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  1. #1
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    Default To hang or not to hang?

    Every year, every time I hike on the AT, the Q. of hanging your food at night comes up. Sometimes we have Bear Cables, sometime a Bear Pole, and now we are seeing Bear boxes, so depending on where you are ( shelters, camp sights, or stealthing in the backwoods) the choices can be obvious. The real question beyond convenience is what is the proper thing to do? Many veteran hikers will laugh at those who hang, swear by the method of just "sleeping" with your food bag. They even support their thinking with logic. So, is there any definitive thinking on this topic that might make future decisions easier. Maybe even a study....

    i would note that the focus always seems to be on bears, but those pesky red squirrels have no respect for a cable or pole.

    Thanks.
    "How can something this hard be so much fun".

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    Mice will cause more damage to your gear then bears if you sleep with your food.

  3. #3

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    Not to mention there is no way I want to take the chance that a mouse gets in my sleeping bag with me!

  4. #4
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    most folks that use shelters hang food poorly so bears become a problem. i sleep with my food away from shelters because they are trashy, filthy urban areas

  5. #5
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    Properly stowing your food is simply good practice, no matter where you are (shelter, campsite, stealthing, whatever). That absolutely does not mean sleeping with your food, which is both a poor practice and a good way to lose it. If there is a bear box available, that's usually a sign of bear activity in the area and you should use it by preference, since these teach bears that food is not accessible at that site. In any other situation, do a proper hang (i.e., a PCT hang) in order to discourage all types of animals from viewing the site you're at and the presence of humans as a food opportunity. This is the main reason not to sleep with your food, since you're basically teaching anything that comes across you that humans and their gear (tents, hammocks, etc.) = food. Not only is this a good way to get your food snatched right out from under you by something small and crafty (mice, raccoons, etc.) but it is teaching the same lesson to any bears who might come around. Even if you don't have a problem, you're setting up others for problems later. Learn how to hang properly and do it consistently, because it's good practice just like other LNT practices.
    Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.
    Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

  6. #6

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    Quote Originally Posted by Strategic View Post
    Properly stowing your food is simply good practice, no matter where you are (shelter, campsite, stealthing, whatever). That absolutely does not mean sleeping with your food, which is both a poor practice and a good way to lose it.
    Not true.

    Do not confuse issues.

    Your food is always safest with you.

    You, on the other hand, are theoretically safer with your food somewhere else.

    These are two totally different things.

    Several years ago Mountain Crossings kept a tally when the bear problem was at its peak at Blood Mountain. The tally at one point was was something like.... Food lost when hanging ... 78. Food loss when sleeping with it...0.

    Another truism... A poor hang, is worse than no hang at all. They hang has to be darn near perfect to be bear resistant. Good trees are hard to find.
    Last edited by MuddyWaters; 05-24-2018 at 15:10.

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by MuddyWaters View Post
    Not true.

    Do not confuse issues.

    Your food is always safest with you.

    You, on the other hand, are theoretically safer with your food somewhere else.

    These are two totally different things.

    Several years ago Mountain Crossings kept a tally when the bear problem was at its peak at Blood Mountain. The tally at one point was was something like.... Food lost when hanging ... 78. Food loss when sleeping with it...0.

    Another truism... A poor hang, is worse than no hang at all. They hang has to be darn near perfect to be bear resistant. Good trees are hard to find.
    This is my point. A poor hang is bound to create problems, Most hikers are not capable of hanging their food in such a manner to prevent it being taken by a bear. A review of bear activity will show that bears do not take food that is next to a person. I've seen many bears take food from bear hangs. I was at Black Mountain in 2011 and I advised my fellow campers not to hang their food and was ignored. The bears took their food from the trees and I just shook my head. My belief is that a hanged food bag is a invitation to the bear to take the food. Sleeping with your food is not an invitation for the bear to harm you. In my research I've have found no incidents of bears harming the hiker sleeping with their food. So the one's that say hang your food need to look at the history of bear incidents and reevaluate their advice.

  8. #8

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    Quote Originally Posted by Fredt4 View Post
    This is my point. A poor hang is bound to create problems, Most hikers are not capable of hanging their food in such a manner to prevent it being taken by a bear. A review of bear activity will show that bears do not take food that is next to a person. I've seen many bears take food from bear hangs. I was at Black Mountain in 2011 and I advised my fellow campers not to hang their food and was ignored. The bears took their food from the trees and I just shook my head. My belief is that a hanged food bag is a invitation to the bear to take the food. Sleeping with your food is not an invitation for the bear to harm you. In my research I've have found no incidents of bears harming the hiker sleeping with their food. So the one's that say hang your food need to look at the history of bear incidents and reevaluate their advice.
    If you believe it is perfectly safe to sleep with your food, then what do you believe is the primary cause of bear attacks?

    Is a bag hung 10 feet off the ground and 10 feet from the trunk of the tree sufficient?

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by FreeGoldRush View Post
    If you believe it is perfectly safe to sleep with your food, then what do you believe is the primary cause of bear attacks?

    Is a bag hung 10 feet off the ground and 10 feet from the trunk of the tree sufficient?
    What is the primary cause of bear attacks? That's an interesting question. I can tell what it isn't, food storage, proper or improper. An interesting article I've read, but wasn't able to relocate, in 2011 discuss the issue. No incidents were found to lead to bear attacks from the garbage sites to less obvious sites. The article discussed the rarity of incidents given the possibilities. Most attacks involved people who worked or otherwise intentionally involved themselves with bears. I note that no AT thru-hiker has ever been killed, or injured (pretty sure about this) by a bear. A few hikers have been killed nearby but it's a very small portion of the one's killed. If you examine the ones killed it's a few children and as I stated before persons intentionally involving themselves with bears, plus a couple of women. I believe the number is less than 1 per year. For hikers the result is that it's extremely unlikely that one will be attacked by a bear. So food storage is not about safety for the hiker. It's about controlling bear behavior. Now given this your concerns are not relevant. As to the question of a bag that's hung 10' by 10' is it sufficient. I will only observe that I've seen bears defeat many such hangs, though most are not as well hung. The reality is that most hikers can't or won't hang in such a fashion. I question the reasons for encouraging hikers to continue to hang when it's given that the hang will be defeated by the bears. A cable, bear box, bear pole can be and are very effective. But a food bag hung in a tree is not effective. Food kept by your side is effective. Food placed in a tent when you are not in the tent is not effective. As many have noted on this thread many hikers have been sleeping with their food. I don't see a slew of incidents of them being attacked by the bears. Most AT hikers, at least after the first couple of months, probably sleep with their food. Perhaps their telling us something about the non-existence of bear attacks. A more interesting question is in the following post, "what about the people who had bears harming them or entered their tents". As noted in most such incidents no food was kept in the tent or otherwise involved. Perhaps the bears didn't know someone was in the tent. Perhaps their keen sense of smell wasn't a factor. As to the incident of the kid in the hammock I believe the bear wasn't looking for food as much as it was thinking the person was it's food. Anyways it's a rarity in any event which I'm not able to explain.

  10. #10
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    i'll continue to sleep with my food in my tent like i have for 30 years. works for me

  11. #11
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    Same for me. Sorry if it upsets the hanging enthusiasts. I've never had an issue and I get out pretty much every weekend.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lone Wolf View Post
    i'll continue to sleep with my food in my tent like i have for 30 years. works for me
    Let me go

  12. #12
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    Anecdotal evidences suggest that black bears along the AT have less fear of humans. Also, I have read that some bears learn to break the tree branches where the food bags are hanged. Fortunately, most shelters have either/or bear boxes (which are sometimes full of hiker's trash), bear poles and bear cables. As a matter of principal, i NEVER keep anything in my tent that a wild animal may think of as food, and that includes hand sanitizer and tooth paste.

  13. #13

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lone Wolf View Post
    i'll continue to sleep with my food in my tent like i have for 30 years. works for me
    How can this work? Four nights ago I hammocked with my pack hanging on the hammock line under the tarp. The food bag was hung far away from camp. At midnight the hammock strings were jiggling and a large animal was outside. I climbed out with my headlamp expecting a bear. It was a small deer. After returning home I realized a small piece of cake in a ziplock bag had been forgotten in the backpack and not hung.

    So did I inadvertently sleep with food? It didn't stop an animal from trying to get it. I'm still a novice and still amazed at how fearless the animals are when you settle down and get quiet at night. Sleeping with food sounds like a very bad idea.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lone Wolf View Post
    i'll continue to sleep with my food in my tent like i have for 30 years. works for me
    By extension to this line of thinking:
    I've never died in a car crash so I don't need to wear a seatbelt
    My house has never burned down so I don't need fire insurance
    I've never had a heart attack so I don't need health insurance
    I've never drowned so I don't need to wear a life jacket on that whitewater raft trip
    I've never had cancer so I guess I'll keep smoking
    Etc.

    It's about risk mitigation. It only takes once.

  15. #15

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    Quote Originally Posted by HikerHarry View Post
    By extension to this line of thinking:
    I've never died in a car crash so I don't need to wear a seatbelt
    My house has never burned down so I don't need fire insurance
    I've never had a heart attack so I don't need health insurance
    I've never drowned so I don't need to wear a life jacket on that whitewater raft trip
    I've never had cancer so I guess I'll keep smoking
    Etc.

    It's about risk mitigation. It only takes once.
    But risk mitigation should be proportional.

    Car crashes kill about 35,000 people a year.
    Heart disease and cancer, EACH over 600,000 a year.
    There are over 300,000 house fires.
    Everybody gets sick, so health insurance is sensible unless someone else is covering it for some reason.
    Drowning kills about 3,500, nearly 100% preventable.
    Bears kill about one person a year. Seldom, if ever, has a person in the United States been dragged out of their tent and killed because they were sleeping with their food. If a bear was going to do that, why would it be concerned about scoring some Poptarts if he could just kill and eat the person?

    Now there are some places, say Yosemite, where it is both illegal and a bad idea to sleep with your food because there are known habituated bears. And if it makes someone feel better to carry a bear canister or do a very good job hanging their food, that's their call to make.

  16. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by Colter View Post
    But risk mitigation should be proportional.
    Spot-on! Risk = likelihood x impact, and determining how much risk is acceptable is a very personal decision. For me it's too risky to sleep with food regardless of how it's packaged, less risky to hang a food bag where that's actually possible and done correctly, least risky to stow food in an odor-proof barrier inside a bear can placed about 30 paces away from your tent. I'm willing to sacrifice the added weight for simplicity and peace of mind. I also love using the bear can as a table to cook on and eat from, as well as to clean laundry in from time to time if there's a convenient water source :-)

  17. #17

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    I certainly agree with hanging food well when the environment supports it, but if that's not a viable option (and it often isn't), then I'll sleep with it under my head also.

  18. #18
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    Just wanted to share my experience here. I'll be thru-hiking the AT when I graduate in 2020. I've never hiked a foot of the AT, but I've done a lot of hiking in the Monongahela National Forest. The Cranberry Wilderness is there, and is crisscrossed with great trails. The Cranberry is also a black bear reserve. The first time I hiked in the Cranberry Wilderness, I decided against hanging a bear bag: it was getting dark and I just wanted to bed. So I slept with my food in my tent. I woke at around 3 AM to the sounds of some large animal (what animal or how large, of course, I couldn't tell) lumbering by the riverside, snapping branches. I lay awake for a while, and I remember getting the feeling that something was near the tent. I was laying with my head pressed against the stretchy fabric of the tent. Well, there was something right outside the tent, and it reached out and scratched my head. I wasn't hurt, just terrified. I lay there for 2 and a half hours, willing the sun to start shining. Now, was it a bear that scratched me? Beats me--could have been anything. But I saw two black bears within half a mile of where I slept when I hiked out early that morning, and I had seen prints and scat near the trail all day long the day before. Granted, this was a black bear reserve, not the AT--I get that. But my lesson was, if I'm hiking where I think it's a good idea to hang a bear bag, and if I'm hiking alone, then I'm just going to hang one. Better safe than sorry.

  19. #19

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    I'm a fan of a bear canister myself. Different strokes for different folks I guess : )

  20. #20

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    Some people drink and drive for thirty years, the on a magical day they kill a family of four minding there own business. If people want to put themselves in danger, more power to them. My point is don’t let your personal choices endanger others. If bears didn’t like dumps, you wouldn’t find them in dumpsters.


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