Something ate my pole

[Erica R]

Something ate my pole strap, and part of the cork handle.

Bad idea putting the handle down as Tarptent recommends. The critter was probably desperate for salt.

I’ll be looking for a replacement Easton Hike Carbon pole in Gear Swap. Probably have to buy a new set of poles. Geeze, poles are like shoes. Best to try them on. I had REI send $1000 worth of poles to try out, and these Eastons were the ones I kept. Now they don’t make them anymore.

I’ve noticed the Protrail Li seems sorta saggy in the morning. Maybe it’ll hold tighter if the pole point is down and it doesn’t move so much.

[Pedestrian]

I’d guess it was deer…..

I once awoke to the sound of rustling in the bushes very close to where I was cowboy camped; a deer was nibbling at my shirt that I’d hung on a nearby tree branch. Yes the salt was probably too hard to resist.

Good luck on your hunt for new poles or maybe you could try getting replacement handle and straps.

 

 

[John “Jay” Menna]

If it was a “little critter” having the handle in the muck is a bad idea.
But a deer is tall enough to have eaten it right side up.

Henrys upside down poles have made me grumpy too.   A handful of mud fist steps in the morning……

[John S.]

Usually mice at night, but could be marmot during day in some areas. My pole handles were screwed up pretty good at night a couple weeks ago on a Mt. Harvard/Columbia backpack/summit trip.

[David Thomas]

A guy I led trips with had a prankster along one time who organized everyone to pee around the leader’s tent.  Then the mountain goats came around at night to lick up the salt.

I wonder if something like the “Bitter Apple” spray sold in the pet aisle to discourage one’s dog from chewing on stuff would help?

[Kevin Babione]

I leaned my poles (GG LT4), handles up, against a tree once over night and in the morning one of the handles was “well tasted.”  It really pissed me off because it felt different in my hand.  It got worse when I broke two poles by falling on them – and the one I broke was always the one with the unchewed handle.

I hammock and use ZPacks Trekking Pole Cups on one side of my hammock (usually towards where my buddies are) to both give me better visibility when I’m in my hammock AND to keep the handles away from tiny teeth.

[jscott]

I was going to mention mountain goats snuffing up pee but Dave beat me to it. This was an issue in a camp in the Olympics in Wa. We were doing trail work so we were there a few days. The goats have terrible eye sight and a bad temper, so are a bit more of a hazard than they look. Bold as brass.

[JCH]

Tips down, handles up is my preference. I used Henry’s pole handle adapters on a Notch with great success. Not as quick to pitch the shelter, but much better than muddy/chewed handles.

[PaulW]

I feel kinda guilty for laughing when I read this. In the past, I’ve had rodents chew up my socks, shoes, bandanas, and pole handles. I once watched a deer walk into camp, grab a friend’s hiking pole, and run off with it. We found the pole, but the handle was trashed. These days, everything goes into my shelter with me.

 

[dirtbag]

And this is why my shoes are NEVER left outside my hammock or tent!!

[BlackHatGuy]

You might have to look for them, but you can find small ziploc-type bags that are tall instead of wide. So you can put the handle in this bag and setup handle down without getting them in mud and such (easy to wipe off the outside of the bag). And you can ‘zip’ the bag around the handles. Cost of maybe a gram or so.

[Greg Mihalik]

 

From a post in 2011 –

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/49922/#post-1756285

(And just coincidentally I’m sure, zpacks started selling a similar product 6 months later.)

[M B]

On the CT I heard this rhythmic sound while I was lightly sleeping I thought was water dripping off my tarp…. Then I sort of woke up and figured it had not been raining for a while……

 

Turn on my light and it was a porcupine eating my pack belt…..sweat salt… Pack was hanging from my tarp Pole and every time it took a nibble it made a little sound.   Perfect rhythm.

 

Ugly critters. Especially by flashlight.  it wouldn’t go away either it kept circling around my nettent rubbing against trying to get in.  I was very glad to have the net tent.  For an hour I would swipe it it with a trekking pole and holler at it and it would go away , as soon as I turn the light off it would come back

[Eric B]

Porcupines are notorious for chewing on anything with salt or skin oils, so it might’ve been one of them.

I had a cached dry bag chewed up once, just the parts where my hands had touched. The likely culprit was a hare who’d been hopping around, but who knows?

And I’ve had Dall sheep lick my trekking pole handles and lick the zipper pull on the tent, but never had one chew on anything.

It’s a little freaky when you’re safely ensconced in the tent, in bear country, and something starts messing with the zipper. And it was a great relief to find out it was only a sheep; said sheep was nevertheless soundly berated.

[Sam Farrington]

Am wondering how many of these critter attacks were on cork grips.  The foam grips have been criticized because many get soggy or melt in hot weather; but not all.  Got a pair of carbon Yukon Charlies with excellent flick locks, alloy lower sections, but lousy foam grips.  Following instructions in a BPL thread on grip replacing, boiled the old grips off, and put on some new ones with hard, durable foam from a European X-C pole.  The result is that the cheap Charlies have become the go-to pole. About 7.5 oz per pole, not ultra light, but not so heavy since I hike with only one pole.

As a last resort, a tent with both front and rear vestibules that come all the way down to the ground, can be used for storage of everything, including pack and pole.  If a porky insists on coming into the tent, there is always pepper spray, like HALT! sold to protect bicyclists from dog attacks.  Used it on the ground in front of the tent, along with a candle lantern; but it was banging pots that finally persuaded bruin to leave.  Never actually saw the bear face to face – was afraid to stick my head outside.  How do I know it was a bear?  With something that big lumbering around and woofing outside the tent, one knows.

[Diane “Piper” Soini]

At my house it most certainly would be the cockatoo’s fault.

[bradmacmt]

A marmot ate off the grips on my wife’s trekking poles. In the highcountry, the marmot is usually the culprit for this sort of nefarious behavior.

Last month I had a marmot (rockchuck) get trapped in a new home over the weekend… it did in excess  of $10,000 damage.

[Gary Dunckel]

After doing some beta testing for both Lawson and David Brandenberg (of Outsack fame), I learned that none of the mini-bears around my rural place could bite through 1.43 cuben fiber. Since my old Tarptent Squall 2 required that I insert my pole tips into grommets, which meant that the handles were on the ground. So I made cuben draw string bags for them, one of which doubles as the stake sack, and the other to hold my potty trowel and TP.

Most of my pesky critter encounters have been in Glacier Park. Twice it was urine-starved mountain goats that hung around my tent all night, tripping over guy lines and generally being harmless pests. I don’t think goats ever sleep.

The best story was when 4 Wisconsin guys shared the food prep area with me. One of them went back to their tent area to get something, and he returned with a totally chewed sweaty T-shirt that he had spread over a small bush to dry. He caught the deer in the act. The T-shirt looked like somebody had blasted it with a shotgun. The deer must have known what it was doing, and it was pretty good at it.

[Murali C]

Learn to snore! Nobody will come close to your tent:-)

[Nick Gatel]

Gear needs to be washed periodically to keep critters from eating or stealing them. This method can be applied to gear other than packs.

http://popupbackpacker.com/why-and-how-to-wash-a-backpack/

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