In years past, we spoke of wilderness survival as the ability of people to survive the land. Now we speak of wilderness survival as the land’s capability of surviving humankind. The increasing use of our wildernesses, combined with improper travel and camping techniques, is creating major human impact problems. If we are to retain the high quality of our back country experiences and keep our wilderness truly wild, each of us must accept responsibility to minimize the impact of his or her visit. Practicing a “Leave No Trace” ethic is very simple: make it hard for others to see or hear you and “Leave No Trace” of your visit. With your help, the wilderness resource can be managed to ensure that its unique character and values remain intact. Learn more about Leave No Trace.

Leave No Trace Principles

Plan Ahead and Prepare

• Know the regulations and special concerns for the area you'll visit.
• Prepare for extreme weather, hazards, and emergencies.
• Schedule your trip to avoid times of high use.
• Visit in small groups. Split larger parties into groups of 4-6.
• Repackage food to minimize waste.
• Use a map and compass to eliminate the use of marking paint, rock cairns or flagging.

Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces

• Durable surfaces include established trails and campsites, rock, gravel, dry grasses or snow.
• Protect riparian areas by camping at least 200 feet from lakes and streams.
• Good campsites are found, not made. Altering a site is not necessary.
• In popular areas:
  • Concentrate use on existing trails and campsites.
  • Walk single file in the middle of the trail, even when wet or muddy.
  • Keep campsites small. Focus activity in areas where vegetation is absent.
• In pristine areas:
  • Disperse use to prevent the creation of campsites and trails.
  • Avoid places where impacts are just beginning.
     

Dispose of Waste Properly

• Pack it in, pack it out. Inspect your campsite and rest areas for trash or spilled foods. Pack out all trash, leftover food, and litter.
• Deposit solid human waste in catholes dug 6 to 8 inches deep at least 200 feet from water, camp, and trails. Cover and disguise the cathole when finished.
• Pack out toilet paper and hygiene products.
• To wash yourself or your dishes, carry water 200 feet away from streams or lakes and use small amounts of biodegradable soap. Scatter strained dishwater.

Leave What You Find

• Preserve the past: examine, but do not touch, cultural or historic structures and artifacts.
• Leave rocks, plants and other natural objects as you find them.
• Avoid introducing or transporting non-native species.
• Do not build structures, furniture, or dig trenches.

Minimize Campfire Impacts

• Campfires can cause lasting impacts to the back country. Use a lightweight stove for cooking and enjoy a candle lantern for light.
• Where fires are permitted, use established fire rings, fire pans, or mound fires.
• Keep fires small. Only use sticks from the ground that can be broken by hand.
• Burn all wood and coals to ash, put out campfires completely, then scatter cool ashes.

Respect Wildlife

• Observe wildlife from a distance. Do not follow or approach them.
• Never feed animals. Feeding wildlife damages their health, alters natural behaviors, and exposes them to predators and other dangers.
• Protect wildlife and your food by storing rations and trash securely.
• Control pets at all times, or leave them at home.
• Avoid wildlife during sensitive times: mating, nesting, raising young, or winter.

Be Considerate of Other Visitors

• Respect other visitors and protect the quality of their experience.
• Be courteous. Yield to other users on the trail.
• Step to the downhill side of the trail when encountering pack stock.
• Take breaks and camp away from trails and other visitors.
• Let nature's sounds prevail. Avoid loud voices and noises

When you visit the national forests, know what to do when you see a bear. This BearWise Outdoors flyer can help protect bears and yourself.

Bears by nature are opportunists. In the wild, they will feed on whatever is readily available. Food odors and improperly stored garbage will attract bears to campgrounds and picnic sites. Bears become used to human food if it is readily available. Although they are naturally afraid of humans, bears lose this fear as they begin to associate human scents with the reward of food. Black bears can become a threat to humans, property, and themselves—a pattern that normally ends with injury or death. Protect yourself and protect the black bears by storing trash and food in safe locations when you visit a national forest. 

Food Storage

Bears are found nearly everywhere in the forests. Proper food and waste storage is essential:

• Always hang or store food, cooking utensils, and scented items in a bear-proof canister or in the closed trunk of a vehicle. Never leave coolers, garbage, or food items unattended in your tent or campsite. If using a bear bag, make sure it is hung at least 100' from your site. Click here for tips on how to hang your food.
• Check to see if the area you are visiting has any current regulations on food storage.
  • Emergency Food Storage Order on Avery Creek Rd (FSR 477) 
  • Requirement to Use Bear Canisters in Shining Rock Wilderness, Graveyard Fields Vicinity, Black Balsam Vicinity, Sam's Knob/Flat Laurel Creek Vicinity
  • Requirement to Use Bear Canisters in Panthertown 
  • Camping Closure in Graveyard Fields Vicinity
• Keep a clean campsite by disposing of food scraps and garbage. Do not leave items in fire rings, grills, or areas around your site. Remember to wipe down tables and grills to eliminate food odor.
• Always remember to Leave No Trace. If you see trash, pick it up!

Tips for Recreating in Bear Country

• Avoid hiking, biking, or camping alone in the backcountry. Hike in groups, and make noise while you hike by talking, singing, or whistling. 
• Never hike in the dark.
• Do not attempt to approach or feed a bear. Remember, a fed bear is a dead bear!
• If a bear is observed nearby, pack up your food and trash and leave the area immediately. If necessary, attempt to scare the animal away with loud shouts, by banging pans together, or throwing rocks and sticks at it. There have been reports of bears who will completely ignore all attempts to scare them away.
• Never run away from a bear. If one approaches, move away slowly and attempt to get into a secure vehicle or building.
• If you are attacked by a bear, try to fight back. Playing dead is not appropriate. Act aggressively and try to intimidate the bear by making noise and waving your arms. 

Black Bears

Despite the name, the coat of a black bear isn’t always black. There are brown black bears, white black bears and even a blue glacier bear. Experts estimate the average weight of a black bear is 300 pounds. Despite their size, black bears are very agile tree climbers. During times of danger or threat, bear cubs will take shelter in trees.

The Forest Service has been managing wildland fire on National Forests and Grasslands for more than 100 years. But the Forest Service doesn’t – and can’t – do it alone. Instead, the agency works closely with other federal, tribal, state, and local partners. Fire is now a more critical management tool than ever as the threat to property increases and the evidence of the ecological importance of natural fire becomes more established. When conditions are correct and specific management needs warrant change, forest managers allow fire to once again play a role in forest and grassland health. However, human safety is always the first consideration whether fighting fires or using fire to restore a natural process.

To report a wildfire: Call 9-1-1

There’s nothing quite like enjoying the great outdoors with a roaring fire, your friends and a starry night sky. But that campfire is also a big responsibility. The National Forests in North Carolina need your help preventing wildfires so more visitors like you can enjoy this experience on our public lands for years to come. That’s why it’s important to learn how to be safe with your campfire.

Follow these tips from Smokey Bear to be safe around a campfire:

• Picking Your Spot
  • DO NOT build a campfire if the campground or area rules prohibit them.
  • DO NOT build a campfire in hazardous, dry conditions.
  • Take wind, and its direction, into account when choosing the site. Choose a spot that’s protected from gusts.
• Preparing Your Spot
  • Clear a 10-foot-diameter area around the site. Remove any grass, twigs, leaves and firewood.
  • Dig a pit in the dirt, about a foot deep. Circle the pit with rocks.
• Building Your Campfire
  • Make sure you have a source of water, a bucket and shovel nearby at all times.
  • Gather wood from the ground. DO NOT cut whole trees or branches, dead or alive. Live materials won’t burn, and you’ll be damaging the forest. The three types of wood to use: Tinder: Small twigs and dry leaves, grass and needles. Kindling: Sticks smaller than 1″ around. Fuel: Larger pieces of wood. Keep these stacked upwind, away from the fire.
  • Keep the fire small and under control.
• Maintaining and Extinguishing Your Campfire
  • DO NOT burn dangerous things like aerosol cans, pressurized containers, glass or aluminum cans. They could explode, shatter and/or create harmful fumes or dust.
  • Once you have a strong fire going, add larger pieces of dry wood to keep it burning steadily.
  • Pour lots of water on the fire. Drown ALL embers, not just the red ones. Pour until hissing sound stops.
  • If you do not have water, stir dirt or sand into the embers with a shovel to bury the fire. Scrape any remaining sticks and logs to remove any embers with your shovel. Make sure that no exposed or smoldering embers.

Remember: If it’s too hot to touch, it’s too hot to leave.

Untethered freedom. Tail wagging, ears flopping, bliss. He loves it, you love it. You have good control over him, usually. Sometimes he gets carried away, though. Maybe he ranges out a little too far, zig zags between other hikers, chases a deer, but who wouldn’t? Or maybe he’s a perfect angel that sticks right by your side, ready to soak up any trail love that comes his way. Either way, many people don’t give a second thought to bringing along their beautiful, drooling mess for a hike – and going leash-less sounds that much more enjoyable.

National Forests in North Carolina have hundreds of miles of hiking trails, and dogs are welcome on nearly all of it. But what’s best for everyone’s outdoor experience might not be fido’s first choice. Here’s how National Forests in North Carolina describes its leash law.

Developed Recreation Areas

While keeping dogs on a leash and under control is often seen as a common courtesy, dogs must be leashed in developed recreation areas in National Forests. Unless you’re blazing a trail through the backcountry, you’re most likely using a developed recreation area. Hiking on a trail and feel like you’re in the middle of nowhere? That’s a developed recreation area. Dispersed campsite away from the crowds? Developed recreation area. Most areas in the forest that have some type of improvement are considered developed recreation areas. So, what about that trail blazer? Did they find a loophole?

County Laws

No matter where you are in the National Forests, you’re always in a North Carolina county. So while the forests are full of undeveloped areas that would seem like leash-free havens, county leash laws often bridge the gap. For example, Buncombe County’s leash law states that if your dog leaves your property, it must be restrained on a leash. This would cover any National Forest land that appears to be a grey area, like undeveloped areas. The surrounding counties of Haywood, Henderson and Transylvania all have similar laws that forbid dogs running at large. Be sure to check county leash laws before heading to the National Forest to ensure your visit goes as planned.

I. Must. Run.

Fido's hands are most likely tied, or at least leashed, in National Forests in North Carolina, but many counties have numerous designated off-leash areas for getting out the zooms. A quick dog park search or phone call to your local municipality or county’s office can provide more details.

Leash laws don’t have to limit your outdoor experience. Chasing an animal or sprinting down the trail might be a rush, but Fido is probably happy just to be there – leash or not.

Requests for placing private memorials or similar forms of remembrance on the National Forests in North Carolina continue to rise. The Forest Service understands the emotion associated with losing a close friend or family member, and the desire to memorialize an individual or event. While the placement of a monument or memorial on public land may help some individuals through difficult times, these memorials are generally of significance to only those most closely tied to a specific person or event. Others may feel that memorials intrude on their experience of the Forest. For this and other reasons, the placement of monuments or memorials on National Forest System lands is prohibited.

Monuments or memorials will be removed and disposed of when discovered. In lieu of placing a monument or memorial on public land, the Forest Service asks that you consider honoring the person or event in ways that do not have a lasting impact on the landscape or other visitors’ experiences. At times, a memorial may be appropriate to mark a nationally significant event or to provide the public with local history. In these instances, it may be acceptable to permit a memorial on National Forest System lands.