Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Dogs and bears

This is more of a general backpacking question. Has anyone ever had a bear encounter experience while backpacking with dogs? I am planning a trip out of the Horseshoe meadows area. I've never seen a bear down there, but assume they are, and was just curious if anyone has encountered a bear with a dog present. I am going on the assumption that a dog would keep it's distance, while at the same time act as a sort of "bear repellant". Any thoughts?

I haven't had any personal experience, but I was told by a ranger near my home (southern arizona) that dogs and bears don't mix.

An area south of town that had a lot of bear sightings last summer required dogs to be on leash and had explicit warnings about dogs. They put a bear down there a couple of weeks ago. It was in a campground and didn't respond when shot with beanbags, so Game & Fish killed it.

A few years ago there were a bunch of human-bear encounters north of town, and a woman's dog tangled with a bear while she was out hiking. According to the newspaper story as I remember it, she at first thought that another dog had attacked hers. She got into the fray to try to break up the dog fight. I think her dog was okay. I remember her picture in the paper; she was covered with scratches and had a helluva shiner.

Later in that same summer in the same area, a girl on a summer camping trip was badly mauled by a black bear. I think AZ Game & Fish paid $$$$ to her after a lawsuit because there had been many bear & human encounters prior to the mauling. The girl who was mauled did not have any food in her tent and had not violated any camping-in-bear-country rules according to reports. Someone shot the bear to get it off of her. Later it was determined that a resident in the area had been feeding the bears regularly -- a woman who cried that the bears needed ice cream she provided. Details are fuzzy in my memory, but I think they could only convict her of disturbing the peace and give her a small fine because there were no laws on the books to address the case. Public awareness material published at the time suggested that bears are easily irked by dogs.

These situations are sad both for the bears and the humans.

I'll be in the Mt.Whitney area soon and I WILL be carrying Bear pepper spray.

It depends on how well your dog is trained and how wilderness-wise it is. I have two well-trained german shepherds that hike with me everywhere and they are fantastic around bears. They have hiked thousands of miles with me in the wildest country in the lower-48 states. We have encountered many grizzlies and black bears in the backcountry and believe me, bears do not like being around my dogs. My dogs do not chase them (nor do they chase any big wildlife like wolves and moose and elk, etc.), and they know how to act around them. I have never had a bear mess with my camp when my dogs are with me. They are fantastic companions and great for bear safety. They just aren't allowed in National Parks so I spend most of my time in the surrounding Wilderness Areas. I encourage anyone with smart, well-trained dogs that are under complete voice command to take them hiking, they love it just as much as we do! Here's a couple sites where I have lots of pics of my backpacking dogs! Happy Tails!

<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=440371">Buck's Wild Adventures</a>

<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=660865">Some more backpacking albums</a>