Returned from a nice Yosemite camping, day-hiking trip where we attended a Yosemite bears lecture. The excellent ranger/wildlife specialist gave the history of how we "domesticated" the bears and since closing the final garbage dump have been trying to make them wild again. Backpackers know this is a long, laborious process and thus, my tie-in.

She noted a current camping closure at Snow Creek, a trail I was unfamiliar with. Here are the trail and closure area. Seems last year a lone (they hope) female bear learned a little trick: "If I knock this canister off that cliff, I can go to the bottom and have a great meal!"

She was responsible for dozens of canister thefts and to break the habit the park decided to close camping there to force her to find another food source and not teach her cubs this great new trick. A look at the map shows the handy cliff and the reason I didn't bother asking whether any particular model of can would survive the fall. The answer is clearly "none." Ironically, an Ursack might be better there, being tethered and not rigid.

Anyway, my takeaway is never place my can where a casual swat might send it off on some journey. In the meantime, Snow Creek is for (ambitious--wow that's steep) day hikers. Their efforts might be paying off because to date, bear incidents are down by more than half over last year.


Edited by Rick_D (08/27/15 04:58 PM)
_________________________
--Rick