I don’t like bear canisters. They’re bulky. They’re heavy. And it’s hard to cram food into them.
So why do I carry one?
I do it for the bears.
For the bears on the bad end of encounters with humans, the ones trapped and relocated, or in the worst cases, killed.
For the bears that have learned how to get into hikers’ food stashes, even when the food is hung at a seemingly unreachable level.
Does that last one sound far-fetched? Consider this:
This summer the Appalachian Trail Conservancy recommended that AT hikers carry bear cans because bear hangs just aren’t cutting it.
“Black bears along multiple sections of the Appalachian Trail have become increasingly adept at defeating traditional food hangs, where a hiker stores their food over a tree branch using a rope and storage bag,” says Hawk Metheny, ATC Vice President of Regional and Trail Operations. “By using a bear-resistant container, hikers are minimizing their chances of a negative bear encounter on the trail and helping prevent more bears from becoming habituated to humans as a source of food.”
It’s not just on the Appalachian Trail.
Backpackers in California’s Desolation Wilderness are now required to store food in bear-resistant canisters because the US Forest Service, which oversees the wilderness in Northern California, says bear hangs are no longer effective.
“Backpackers at Lake Aloha, Gilmore Lake, and other popular camping areas in Desolation Wilderness have lost as many as ten ‘bear hangs’ a night to bears in recent years,” the Forest Service says.
I’ve never had a bear go after my food in nearly 50 years of backpacking, although I have done a lot of poor bear hangs. Call it luck, but luck doesn’t last forever.
On one trip I heard a bear rumble like a freight train through a backcountry campground at night while, lacking any good trees to hang my food, my food bag was locked in the privy. Admittedly not my best move.
Another time I set up in a shelter where a sleeping bag and gear were laid out, but no hiker. He showed up close to midnight after a night in town, and thanked me for being in the shelter so a bear wouldn’t get his food.
I’ve read endless debates about food storage, and shuddered at boasts by people who say they sleep with food in their tent. Why would a tent protect them when bears in Connecticut, where I live, have broken into houses—some of them with people inside—looking for food?
Jim Fetig, a trail maintainer for the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club and a Leave No Trace Master Educator, told me several years ago about a bear that ripped apart a tent to get at food inside. Later, the same bear tore up an empty tent looking for food, although the hiker had properly stored their food away from their tent.
“The bear was doing what people taught it to do,” Fetig says. “As I always tell campers, you never know what happened before you got there.”
In New England, where I hike, the Appalachian Mountain Club and the Green Mountain Club have placed bear boxes in most of the backcountry camping sites they maintain. The AMC reports that the boxes are effective at reducing bear-human encounters.
Still, the boxes aren’t foolproof. A bear broke into a bear box at the AMC’s 13 Falls Tentsite in the White Mountains recently after the box’s latch failed. (See the havoc wreaked in the above photo.) The AMC is checking all its backcountry food storage containers to ensure there won’t be a repeat.
And the AMC encourages backcountry hikers to carry bear cans if they won’t be camping at club-maintained sites.
The GMC, which maintains the AT and Long Trail in Vermont, stepped up placing bear boxes at backcountry sites in 2019 after game wardens shot and killed a bear that ransacked tents, followed hikers, and charged a hiker on the LT/AT in Southern Vermont.
Along the Pacific Crest Trail bear canisters are required in parts of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, Inyo, Sierra and Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forests, and in all of Yosemite, Desolation Wilderness, and Lassen Volcanic National Parks. The Pacific Crest Trail Association strongly recommends that thru-hikers carry a bear can for their entire hike.
Unfortunately, even carrying a bear can is no guarantee that your food will be safe.
Clear plastic canisters such as the BearVault—the one I carry—have been banned in the Eastern High Peaks Wilderness of the Adirondacks in New York because bears have learned to open them. A bear named Yellow-Yellow was the first to be seen opening the BearVault, but other bears seemed to be catching on.
Similar bear behavior hasn’t been seen outside the Adirondacks, and the BearVault is approved for use in black bear country by SierraWild.gov and in grizzly country by the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee. Both groups list approved bear-resistant products on their websites.
Many hikers carry an Ursack, which is lighter and easier to fit in a backpack than a bear can. The downside? An Ursack can keep your food safe, but it won’t stop a bear from stomping on it and crushing everything inside.
And it’s important to check with the regulations where you’ll be hiking. Some areas such as the Adirondacks and the Desolation Wilderness require hard-sided bear cans and do not accept Ursacks.
So what’s my takeaway on storing food in the backcountry? It’s this: No bear hang or food storage is perfect, and keeping food in your tent is definitely courting trouble. But using a canister is the best way to ensure that the next bear you see isn’t the one tearing into your food stash.
I’d like to wrap this up with a final anecdote.
Several years ago I was camping on the AT at Speck Pond in Southern Maine. The caretaker stopped by the shelter for a brief riff on campsite rules, which included: prepare and eat food at the cook site away from the shelter and tent platforms, and store food in the bear box, because bears are frequent visitors.
I fell asleep that night to the sounds of my shelter mate munching away on a bedtime snack. I wonder if his luck ever ran out.
Thanks to Matthew Paille for the photo of the bear damage at 13 Falls Tentsite.