I recommend talking with the bears. Try reasoning with them, appealing to their sense of communality, rather than focusing on your differences.

Or an elaborate hoax. There’s no way a humorless provincial government in Canada would put up such a sign.

The more and more rapid arrivals of bears at elk kill sites has resulted in development of “quarter and run” as the approved method of cleaning your elk, as the bears consider the offal theirs, and if you aren’t done, packed, and gone before they arrive, so is the rest of the elk.

A Colorado elk hunt last year with Montana, Alaska, and Colorado hunters was interesting, in that the Alaska and Montana hunters carried 44 Magnums, along with their rifles, while the CO fellows felt that unnecessary. When I asked the handgun carriers why they did that, they said it was out of habit. A handgun on the belt was available after climbing a tree if one was surprised by a bear while cleaning an elk, but they thought their rifles would be left behind on the ground, as both hands are necessary to climb as fast as possible.

And my mother in law always carried and rang a bell while hiking in bear country. I encouraged her to do so.

We used to wear bells (and regularly tooted my dad’s old bugle) when venturing afield in Vermont in deer season, but that was to protect us from the idjits from new yawk and taxachusetts who armed themselves once a year and invaded Vermont. Worked, too – though we got some vicious looks from a few hunters..:-)