[Schenk]

[Chief Joseph]

[hikersarenumber1]

[hikersarenumber1]

[iron]

ok, i will only hike on straight trails or above treeline. perish the thought if i'm off-trail somewhere.

[olderthanIusedtobe]

Yeah, nobody hikes in the Northern Rockies due to potential threat of grizzly bears...wait a minute... I'd rather not run into a griz at point blank range, but this thread (and every other similar thread ever) seem like sky is falling hysteria to me. There are plenty of places that have healthy griz populations and they aren't out there eating people on a daily basis.

[gb]

I don't know that much about Woodland Caribou (except food - lichen and height of lichen in winter) but Parks Canada in Jasper National Park has made extra steps to separate Caribou from humans. You should be able to find an article from Parks Canada on management of Caribou habitat.

[gb]

[hikersarenumber1]

[Chief Joseph]

My main issue with Griz reintroduction into NCNP is that it's not like there is any shortage of Griz in the US, some things should be left alone.

[RumiDude]

I remember a trip in late September in ONP about six or seven years ago. Myself and a friend did the loop from Sol Duc to Appleton to Cat Creek Basin to High Divide and back to Sol Duc via Deer Lake. We saw seven black bears that day, some of them at relative close quarter of about 15 to 30 feet distance. The bears were all either moving away from us or ignored us as they ate huckleberries. On the way down off the High Divide to Deer Lake, we met a couple coming up to the High Divide. We eagerly told them our bear sightings, the last of which was only about 150 feet back up the trail. The woman was very nervous as we told our tale and pulled out two cans of bear spray. I tried to reassure her that the bears were nothing to be afraid of but she was not assuaged from her vigilant grasp of her two cans of bear spray. I thought to myself she was worried about nothing. After all, ONP only had nice black bears, not those terrible grizzlies. But in actuality, since 2000, more people have been killed by black bear than by grizzly. From this little Ask A Bear column in Backpacker Mag: "In the 2000s, there have been 27 fatal incidences so far in North America, resulting in 29 deaths. 15 were in Canada, three were in Alaska, two were in Tennessee, and single fatal attacks happened in New York, New Mexico, California, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Utah and Montana. 17 of those attacks were perpetrated by black bears, and 10 by grizzlies." List of fatal bear attacks in North America Most of us feel comfortable in the wild with black bears but some seem afraid of grizzly beyond what the statistics warrant. NOTE: I don't think we should be complacent around black bears. They are wild animals which are capable of killing a human fairly easily. IIRC, cattle theft is a much bigger issue for ranchers than is predation from all species. Of course individual ranchers have varying degrees of issue with predation depending on location. Also ranchers are compensated for their losses. Rumi

[Chief Joseph]

Another example of environmentalist tampering is here in Priest Lake, Idaho. They want to get rid of the Mackinaw who are non-native and restore Mountain Whitefish, which are native to the lake. The Mackinaw were introduced for sporting purposes in the early 1900's and are a very invasive, predatory species. They have now have a year around season and no catch limit on the Maks...which while that's a very good thing for the Sport fisherman, imho it will have little impact on the population, there simply aren't enough fisherman catching many fish. Also (and thankfully) it's a huge lake, so they can't simply poison it as they do small lakes and start new. This is a good example of something that should be left alone, the 'damage' is done and there really is no sensible way to undo it.

[treeswarper]

How much money are you willing to throw at the bears? What is a griz worth? I expect it'll cost a lot to catch and dump the bears. Then there will have to be more $$ for studies and monitoring. But, if the goal is to have a "real" wilderness, there's no need for trail maintenance because a "real" wilderness would not have maintained trails so that money could be switched over to the bear project. I've talked to one old timer who spent a lot of time in the Pasayton area, before it was "wilderness". They never saw a grizzly there and he maintains that the habitat is not there to support any more of the bears. That's assuming that there is bear or two in the area wandering around. There's a few other modern factors. Salmon are pretty much non-existent (another species in trouble) and mule deer winter range now is pockmarked with second homes-the Methow Valley. Maybe we can make a new garbage dump to make sure the grizzlies don't starve. I really don't think the food they need is abundant to support any more bears in that area but maybe they'll learn to eat the hikers? This will be interesting to follow. I remember having a discussion about this 30 years ago and it was predicted it would never happen because the Seattle folks would raise a big commotion about having scary bears in their playground. We shall see.

[Backpacker Joe]

North Cascades heck. My neighbor saw one in his back yard in Cle Elum a year before I moved there. And before you ask, yes he knows what he's looking at. He's bear hunted in Alaska before.

[hikersarenumber1]

We had tracks confirmed by wildlife people on the property I grew up on in E. WA. My brother and I and dogs and ponies and other kids I'm sure... ran all over the country side. No issues.