How To: The PCT Food Hanging Method | Appalachian Trail Conservancy
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- čas přidán 12. 02. 2020
- UPDATE 7/14/2022: The Appalachian Trail Conservancy has adopted a new policy recommending all overnight Appalachian Trail (A.T.) visitors carry a bear-resistant food storage container as a vital part of their backpacking gear. This policy comes after a multi-year increase in human-bear encounters at A.T. campsites, many of which were the result of improper food storage by visitors or black bears’ successful circumvention of traditional food storage techniques. Learn more: appalachiantrail.org/news/atc...
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If you’ve had a mouse scurry over your sleeping bag or heard a bear rummaging through a campsite, there is a good chance they were looking for leftovers. Choosing the right technique, like the PCT Hang, when hanging a bear bag and ensuring proper food storage can make all the difference when hiking the Appalachian Trail! It limits the accessibility to human food and trash, keeping wildlife… wild. Check out this quick how-to on the PCT Hang!
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And to get your bag down, all you have to do is pull on the loose cord until the stick comes back down to your reach, pull the stick out of the clove hitch knot, or whatever knot you’re using, then your bag will slide all the way back down to you as your carabiner will no longer catch the stick. You can then collect your cord, wrap it up and put it away for next time. Once you get used to it, finding the right tree branch is honestly the hardest part. It may just require walking a little further away sometimes to find it, but you want it about 200 feet from your campsite anyway. The further away you hang your food bag, the further away the bear is from you when it tries to get to your food. :-)
Choose a stick that will not break in half under tension of the heavy food bag and horsing around bear.
Hey I know this guy! Hi Nick, I’m the one who pestered you about mushrooms the other day in SD. I thought your voice sounded familiar. I’m gonna try and go save my food now!
Best bear hang video yet, thanks!
Thank you for this video. Very helpful!!
That was a awesome class. Thank you. Great job!
I would also suggest ordering a Dog Bone from Garage Gear. It eliminates using a stick and tying a knot over your head. They weigh nothing and cost a few bucks.
I just use my extra tent stake
it's suggested to use a locking carabiner to prevent a rare a problem to occur about some line securing thing
Thanks
Thanks for the tips!
Instruction starts at 2:56
Thank you so much!
Great video thank you!!
Good video.
Master Splinter!
Bears are pretty smart and wicked strong. Underestimate them at your peril. Good stuff.
Is that Master Splinter doing the demo? If so, I met him in the smokies during my 2017 hike.
Yes it is. He’s a Ridge Runner with the ATC in Georgia.
What are your thoughts on bear proof bags and containers that you tie at the trunk of trees?
Those work, but just seem like a really bulky, non-compressible option. Bear bags would probably be best.
What do you do if your line does wrap around the branch? How can you get the rope back?
I saw people use a ziploc bag as a rock sac. If it gets caught, your can pull and rip off the ziploc to free the line.
Yank hard on the brach and eventually the tension will force the other side of the rope to come flying off
How do you get your food down now?
Pull on the cord until you can reach the stick. Remove the stick and lower your food to you.
Or you could just get a bear canister instead and save yourself the hassle. I've been at a campsite where the lowest branch was 50 feet off the ground and had no choice but to wedge my food bag in a rhododendron with paracord wrapped around it 30 times. Yep, had to search in the dark too for the right tree to hang my bag from. Decided to get a bear canister instead. Yeah I know they add weight, but to me they are worth it.
That is also a great choice for food storage!
A bear canister can be a great choice, but some bears have learned to get into those. Last year when I got into Damascus, there was a totally busted up bear canister sitting in the Broken Fiddle hostel. “Treehouse” said a hiker had left it there after a bear got into it, and he was keeping it right where it was left, for other hikers to see that they are not always bear proof. The “bear proof” Ursack bags are also being torn into more and more.
@@troubadouroutdoors2126 There’s inevitably gonna have to be new ways to protect food in the near future. Bears are getting smart.
I am guessing your pretty young. Well under 50? I could be wrong but there was a time I would not have felt an extra three pound or so. I have rarely met an AT through hiker carrying a bear canister. I did a couple hundred miles on the AT this year as a section hike I saw one. What many will not admit is many sleep with their food. It’s not what I would do now but to be honest from 1974 until about 2000 that’s what I did. Fortunately in the Whites they have bear proof containers at most camping areas. I am on the Long Trail now and hanging my food. The only place I have ever had issues with bears is in Yosemite. It’s also a good idea to eat and clean up about an hour from camp but most people don’t do that.
This is great, but what happens when the bear slashes the slack - aka the part that retrieves your food??
take down the tree
PCT?
Just don’t use ur food bag as a pillow like one thruhiker was doing last year👍🏼
One thing would help bears used to be afraid of humans because we hunted them now most people of stopped. There’s more bears in there used to be and less land for them to live, but still hang your food up in a tree is a good idea.
Great but... how do you get it down?
"Pull on the cord until you can reach the stick. Remove the stick and lower your food to you." -Budget Guns and Gear Reviews
counterbalance method is far better than the pct method !
How so? Care to explain?
It is absolutely not a better method. A bear can pull the second bag down by pulling on the rope, and when that bag is slashed open, the first bag comes crashing down.
Is this guy originally from California? The so called - "PCT Food Hanging Method", was not invented or started in California! It has been around for centuries!
Hahahaha thats funny
Politically Correct Thruhiker 😃😃
Many things wrong with this video. Here are two:
1. Bear hangs don't work. a. Bears are extremely athletic and smart. If she wants your food, she is going to get it unless it is on a cable, pole or box. b. The perfect branch for a hang is the unicorn of hiking. The branch must be perfect to work (see 1a.).
2. Putting everything that smells in your bag is pointless (unless you hang your tent and sleep gear in the bag too). EVERYTHING in your pack smells like food. Tent, sleeping bag, the pack itself, has been ruminating with your food all day long, plus all the crumbs and spills that inevitably get all over everything as you hike. You can't avoid it. I met at least 10 hikers who had their food stolen from a bear hang, but NONE who had it stolen from their tent while sleeping with. I'm a rule follower, so I used an Ursack tied to a tree on the few occasions there were no cables, poles or boxes near camp. Frankly, the main reason no bears tore open my Ursack was pure luck, no bears around that night.