[philmont] Bear Ropes

Great story, Joe.

I think we saw more bears in years past because the bear procedures
were not very good in those days. The "bear bag system of the day"
that I remember from 1970 consisted of hanging bear bags from an
available tree branch. If you were industrious, you might try
stretching a rope between two trees, but this was rare. Any uneaten
food was buried. The bears frequently roamed through camp at night and
brazenly climbed trees to try to get our food, unfazed by our banging
of pots and pans.

Philmont really needs to be commended for their bear procedures. The
rangers do a great job of training and the system of bear cables allows
the camp to deal with large numbers of campers with few problems. We
don't see as many bears as in the past but it is a more natural
wilderness experience and the desire to see a bear gives you one more
reason to go back.

Dan Preston
On Jan 18, 2007, at 6:30 PM, Joseph Jansen wrote:

> They are there all right.  If you haven't seen them, give yourself a
> pat on the back, as your attention to miinimising smellables, more
> than any other single factor, probably led the bears to conclude that
> you weren't worth their time.
>  
> One bear story.  In 1965 a bear raided our campsite, shared with
> several sister crews.  Bear found a way to shinny up a tree and outwit
> the bear bag system of the day, eating most of a crews food.  Our
> crew, too exhausted to erect the bear bag system, put our stuff under
> a tarp and set a jelly mixed with soap powder trap for the
> bear. (Warning:  Do not try this at home.  Do not try this at
> Philmont.  It can only be revealed now because the statute of
> limitations for Philmont misdeeds has passed) Great chaos that night,
> with bear noises and boys yelling.  Next morning the results were
> learned.  Bear had eaten the other crews provisions, even though it
> had to climb to get them and outwit the bear bag system.  The
> jelly/soap powder bait had been taken - and there were bear droppings
> very near where the bait had been set -  but our provisions were
> untouched.  We had a few jokes at the sister crew's expense over the
> next few days until arriving at the next food pickup.  And once during
> this trek we saw bear claw markings on wooden "swap boxes".
>  
> Joe Jansen
> JAJansenJr@gmail.com
> Philmont 1965; 1978 
>
>  
> On 1/18/07, Phil Brown <Phil@eisnc.com> wrote:
>>
>> Lou wrote:
>> They love to play up the bear problem, but we didn't see any on our
>> trek.
>>
>>
>> I have seen bears on 2 of my 3 treks.  I am convinced the reason
>> Philmont has as few bears problems as it does is due to the diligence
>> they have to their bear procedures.
>>
>> Phil Brown
>>
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Dan Preston
Preston Associates Architects
Received on Fri Jan 19 08:57:14 2007