RE: [Philmont]: Bears

Brian,

We saw the cinnamon colored bear on Mt. Phillips as we were breaking
camp on Friday morning 13Jun02 (based on my hasty reconstruction of
dates and camps)

We first heard a crew shout that there was a bear. Then we heard the
bear turning over rocks looking for breakfast. Finally we saw the
cinnamon bear about 100 feet east of our camp site. We gathered as a
group in the fire ring area. The bear looked us over, but was not
worried and continued around our camp flipping rocks. The bear found
our sump and inspected all our cooking and eating gear located at the
sump. The bear found nothing interesting at the sump and disturbed
nothing. The bear looked us over again for a considerable length of
time. We had taken down our food and other smellables earlier and had it
all in the fire ring area. We were wondering if we would have to
vacate the fire ring, but finally the bear decided to move on. We were
relieved.

PSR bear protocol works. Be vigilant for the entire trek.

Larry Sims

Philmont 2004 Expedition Coordinator

Troop 1288 Katy, TX

610-C4 2004 Trek #24

2002 Philmont Expedition Coordinator

609-A3 2002 Trek #5FM (Fire modified trek)

718-G1 1965 (The Monsoons of '65)

IWTGBTP!

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-philmont@troop47.com [mailto:owner-philmont@troop47.com] On
Behalf Of BDMartin57@aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 8:20 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list philmont
Subject: Re: [Philmont]: Bears

We've all heard of the stories of Bear attacks at Philmont. I had 1
scout who was genuinely terrified of any encounters with bear and
unfortunately let that overshadow his experience at Philmont.

As a flatlander who has encountered 2 black bears at different times in
my scouting life on the AT in the NC area, our encountered with a black
(cinnamon colored) bear at Mt Philips was more comical than frightening.

We were finishing breakfast after spending the night on Mt. Philips when
one of our scouts yelled "Bear!!" As we looked up we saw the bear
wandering through the next campsite about 50-75 feet away. It sniffed
the fire ring area, looked up at the hoard of scouts, and wandered off.
We were later told by several rangers that viewed the digital video I
had taken of the bear as it wandered away, that it was most likely a
young female.

That was our encounter.

As a Flatlander, I believe the black bears in NC and TN are MUCH MORE
used to humans and would have approached us.

I was, personally, more concerned with the possibility of Mountain Lions
as the other advisor and myself both believe we heard a call....I don't
want to call it a roar....that silenced the wildlife for a few minutes
until the silence was broken by two "mule deer" (Not sure what they were
but they were bigger than the "white-tails" we have around here) break
the woods and run up the trail......also our path to get back to our
campsite.

Hope this doesn't muddy the water.....

Brian Martin, SM. T-319
Louisville, KY
Eagle ('72)
Advisor Exp. #609-B ('02) Trek #5
Current River, MO - 2005

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Received on Wed Jun 1 16:25:21 2005