Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Carry a Bear Canister?

According to the Mt. Whitney ranger station permits ARE free. What you are paying for is the reservation to hold your permit for that day. If you walk in and ask for a permit you don't have to pay a dime.

While in my earlier post I did say that I would be in favor of raising the permit fee ten times above the current limit, I spoke with hyperbole. Paying $150 per person to enter the Whitney zone is going to seem excessive to most people and would do much to keep those with fewer financial resources out of the mountains and I am not an advocate of a $150 fee. I am very much in favor of seeking measures that will mitigate our impact on the mountains. I hope you will agree with me that you would much rather visit the great outdoors in a pristine condition rather than befouled by a few careless citizens who went before you. I personally would pay an extra couple of bucks if that money could be used to help maintain the area. I would also welcome stricter trail quotas to keep the crowds down to a smaller size. In general I do not favor big government and I often find myself in the Libertarian camp favoring a greatly reduced role of government in our lives, but there are exceptions, and I believe the stewardship of our punblic lands for future generations is one of them. In this area I believe that regulations, permits, and trail quotas are for the public good and will ultimately help us maintain some sembelance of nature for our children's children.

As for what Muir would think I believe he would very much be in favor of taking action that made people more aware of the natural world around them and preserved it for future generations. He was very much against the overuse of land and some of his first environmental battles were to limit access to public lands including Tuolomne Meadows. I am paraphrasing, but his argument was that it is possible for the public to love the land too much. Of course he was also angered by the over abundance of sheep in the area, but he also mentioned the negative impact of man in trying to gain some type of protected status for the meadows.

Thank you RangerJoe regarding your input on the application of registration fees.

it unfortunatly has been several years since i been up whitney. post was mentioned about the bear boxes becoming dumpsters. right noe the portal boxes are always full of stuff people have left for a few days, or longer. will we have to get more rangers to keep the boxes at outpost and trail camp from getting stuff left in them? "well i was on my way down didn't need that, and didn't feel like carrying it, so i left it". also i watched bears tear into improperly hung food in '98. saw bear scat on the trail up to trail camp in '99. and was warned bears were up there. i would certainly like boxes at outpost and trail but i think we would have to have more forest service personel to poliice them. of course m,aybe everyone likes the sound of helicopters landing every couple of days to empty the boxes of 'left behind' stuff...

I agree with the posters who don't like fees for use of the wilderness. The National and State Forests, Parks, etc. should be covered by taxes. Fees are just a selective, hidden tax. You can drive the interstates for free but have to pay for this or that bridge, etc. But, this is not the fault of the Forest Service.

I am not against restricted access, but increasing the cost is not the way to do it. Whitney is a crowded wilderness area, but it's still a wilderness area. I, for one, would like to keep it that way.

I can understand complaining about the rules up to a point. However, I'd rather have the Forest Service protecting bears by requiring cannisters than adopt an every person for himself attitude.

The fact that some guy has been to Trail Camp over 30 times and never seen a bear simply doesn't mean that there is no bear problem there. The fact that someone else thinks we should all get by with hanging food does not change the fact that bears are getting better at defeating such schemes. In neither case does the know-it-all have to be the one to deal with the real-life problem. Bear cannisters may or may not be operkill for Trail Camp, and that can be debated here. But pretending that there is no problem or that we should do things as we did in the old days is silly.

uhh Ranger Joe

if I show up unanounced, unreserved, and unpaid for on any given day of June, July, or August, what are my chances of getting a Whitney permit, slim or none? So for all practical purposes, you have to pay for a Whitney permit, and the distinction you make does not exist.

Mike

Hmmm...

I doubt if anyone "approves" of double taxation. Yet, if you were to try and list all of the ways we are double, triple, or even quadruple taxed, I doubt if you could. The Forest Service is hardly the perpetrator of this. If you don't like it, you've got your wonderous representatives in Washington (either party - both are just as bad) to thank, not the NFS. You're blaming the wrong entities.

Basically, the NFS budget is cut so that money can be siphoned off to some Congressperson's pet pork-barrel project so they can get re-elected. The NFS is told, "Make do". They get less money and are asked to do more. Result: Wilderness "Adventure Passes" and fees for services like managing the huge impact of everyone who wants to climb Mt. Whitney. Yeah, these are nothing but taxes by another name, but it's Congress that's making it happen.

Someone mentioned that driving on the highway was free, except for tolls for bridges, etc. Please! Here in California the numbers are usually posted in the gas stations, but between the Fed and State govt's, something like 40 some odd cents out of every gallon of gas you buy goes to Federal and State coffers (sorry, I didn't look lately and forget the exact amount). Not to mention automobile registration fees. Unfortunately those billions of dollars too, are siphoned off and used for many purposes other than highways. If they weren't, every road would be in perfect condition.

It's ironic that having to pay a few dollars for a permit is such a sore spot. If you think about it, there are thousands if not millions of people who's taxes are supporting the National Park System, who never, ever set foot in a national park or climb a mountain, etc. If it weren't for them - and we each had to bear the full proportional cost of our usage of these systems, permits would cost $10,000 instead of $15.

Seems to me those folks are the ones who have something to complain about. Frankly, I'm grateful that there are systems in place to (for example) manage the waste of the 175 or so humans on the Whitney Trail every day. I've stepped over human feces up on Trail Crest before and it wasn't a pretty sight. Can't imagine what'd be like if those toilets weren't there.

Back to the topic about bear cannisters. I just got back from a 3 day hike in Desolation Wilderness and of the several camps I saw not one had food properly counterbalanced. If a bear was around they would have gotten the food and I did indeed come across a pile of remains from a successful bear raid from the last couple of weeks. I love my cannister because it is so easy and saves me time. I left it home on this trip because of the length of the trip and access to big trees. A mother and 2 cubs once spent a night tearing down branches in a tree my food was properly hung in and the morning found a pile of branches at the bottom of the tree but my food intact.

Throcker - while I agree with your sentiments about people being on their own in the wilderness your idea of letting the idiots learn by losing their food is the same as saying a bear must die because of irresponsible people. Once a bear gets human food it is almost certain death. I think carrying a bear cannister for that reason is enough.

Cmore - I'm not crazy about the fees but you have to admit Whitney is a special place that requires special management. The Forest SERVICE is actually bending the rules to give as much opportunity to the masses to complete this hike. I don't understand so much bad sentiment with people trying to perform an honorable occupation. There is so much wilderness out there that is much more beautiful and wild than Whitney that can be visited for free year round. Just because it is higher by a couple hundred feet than many more beautiful mountains makes it more special? I think a lot of people need to consider some peoples passion for Whitney and wilderness goes beyond ticking off another peak because it is the highest. Unfortunately people forget that Whitney is in a Wilderness because it certainly is not a good representation of what wilderness is. I think 15 busks to experience Whitney is the bargain of a lifetime. The popularity of Whitney has overwhelmed the massive USFS budget so a special tax that pays just for that area has to cover the extra expense or else other areas would be cut. I'm sorry that some people refer to the rangers and USFS personel as morons but the truth is they are necesarry because of the high number of morons who visit the mountain daily.

I passed on my Whitney trip this week to instead visit a quiet corner of a wilderness area only to be disheartened by illegal campsites, improper food storage and barking dogs brought up by morons. I wish a ranger was nearby but I guess they were all busy building toilets and carrying trash off of overused mountains.

Did anyone happen to see the LA Times article in last week's paper about bear canisters? I believe it was in Thursday's paper (August 14). The article discussed why bear canister's are important and how they are tested. It was pretty interesting reading and I reccommend it to others to read.

Yeah, pretty interesting piece - "The Packers Versus the Bears" was on Thursday , Front Page, Column I. You can go to www.latimes.com but at this point I think you have to register to read it ( no charge). Kind of a hoot how the test bear up in Folsom, CA was labeled a thug and ruined the dreams of a few bear canister developers.

I tried to read the article but they wanted $ for more than the first few lines.

I live 2 miles from Fisher the bear here in Folsom and have known that bear for 10 years. It's good to know he's doing good work. They just built a new habitat for that bear and for the first time in a long time he's got a decent prison cell. That zoo is unique in that it only takes in exotic animals beyond the ability of the owners or otherwise homeless animals. Fisher would have been another destroyed bear due to his constant raids at the Convict lake campground but the Folsom zoo saved him from his death sentence.

Try again..... use the URLS provided. I just accessed the article and the video momments ago.
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Here is the original Article: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-me-bear15aug15004424,1,918681.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage

Here is Video showing the bear and the Ursak: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-fishert***ear-video,1,2515014.realvideo?coll=la-headlines-frontpage

The Packers Take On the Bears

Keeping campers' food from prying paws is not easy. Apparently reliable receptacles must pass an unusual quality-control test.
By Steve Chawkins
Times Staff Writer

August 15, 2003

If you want to make good in the bear-canister business, you go up to Folsom with hat in hand and pay your respects to Fisher — a larcenous, no-neck, knuckle-dragger who could take your face off with a lazy flick of his wrist.

Fisher is a 580-pound black bear. He used to be what wildlife types call a "problem bear," snatching fish guts and scaring anglers at a fish-cleaning station near Bridgeport in the eastern Sierra Nevada. Now he is a quality-control expert at the Folsom City Zoo Sanctuary — stomping, whacking and ripping with his massive jaws the cans, bags and boxes designed to keep backpackers' food away from hungry bears in the wild.

One of the big tests for a new product is an hour with Fisher. If he manages to smack open a supposedly bear-proof receptacle loaded with goodies, it will be rejected by a committee of park officials called the Sierra Interagency Black Bear Group. But if Fisher can't crack it, officials will endorse it for use by the tens of thousands of hikers who trek to Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks and the Inyo National Forest each year.

"He's sent many an inventor back to the drawing board," said Roberta Ratcliff, a zoo spokeswoman. "He's a pro."

Fisher is a key player in the small but growing industry devoted to thwarting hungry bears. In areas of the Sierra that draw a lot of backpackers, bears have gotten wise to the old camping precaution of dangling a sack of food from a rope or tree limb. Now they make quick work of nylon bags filled with candy bars and freeze-dried beef stroganoff, crawling out on flimsy branches and swiping at ropes with the skill of pirates scooting up to a crow's-nest.

As a result, campers in some bear-rich national parks and forests in California, Washington and Alaska must tote food canisters that bears can't open or risk a $150 fine.

The market is dominated by bulky, drum-like cans that cost $60 to $200. Many hikers find them to be a pain in the backpack, but their discomfort has put entrepreneurs on the scent of opportunity. In Santa Barbara, retired aerospace engineer Allen DeForrest and two longtime colleagues mortgaged their homes to develop a lightweight canister called the Bearikade.

In three tests, Fisher punctured the space-age composites used to make the prototype Bearikades, succeeding where two grizzly bears at the Fresno Zoo had failed. The Fresno bears, Betsy and Ross, had scrutinized a Bearikade smeared with blood and filled with rotting meat, carefully inspecting it for seams and even tipping it on its side to expose its weakest point.

"They went at it kind of like engineers," DeForrest said. "Fisher used brute force. He had no regard at all for his teeth or his gums or his lips."

DeForrest eventually thwarted Fisher with an improved design, but San Francisco attorney Tom Cohen hasn't been as fortunate.

Bulletproof Kevlar

A few years ago, Cohen, who once hauled a heavy canister over the 211-mile John Muir Trail, invented the Ursack, a lightweight, scrunchable bag initially made of bulletproof Kevlar. A bear in the Adirondacks shredded an early Ursack, so Cohen found a stronger fabric and had it sewn with even tighter seams.

Then came Fisher.

Cohen poured a quart of honey into his new, improved Ursack, added some bagels for heft and looped the bag's Kevlar cords around a concrete post in Fisher's den. When Fisher lost interest after grappling with it for just 3 1/2 minutes, Cohen jubilantly declared a technical knockout.

But officials with the interagency group turned down Cohen's bid for approval, citing five punctures from Fisher's teeth. Cohen pointed out that Fisher, who goes unfed before his testing sessions, didn't bother to suck the honey through the holes.

"If we can ever get them to change their minds, we'll have a real business," said Cohen, who has hired an attorney and is considering a lawsuit.

Texas engineer Bruce Warren, the inventor of a canister he calls the Stealth Can, is also frustrated, contending he could sell "jillions" of units if the interagency group were more open to innovation.

Warren readily admits that any bear could slice the Stealth Can like a tomato. But, he says, bears won't even approach the can, which ordinarily is used for hazardous waste, because its vacuum-sealing lid traps all food aromas inside. The cans, loaded with Oreo co****s and other delicacies, sat on a New Mexico trail untouched for two weeks as bears padded by, Warren said.

But Harold Werner, an ecologist at Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks, as well as a founder of the interagency group, was skeptical.

"No matter how good the seal is, you'll still have food odors associated with it," he said. A greasy fingerprint on the outside of the can would be enough to draw a hungry bear, he added.

Bears have an extraordinary sense of smell — more than seven times sharper than a bloodhound's, by some estimates.

That makes wildlife biologists like Tom Smith all the more astonished by the chutzpah of some outdoorsmen when it comes to storing food.

"Some of these people!" said Smith, a bear expert with the United States Geological Survey in Anchorage. "One guy in a field camp tied some bacon to the center pole of his tent so he and his buddy could defend it if they had to. He woke up one night with a bear standing on his back, and his friend shot it."

Tug-of-War

Last year, a bear in Yosemite snagged Michael Stanfield's food bag and the long rope it was hanging from. Grabbing the rope's other end, the 55-year-old Jamestown carpenter engaged in a futile tug-of-war with the beast.

"I was being a bit of an idiot," admitted Stanfield.

That night, he hung his backpack with his few remaining provisions, including a grapefruit, from a higher limb and slept at the base of the tree. In the morning, he realized that tactic had also been a mistake when he discovered a cleaned-out peel only inches from his head.

In Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon, bears jump on car roofs, pry off doors, shatter windshields and rip up back seats to get at food stored in trunks. In Yosemite five years ago, hungry bears staged a months-long demolition derby in parking areas, smashing open more than 1,300 vehicles. The number dropped to 306 in 2000 after rangers started requiring the use of bear-proof food lockers at campsites.

Rick Agnelli, a camping-goods salesman at Recreational Equipment Inc. in Northridge, saw the flattened wreckage after a notorious bear at Yosemite flung himself on a tent "to see what would come out." Fortunately, the tent was unoccupied.

A few years ago, a bear rifled Agnelli's backpack as he slept. Although Agnelli had stored his food in a bear-proof locker, the bear nonetheless ripped through every plastic bag it found in the pack.

"They were just extra bags, but the bear associated them with food," Agnelli said.

Because bears associate food with people, "they simply pursue people with a ready source of food," said Werner, a 23-year park veteran who one year early in his career was forced to shoot seven bears that were deemed incorrigible.

With hundreds of encounters between humans and bears occurring in the Sierra each year, wildlife officials over two decades have tried to increase safety for both.

Engineering Challenge

In the early 1980s, they turned to Richard Garcia, owner of a machine shop in nearby Visalia. His assignment: Come up with a way to keep human food out of ursine paws.

Today, Garcia's company is the oldest and biggest maker of bear canisters.

"It was a real engineering challenge," he said. "You had to make them light, but also big enough to keep a bear from getting his jaws around them."

Garcia's first models were 5 pounds — a millstone to backpackers, who aim to shed every needless ounce. Today, Garcia's canisters are made from highly durable plastic and weigh 2.7 pounds. Campers usually unlatch them with a coin — a technique well beyond the average bear. "You have to outsmart them," Garcia said.

At the Folsom zoo, Fisher has more than once used his mighty legs for leverage after tossing a canister into his pool, jamming it into an underwater crack and bending down to grab it between his jaws.

Although he has a couple of understudies who also test canisters a couple of times a year, Fisher is still the king.

Stories about him abound. There was the time five grunting men carried a jam-packed, bear-proof food locker into his den. With one colossal paw, Fisher sent it sailing. The zoo's Roberta Ratcliff said she has seen him extend his arm through hard plastic into a picnic cooler.

"He didn't pop off the lid," she said. "He just reached in."

At Sequoia and Kings Canyon, Werner has seen bears like Fisher in the wild more times than he can count. Little wonder that he vacations in the desert or at the beach — anywhere but bear country.

"My car must reek of food," he said. "Why take the risk?"

Thanks for posting that Paul - A good read.