Solo Hiking in CO – Q's on Bears and Designated Camp Sites

Did you check the administrating websites for permit and camping rules? Such places as the Indian Peaks Wilderness have backcountry zones and you need to know in what zone you will be camping — some zones require designated campsites and others do not.

Congrats on the move to CO – it’s an amazing state for backpacking. After spending 20 years in CO hiking, backpacking, skiing and mountaineering nearly every weekend, I think I saw a bear once or twice – and that was lower down in the foothills. Saw bear scat on many occasions though, and some areas I hiked in (RMNP) have seen bear fatalities. So, there are bears, but they are not a near constant presence like in other areas (like Montana for example).

I know of nobody who carried bear spray in CO. Where you can legally camp and food storage rules depend on the land manager and their local regulations – always check before a trip – the rules can change from year to year. Using good camping practices is more important than bear spray in a place like CO, IMHO. For example, don’t eat or cook in your tent, keep a clean camp, don’t put smelly stuff on your body, clothing or inside your tent at camp, use a bear canister where required, hang food properly where allowed, avoid heavily used sites if possible, inquire about recent problem bear activity, etc, etc.

Sorry I forgot, Indian Peaks I have already secured permitting for both my trips, I will not be in any zones where I see any designated camp sites on their backcountry zone map (they look to all be located at the lakes) so I am assuming I am ok to select campsites there.

Thanks for the feedback Lester.  I have always heard it wasn’t much of an issue here but I am more worried about other hikers/campers attracting bears than I am myself.  I would like to stealth camp where designated sites are required but am too big a pansy to break the rules.

No need to break the rules. There are some very nice and remote places to camp in the RMNP backcountry zones and in the Indian Peaks, many of them without trails. For example, you can avoid heavy traffic areas like the Odessa lake/Bierstadt lake loop in RMNP and try less-used areas like the North or East Inlets or Wild Basin instead.

I’ve hiked in the Rawah’s quite a bit.  In my experience more moose than bears.  I’ve seen bears and you may not want to camp where hunting oufitters have set up.  But you need to watch for the moose while hiking.

If you’re unsure about carrying bear spray, watch the first half hour+ of this video by one of the top North American bear researchers. It’s informative and entertaining. He covers why you need a deterrent, what’s most effective, as well as many common misconceptions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PExlT-5VU-Y

^^Excellent video! That guy is pretty fun to listen to.

Skip the bear spray in Colorado. There’s no need for it. Colorado bears are skittish. I’ve never even seen one backpacking. The ones that I’ve seen day hiking ran off as soon as they realized I was there. The ones that come around the house run away as soon as you yell at them. Carrying bear spray and bear bells in Colorado are the surest way to get a greeting of: “So where are you from?” :)

I’m with Randy. I’ve never seen a bear while backpacking, or while hiking either. But they seem to be a nuisance around Aspen and Vail. RMNP has maybe all of 22 black bears, of which they are quite proud. On any given day half of them would likely be outside the park (less people). But this didn’t stop the Park from requiring bear canisters 8-9 years ago. It seems that a few figured out the “fairway of the food” opportunity where there are several campsites strung along the trail to Thunder Lake, and a few incidents of bears pilfering campers’ food prompted the Park-wide canister rule.

Now moose are quite a different story. A few decades after they re-introduced them to CO on the west side of the divide (just west of RMNP), we now have them everywhere. How they manage to cross over the divide (and even another range just as high) escapes me. I guess they just like to “go over the mountain to see what they can see”. But you need to completely avoid them and give them plenty of space, especially a female with babies. All moose seem to be very territorial, and their erratic behavior can be goofy and dangerous to anyone nearby.

But forget the bear spray, and only use a bear canister where it’s required (RMNP and the 4-Pass Loop near Aspen, and perhaps other places now). I’ve thought of carrying 3-4 very loud firecrackers to thwart a black bear, but I’ve never gotten around to buying some. It sounds like you know how to practice safe food management, which is your best technique. I myself use an Outsak mesh food storage bag, which I will hang from a tree branch. A bear could probably breach it, but no rodents, even raccoons, can. That’s all I feel that I need around here.

I hope that you enjoy our beautiful state, and that you can take advantage of all 4 seasons here. It’s getting fairly crowded in the backcountry now, with all of the new people moving here. But there are still some pristine places to hike and camp (and no, I’m not telling anybody where my favorites are).

Bob, Thanks for the link to the video.  I’ve read Stephen Herraro’s books but Dr. Smith had some newer data (they often work together).  At 39:55, he gives summary info from recent incidents in Alaska:

Out of 71 spray incidents involving 175 people and 289 firearms incidents with almost 500 people:

Slight injuries: 3 with spray*,  24 with firearms

Moderate 0 with spray, 42 with firearms

Severe (loss of limb / face) 0 with spray, 25 with firearms

Dead humans: 0 with spray, 17 with firearms.

Injured bears: 0 from spray, 23 with firearms

Dead bears: 0 spray, almost 200 with firearms

*he described the 3 human injuries in spray incidents as being “freight trained” by a bear in full charge who didn’t/couldn’t stop, bowled over the human and kept going.

The top four predictors didn’t include: caliber, type of gun, or presence of gun.  For that matter, whether the gun was fired or not did not change the average outcome.  All the top four predictors were how the human carried themselves in bear country.

The biggest rule I would follow is to put the contents of your food inside a Mylar sack or Opsak for complete odor elimination.  I’ll never understand those that ignore this part and simply rely on hanging.  Hanging without odor control invites critters to come to your camp before discovering they can’t get to what they smell.  Eliminating odor likely will prevent animals from coming into your camp in the first place.

Severe (loss of limb / face) 0 with spray, 25 with firearms

I guess “loss of face” means one thing in a panda encounter, and something quite different in a grizzly encounter.

I dunno Randy. I do use an Opsack when hanging but only because I already have some. I saw one test where a dog had no problem smelling something inside one. And a black bear has a far greater sense of smell than any dog. It certainly doesn’t hurt to use one too. But I’m probably still the biggest attractant. odor wise, (inversely proportional to how I’m viewed at home). When I inevitably spill a bit of Pad Thai on my shirt when eating, i start thinking it might be better if my hanging food can be smelled too. I don’t have any spare clothes and my hiking clothes go back in my pack at night. And, contrary to popular thought, I hang close to camp so I can hear if there is a bear is trying to reach my food. I’ve never had an issue and my dog has never even alerted me to a bear coming around.

Colorado does have poor trees for bear bagging. I always carry 2 hanks so if I don’t find a good hang, I can pull the bag back out to where it can’t be reached. I like to go to sleep feeling as confident as possible that my food is safe.

On multiple occasions in the Winds, I’ve been above treeline and have done a hang over a rock face. Worked fine. Other times there was no way to hang at all. The bag I use for water in camp is a dry bag. I’ve read about putting a rock in it with the food and tossing it into a lake. Has anyone ever tried this? Seems like it would work. At least it would be fun to test. Maybe next time.

Thanks for all the feedback, definitely a lot to chew on.  The video was excellent and dispelled a lot of things you normally hear about how to deal with bear encounters.  I really feel this depends on region though.  I met a dude who said he was somewhere out in Alaska and his guides recommended the second you see a bear to yell, scream, and chuck large rocks at them or else they will approach you without giving it a second thought and only that aggressive behavior will thwart them from approaching… could have been a tall tale but is definitely a different approach than what was said in the video – just stand your ground, don’t say anything, don’t do anything until the bear has assessed you, then just move away carefully.  I would assume the difference in approaches has to do with how conditioned the bear populations are to humans but that’s just an assumption.

Kinda wish some of the stats that were thrown out included those who had no deterrent at all and used correct actions per their guidelines vs those who didn’t

“I’ve read about putting a rock in it with the food and tossing it into a lake. Has anyone ever tried this?”

I’ve cached food on a pretty seriously bear-infested trail (along a salmon river and they commute to lunch along the trail) by bagging it and putting it under a rock in the stream.  It’s always been there, days later, when I retrieved it during some death march.  Also, a 38F stream functions as a refrigerator for a deli sandwich or tortilla wrap.

We just moved to Laramie (just N of RMNP / Rawah Wilderness), so hike down in CO a lot.

The only bear sign I’ve seen was in the Colorado desert (tracks, in the Black Ridge Canyons Wilderness), and a few scat piles in RMNP.

Coming from Montana, this was quite a change. I don’t carry spray in the CO Rockies.

Yes to moose, though. We’ve run into moose a lot. Last week one came out of the trees and charged our dog. It was a little scary.

We just moved to Laramie (just N of RMNP / Rawah Wilderness), so hike down in CO a lot.

The only bear sign I’ve seen was in the Colorado desert (tracks, in the Black Ridge Canyons Wilderness), and a few scat piles in RMNP.

Coming from Montana, this was quite a change. I don’t carry spray in the CO Rockies.

Yes to moose, though. We’ve run into moose a lot. Last week one came out of the trees and charged our dog. It was a little scary.

I won’t tell you not to carry bear spray.  But Colorado bears are all black bears, not brown bears, and under pretty heavy hunting pressure, so they rightly fear people.  I know very few locals who bother with the spray.  Might be different if you’re a tiny 90-pound female or something, in which case I’d propose that the mountain lions are more of a worry.  One goes after a petite jogger now and then hereabouts.

I’ll also point out that in all of the spray vs gun research I’ve seen the “gun encounters” include many in which the gun is not used (i.e. never fired), whereas the spray encounters are always ones in which the spray was fired.  The one everyone likes to quote was especially egregious, with 73% of the “gun encounters” actually being “no deterrent used encounters”.  Gee, no wonder they didn’t seem to deter attack.  They also counted episodes where an armed person comes to the aid of someone who is already being mauled as a “failure,” because someone did get injured.  No similar situations cited for spray.

So can anyone point me at this guy’s data?

Not that I’m poo-pooing spray, but I hate bad (or clearly biased) research.  Guns have other problems than effectiveness.  Like killing the bear.  And that they aren’t appropriate for the large majority of people who don’t really know how to use one.  Etc.  Etc.