Weekend Essay
Fear of Bears Flourishes While Son Sleeps, Unperturbed
By Robert Struckman, 11-04-07
The sound of a large mammal breathing outside the tent interrupted my sleep. It was well after midnight. Snow was falling thick in the high foothills on the eastern slopes of the Mission Mountains. Every now and then a drift would slide from the tent roof with a gentle sound of snow on nylon. I just knew an animal was outside, nosing in the soft powder.
My bear spray, as usual, was propped in my boot near my head. My hand found it in the darkness. I lay still, listening intently, gripping the cold can of spray. My son slept peacefully beside me, comfortable in two sleeping bags. (That’s the way we roll, we like to joke, as we stuff our sleeping bags, one into the other, on our winter trips into the backcountry.)
This time our goal was to chase whitetail deer. We were high by a lake that would have a ring of ice in the morning. It’s pristine country – and perfect bear habitat. (A friend on the trip with us wondered why I would carry bear spray while also packing a hunting rifle. “You’ve got lead spray,” he says, gesturing to the gun. But I don’t want to shoot a bear – unless I have no other choice.)
That doesn’t mean I’m not terrified of bears. I can’t say how many times the night sounds of the forest have taken me from deep slumber to high alert. But it’s something that only happens when I’m in a tent with my son. When I’m alone, bears hardly cross my mind. Surprisingly, I slept like a log a few months ago when our family of four camped in Yellowstone National Park, even though our infant daughter was the picture of sweet vulnerability and a sow grizzly with two cubs had been reported in the area. But as a family unit, we seemed somehow stronger, tougher.
Not so when it’s just my boy and me. A few summers ago I harangued myself into the wee hours for bringing him, then six, into the Bob Marshall Wilderness to a place called Grizzly Basin. In any other place, a name like that would be poetical exaggeration. In the Bob Marshall, it’s an honest description.
It was a horrifying night. Something kept smacking the wall of the tent. I argued with myself about what would be worse – getting out of the tent, spray in hand, to confront the grizzly (I knew it was a grizzly), or staying inside the tent and, what? I realized the spray was useless inside the tent. A bear could collapse the tent and maul us, and I probably wouldn’t get a chance to cut loose with it without giving an eyeful to Josiah and myself. That night, at length, I realized that the slaps against the wall of the tent came from my son, who would roll over in his sleep and throw out an arm to cool off.
My tortured sleep that summer night and my fear of bears in the Bob Marshall prompted me to pick a spot in the mountains east of Hamilton for our backpacking trip this past summer.
I should add that we’re careful backpackers. As usual, we prepared and ate our food – and then hung our food stash – more than 100 yards from our campsite. We don’t even keep toothpaste in the tent.
Still, east of Hamilton in the middle of the night, I woke to hear snapping sounds as an animal walked clumsily through the brush nearby. As I strained my ears, I caught what seemed to me a clear progression: from the food stash and eating area toward the tent. Steeling myself for action, I reasoned that this black bear (it had to be a black) was about to get an appropriate lesson. Unable to get an easy dinner from our out-of-reach food bag, it would now get a solid blast of pepper in the face.
I stepped from the tent to find myself face-to-face with a good-sized whitetail buck. Surprised and chilly in the mountain air, I almost sprayed him. In the moonlight, a string of does was visible behind him, the whole train of them munching on bushes and stepping on twigs.
All these previous scenes flashed through my mind on our most recent trip. A phrase came to me – “obligatory bear noises” – as I forced myself to drift back to sleep. The next morning the snow recorded no bear tracks, no tracks at all.
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Comments
As large as they are I am amazed at how quickly and quietly bears can disappear. Recently, I got a tip from the Fish Wildlife and Game guy. Look up. ...Seems like a pretty obvious tip but one that never occurred to me.
It's such a scary place out here in the west... I worry so much as a mom.
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BENTON, Tenn. (AP) -April 14, 2006 - Authorities hunted Friday for a black bear that picked up a 2-year-old boy in its mouth and mauled his mother, critically injuring them before killing the child's older sister.
The attack came Thursday afternoon in the Cherokee National Forest in southeastern Tennessee.
The family was at a pool below Benton Falls on Chilhowee Mountain when the bear attacked, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency said.
Witnesses told authorities the bear picked up the boy in its mouth while the mother and other visitors tried to fend it off with sticks and rocks, said Dan Hicks, a spokesman for the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. The mother and the boy were critically injured and flown to Erlanger Medical Center in Chattanooga, authorities said.
When the bear attacked, the 6-year-old girl ran away, authorities said. Rescuers found the girl's body about 100 yards down the trail from the falls. A bear was standing over her.
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A recent highway human mortality study found that the vast majority highway deaths and vehicle accidents occurs at speeds in excess of 45 mph. So how many people in this country would support posted maximum speed limits on all highways of 45 mph if this would, annually, save 40 thousand human lives (And a side benefit would be that millions of gallons of gasoline would be saved). And the obvious answer to this question is vertually no one would support maximum speed limits of 45 mph, regardless of how many lives would be saved!! So one would have to conclude that speed is more important than lives.