba

Of course not dude..fight back bare handed like the rest of us do...wuss..

Griz

My 'friend with a bear gun' story involved research in Alaska. Yes, he had to qualify, and wouldn't have been allowed in without arms; he said the weapons of choice were a .45 magnum for tenting and a .30-06 otherwise. He brought home an AK-47 that his advisor had bought as a novelty and let me fire all three. While the deer rifle almost put me on my a$$, the AK was almost effeminate by comparison. Although it was accurate and easy to fire (and LOTS of fun), it put neat little holes in the target, while the big gun blew the plywood all to hell. He got rid of it soon after, as it has a little too much baggage in a civilized area.

I thought "Bear Spray" was a new deodorant.

mmmmm...scent of a bruin, brought to you by Calvin Klein.

I usually scare bears away with an impressive martial arts display. If that doesn't work, I challenge them to a dance off. Usually we then become friends and go out for beers and kareoke. Just don't laugh when the bear starts singing Olivia Newton John songs and don't let them drive!

If you feel comfortable with carrying bear spray then do it. I do. I don't have it in a holster, I'm not that paranoid, but if the chance ever came up I'd be glad I had it, especially in the evening when you're trying to eat dinner. Most of all, I carry it to defend myself from crazy people on the trails. I spent 3 summers in Washington State and probably saw 20 bears, especially in the National Parks. I also saw a Mountain Lion which blew my mind. So having the bear spray in my pack gave me some sense of comfort, even though I never had a problem in Washington. Although it's a different story in the northeast. Last summer I had bears in camp past Marcy Dam in the Adirondacks. We had a bear canister and they kicked it around during the middle of the night. I clapped my hands and they left and never came back. So I guess my point is do what makes you feel comfortable. You're no more or less of an outdoorsman/woman whether you have it or not.