A Philmont Journal – Part 4

Tom's other article.

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/philmont_redux_returning_scout_report.html#.Udyu3hanqDY

Enjoyed the article. Looking forward to the second one. Just came off the trail at Philmont on June 24 for my 5th time. Just a few comments. Surprised that your ranger let you take the longer way. Usually the ranger training needs to be done (Philmont procedure) and the first day is usually minimal on the mileage. FYI – The place you went is one of my favorite places on the ranch. Secondly, grouping the tents together does help keep bigger animals from wondering around the tents. I saw a bear go around spaced out tents in the 2010 Philmont trek. Sounds like that you had a good and flexible ranger. That is usually a plus.
FYI – I was also at Philmont in 1972 and then in 1974. I do remember those backpacks.

I really cant see why any one would want to go to philmont? Why would you not just bring your scouts out backpacking somewhere else?

I was in the scouts for all of 2 weeks. But have been backpacking, hunting, fishing, mt bike riding, snow boarding, snow treking, and snow shoeing since I was a boy.

I am a pretty high strung guy with a little of a short fuse (depending on when I ate last and yes im working on it) and I could not imagine having some one stand over me telling me what I can and cant do. I have a boss already I dont need another to manage my free time. I dont mind advice but orders?

I havent seen anyone else complain so maybe im alone on this. but to me their is way to much wilderness out there to spend anytime in a place like that.

It was a good read though, thank you.

Oh I see. yeah I can understand going back for nostalgia. And to show your boy your history. That makes sense to me. I shoot pictures sometimes with a polaroid for fun. It doesnt take great pics compared to todays tec but its fun still.

Hope you and your boy have great times in the hills.

Agree with the commentary about way better options than Philmont for getting outdoors (at a whole lot less cost than Philmont). Been pushing back with Mark Anderson and the leadership team at Philmont to understand all the crazy rules. They are still incredibly close minded. Here is the text of the latest responses to my questions. My response is also included. Not sure they are interested in adopting any new ways. Very disappointing that these folks call themselves Scouts.

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From Mark Stinnett, Chairman, Philmont Program & Risk Management Task Force, Philmont Ranch Committee Chairman, BSA National Outdoor Programs Committee

1. Can someone please confirm if there are now rules that prohibit turkey bag cooking, cooking in the foil packs, and cooking in ziplock bags?
Yes. These practices are not permitted at Philmont for a variety of reasons.
Regarding “cooking in the foil packs,” the foil food packages issued by Philmont are not designed or approved for direct cooking in the packages. Ziplock bags are also not designed or approved by the manufacturer for direct cooking. Although we are aware that some backpackers choose to disregard manufacturer warnings about such use, we do not teach or condone that sort of safety violation and health risk at Philmont.
Turkey bags or oven bags, of course, are appropriate for cooking, and we at Philmont are certainly familiar with their use by many backpackers on short-term outings. However, Philmont does not permit their use by crews on its treks for two important reasons, one related to safety of campers and the other to sustainability.
Use of turkey bags, multiple cooking bags, and similar creative cooking methods are all done solely to reduce cleanup time and to slightly reduce the weight of cook gear to be carried. However, these methods create an increased risk of bear problems in Philmont’ campsites by increasing cooking odors in the campsite and by leaving a food residue on the bag that then becomes a continuing and ongoing source of residual food odor. That food odor problem then persists so long as the bag is in the crew’s possession. The only two methods for disposing of the used cooking bags are to pack them out or dispose of them at one of Philmont’s staffed camps. Most Philmont staffed camps do accept garbage from crews, which must then be hauled out, usually by a commissary truck. These vehicles typically do not visit a staffed camp more than once a week, and in some cases, not that often.
While this may not seem like a big issue for a single crew like yours, it becomes a major problem for Philmont with hundreds of crews and many thousands of campers each summer. Philmont has made concerted efforts in recent years to promote sustainability and reduce the use of vehicles in its backcountry. Allowing crews to carry and use disposable turkey bags or oven bags multiplies backcountry garbage exponentially. This creates a safety issue for the crew, which has to carry the used
bags (with attractive food odors) until they are disposed of at a staffed camp or at base, and for the staff in the backcountry camp, which has to collect and store an even greater amount of odorous garbage from passing crews until such time as it can be picked up by a vehicle. Increased trash in backcountry camps requires increased vehicular traffic to pick up and haul out that garbage, and also results in increased filling of our landfill.
On balance, Philmont management, with the full support of our volunteer Ranch Committee, has determined that the overall benefits of bear safety for all crews and protection of Philmont’s environmental resources outweigh the perceived benefits to individual crews of slightly less weight to carry and easier cleanup after meals. We have found over the years that the Scouts attending Philmont are quite capable of managing the weight of crew cooking gear and individual bowls and cups, and that time spent washing dishes after a single cooked meal each day has not interfered with the Scouts’ abilities to partake of Philmont programs.

2. Do I understand correctly that Philmont is now requiring two 8-quart pots and one 6-quart pot per crew?
No. Philmont recommends such equipment for each crew, but recognizes that some crews, because of size, experience or their own equipment, may be able to make do with different sizes or numbers of pots. However, Philmont does teach and require crews to use a 3-step method for dishwashing, which requires immersion of dishes in boiling water for sanitization before the next meal. For most crews, complete immersion of personal eating gear will require at least one 8-quart pot. If your crew members all have bowls and cups that can be fully immersed in a 6-quart pot, your crew may be able to get by without an 8-quart pot.
This procedure has been reviewed and adopted by Philmont’s Health Lodge Task Force, comprised of Philmont physicians, program staff and volunteer leaders. Again, this is a safety issue for Philmont because of the nature of its operation and the large numbers of campers it accommodates. In some past years, Philmont has had issues with the occasional outbreak and spread of viral illnesses. Experience has taught us that these types of problems are effectively reduced through use of the dishwashing techniques required by Philmont. Once again, while an individual crew might deem these techniques to be excessive or unnecessary for themselves, we must consider the greater good of the thousands of campers using Philmont each summer.

3. Is Philmont insisting that all food be dumped and cooked directly in the pot?
Yes. Philmont food packaging is not designed or approved for cooking directly in the package.
One of your initial emails suggested that use of the foil packs or Ziploc bags for cooking “do not generate very dirty pots that then require introducing grey water waste into the environment.” As with most such issues, a value judgment must be made as to which method poses the least problem for the particular environment involved. For the reasons described above, Philmont has made the determination that cooking in pots, with disposal of waste water in sumps provided in most camps for that specific purpose, is the preferable course for the Philmont environment. While you or your crew may make a different value judgment that is entirely appropriate in some other environment in which you hike, while hiking at Philmont, we do expect and require crews to abide by Philmont policies. This requirement is no different than what would be expected of crews hiking in any national park, national forest, wilderness area, or state or private property, all of which have widely varying policies and requirements for users to follow.

4. Will the patrol be permitted to cook meals using methods of their own choosing provided that does not introduce additional waste?
Crews are taught by our rangers and are expected to follow Philmont’s policies as outlined above. Obviously, Philmont has no direct control of what crews choose to do after their ranger leaves them.

5. What MANDATORY items must the crew check out from PSR? Are we to leave our tents, cooking kits, dining flys, water purification filters and such home?
There are no mandatory items that a crew must check out from Philmont, so long as the crew brings with them the required crew gear as outlined in the 2013 Guidebook to Adventure. The vast majority of crews coming to Philmont do not have all of the required equipment on hand, so Philmont makes certain items of crew gear, such as tents, dining flies, etc. available for crews.
Having said that, certain items of equipment that a crew might want to bring would not be acceptable. For example, some crews want to save weight by using “tube tents,” which are little more than an extended garbage bag with no flaps or doors at either end. Such “tents” are no longer acceptable at Philmont because of bear safety precautions initiated years ago. Philmont now requires campers to sleep in a genuine tent with a flap that closes. Likewise, some campers arrive and announce that they want to sleep in hammocks. Philmont prohibits use of hammocks for the same bear safety reasons.

5. Who will decide if gear we bring is a suitable substitute for PSR gear?
Initially, that is the responsibility of the crew’s assigned ranger. If an issue arises, ultimately the Philmont Director of Program (Mark Anderson), following policies adopted and approved by the Program and Risk Management Task Force of the Philmont Ranch Committee and the Philmont Health Lodge Task Force, has that responsibility.
As set forth in the Guidebook to Adventure, these issues are best addressed before the crew arrives at Philmont.

6. I also asked questions about using our own larger bear bags, bear bag hanging systems that does not require harming the PSR trees by trampling on their roots and wrapping rope around their bark, paint strainer bags for sumping, and smaller 6 and 4 qt pots for cooking.
Crews are not required to use Philmont bear bags if they bring an adequately sized and strong enough substitute. Crews are expected to use the bear cables installed in most campsites for hanging their bear bags. Without more information on your “bear bag hanging system,” I cannot say whether it would be acceptable or not. However, if it involves hanging your crew’s bags somewhere other than the pre- installed cables provided for that purpose, the answer will be probably not. If you have a description you could provide, that would be helpful.
Paint strainer bags for sumping are not encouraged because they simply add another bag to the garbage load for each cooked meal. The “sump frisbee” Philmont provides to crews for this purpose is more environmentally friendly because it is reusable. The Philmont professional and volunteer staff certainly recognizes that paint strainer bags are lighter weight than the sump frisbee (which, of course, is not “heavy” by any stretch of the imagination). However, this is a perfect example of how Philmont has made a decision in favor of sustainability rather than convenience or preference of an individual crew.
These are the types of decisions that allow Philmont to continue to serve more than 20,000 campers every summer.
As discussed previously, 6 and 4 quart pots are permissible if the crew can meet the sanitization requirements using a 6 quart pot.

7. The issue here is not the request from our crew to use a specific method for their cooking. It is the attitude at PSR that they know the only “correct” way. . . . I would rather have expected PSR to embrace best practices from their many visiting crews. But alas, the attitude at PSR is that PSR knows the only correct way. Your insistence on a specific cooking technique is just one more example of this culture that has permeated PSR. I would ask you to stop and reevaluate your “rules” in light of the aims and methods of Scouting. We are supposed to be here to Explain, Demonstrate, Guide and Enable our youth using the principles of shared leadership. The PSR “Big Boss” style really has no place in Scouting. Philmont is supposed to be the premier backcountry experience in BSA. Might I suggest you and your staff embrace the constructive creativity of our youth rather than squashing it with your rules?
As Mr. Anderson said in one of his messages to you, for most matters relating to backpacking techniques, Philmont is not a trial site for new methods. Philmont’s policies and practices have been developed, through experience, over many years to assure a safe and quality experience for many thousands of campers each summer. To successfully operate a camp and backpacking operation of Philmont’s size requires choices that may not seem “the best” to a particular individual or crew, but are made with the overall operation in mind. An individual crew that wants to use different methods or follow its own “rules” may correctly feel that it isn’t causing any problems for Philmont, but if that was multiplied across several thousand crews, Philmont would be seriously impacted. Many Philmont policies and “rules” consider issues like sustainability and environmental protection on a ranch-wide scale that an individual crew simply doesn’t have to face. Philmont does – and those policies have allowed Philmont to continue to offer quality programs to almost a million Scouts over 75 years. If I may quote a line from an old Star Trek movie, “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
Philmont is visited annually by many advisors who have significant skills and expertise in particular program areas, such as climbing, horsemanship, shooting, or as in your case, backpacking. However, Philmont does not make exceptions to allow those individuals to demonstrate their expertise outside the established Philmont program parameters. For example, an expert mountaineer serving as a crew advisor must still sit through Philmont’s climbing safety program, must still climb with a belayer, and must still use the specific rock routes established by the Philmont program staff. An experienced horseman must still wear a helmet, must still ride in a single-file line with other inexperienced riders, and must still follow directions of Philmont’s wranglers. They follow the same rules as all other campers, even though they themselves have the skill and expertise to do the activity differently, or even better. With rare exceptions, our “expert” advisors understand and appreciate the need for policies in an operation like Philmont’s and embrace the program opportunity provided for their Scouts.
My own troop is blessed to have multiple mountain backpacking opportunities available. Several of our adult leaders are consummate backpackers with hundreds of nights of backpacking experience under their belts. On our troop outings, we use some of the same techniques you advocate (our own bear bags with lighter 550 parachute cord to secure them, 6 quart pots for cooking, paint thinner bags for sumping). However, when we do our own Philmont trek this summer, we’ll be using Philmont’s bigger bear bag ropes, 8-quart pots and sump Frisbees because we are also an experienced Philmont troop. We
recognize that Philmont’s policies are there for a reason, and that when we camp and hike at Philmont, we are expected to use the “Philmont method,” even if that isn’t the same method we use back home. Using the EDGE method you referenced, we find that Scouts are well able to understand the need for some tradeoffs between individual crew preferences and the overall camper safety and sustainability issues for an operation the size of Philmont.
This is not at all an issue of Philmont management being “close-minded” or believing that “the Philmont way is the only way.” Rather, we believe that “the Philmont way” is the best way for Philmont, and freely acknowledge that it is not the only way, and certainly not the best way, in other places. Philmont program techniques and teachings are evaluated regularly by experts, and new methods of doing any of our programs (climbing, shooting, backpacking, camping, blacksmithing, archery, mining, really anything) are continually incorporated with consideration given to individual and overall camper safety, protection of Philmont’s scarce resources, and delivery of a quality adventure experience for the many, not just the few.

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My Response

Mark;

Thank you for your responses. I appreciate the explanations. But by far the most important action I need to ask of you and the Philmont staff is to update the Philmont web site to make the answers you have provided clear to ALL crews. That is not currently the case for these particular questions.

I respectfully disagree with you reasoning behind use of turkey bags. The advantages of the turkey bag go well beyond cleanup. The turkey bag enables full hydration of the meal and avoids burnt-on reside in the pots. The Philmont technique of pouring boiling water into a second pot to hydrate the meal rarely if ever fully hydrates the meal and requires unnecessary extra space and weight for a second large pot. Use of turkey bags also permits the crew more time to participate in program rather than meal preparation and cleanup. Philmont includes foods in literally every one of their food packages that leave significant smellable residue. So I find your residue arguments against turkey bags a bit hypocritical.

Just as some foil packs are and are not rated for boiling, so are Ziplock bags. The Zip'n Steam steam bags informed crews use are fully rated by the manufacturer for boiling. So I would be very careful making statements such as "Ziplock bags are also not designed or approved by the manufacturer for direct cooking."

Crews should not be permitted to deposit garbage at staff camps. This practice is inconsistent with Leave No Trace principles that we are trying to to teach to our scouts. Insisting on Disposing on Waste Properly will help motivate the scouts to do a better job to Plan Ahead and Prepare. This latter point is a LNT principle not because scouts need to be preparing to go backpacking. It is there because scouts need to be preparing to minimize their backcountry impact. Dropping the practice to allow crews to deposit waste at staff camps would also help you meet your objective to minimize your vehicular traffic.

Our strainer bags are reused. In fact, only one strainer bag is used by each crew for their entire Philmont trek. They are no more "smellable" than the Philmont frisbee.

I would call your attention to the bear bagging system initially proposed by Al Geist many years ago. I personally demonstrated a very similar method to the chief ranger and his staff a few years ago. It employs a releasable hook for the bear cable, a block and tackle system with much smaller line, and is tied off with a jamming method that eliminates the need to harm trees. The mechanical advantage of the block and tackle also eliminates the need for a second set of ropes for the "oops" bag.

Many state and national parks will restrict the types of fires, group sizes, specify human waste practices, and approve certain bear bag containers/methods. But I have yet to come across any park that insisted on policies of pot sizes, cooking techniques, specific sizes of ropes, tent types (short of insisting on clustering all campers for bear safety), etc. The statistics for the Grand Canyon for last year were over 300,000 backcountry campers restricted to far fewer backcountry campsites than are available at Philmont. And the GCNP is a far more sensitive environment than Philmont. The Great Smokey Mountains National Park is probably the most comparable to Philmont in that is is about four times the size and has about four times the annual backcountry user load, albeit with a similar count of established campsites. The user density for most of the state parks is off the scale when compared to Philmont's 22,000 campers. Yet I cannot name a single one of these state or national parks that require the degree of intervention you and Mark Anderson are prescribing for Philmont. And despite backcountry lore, I find our trained Boy Scouts to be far better stewards of the environment than the majority of the users I have encountered on my many trips to state and national parks. So Philmont should really not be having as much trouble as would appear to be the case from the Philmont "rules." I would encourage you to dig a bit deeper to find the root causes of the sustainability challenges at Philmont rather than regulating the symptoms.

Mike Mercer
Crew Advisor
Ultralight Backpacking Instructor
LNT Master Educator

Yup. In 2010 I "pretended" to hike 96 miles with my crew. I would have liked to have "pretend" to hike more this year but my trek was limited by the fires. All the kids seemed to be smiling and having a good time. Maybe they were "pretending" too?

BK

Actually I think if you read the article you'll see that there are a good many folks that go to Philmont who have done lots of backpacking. Hence we are often frustrated with the rules. Are there many who have not done some/any backpacking going to Philmont? You bet. Are they pretending? I don't think so. They will have a wonderful memory to take home about the West, the Rockies and also will have the basic fundamentals to take their own kids backpacking some day. Isn't that a good thing?

Scouting is a team sport. The biggest part of Scouting is learning leadership skills, along with training, to build a crew of people, with different physical makeups and outdoor experience, into a cohesive unit that works together. Getting a crew to work together is a skill that will be used on a daily basis for a lifetime. Sorry your kid missed that.

As far as adults attending, I have nothing but respect for any Dad or Mom who takes two weeks off from work to sleep on the ground and huff up a mountain. Your kid must be lucky to have a parent that does. Most don't. Maybe he needs to be reminded of that?

BK

I just got back from my first trip to Philmont. Interesting to read the various perspectives and perceptions here. For our trek, we implemented as many UL tactics as we could ($$ being the biggest constraint) for the crew that didn't go too much against what PSR wants you to do. It didn't get us near UL range but I was happy with the results. Overall, we did fairly well with our heaviest pack sans water being 36 lbs and our lightest being 25. That was with 3 days of food (~8 lbs). Compared to the 45-60 lbs we saw in the other crews, that was pretty good. I got quite a few "how did you do that??"'s when I weighed in.

Tom, you probably know our ranger very well. Good kid. :-)

There are many reasons someone would want to go to the ranch. For some it is nostalgia. For others it's their only opportunity to have a 10 day backpacking experience that doesn't put a ton of planning stress on working parents. I don't see myself happily doing meal planning and logistics for a 12 person crew on a 10 day trip. No, it's not a true wilderness. It's a controlled outdoor experience where hopefully, a kid gets the bug to go out again using some of the things he learned on the way.

I do think some of the rules the management imposes are bordering on archaic. Many of the rangers agreed. They could do a lot to encourage crews to use their own creativity to meet a few guidelines vs forcing "their way". If PSR was truly interested in cutting out some of the trash, they would lose the individually wrapped food items and stick with smaller portions. No one needs all the empty calories they are serving. We always had leftovers and it was always one kid's job to gut sump it. It wasn't always easy, but he took care of it. The result was the next day he was checking in to the Red Roof Inn's way too much. Talk about adding waste!!! In Philmont's attempt to force you to cook in the patrol method, they are totally contradicting their request to reduce trash. Meal prep was always the job of two scouts. They got more team building skills out of having to set up the other crew gear while food was being prepared. I feel much better using one bag to store and cook my dinner entree and then combine the bags into one. If PSR didn't allow staff camp trash dumps, they would be forced to lighted up their food items. That just means lighter food loads and lighter pack weights (good things IMO). I think the go a little overboard with the bear threat regarding smellables. Sure you don't store food in your tent EVER. I'd like to see one documented case of a bear going in to an occupied tent because the kid had a spot of chillimac on his pants. Hanging bear bags took way too long and lighter loads would mean less time doing so.

Philmont often takes a misconception and treats it as a fact. Take for example, tree protection. We got fussed at several times for using a piece of cord (reflective) as a clothesline in the tree because we might damage the bark. What are people doing each time they tie a 40lb bag of food up on a cable? — tying it to a tree. All I was trying to do was dry some clothes and they would prefer me to put them on the tree branches. You could say the same thing for hammocks too. For the miniscule "damage" they do to the bark, the tent crushing vegetation is way worse. I know there were several places I would have loved a level sleeping surface.

While I agree with some of the sentiments of the corniness of some of the programs, keep in mind you are trying to keep the interest of kids who are, more likely than not, over-stimulated back home with media. Simply hiking from point to point may be paradise for adults, it may get pretty boring for kids and there are days were you don't have a program to do. The programs that our kids like the most were of activities I would never do while on a regular backpacking trip (know of any UL tomahawks or spar pole climbing gear?). If you only want to do hiking, then PSR is not a place you want to go. The scenery is fantastic, but there are much more wild places that offer the same thing for a fraction the cost of admission. Anyone who takes enormous pride in how they can hike 20 miles a day and easily gets annoyed with others who can't or want to take breaks, doesn't really get what the point of doing a PSR trek is. You are there to work as a team and you aren't gaining much by employing the hurry up and wait tactic when you can hike 4 mph and your campsite is only 6 miles away. Maybe your crew mates want to enjoy the scenery and aren't in such a hurry to set up camp and do nothing. It's not a race.

Pretending to hike??? Really? Sorry, that comes across as incredibly arrogant and counter to what attracts many to activities like backpacking. No one on my trek was pretending the grades on the trails weren't steep in places. I didn't see anyone pretending to be deal with the hail and high winds coming through. Sure we came out healthy, but I wasn't really interested in coming home with an injury – pretend or otherwise. How exactly does one "pretend" to hike 70-100 miles in 10 days with a group of kids at various fitness levels over similar terrain you would find at other mountain ranges?

I would definitely go back sometime, even with some of the rules. We had a great time and I like the chances of a kid getting hooked on backpacking much more in an environment were he/she can do more than just hike. I know my son's willingness to go out more increased. For that I'm happy.

I know what you mean about some taking forever to get their stuff together. We were always an hour to 90 mins in getting camp put up. We had a few done in 10 minutes and others who simply take forever to drag their butts out of bed and get moving. I know it drives some people nuts but why? That's the hurry up and wait paradox for you. Get there to sit around. If the people who are dragging do get done sooner, there's an expectation to be faster for what reason? It never got that hot for us. For us a lot of the causes of delay were from all of the "Philmont Ways" of doing things. We boil water in pots. Why did those have to sit by the sump? Why was the fuel stored in another location? We had rain every day on our trek and several times it took us time to clean up gear or dry out tents so we weren't hauling 5 lbs of extra water and dirt. Throw in breakfast time and we were always getting out at the same time. We only missed one program the whole time and that happened to be on the day we did our conservation project, then had one of our longest hikes mostly uphill. We weren't really up to doing much more than eating and going to bed then anyhow. Fitness levels are going to vary amongst any crew. Trying to get people who are somewhat close isn't always possible. You may have some dealing with injuries or others who want to take in scenery and enjoy the trip as much as the destination. There's got to be some give and take or conflicts start arising. I suspect most crews work out their break schedules where it works best for them. We used the caterpillar method to give everyone a regular break to do whatever they needed and keep us together. Outside lunch or a nice vista, we didn't stop (diet change induced increases in cathole/latrine visits not withstanding). Any group like that is about team work. You stay together and help out the kid who is struggling. Getting annoyed because one member can't keep up the max pace for whatever reason isn't helping anyone.

Thanks Mike for your efforts.

RE: LNT –

I agree with your observations on garbage disposal an LNT method would be better.

In addition, on our last trip in 2011, the bear bag ropes wrapped around the trees produced very visible bark damage – all the way down to the phleom. In fact, I took several pictures of that at each camp to illustrate what not to do in my LNT presentations. I had hoped to hear that by now at least the use protective stand-off sticks to protect the bark from rope wrap would have been encouraged. (If they are unwilling to step up and utilize a modified PCT method, such as the Al Geist system)

For a Scout to earn the Leave No Trace Achievement Award, one of the prerequisites that he must have the Environmental Science merit badge … a merit badge that teaches conservation, with water conservation having an prominent role. Too bad Philmont does not fully recognize the need or practice of water conservation in the back country even though ironically, water conservation is one of the commitments in the Philmont Wilderness Pledge … especially when approaching it's cooking method. The cleaning required for that approach wastes water, time, and fuel (from unnecessary boiling of water), in addition to increasing the generation of fossil fuel emissions.
Philmont unfortunately hasn't recognized that its approach less sustainable.

RE: Cooking Approach –
Yes, "Philmont includes foods in literally every one of their meal packages that leave significant smellable residue" and combined with the smellable residue left over rehydrated food from the sump strainer, the Philmont cooking "method" definitely generates odorous garbage and as a by-product of it, renews smellable contamination in the pots themselves after each dinner and the sump strainer itself (which are both avoidable with water conservation methods) …

Philmont has the potential to be a showcase. Seemingly an unfulfilled potential at this point.

When I went to Philmont in 2000 there were a good number of bear incidents on the Ranch. I was allowed to hang out in the radio room my last night with one of our guys and listened to a few of the reports as they came in. If I remember correctly there were 5 call ins that night about bears. We passed several sumps that were dug out by bears. For some reason that year was bad. Drought, overpopulation of bears, bad mast year could have caused the problems. I don't have a clue why it was bad.

One call that night was for an attack with injuries. Apparently a kid had thrown up on himself and had some residue on his shirt. The only reason I know a little more about it is that the kid later roomed next to my kid in college. He told the story and we put the facts together to assume he was the scout in the report. The scout in question was bitten in the head which required many stiches. The adult leaders fought the bear off with trekking poles as I understand it.

Another attack was on a kid who had eaten the Gatorade out of the package like a pixie stick. The bear followed the trail of Gatorade left by the kid right to him. That's all I heard about it.

I've been to Philmont 5 times. This year I actually saw a glimpse of a bear with cubs. Otherwise I've never seen a bear at Philmont. All I'm saying is I guess incidents happen there. Maybe that's why there's so much attention given to the bear procedures.

BK

While it is nice to hear about the stand-off sticks, it is too bad the trees are being used as belay pins to provide enough friction to control the rope when lowering down the bear bags … yup, the tie-off trees are then definitely sacrificial.
Need either tie-off poles to concentrate the impact or start utilizing a modified PCT method, such as the Al Geist system to eliminate that type of impact.

Concentrated Impact is apart of LNT. Old school would have it listed as "Concentrate Impacts in High Use Areas", current practice lists it in "Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces", specifically when talking about high use areas such as "camp on sites that are so highly impacted that further careful use will cause no noticeable impact"

… and there are still the other 6 LNT principles to observe !

I too, unfortunately have seen your observations. With the Wilderness Pledge and LNT preached, Philmont certainly talks the talk, and it should still strive to develop into a showcase to the boys on how best practices are done … in other words be able to walk the talk.