bear spray?

[WasatchWill]

Carrying bear spray is a must in areas...accessibility and PRACTICE drawing it are a must..... I have an airhorn, but its only by me in the tent. Hiking I'd go for the spray in my hand not the horn......

I took the airhorn off quite a while ago. I do still make some good noise when hiking through dense vegetation or trees no matter where I hike, but when I'm just here locally in the Wasatch or Uintas, with few exceptions, I've been reluctant to carry any bear spray.

But like I said, after seeing that video I posted earlier in the thread, I'm a bit more convinced that it would probably be wise to start doing so, even around here, especially when solo. While most all bears around here are very skittish and quick to get out of sight whenever humans come through, all it takes is just one lazy camper or worse yet, a stupid person willingly feeding any particular bear to get it habituated. So I think it's time for me to pick some up and start practicing the quick draw. Though I may still be reluctant to take it along on most trips here in Utah when I'm with a group.

For any trips into the Winds, Tetons, Yellowstone, Canada and so many other areas that have a history of dangerous encounters and attacks, I would have no such hesitation to carry spray.

 

[WasatchWill]

Here's some interesting stuff on black bears and bear spray. They actually claim to have found that even weaker and smaller dog sprays have consistently proven to be highly effective against black bears when directed at their eyes.

http://www.bear.org/website/bear-pages/pepper-spray/204-pepper-spray-questions-.html

They also refer to some statistics about just how minimal the chance of encountering a predatory black bear is and even then, they are supposedly less aggressive about it than a defensive minded grizzly would be so you still stand a good chance of being able to fight it off if you can act aggressively back and let it know you're not food. Most blacks that continue to come up to you and pursue you are probably looking for a food "reward" in that it's probably gotten close enough to a human before where that human dropped their pack allowing it an easy meal. So when it approaches other humans, it's probably expecting the same thing, a dropped pack with some goodies to get at. I'm thinking that may have been the case with the bear in that video I posted.

 

[Jon Carbaugh]

We came across a black bear near our camp a couple of weeks ago on the Lamar River in YNP, I took out my spray and had my finger on the trigger watching it cross the river and head into the woods on the other side when I tripped a little and sprayed about a nanoseconds worth... the bear just ran into the woods laughing at me! I choked for about a second before holding my breath and walking away. The only time I can say I "deployed" it.

 

[Bob]

Never know where griz will show up ....... Neighbors deck about 300 ft away from my place in island park two days ago