Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Bears, Bear Cannisters,Food Storage.

Hi Looks like permits are in the mail now , So lets talk about those Bears . Food storage is critical, don't bring a truck load of STUFF and hope there is a place to store it. Leave you car/truck/van/mo-ped whatever empty ----nothing ,trunks are not safe from bears and cause more damage because they will get into the car and go into the trunk from the back seat. We hear every year that "I HAD NOTHING IN MY CAR" except , well we have found that if people take nothing and except out of the vehicle ,bears will most likely hit the vehicles with the "STUFF".
Last year we had one bear break in that was cause by an air freshner hanging in the car This person had cleaned the car 100% . I looked in the car and as my head went into the broken window I could smell the freshner.
Check the glove box, ashtrays
underfloor mats, sun visors and wheel wells in the trunk and map pockets in the doors.
Bear cannisters are required for overnight trips on the Whitney Trail, We rent them at the store and our store in town, We have enough for the demand so we DO NOT Reserve Them, We also sell them for $49.75 +TAX at the stores These are the standard Garcia Cannisters Model 812, we will sell them on the online store in about a month and the Price will be $59.75 + tax and shipping .
The Bears are in the area .They will break into your car, take your Stuff and can carry off you pack, food ,bottles, boxes and clothes So storage is critical.
Plastic water bottles are about the #1 item that will be overlooked and they seem to be the #1 cause for breakins. A map laying on the seat flat, arm rest between the front seats should be folded up. Nothing that looks like a box ,pack sack should be left in the vehicle EVEN Empty , bears seem to go by sight, smell and location ie if you see broken glass in the parking spot the bears will be Back to check, so park somewhere there is no glass on the ground, Park in the open part of the lots, not the ones where the bears can come out of the trees and break in and leave with out being noticed. Bears are active NIGHT AND DAY, if people protect their Stuff at night the bears just do more food hunting during the day.
Well these are some items we see every year The famous Quote "ONLY YOU" are the critical part in the bear topic . Thanks Doug

Great info Doug. Thanks!!
Quick question. I was planning on sleeping in the back of the mini-van in the campground. Good idea or no?? I will of course remove everything else in the car and plan to make a "bed" in the back. What do you think.
Thanks
Bryan

I don't think that would be a problem just as long as the bear can see your a person and not some big beef burrito.

Folks, Doug might won't say it but I will. When I hike out of Whitney Portal, or Horseshoe Meadows for that matter, the only food I bring is the stuff I take up the trail and breakfast for the morning if I'm getting an early start. I eat the rest of my meals at the Portal Store. The food is great, the portions are large and prices are reasonable, these folks could play Disneyland or the ballpark and really put the screws to people but they don't.

Doug and Earlene deserve to be supported by the hiking community.

Bill

OK, I knew this might be a problem, but I didn't expect it to be THAT BAD. I have a big question then.

My permits are for July 30-Aug 1. We'll arrive July 29th and get an early start on the 30th. My husband and I are doing Whitney as part of a 2-week trip, which includes canyoneering, backpacking, and a convention where we will be camping (in Porterville). We will obviously not be taking everything up the mountain that we will have with us for the 2 weeks. I have a pickup with a cap, definitely NOT BEAR-RESISTANT. The convention starts AFTER our climb. I don't really know anyone in the area.

Any suggestions on how to handle this? Are there storage units in Lone Pine?
Thanks,
Amy

There are bear lockers all around the portal. All campgrounds have them for individual campground use and there also are community lockers in campgrounds all the way down to Lone Pine campground.

Can't emphasize enough keeping the bears safe. Only careless campers keep the bears interested enough to give themselves a death sentence

Tuttle Creek (free, no water) has no bear lockers because bears don't go there. Consider camping there if you have a lot of "stuff." You can filter or sterilize water from the creek.

Word of advice is pick out a campsite there, put your "stuff" in a tent and then collapse the tent around your "stuff" making sure things are fairly well sealed. Squirrels are the only menace there (I learned the hard way, they chew like their cousins, the marmots).

Doug I can't believe you offer the bear canisters that cheap! I bought mine for almost 80 bucks at REI. Got some of it back, I think...

Vince

Hi Sleeping in the back of the truck or tent so far has worked, the key is no food and I would leave the tailgate open so the bear could look in and see nothing, they would leave. Any noise or movement by you sends them on the way,

Amyb Sorry we call you targets The best is try to get a room in town and leave your stuff in the room, all the boxes,bags,crumbs, packs etc. cause the bears to want to look inside . There is very limited space at the portal for storage and expect the lockers to be full and half the locks not working, People will leave items in the lockers and not take them out when they leave and no date on the items so when and who takes the things out and what do they do with them?
We see people park their cars in town and connect with other hikes to get a ride to the Portal , The bears travel from the foothills to trailcamp and will go into the houses outside of town, The key to the problem is the bears are searching for food and your vehicle will standout because of the excess cargo, This sounds crazy but my theory is that cars that have driven hundreds of miles to get to the portal, are more likely to be looked over, I think it's the bug splatter on the front??? We know fron our own area behind the store when we have different family cars parked the bears will check out the new arrivals. We leave our car windows open and the tailgate on the truck down and open.

Do car rental places cover bear break-ins if you get the extra insurance?
I do plan to have a very cleaned out car when I go, but wondering just in case the worst happens.

I'll second what Doug suggested about leaving your extra stuff in town. When my son and I did Whitney in 2001 (see http://www.mtritter.org under "highpointing" for details), we had spent a couple of nights at the Econolodge in Mammoth Lakes before heading down to Whitney. Since we were coming back through Mammoth (had planned to do Boundary Peak, but that's another story entirely) on our way home, we just left all of our gear except our packs with the manager at the Econolodge and picked it up when we got back to Mammoth.

We were in a rental and I did NOT want to have to argue about those funny claw marks and can-opener-ed doors...

Over the years, I've stayed at that Econolodge numerous times, so I know the family that runs it and felt quite safe leaving a bunch of gear (including my laptop PC inside one of the suitcases) with them.

We saw no signs that the bears had paid any attention at all to the car, although there were signs (broken glass, etc.) that other cars in the same lot had been hit while we were on the mountain.

You can count me in on a visit to Doug & Earlene's after the dayhike 08/23 around 3-4pm for a nice big juicy hamburger, fries, and a root beer!

Did Whitney twice and both times were three day passes, we saw the can-opener-ed cars along the road and in the parking lot. Bears like to snoop under covers. This year we will be staying in Lone Pine the night before we start up and will leave all our extra stuff there. (We will also stay the night after in a room with a jacuzzi!)
"Mr. Ranger" met us on the trail going up and back down and visually checked our canisters. So very important to have them!!!! We will start up on the morning of the 26th of July, stay at Lone Pine Lake that night, our passes start on the 27th. We're real slow hikers. (I live at 100 ft above sea leval so I go up real slow) Have never seen a bear (yet) but I smelled one my first time, so I know they are there! Hope to see some of you on the trail.

DougSR...quick question on your bear cannisters, how much do you rent them for? My permits are for early May, the 9-11. By the way, what do you think the expected snow pack will be in that time of May?

Thanks much!
Keir

Fellow Hikers......Yes those bears are very clever and adept at robbing us of our food. Two year's ago a bear and her two cubs stole my husband's pack while we were loading the trunk in the Whitney Portal campground. WE WERE RIGHT THERE....but she was out of the circle of light that the lantern was making. We found the pack a little ways down the lane undamaged but minus our food that we had packed for our hike. Luckily we were camping so we quickly put another lunch together. The reason the bears are so good at pilfering is that they are taught by their mothers when they are cubs how to do it.

So how come it's always the mother bear teaching the young cubs something, like stealing food. What about the father bear? Is he off and about doing fatherly bear stuff? Does he pay child support?

paul

LOL paul that's a good question!

You know us male types. Do business and leach off the females.

In all seriousness, mama bear does the teaching. I ran into a male bear last year and he just does what he does, eat. And the other stuff.

I wonder if not having Grizzlies in the Sierra is a good thing or a bad thing. Hiking would be very, very different.

How active are the bears in April? Although I plan on using a cannister and following your advice, is it as big an issue that early in the year? Thanks