Ursack Question

I don’t have one and I expect most people who do have not had a bear encounter with it, but I have heard of reports of pulverized food mixed with saliva rendering it inedible.

Jeremy’s post here,

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/60464/page/3/#post-1902438

A lot depends where you camp. A popular campground versus a remote location makes a big difference. According to the “experts” and Ursack they need to be placed quite a distance from the campsite. Also, not a good idea to place them close to each other if several in the group have them. Spread them out like 30 yards or so.

I won’t say I do all of this, except I usually don’t camp in popular campgrounds. I have little faith in the Opsaks, although mine are an older version that are the single “zip” that I bought a long time ago… and I bought a ton of them. The newer “double zip” probably work better. But I keep bringing them “just in case” they might make a difference.

I want to try nyofume <sp?> bags instead of the Opsaks, but I keep forgetting to search for them, and then remember just before I need to make a trip. Perhaps this thread will remind me to take action. More and more I am just bringing a canister if there is a good chance of a bear encounter. Just easier to deal with and I just have to deal with the weight penalty. I always take canisters in places that require them.

I will confess that in remote wilderness areas I often sleep with my food placed in a Ursack and Opsak with no liner. My Ursack is pretty old, the yellowish material that was sold about 10 years ago. I think it proceeded the S-29 model. I am not recommending this. But then I cook in my shelters too if the weather is crappy.

Ken, thanks for the link. Very interesting.  I noticed that post was from 2012.  The Ursack Almighty that I bought is a new model.  Bears are not suppose to be able to pierce the Almighty at all.  I would probably have smashed food if a bear tried to get it but it shouldn’t get any saliva mixed with it.

@ngatel

Here it is, Nick.

https://www.litesmith.com/nylofume-pack-liner-bags/

Well, heck Tom!

I know Peter, who owns the company (met him one or two times at the So Cal GGG).

Thanks, and I’ll get some today.

Edit: Looking at these, with the open top, seems it might be a good idea to double bag them in bear country. Thoughts?

Half a dozen are on the way. Thanks again, Tom. Actually Doug and I talked about this very thing one night at our campsite and now that I think about it, he mentioned you were using the bags.

I use the nylofume bags and I do double bag them. I have had a bear go at the ursack one time. It was hanging on a branch about 5 feet up. The bag stayed intact with some crushing of the food inside,but no big deal. The slobber on the outside was kind of nasty!

BJ,

Do you tie a knot in the first bag, put it in the 2nd bag and then knot the second one? Or do you just use one knot for both of them? And why did you pick the method you use?

Nick,
I use a 6″ Nite ize gear tie on each bag after twisting it shut. Not totally happy with the ties as the wire inside can break. Sometimes I twist both bags together and use one tie. The bags hold up incredibly well, much longer than opsacks. No special knowledge here, it just seemed the easiest way to seal the bag. When I open the bags I put the ties through the eyelets in the ursack so I don’t lose them. I use orange ties so they are easy to see. If anyone comes up with a better way to close the bag, I’m all ears. The bags came with twist ties, lost them!

Thanks, BJ.

My only concern obviously is in bear country. Of course the further you get from popular places and habituated bears the fewer problems one will have.

So the weak point in these bags is using a method to stop odors from escaping is how it is tied. We probably can’t make them 100% odor proof anyway. I guess I’ll have to play with them and do what seems to “theoretically” work best.

I mostly eat freeze dried foods so I don’t care if a bear crushes it. I do care if bear slobber gets inside all my food ;-)

Yeah I had a bear work over my ursack once. I retrieved the bag in the morning, opened it up and was like “why is my stuff broken? did a mouse get in?”. For a minute I thought it was an epic mouse, but nothing was chewed rodent style. It was just broken – often with the packaging still intact. Too slowly I realized it was a bear. Then I looked more closely at the outside of the bag and you could see teeth dimples all over it. Not damage, just sort of pulls in the weave from the bears teeth that could be smoothed back out (kinda like how you can smooth out pulls in noseeum netting).

The food wasn’t that bad of shape. I was glad it wasn’t a rodent actually chewing on it. Totally eatable. Just kinda funny to pull out broken chocolate bars. A few ziplocks were torn and I had to repackage some oatmeal into empty used ziplocks.

Here https://www.kamaainatermite.com/hawaii-termite-solutions/hawaii-tent-fumigations/how-to-bag/ (can’t get the link to work on the phone) there is advice on how to close nylofume bags for fumigation; I’d imagine it’s the same for keeping odour in. An elastic band over the fold works as well but it’s more faff than a twist tie.

So I order the bags from LiteSmith yesterday. The mail carrier dropped them off here about an hour ago. OUTSTANDING SERVICE!

Need to mention that LiteSmith is in California as am I.

“Actually Doug and I talked about this very thing one night at our campsite and now that I think about it, he mentioned you were using the bags.”

Yes.  SOP ever since they came out.  They are far superior to OP sacks, IMO.  I also double bag, as follows:  first Nylofume bag goes inside my food stuff sack, tied off with a heavy duty twist ’em as low down as I can get it to the food after compressing to remove air.  Then I continue to twist the tag end of the Nylofume bag most of the way to the top, double it over, and secure it with the tag ends of the twist’em, i.e. a double seal of the bag.  Then, I push this sealed end of the Nylofume bag down into the stuff sack and cinch it tight.  Then, after cleaning my hands to remove any trace of food odors, I slip a second Nylofume bag over the stuff sack in the reverse direction, so that the closed bottom of the Nylofume bag covers the cinched up end of the stuff sack, and repeat the sealing steps for the second Nylofume bag.  This whole set up goes inside the waterproof bag I use for my sleeping bag and gets covered with my WPB jacket, which I place inside my shelter when sleeping.  I am comfortable with this routine when hiking in areas where the bears are not habituated.  Beginning last year, I added an extra layer, a large Mylar zip lock style bag, as an added precaution.  The operating principle here is to suppress odors enough not to attract bears from a distance to investigate.  I am sure that if one actually stuck his head inside the shelter, he would detect food odor, but not from a distance.  So far, so good.  Not recommended in habituated bear country, on the supposition that if a bear don’t get you, a ranger will.  ;0))

Been using them sans aluminum liner for 13 years in Alaska without a problem. We just put our food/ziplock/etc in the bags, tighten and knot it up at the opening, then tie it to a tree limb or a stout brush limb if in tundra. We store them all together. Never had a problem in the morning.

I also double bag, as follows:  first Nylofume bag goes inside my food stuff sack, tied off with a heavy duty twist ’em as low down as I can get it to the food after compressing to remove air.  Then I continue to twist the tag end of the Nylofume bag most of the way to the top, double it over, and secure it with the tag ends of the twist’em, i.e. a double seal of the bag.  Then, I push this sealed end of the Nylofume bag down into the stuff sack and cinch it tight.  Then, after cleaning my hands to remove any trace of food odors, I slip a second Nylofume bag over the stuff sack in the reverse direction, so that the closed bottom of the Nylofume bag covers the cinched up end of the stuff sack, and repeat the sealing steps for the second Nylofume bag.

Ingenious — reversing the bags. I wouldn’t have thought of doing it that way.

“I wouldn’t have thought of doing it that way.”

The idea is to obstruct what little odors escape through the double seal of the first bag, plus whatever odors are left on the outside of the first bag during the sealing step.  I view the entire process as a series of small steps that hopefully reduce the odors that escape into the atmosphere to a level that bears will not detect them from afar in real world situations and come to your camp to investigate.