Utah200
Adventurer
They're probably reading this thread.
How do you store food while overlanding in bear country?
- Thread starter silverfstop
- Start date
They're probably reading this thread.
jeep-N-montero
Expedition Leader
If you have food in the car and they are hungry they will look until they find it, watch some of the youtube videos of bears tearing up hard sided campers and cars because they could smell food.
PIC4GOD
Adventurer
It all depends on where you are camping and how habituated the bears are to humans. Most dispersed/remote camping hasn't been a problem. I keep most of the smelly stuff and food in my fridge. I put trash in a Trasharoo and hang it high from a tree away from camp. If you are in Yosemite or other site with bear lockers you better use them. I even move my fridge with backup battery to the locker overnight and move it back to the vehicle during the day. To date I haven't had any issues with bear and my campsite. I have had bear encounters in other situations not related to camp though.
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Kerensky97
Xterra101
That was my concern too. So I treat the truck bed like the tent, no food and nothing allowed there that has hand odors.
The refrigerator is in the back of the cab and not removable without tools so I put my food bin and garbage bag in there with it. Windows and doors closed to help keep scents from getting out. Most garbage is in the emptied out ziplock bags I brought the food in. Kitchen goods and stove are cleaned but just in case they're kept away from the RTT (usually on a picnic table if I'm at a site). Washwater and any food scraps/grease that aren't in the garbage are usually poured into the firepit before making a fire. If no fire then they're dumped out far from camp. Same with "human" waste issues, also taken care of 100ft or more from camp.
Basically by time I'm going to bed at night any food or odorous object is packed in bins and those bins sealed up in the cab if the site doesn't have a bear box. Not even crumbs are left on the ground, any dropped food is incinerated.
But in nearly 40 years camping bears have never really been a problem. It's the smaller creatures that are really a pain. I've had coyotes chewing up plastic containers, chipmunks and mice eating through cardboard, and skunks walking around camp like they own the place. I think the best solution is just good general cleanliness of camp. Make sure your neighbors smell more delicious than you do and your camp has no odors that aren't natural odors that exist before you were there.
It's the old rule of surviving a bear chasing you, just surround yourself with people slower than you. Or a better way of putting it, don't make yourself a target in the first place.
Outside somewhere
Overland certified public figure brand ambassador
Well I need the cell/signal booster they are using because my service in the appalachian/smoky mountains is zero.
Outside somewhere
Overland certified public figure brand ambassador
Had a park ranger tell me you push gf/spouse down.
buckwilk
Observer
55 yrs of dealing with bears from Alaska to the Sierra have taught me a couple of things. One, it is said that bears can smell a carcass up to 20 miles away. Bears are mainly carrion eaters, they will eat anything dead and smelly. They are learners just like a dog. Some box yielded food before, it will again, regardless of where it is stored. Putting a towel over a cooler may make you feel better but the bear will just use it as a napkin. It isn't just food that will attract these guys into your world, anything with a strong smell, odor, color will attract them. I don't agree with any of the so called responses to a bear entering your world put forth these days. Everything you have been told to do when confronted by a bear have failed, many this past spring. Having operated 300 campgrounds for the N.F. in Tahoe Nat. Forest I will say bear boxes work in terms of the bear not getting your food. Beyond that all bets are off!