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  1. #41
    GSMNP 900 Miler
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    Quote Originally Posted by 4eyedbuzzard View Post
    ...I just have this (future) vision of lost bear canisters littering the woods in the southern Appalachians (yes, likely an exaggeration, but maybe not given the sheer number of and skill level of many hikers) - and ultimately, bear canisters winding up hoisted on metal poles or secured in bear boxes at shelters and camp areas. Losing a canister likely isn't going to happen to most hikers. But if---WHEN that happens (especially so if it's you or me), losing one's food supply and canister when several days from resupply is more than just a inconvenience. There are many areas on the AT where "careful selection" or a level area to avoid a canister rolling off a significant distance, especially with help from a bear, isn't a reasonable option due to terrain (on the side of a mountain). I guess I could hang the canister, but that kind of defeats its reason for existing in the first place and gives the bear a better way of holding it should it get to it.

    There's one sure thing though - the canister manufacturers would be thrilled if they became mandated on the AT.
    The Sierra Nevada Mountains (and other places where bear canisters are required) are not littered with missing canisters.

    They are a tested and proven technology. Are they perfect? No. But I don't see how using a bear canister is going to make your food MORE prone to disappearing than using a food sack.

    And yeah, you don't want to hang a canister... but again, you don't see that being an issue in places where bear canisters are mandatory.

    About the only problem I've heard with canisters is the occasional campsite near a cliff that the bear has access to both the top and bottom of the cliff. In these cases, the bears occasionally learn that if the cliff is high enough, rolling the canister off the cliff will cause it to bust open under it's own weight. But the locations this sort of thing happens is limited and the community finds ways to deal with it (issues warnings, finds alternate locations, or installing bear boxes at the troubled site).

  2. #42
    Registered User ldsailor's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by 4eyedbuzzard View Post
    Yeah, I was wondering about using such a device and smartphone compatibility, especially the range.
    Please post results when you do this. Sounds like a good idea.
    These trackers are sold on Amazon. There are 2,051 reviews of which 79% are 5 star. Here is a link - Tile Pro.
    Trail Name - Slapshot
    "One step at a time."
    Blog - www.tonysadventure.com

  3. #43
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    Complete nonsense in my opinion. I worry more about the amount of trash I find along the trail or at campsites than I do from food storage.

    I am a firm believer in making good judgement calls in the woods...limit exposures by being smart not by being ordered. I hang my food in bear heavy areas (i.e. SNP) or when I have my small kids with me.

    Otherwise? Sleep in my tent with it or empty shelter. A bear will smell a lot of other stuff on me as easy as it will the food in bags.

  4. #44

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    Quote Originally Posted by Huntmog View Post
    Complete nonsense in my opinion. I worry more about the amount of trash I find along the trail or at campsites than I do from food storage.

    I am a firm believer in making good judgement calls in the woods...limit exposures by being smart not by being ordered. I hang my food in bear heavy areas (i.e. SNP) or when I have my small kids with me.

    Otherwise? Sleep in my tent with it or empty shelter. A bear will smell a lot of other stuff on me as easy as it will the food in bags.
    My thoughts too. "Complete nonsense" about sums it up. Like with trash, I worry more about human turds dropped on the ground with a big wad of toilet paper and the idiot is no where to be found.

    "Being ordered" seems to be a coming trend in the backcountry. Look what happened in the GSMNP---I think Ed Abbey mentioned it---"Have fun but only in a clockwise direction."

  5. #45
    Registered User 4eyedbuzzard's Avatar
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    We are the BORG (Bureau of Outdoor Required Gear). Your existence as you know it is over. You and your technological distinctiveness will be assimilated to service us. Lower your hang bags and surrender. Resistance is futile.

  6. #46

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    This idiot is a firm believer in packing out the toilet paper along with all the other trash.And I almost feel guilty about being a freezer bag cooker but I'm not ready to give them up just yet.Maybe one makes up for the other... I would carry a bear cannister if it were the law,but not until then.

  7. #47

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    In places that require the use of bear canisters, who does the mandating? Local, state, Fed? Ordinances, state laws? Also how do enforcement and fines work?

  8. #48
    Registered User soilman's Avatar
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    Bear canister use regulations were enacted by the USFS in Pisgah and Chattahoochee NF. The 5 mile stretch of the AT with a bear canister requirement is in the Chattahoochee. Don't know about fines. What is interesting to note that the bear canister requirement in the 5 mile GA stretch was considered as an alternative to closing that area to camping.
    More walking, less talking.

  9. #49
    GSMNP 900 Miler rmitchell's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Slo-go'en View Post
    When a bear becomes a nusense bear, which it will once it starts scoring hiker food, it becomes a dead bear. Otherwise, it has a fair chance of avoiding the hunters.

    So using canisters can save a bear from certian death. It will also save you from having to deal with a possibly aggressive bear in the mean time.

    That said, I will resist using a canister as long as I can...
    Yeah. 2lbs. +

  10. #50

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    There's way more nuisance humans than there are nuisance bears throughout the trail corridors. Bring on the hard-sided food canister requirements, and if not, require a backcountry competency and ethics exam before allowing folks to overnight on our public lands.

  11. #51

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    Quote Originally Posted by August W. View Post
    There's way more nuisance humans than there are nuisance bears throughout the trail corridors. Bring on the hard-sided food canister requirements, and if not, require a backcountry competency and ethics exam before allowing folks to overnight on our public lands.
    Who would administer such an exam? Pay for it? Enforce? To be tax neutral, you'll need to create a back-country permit system. It's multi state, so you better go federal. Given the number of AT hikers and the required size of such a program, I think $250 per year per person would work. Neither humans or black bears are an endangered species, let God sort it out. We don't need more mumbo-jumbo regs. Just my opinion, YRMV
    Last edited by AsoloBootsSuk; 02-20-2020 at 12:19.

  12. #52

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    Quote Originally Posted by FromNH View Post
    I do not shoot anything that’s unarmed or doesn’t otherwise pose an immediate risk to myself or others.
    I'll bet you eat it if it's from a restaurant or store though.
    MEGA '19

  13. #53

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    Quote Originally Posted by AsoloBootsSuk View Post
    Who would administer such an exam? Pay for it? Enforce? To be tax neutral, you'll need to create a back-country permit system. It's multi state, so you better go federal. Given the number of AT hikers and the required size of such a program, I think $250 per year per person would work. Neither humans or black bears are an endangered species, let God sort it out. We don't need more mumbo-jumbo regs. Just my opinion, YRMV
    Since the AT is a National Park, why not do what they do in the Smokies?

    #1---get every AT backpacker and/or thruhiker to pay $4 per night while on the trail.
    #2---set up an extensive list where a hiker must name every campsite he/she will stay at for the entire trip (this is what they do in the Smokies).
    #3---camp only at designated campsites.

    There you go. I just destroyed any incentive or motivation to go backpacking.

  14. #54

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    ^^^^Eleventymillion percent agree

  15. #55

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    Quote Originally Posted by AsoloBootsSuk View Post
    ^^^^Eleventymillion percent agree
    98% of the 11 million Park visitors are in cars rolling thru the park or dayhiking---where there is not an entrance fee for autos or a permit or fee for dayhikers. All the rules I mentioned for the Park only apply to overnight backpackers. And so of course without any kind of fees those 11 million would totally agree with the rules and fees for backpackers.

  16. #56
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tipi Walter View Post
    Since the AT is a National Park...
    Huh? I missed that memo.

  17. #57

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    Quote Originally Posted by Paleolith54 View Post
    Huh? I missed that memo.
    It's a unit of the National Park System.

  18. #58

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    There is post elsewhere about a pipeline case that is going to the Supreme Court next week regarding what federal agency calls the shots on the AT. The USFS had given approval to cross the AT corridor and lower courts have ruled that the NPS (Department of Interior) has control over the entire length of the corridor. All of the trail maintaining clubs sign contracts with NPS and all volunteers sign a contract with the NPS.

  19. #59
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    Quote Originally Posted by peakbagger View Post
    There is post elsewhere about a pipeline case that is going to the Supreme Court next week regarding what federal agency calls the shots on the AT. The USFS had given approval to cross the AT corridor and lower courts have ruled that the NPS (Department of Interior) has control over the entire length of the corridor. All of the trail maintaining clubs sign contracts with NPS and all volunteers sign a contract with the NPS.
    Quote Originally Posted by Tipi Walter View Post
    It's a unit of the National Park System.
    I knew that NPS has had what I guess you could call "cognizance" over it since it is a National Scenic Trail, but was unaware of the extent to which their role seems to have pre-empted that of other agencies, like USFS.

  20. #60

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tipi Walter View Post
    Since the AT is a National Park, why not do what they do in the Smokies?

    #1---get every AT backpacker and/or thruhiker to pay $4 per night while on the trail.
    #2---set up an extensive list where a hiker must name every campsite he/she will stay at for the entire trip (this is what they do in the Smokies).
    #3---camp only at designated campsites.

    There you go. I just destroyed any incentive or motivation to go backpacking.
    This is why I no longer overnight in GSMNP. I like going where the wind blows me and not where I'm supposed to be. I did get a "permit" for sites in the maddron bald loop not long after all this was implemented. I get to #29 and only me and another guy had permits. Three other parties did not.

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