A Reflective version of the Ultraglide Bear Line. Who wants it??

Greeting,
How long is not long? So the part that touches say bark,lasts how long? Compared that to the reflective part that touches no Rough areas?
Cheers!

I've used other reflective cords for bear bag lines, and I've just accepted that wear is natural and they'd eventually need to be replaced. Truthfully, I never gave it much thought and it didn't csuse me much worry.

So my question would be, would the tracers in the ultra glide line wear out any faster than other reflective cord used as bear bag line? If not, I'd be fine with than.

Also, would the tracers have any appreciable affect on the friction between the line and the tree branch? I'd expect some, but as long as it glides noticeably better than standard reflective line, it would still be worth it to me.

All in all, a reflective bear line idoes make it easier to find, particularly in seasons where it gets dark early, so I'm comfortable with these reasonable trade offs.

Along 50' of rope, even if there was heavy wear, you should get enough reflection to easily find your bear hang in the dark.

I've been using Lawson's glowire for a couple of years and Bluewater's heavier reflective cord before that. Can't imagine going back to a non-reflective cord for my bear bag kit, unless I didn't want to find my hang at night… or were only using developed campsites ala Glacier NP.

I'd buy some at that price; if it really is that much more slippery, is lightweight, holds knots well, isn't extremely tangle-prone, AND reflective, well that would just about be perfection!

Maybe I am thinking wrong about this. Twenty or thirty years ago we were hanging our food in Yosemite, before the bear canister mandate came along. We always tried to use the darkest and least visible cord available. That was usually a parachute-type cord, and usually black or dark green. The food bags themselves were usually dark color as well.

Yes, that makes it harder for the human to see, but more importantly it makes it harder for the bears to see. Yosemite black bears operate partly by instinct and memory of where the backpacker camps are, then partly by smell, and then partly by sight. When it was a dark sky night, they had a hard time seeing the bag and line, so they had to operate by smell. Often, which is how we planned it, they got it wrong, and they would climb the wrong tree in search of the smell. That allowed the humans to wake up and defend the proper tree.

When putting the bag up and when taking it down, humans have the luxury of using a headlamp for visibility. You know why bears don't use a headlamp? Because they don't have opposable thumbs, so they can't open up the headlamp case to change batteries.

Where we used the highly visible lines and bags had to be for the decoys. We would hang up empty brown paper bags with short white parachute cords. The bears would go after those first, and that noise would allow us to wake up and defend the proper tree as before.

–B.G.–

"Along 50' of rope, even if there was heavy wear, you should get enough reflection to easily find your bear hang in the dark."

Even more to the point, the reflective material will wear away quickest where it gets the most abrasion, and won't wear away in spots where it hardly ever gets abrasion. The portion of the cord that will get the most abrasion is the middle, and even if you define "the middle" as everything but the last several feet on each end that's still fine, that non-reflective portion will be from roughly eye level and up. The ends of the line won't see much abrasion so will continue to reflect from the bottom up the first few feet, plenty to see it so you won't trip over it or clothesline yourself.

"When it was a dark sky night, they had a hard time seeing the bag and line, so they had to operate by smell."
I love it… a decoy bear hang!

Reflective blaze yellow and orange cord has been part of my kit for years and I've experienced very little bear activity around my hangs. But bears that mess with food up here are dealt with in quite a bit different manner than in Yosemite!

Another option is to have the reflective tracer separate from the line.

You would connect it to the bear bag just before pulling the bag up into place.

It would look like tinsel hanging on a christmas tree.

You would only need about 10-12 feet or so.

It doesn't come in contact with the branches, so no wear.

Very light weight.

It would have more reflective surface area to be seen.

Less work for Lawson.

The wear is about equal to my glowire in the areas the reflective tracer comes in contact with the bark. Areas that do not contact the bark would be of no issue. While there hasn;t been much activity on this forum, I have received a quite few more emails from interested people, so I am going to go ahead and start making a reflective version as well. I will offer both and let you guys choose which one you want.

Thanks,
Lawson

I am having a pre order sale on it. $15 per 50'. Its running on my machines now. If you order it. It will ship by Feb 27th. I just want to gauge how much to run. Here is a photo.

Thanks,
Lawson

Looking at the product description on the website, you may want to add a note about durability along the same lines as what you posted here. You might save yourself some unhappy customers down the line by setting durability expectations up front.