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The Six Biggest Mistakes Made by Both New and Experienced Campers #3
You've watched them on television, Yogi Bear and Boo Boo "terrorizing" the campers and making off with their picnic baskets. And of course, Ranger Smith is always there to point out the error in their ways. In the end, everything turns out fine. It's not the case in real life. It's unsafe for wild animals to correlate people with food because they can become hostile. When that happens, wildlife managers often have no choice but to kill the animals.
Another unfortunate result of feeding animals disrupts their natural diet. They suffer from malnutrition, which makes it hard for them to bear young or even causes them to die.
Take deer. People who feed deer that come near a campground often have no idea what deer eat. What they see is deer picking up things around the campground, and that's the wrong food. If these animals regularly feed on junk food, the microorganisms in their digestive tracts can't keep adjusting; they cannot process the food.
Deer also have trouble discriminating between junk food and the packaging it comes in. Many have died from stomachs filled with candy wrappers and all kinds of garbage they think are edible.
Don't feed any wildlife, especially if they seem to be asking for a handout. Animals that are too used to people may become too comfortable in our presence, making it easy for people with bad intentions to harm the animals that have now become too trusting
You can prevent accidental feeding by keeping all food up and out of the reach of animals when not in use. There is nothing worse than coming back from a day of hiking to find a bear has made himself at home at your campsite. Dispose of any uneaten food in the same manner until you can find a proper place to dispose of it.
Also, do not eat in your tent. The scent of food will remain on the tent. A raccoon or other wild animal may think your tent is a tasty treat and will start tearing it open to get to it.
We feed them because we want to help them, in a vague, sentimental way, not realizing that our help is not needed--in this form. Or we do it because the animals are charming, we want to see them up close, we want to have a picture of ourselves with a wild animal.
If we truly care about wild animals we will learn more about them, make sure they have the environment they need, respect their independence, and spare them our charity. The urge to offer food is natural. It's called hospitality when we offer it to our own species. It gives us pleasure. However, let's not unintentionally kill wildlife with kindness.
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