Dreading that second can of bear spray

I recently purchased my first can of bear spray.
Hopefully, it’s my last.
Buying another would mean I had occasion to use it, and although that’s not something I relish, it would offer proof the first can worked.
Upon hearing I was planning a week-long backpacking trip through the Bob Marshall Wilderness, a friend suggested I bring along a sawed-off shotgun.
“Lots of grizzlies up there,” he told me. “Lots of grizzlies.”
“I’m packing bear spray,” I said.
My friend laughed.
So did I.
“Good luck,” he said, shaking his head.
A lot of outdoor folk, hunters and horse packers foremost among them, have little confidence in bear spray. Given a choice, they’d prefer a shotgun or hand cannon.
I’d prefer to run. Not that I can outrun a grizzly, but like the old joke goes, I just have to run faster than you.
Unfortunately I don’t have the wheels I used to and I’m the slowest guy on this trip.
Still, I didn’t actually buy the bear spray. My wife did after telling me I couldn’t go on the trip without it.
Had it been left up to me, I would have skipped the spray and packed more food. That can must weigh as much as four bags of jerky.
And I never considered carrying a firearm on the trip. Unless the weapon was in my hands or on my belt ready for a quick-draw it probably wouldn’t do me much good anyway.
I’ve experienced a number of close encounters of the grizzly kind both armed and unarmed. I ran into a pair of young grizzlies a few years ago while elk hunting. They answered my cow call at close range and the big game rifle in my hands offered little comfort as we all stared at each other from 50 feet.
The tree I climbed to avoid a big boar in Yellowstone Park was considerably more comforting than any rifle.
I spotted the grizzly on a game trail through the snow and he charged as soon as I reached for my camera. I climbed like a monkey 20 feet up the closest tree.
Another bear I surprised on an elk carcass in the sagebrush raced off at my approach, then stopped and watched me slowly back downhill away from him.
Had I been packing bear spray in any of those instances, I doubt my behavior would have been much different. But I’m sure the can would have been in my hand.
I’ve read enough stories about charging bears being turned away by pepper spray to believe the stuff works. I just hope I never have to buy that second can.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net

Time to dig out that old backpack

There’s a map on the wall in my house of Isle Royale National Park. A friend and I hiked 60-some miles carrying backpacks from one end of the island to the other 35 years ago.
The map is just another souvenir from back in the day.
And now that I’m 55, I worry a bit that I spend too much time reminiscing about back in the day and not enough time living this one.
But when I was recently invited on a 10-day backpacking trip through the Bob Marshall Wilderness this summer with a couple of younger buddies, I still hesitated.
“Let me check the calendar,” I told Ben when he called.
As if I had something else to do.
To be honest, I found the trip a little daunting.
I gave up backpacking for horse packing shortly after that trip to Isle Royale and except for a couple of extended hikes to sheep-hunting camps in the Beartooths in the mid ‘70s, I hadn’t toted much on my back since.
It didn’t take long, though, before I decided to accept the invitation.
I’d never seen the Bob and this invite sure beat the ones I’ve been getting lately from AARP.
Anyway, I figure I have at least one kick-ass trip left in me. If not, this will be a good opportunity to find out I don’t.
I called Ben back and said count me in.
Then I jumped on my bike and started pedaling. There’s a hill south of town that I’m becoming very familiar with in an effort to avoid being embarrassed on the trip by Ben and Erik, who are both younger than my backpack.
I still have the old school external-frame model I ordered out of an Eddie Bauer catalogue back when Eddie Bauer billed itself as an expedition outfitter and not a trendy fashion outlet.
More difficult than getting in shape, however, is wrapping my head around a trip of this length.
I considered doing it as a vision quest, wearing nothing but a loin cloth and packing no food or sleeping bag, but that idea was quickly vetoed.
Erik seemed to think it was simply a ploy to get him and Ben to carry all the gear, and he was more than a little uncomfortable at the idea of following me up the trail while I was wearing a loin cloth.
This younger generation has no imagination.
So in order to keep on truckin,’ I’ll just have to put one foot in front of the other and carry my own load. It’s been a while, but I’ve done it before.
Maybe in another 35 years I’ll tire of looking at a map of the Bob Marshall Wilderness on my wall.
I can only hope.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net

On-line hunting tags not so easy

I was feeling so tech savvy flying around the globe on Google Earth.
Visiting South America.
Looking in on my childhood home in Indiana.
Checking out the breaks on Frenchman Creek where I hunt in the fall.
Then I logged on to the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks Web site to apply for my antelope and elk tags and was quickly brought back to Earth.
Or reality.
Whatever. My computer ineptness returned in an instant to bite me on the … application.
“Did you confirm your ALS number with the computer?” the woman who answered the phone at the FWP help line asked me.
“Huh?” I thought. “How do you confirm something with a computer?”
“And how would I do that?” I replied in as nice a voice as possible.
There was a long pause on the other end of the line and I thought I heard muffled laughter.
It used to be so easy. I would wait until the very last minute, fill out an application for the special tags I wanted, sign my name at the bottom and get it in the mail by June 1.
Sometime in August the results would be mailed to me.
A number of years ago the online option became available. I resisted at first preferring old-school snail mail, but decided to give it a try after an incorrectly filled out application was returned to me and I wasn’t able to hunt antelope that fall.
One big advantage of applying online is that if there are any errors on the application the process will be stopped and you won’t be able to proceed until the problems are remedied.
And there will be errors.
Every step of the way it seems.
At least on my part.
Like the wrong Automated Licensing Service number, a missing digit in my home phone number or the omission of my country of residence.
All of those errors were pointed out to me in red type at the top of the screen, an uncomfortable flashback to my school days.
But I was able to correct every error on my own except one – the ALS number. The longer I looked at it, the more I was convinced I had the right number and FWP didn’t.
Of course I was wrong.
After the nice lady at the FWP help line pointed that out I finished my application with no more trouble.
Until, of course, I tried to print the receipt for the tags I had purchased, including $2.31 for a “convenience fee.” My computer locked up and I got a “not responding” message.
Oh well, it’s done and now all I can do is wait.
Come August I may even try to “confirm” my success in the drawing.
It’s so convenient I could scream.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net

No mistaking odor of bat guano

MALTA -- Ahhh, the smell of spring.
I was in the garage last week gathering my fishing gear for a trip to the reservoir east of town, visions of a walleye dinner coursing through my mind, when I got the first whiff.
Whew.
There’s no mistaking the unique odor of bat guano.
I put the spinning rod back on the rack and picked up a hammer. The walleye would have to wait. In a few weeks the bats will be back and I still had holes to plug.
After awakening from a long slumber inside caves in the Little Rocky Mountains south of here, the northernmost colony of migrating little brown bats will return to town.
And more than a few of them will be headed directly to my place where odor of their past inhabitance is unmistakable.
I suspect my wife, Barb, and I got such a good deal on the house we bought here a couple of years ago because of the number of dead bats that littered the inside.
Vacant for a number of years before we moved in, our two-story stone house built in 1915 had enough holes in it to make it a very popular summer destination for members of the colony.
Following months of renovation, the house is now relatively bat-proof, but the garage is not. Sitting on the deck at night last summer, I watched as bats, squeaking eerily, came and went through a hole under the eaves.
Not wanting to trap them to die inside the attic, I decided to wait until they left town before covering all the cracks and holes in the garage with trim.
Then came hunting season when all work is put on hold.
Then came winter when it was too cold to work outside.
And then I forgot about them until spring when I was greeted by the odor of guano and forced to cancel my fishing trip.
Fortunately this isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve lived with wild animal issues before. In Kentucky a family of skunks took residence in the crawl space under my house. In Cooke City black bears raided the beer fridge on the porch of my cabin.
I’m hoping a lack of access to the dark recesses of my garage will persuade the bats to roost elsewhere.
If not, well, I may just have to adjust.
An elderly couple, who used to live down the street, wielded tennis racquets at night while watching television to fend off any bats that dared disrupt their favorite shows.
Come to think of it, my backhand could use some work.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net

FOR PUBLICATION ON OR AFTER MAY 13

By Parker Heinlein
Outdoors columnist
MALTA -- Ahhh, the smell of spring.
I was in the garage last week gathering my fishing gear for a trip to the reservoir east of town, visions of a walleye dinner coursing through my mind, when I got the first whiff.
Whew.
There’s no mistaking the unique odor of bat guano.
I put the spinning rod back on the rack and picked up a hammer. The walleye would have to wait. In a few weeks the bats will be back and I still had holes to plug.
After awakening from a long slumber inside caves in the Little Rocky Mountains south of here, the northernmost colony of migrating little brown bats will return to town.
And more than a few of them will be headed directly to my place where odor of their past inhabitance is unmistakable.
I suspect my wife, Barb, and I got such a good deal on the house we bought here a couple of years ago because of the number of dead bats that littered the inside.
Vacant for a number of years before we moved in, our two-story stone house built in 1915 had enough holes in it to make it a very popular summer destination for members of the colony.
Following months of renovation, the house is now relatively bat-proof, but the garage is not. Sitting on the deck at night last summer, I watched as bats, squeaking eerily, came and went through a hole under the eaves.
Not wanting to trap them to die inside the attic, I decided to wait until they left town before covering all the cracks and holes in the garage with trim.
Then came hunting season when all work is put on hold.
Then came winter when it was too cold to work outside.
And then I forgot about them until spring when I was greeted by the odor of guano and forced to cancel my fishing trip.
Fortunately this isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve lived with wild animal issues before. In Kentucky a family of skunks took residence in the crawl space under my house. In Cooke City black bears raided the beer fridge on the porch of my cabin.
I’m hoping a lack of access to the dark recesses of my garage will persuade the bats to roost elsewhere.
If not, well, I may just have to adjust.
An elderly couple, who used to live down the street, wielded tennis racquets at night while watching television to fend off any bats that dared disrupt their favorite shows.
Come to think of it, my backhand could use some work.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net

Socorro, por favor

My cousin, who lives on Florida’s Atlantic Coast, fears one day he’ll answer a knock on the door and find Jim Cantore standing there.

Although he’s already weathered more than a couple of hurricanes in his beach house, my cousin knows the presence of Cantore, the Weather Channel’s harbinger of really bad weather, would mean he’s in for the big one.

I, on the other hand, fear the day Cesar Millan, knocks on my door. The “Dog Whisperer” from the National Geographic Channel is apparently summoned only in times of dire canine distress. And having lived with dogs my whole life, I’m a bit too proud to make the call myself. So the summons for help would have come from elsewhere.

Perhaps, I fear, from my dogs.

Because, after all, according to Millan, a native of Culiacan, Mexico, the majority of dog problems are actually people problems.

“That’s what I’ve always said,” my springer bitch Spot recently told me.
“It’s you, not us.”

“Exactly,” her studly little brother Jem agreed. “It’s your boyfriend, girlfriend.”

“Get a clue,” Spot growled at me. “You praise us when we’re bad and discipline us when we’re good.”

“And when are you good?” I snapped.

“I’m calling the Dog Whisperer,” Jem told her as he lifted his leg on the couch.

“Oh, yeah?” I said as I reached for the phone. “I’m going to call that woman in Bozeman who makes jewelry out of baculums.”

“Huh,” he asked as he sniffed himself. “What’s that?”

“It’s a bone found in the sex organ of most male animals,” I told him. “You’ve got one. For now anyway.”

Babs Noelle makes necklaces and earrings out of gold, silver and platinum casts of the bones. She won’t say where she gets them, but she keeps the bones in tiny white boxes in the back of her shop.

Noelle’s creations sell for up to $3,000.

“I think it’s about time I started wearing some bling,” I told the dogs.

Jem stared at the floor. Spot closed her eyes and went to sleep.

Then the telephone rang.

“Maybe it’s Jim Cantore,” I told the dogs as they followed me into the other room. “I read where the Weather Channel is offering a service where Cantore will call you when a storm is coming.”

“There’s not a cloud in the sky,” Spot said. “Maybe it’s Cesar Millan. He must have heard about your necklace.”

Jem raced to the phone.

“Socorro! (HELP!),” he whispered as he picked it up. “Socorro, por favor. (PLEEEZE)”

Caddis, a window of angling opportunity

There’s a window of angling opportunity on the Yellowstone River I hope to slip through this spring, a time of exceptional fishing that’s here and gone so quickly it often goes unnoticed.
Catch it right and you’ll mark it on your calendar as the very best time to fish the river. Miss it by a day and you’ll wonder what all the fuss was about. The window can slam shut overnight.
The Mother’s Day caddisfly hatch on the Yellowstone doesn’t always occur on Mother’s Day. Some years it’s already over by then. Not that the bugs are gone, but the opportunity to take advantage of the trout feeding on them has disappeared in the rising brown torrent of spring runoff.
The river won’t be fishable again until summer.
But catch it right …
After launching your boat in the morning somewhere above Livingston, you begin to notice a few bugs in the willows along the bank. Then the day warms and clouds of caddis begin to fill the air. Rafts of dead bugs swirl in the eddies and pepper the scum lines. Trout feast eagerly on the first big bug hatch of the year.
You can actually hear them feeding.
Drift an elk-hair imitation along a current seam and watch it vanish in a splash, rod bowing to a fighting fish, line cutting through the glassy surface of the river.
Rainbows, browns and cutthroats, along with mountain whitefish, all feed with equal abandon.
Sink a caddis emerger next to a cut bank, see the line go taught, raise the tip of the rod and a rainbow comes flying out of the river. Or maybe it’s a brown or a cutt that goes racing downstream. Again and again.
Caddis flies get down the collar of your shirt, on your glasses, in your mouth. But you don’t care. You’re too busy catching fish.
The hardest part of it all is keeping track of your fly among the swarms of real bugs on the water.
You go to sleep that night with visions of rising fish in your head and dream of doing it all over again tomorrow.
But when you get back to the river the next morning the window has shut. The off-color water of yesterday has turned an opaque brown and while caddisflies still fill the air, there are no fish rising to feed on them.
At least you had yesterday.
That’s why I keep my options open the last week of April and the first week of May, hoping for a chance to slip through that window of angling opportunity.
Parker Heinlein is at pman@mtintouch.net