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Bears..hazard Area???


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There has been a report that my cache is in a black bear monitoring station. I didn't not see any signs when placing cache, but do not want anyone to be hurt....my husband says that anyone could meet a black bear anywhere in the woods..we did last week fishing, and he doesn't see any reason to worry about it.

 

Should I move it or just warn others of a bear sighting??

 

Thanks in advance!! MudFrog

Edited by MudFrog&FireChief
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If we removed caches from everywhere that bears were sighted then you might as well remove every cache in the Pacific Northwest. Personally, I wouldn't worry about it. Bears are just a fact of life in the woods and anyone hiking in the woods can reasonably expect to encounter a bear if they don't take the proper precautions and sometimes even if they do. The best way to avoid bears is to make a lot of noise on the trail so that you don't surprise them. Bears are generally less eager for a close encounter with humans than we are.

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Bears themselves shouldn't be an issue. If they were, I'd have to archive about 90 percent of mine. The monitoring station might be. I assume some government entity, or biologist, or something runs the monitoring station and may not take kindly to finding a cache in or near it.

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There has been a report that my cache is in a black bear monitoring station.  I didn't not see any signs when placing cache, but do not want anyone to be hurt....my husband says that anyone could meet a black bear anywhere in the woods..we did last week fishing, and he doesn't see any reason to worry about it. 

 

Should I move it or just warn others of a bear sighting??

 

Thanks in advance!!  MudFrog

Where did you see/hear this report? And what exactly did it say? Where did you see the bear? ;)

Edited by Team Cotati
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This was sent to me a while back:

 

When hiking in the wilderness, especially in the woods, remember there

are bears, some of which would love to have you for lunch.

 

One way to avoid this is to wear little bells like the ones used on

horse/reindeer harnesses or Christmas stockings. The constant jingling

is unpleasant to the bears and will keep them away.

 

When you are walking in the woods you frequently find signs of bears

having been there before you.

 

Some of these signs are: scratches on trees (where a bear has

sharpened it's claws), little tufts of bear fur imbedded in the tree

bark (bears sometimes scratch an itch) and bear droppings.

 

By examining the droppings, you can tell what kind of bear left them.

 

Brown bear and black bear droppings contain undigested berry seeds,

little bits of rodent fur and rodent skulls.

 

Grizzly bear droppings frequently contain little bells. ;)

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There has been a report that my cache is in a black bear monitoring station. I didn't not see any signs when placing cache, but do not want anyone to be hurt....my husband says that anyone could meet a black bear anywhere in the woods..we did last week fishing, and he doesn't see any reason to worry about it.

 

Should I move it or just warn others of a bear sighting??

 

Thanks in advance!! MudFrog

No.

 

Everyone of my rural caches is in areas where the Louisiana Black Bear population is on the rise. There are also alligators in the area and, GASP, large fields of poison ivy. If you are concerned, post a disclaimer on your page in the description of the cache. I do, just to let people know.

 

Black bears have a rather large range and they are not going to stay in a "monitoring area". They, like all animals, do not heed property boundaries. If there are bears in the area they will move around a lot and you're likely to see them just about anywhere you go. They tend to avoid people anyway.

 

sd

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Like others, I'd like to know what this "station" consists of. If there is resident equiptment involved, I'd stay away. In grizzly country they monitor and estimate bears by satellite - they take a square mile in known grizzly country and catalog the flora and fauna and take a pic from space, and then they compare that to everywhere else. You could hardly interfere with that. Does it perhaps mean that they've had to capture, tag, and relocate bear?

edit: If you're just a bit north of Gaylord, maybe all anybody needs for your bear is a leash. ;):P You might, however, avoid those berry patches.

Edited by Robespierre
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MF&FC - I just want to note that I think it is very considerate of you to offer to post a note to unfamiliar cachers warning that bears have (and may) be likely in the area of your cache. As some of the Nor'wester's posting to this thread have pointed out, for those cachers who live in that area, the possibility of a bear encounter may be a given. But for cachers visiting from elsewhere who may not know as much about "local hazards", I think they'd appreciate your offer of additional information and caution.

 

Similarly, I recall a Nevada cacher talking about placing a cache in a ravine, which in the event of rain would turn into a dangerous fast moving river very quickly. For the locals in that area, they may already know that, and know not to venture too far down into the ravine if it's threatening to rain. For non-local visitors (like visiting geocachers), I think a note of caution warning them about such potentially dangerous conditions would be a very friendly and helpful gesture, to keep them (and their families) safe.

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Wow!! Thanks! All of your advice is greatly appreciated.

 

The cache is in Indian River, Michigan. Not to far from Gaylord. When we placed the cache we did not see any signs, we didn't see much of anything, hence the name B.F.E. But we are going to go out and check it out to make sure we are not harming anyone’s research. There is a motor bike trail within 100 yards so I can't believe a few people stomping around the area would hurt. By the way this is public-use land. My husband picked the area because he hunts there regularly. Someone mentioned berry patches...it's sort of funny, but we did notice a large amount of raspberries around! ;)

 

I will post a warning just to be on the safe side. I would feel terrible if I knew that bears frequented this area, didn't post a warning and someone got hurt. But that might be a mute point now since someone has posted his experience. Better safe than sorry. Hey I might just use that little bear warning from Team Dromomania, that was cool! Do you mind??

 

I will post again after checking it out and let you know what happened. If you want, you are more than welcome to visit: Use waypoint: GCP45Z

 

Maybe I should place some bells in the cache. ;)

 

Thanks for all the helpful advice.

 

~MF~

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The odd thing is that most of the critter encounters that I have experienced have taken place in areas I would not expect to see the animals. I have only twice seen bear out in the open forest, but have often seen them in close proximity to poplutated areas. I was still a little surprised when I took a recent business trip to San Jose, CA and saw a news report about three mountain lion sightings in the area. Silicon Valley is not what I would consider "lion country"! ;)

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Brown bear and black bear droppings contain undigested berry seeds,

little bits of rodent fur and rodent skulls.

 

Grizzly bear droppings frequently contain little bells.

 

You do realize that a Brown bear and a Grizzly Bear are the same thing?

 

I know and understand the point of the joke, but having lived in bear country near all my life I tend to get a bit picky on how bears are defined. In reality, Brown/Kodiak/Grizzly bears are just not that common in human population areas. There are a few exceptions to this - mostly in Alaska, BC, Wyoming, and Montana - but those aren't areas known for high human populations either.

 

Black bears however - very common throughout nearly the entire US.

 

Luckily, like most "dangerous" wildlife, bears are more likely to avoid humans rather than confront them - so long as they are not FED by humans directly or indirectly. Making noise while hiking in the woods is a good idea as it alerts wildlife ahead of you that you are on the way - and that it is time for them to leave and clear a path for you.

 

Just to share, I wish to recount a story from a hike my wife and I did a decade ago in Yosemite. We were in the park for Memorial Day weekend (like everyone else it seemed) and wanted to do our annual trek to the top of Half Dome. Well - we were recently married and hoped it would be annual but it was only my second time up the trail and my wife's first time.

 

We started early to get a parking spot at the trailhead and some sunrise pictures over the Merced River - then headed up the Vernal/Nevada Falls trail. Not even a half mile into the hike - before we even left the dirt roads along the valley floor a white Ford Bronco with NPS logos on the side came ROARING up and skidslided to a stop along side us. A guy hopped out with a bulky backpack and a huge wand thing in his hand and ran right past us without even glancing at us and waved the wand back and forth.

 

It was at that time my wife looked closely at the logos on the SUV and saw he was part of the Bear Tracking Unit. So she asked the guy what he was doing - and he replied in a nonchelant manner that he was tracking a bear that had been into the campgrounds lately.

 

She dropped her backpack - took out the granola bars we had packed for lunch and handed then to the guy and told him good luck with his project. Sadly, we only made it a short ways past the top of Nevada Falls that day as hunger told us it was better to go down rather than to finish the trek to the top. We still got some good photo ops on that trip - especially along the Mist trail that was quite vibrant due to a very wet spring runoff that year. It still crackes me up thinking about how quickly her actions changed upon catching wind that a bear she never even saw might be close.

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Brown bear and black bear droppings contain undigested berry seeds,

little bits of rodent fur and rodent skulls.

 

Grizzly bear droppings frequently contain little bells.

 

You do realize that a Brown bear and a Grizzly Bear are the same thing?

 

...

 

Just to share, I wish to recount a story from a hike my wife and I did a decade ago in Yosemite.

Yep, they're the same but then the joke wouldn't work. :P

 

The best I can figure out is that it all depends on your location on what the bear is called.

 

As for Yosemite, I was on that same trail quite a few years ago hiking alone when a Black started following me. I wasn't carrying any food but it still keep trying to approach me and got within a few feet several times. I banged my metal things but it ignored the noise. After about 10 minutes of this without any letup I met a young couple heading back towards the campgrounds. The bear ran off. I told them about my experience and we went our ways. About a minute later I started hearing metals banging in the direction of the couple. That bear just would not give up!

 

I've never been to Yosemite with a GPSr. I'm going to have to do that hike again and record my path. It looks like there's several virtuals there.

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There are lots of bears in my local area, especially Black Bears, they are native the the area and are just recently making a large come-back after being nearly extinct to this area. You are just as likely running in to a bear in a park or anywhere as you are running into one in an inhabbited area. I say Just warn the cachers that Bears have been spotted in the area to be careful!

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You do realize that a Brown bear and a Grizzly Bear are the same thing?

 

 

The best I can figure out is that it all depends on your location on what the bear is called.

I don't know about the lower 48 but here in Alaska we call them brown bears if they are within 100 miles of the coast and grizzlies if they are in the Interior. This is because the brown bears near the coast get much more protien from fish and therefore are larger. Grizzlies have much more vegatation in their diet so are not as big (though big enough to get the job done). Hope that helps.

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There has been a report that my cache is in a black bear monitoring station. I didn't not see any signs when placing cache, but do not want anyone to be hurt....my husband says that anyone could meet a black bear anywhere in the woods..we did last week fishing, and he doesn't see any reason to worry about it.

 

Should I move it or just warn others of a bear sighting??

 

Thanks in advance!! MudFrog

I live in bear country. No one tells anyone on vacation caching here about bears, it's understood that when your in the wilderness, things like bears, snakes, coyotes, etc. are a possibility of finding you when you're searching for a cache. If you REALLY find it a problem then you should post a warning, but unless these bears are aggressive or HAVE A REASON to be aggressive, they normal won't confront you. (Or this is atleast what I'm told from rangers). Either case, post it on your site, make them aware of it atleast.

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There has been a report that my cache is in a black bear monitoring station. I didn't not see any signs when placing cache, but do not want anyone to be hurt....my husband says that anyone could meet a black bear anywhere in the woods..we did last week fishing, and he doesn't see any reason to worry about it.

 

Should I move it or just warn others of a bear sighting??

 

Thanks in advance!! MudFrog

Bears are not really a hazard to people. There is less than one bear related death in the US per year and over 150 caused by deer. A simple warning should be plenty so those that do not want to see a bear can stay away.

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Bears are not really a hazard to people.  There is less than one bear related death in the US per year and over 150 caused by deer.  A simple warning should be plenty so those that do not want to see a bear can stay away.

While I agree that a warning on the cache page should be sufficient, keep in mind that things DO happen. We just had a couple here killed. Last summer my co workers husband was mauled. After a year of therepy and many surgeries, he is walking again although still has to use a walker. The bear grabbed him by the lower leg and shook, stripping all the muscle from the bone. Bear attacks happen every year here though no, not every one dies from them.

 

Couple killed by bear near Hulahula River

 

By JEANNETTE J. LEE, Associated Press Writer

 

Published: June 26th, 2005

Last Modified: June 27th, 2005 at 04:40 AM

 

ANCHORAGE (AP) - Two people camping along the Hulahula River in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge were killed by a grizzly bear, officials said Sunday.

 

Officials discovered the bodies and an unused firearm in a tent at a campsite near the river.

 

The couple, whose names were not released, was believed to be in their late 50s or early 60s, North Slope Borough police said. They were from Anchorage and had been on a recreational rafting trip down the river, Alaska State Troopers said.

 

The victims were in their tent when the attack occurred, according to Tim DeSpain, spokesperson for Alaska State Troopers.

 

The campsite was clean, with food stored in bear-proof containers.

 

"The initial scene indicates that it was a predatory act by the bear," DeSpain said.

 

The bear was at the site Saturday night when public safety officials arrived. They shot and killed the animal, but did not remove it.

 

A rafter had seen the animal at the site and notified authorities in Kaktovik.

 

The couple's injuries were consistent with a bear attack and there were no signs of foul play, said Kelly Alzaharna, a lieutenant with the North Slope Borough Police Department.

 

There were no other people at the campsite, which was about 12 miles up river from Kaktovik, a community of about 300 on Barter Island and the only village in the refuge.

 

Officials are not sure when the couple was killed.

 

The bear's height and weight are unknown because wildlife officials has not yet retrieved its remains, Alzaharna said. The refuge contains grizzly, polar and black bears.

 

Cathy Harms, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Fish and Game in Fairbanks, confirmed the bear was a grizzly.

 

Fish and Game officials were alerted at 4 a.m. Sunday, Harms said.

 

Wildlife officials were taking the bear carcass to Fairbanks on Sunday for a necropsy, which would confirm whether the bear attacked the couple, Harms said.

 

Alaska State Troopers are retrieving the bodies from the campsite.

 

Authorities said they would release the victims' names after contacting family members.

 

The Hulahula River begins at the end of a glacier in the Romanzof Mountains at the eastern end of the Brooks Range.

 

It flows west and north about 100 miles to Camden Bay in the Beaufort Sea east of Barter Island.

 

The river is popular for wildlife viewing, rafting and kayaking.

Edited by 1stimestar
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