Bear-Resistant Trash Receptacles

Michelle Ryan, editor

 

In order to test the ?EUR??,,????'??bear-resistance?EUR??,,????'?? of their products, BearSaver travels to the Grizzly Wolf Discovery Center in Montana and permit the bears to pummel their work for approximately 90 minutes at a time.

It is no secret that the staff at BearSaver is made of avid campers and outdoor enthusiasts, who spend much of their leisure time in the Sierras camping and hiking. They share a common concern about the growing problem of bears foraging for human food and the increasingly frequent unpleasant consequences.

The company applied their many years of fabrication experience to this problem, guided by input from highly-trained and experienced National Park Service (NPS) Wildlife Biologists, US Forest Service (USFS) recreation personnel and biologists from US Fish and Game. The result of all of the research was a culmination of criteria that addressed how to best defeat the capabilities of these extremely intelligent animals. Research was conducted for almost two years before making the first marketable containers.

All hinges, handles, striker plates and hardware that make up this BearSaver trash enclosures are zinc coated for corrosion resistance. The door hinges are heavy-duty piano hinge material using stainless steel pins. The housing and doors are made from corrosion resistant steel and are finished using a textured powder coat process. The finish is resistant to humidity, salt spray, fog, ultraviolet rays, abrasion and chemicals.

As product lines progressed, BearSaver worked with the personnel in the USFS San Dimas Research and Development Center to further understand the specialty requirements for containers to be ?EUR??,,????'??bear-resistant.?EUR??,,????'?? Part of these requirements meant testing in a controlled environment. The containers were tested extensively at the request of the USFS at the Grizzly Wolf Discovery Center in West Yellowstone, Mont. under the stringent testing protocol developed by the Living with Wildlife Foundation, in cooperation with the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee.

Being ?EUR??,,????'??user friendly?EUR??,,????'??? was also important because a container that was difficult for the user to open and re-close would likely be misused. An open container is an invitation to a bear, so all BearSaver?EUR??,,????'???s products had to have simple push to close lids, without exception. Locking clips and other designs that require users to do manual re-latching are not consistently re-latched and this makes the containers vulnerable.

Across the country, where there are bears, there are now ordinances that may require ?EUR??,,????'??bear-resistant?EUR??,,????'?? enclosures to prevent the very clever animals from foraging for food and oftentimes dangerously interacting with humans. BearSaver, a company based in Ontario, Calif. is growing a product line of unique site furnishings that attempts to keep the bears at bay.

Armed with new knowledge, sophisticated equipment and engineering capabilities an easy-to-open, push-to-close latch was designed and patented that also complies with ADA guidelines. Now thousands of metal containers ?EUR??,,????'??? from food storage, trash and recycling ?EUR??,,????'??? to hundreds of national, state and local parks, cities and private residences have been sold.

Source: BearSaver