Leah's Legacy

In late May, the community of Ovando unveiled stickers listing the top six commandments for tent camping in bear country.

The stickers are the latest effort by the town to ensure the safety of visitors after a young male grizzly bear killed cyclist Leah Lokan of Chico, Calif. last year. Lokan was camping in a tent near the Brand Bar Museum near the center of the town in the early morning hours of July 5 when the bear attacked her.

Kathy Schoendoerfer, owner of the Blackfoot Angler and de facto ambassador for the bicyclists traveling through town, said the idea came about to provide campers with an easy reference for how to avoid conflicts with bears.

"After this whole thing happened, we started looking up what people do when tent camping," she said. They found there wasn't much information available. "If you're hiking, there's a ton of things to do; if you're 'camping' camping, there's a ton of things to do, but for tents, backcountry, there wasn't a whole lot."

She said the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks provided some cards that were "really cool and nicely done," but realized that cards are often lost, set aside or thrown away. Instead, someone pointed out that people will put stickers on their campers, their coolers, their cups and water bottles where they're more likely to be seen.

For Ovando there was a particular emphasis on tips for bicyclists. Those riding the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, which goes through both Ovando and Lincoln, travel very lightly and often camp at dispersed sites along the route.

They looked into bear awareness information and pared down the tips they found to come up with their own top "commandments" that would work best for bicyclists.

"Let's face it, that's our target audience, people sleeping in a tent in the middle of nowhere."

They started with a list of ten tips, but shortened the list to make them legible on a sticker. "We took the six top 'commandments' and we made it into this really cool sticker."

The top three "commandments" deal with scents and food, which played a role in Lokans death. According to January report on her death created by an interagency review board, Lokan moved food that had been in her tent into the Ovando "Hoosgow" after the bear first came through the area. However, there was still food in her bicycle saddlebags nearby and in the tent with her she had toiletries and personal items in two bags that had held dried blueberries and still carried the smell.

The stickers are just the latest effort by the community to prevent another bear-related tragedy. Since Lokan's death last summer, Ovando has taken strides to promote bear awareness, with signs around town and new bear proof food containers.

"It's been well received by the bicyclists," she said. "They've been so supportive of us."

She said bicyclists have been coming out in droves to support the town, but they aren't camping in town, even though there are no longer any restrictions against it. Instead, they're staying in the hard shelters or in the basement of the church, which is still open to them.

After Schoendoerfer posted an image of the original sticker on Facebook in May, one person referred to them as the "Tent Commandments," a term she commandeered for reprint of the sticker.

The stickers are funded by the town's improvement fund and businesses in Ovando hand them out for free.