Bears. Advice needed.

[quazi]

Shadows on the Koyukuk by Sidney Huntington (as told by Jim Rearden) has part of a chapter devoted to how the Koyukon Athabascans hunted grizzly bears with spears.

Here's my summary of how a spear handle was chosen and tested, from pages 169-170:
The spear handle was cut in July from a birch no more than 2.5” in diameter growing on level ground. Preferably it would be cut from a slow-growing birch near a river, shaded by spruce trees. The bark was required to be pinkish-brown with no loose bark. Small, clean horizontal lines were a sign of strength. The tree was cut about a foot up from the ground.

A test piece would be cut from above the section that was going to be used as a handle. An axe would be placed across the end and driven in a short way with a baton. If it didn't split then hard, dry spruce wedges were driven into the cut. If it still didn't split it was acceptable.

The pole would be placed in the fire with the bark on to harden it. After the bark was burned off it would hung in the shade to dry for many weeks. Then it would be hardened in the fire again.

The pole would then be beaten against a tree that had its bark removed in every way the hunter thought might possibly break it. After that it would be held over a fire to expand the wood. If even a hairline crack was revealed the pole would be discarded.

Shadows on the Koyukuk is a very good book. I would definitely recommend it, especially for people interested in bushcraft. It's not a bushcraft book, but a biography of someone who lived a bushcraft lifestyle. I'm not sure why the price on Amazon is so high, I'm pretty sure it sells for $15-20 locally.

[Red Green]

in all reality, your chances of running into a bear are sorta slim but of course an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, the food hanging and the no spilling and etc. that everyone has posted is all wonderful advice. one thing that noone has said yet is that if you are confronted by an aggressive bear, don't run it is much faster than you are. don't climb a tree, it can wait, climb it too or knock it down and then you are just as fucked. Bears are not unstoppable immortal murder-beasts that everyone makes them out to be though, there are several examples of relatively ordinary people taking down bears with very little of anything
A log for instance
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3306263
this 55 year old man killed himself a bear with a small knife
http://neveryetmelted.com/2006/07/23/55 ... ith-knife/

I've camped quite a bit through Ontario & Quebec, some of it pretty far north & the only bears I've seen are while driving to or from my put in spot, usually eating in the ditches.
I read the article about the Waterloo man with the pitbull....I was impressed.

Not to say I haven't seen signs of them but I usually have a dog with me & camp on an island if possible, not foolproof as one couple in Algonquin park just started setting up camp on one of the larger islands on one of the larger lakes and was killed by an old bear who ignored the pack of hamburger left out for supper but was later found guarding the cache of bodies covered with leaf litter....this bear was shot on the spot,the man put up an awful struggle from the signs left,a splintered paddle was found as well as wounds to the bear, this was about 15 years ago.

Then about 30 years ago my eldest brother & his friend, both as drunk as lords snuck up on a bear with his head in a dumpster & one whacked him in the rear with a 2x4...neither would admit to doing the deed but both agreed that if the bear had turned on them they would have been done like dinner....dummasses.