6 Best Bear Sprays In 2020

A bear deterrent is a bear deterrent formula contained in a spray that can be intended to help you escape a bear that comes to close to you or is attacking. The formula is similar to a pepper spray used in self-defense but much stronger, fit to deter an animal of a much larger size and ferocity than a human attacker, of course.

As far as active ingredients go, both kinds of formulas are based on capsaicinoid-derived components. Capsaicin is the substance that makes hot peppers spicy; the more a pepper has of it, the hotter it gets. Pepper sprays and bear sprays contain highly concentrated amounts of these substances, in a much higher concentration than you could find in nature.

This acts as a powerful irritant and mild paralytic agent for humans and large animals like bears. It will allow the user to get away from danger while the attacker (in this case the bear) is incapacitated. According to government data (from a study presented at the end of this guide), bear sprays are effective in over 92% of bear attacks and encounters, whereas firearms are only effective in a little over 50% of cases. Impressive, right?

Not only is the pepper spray more effective than firearms against a bear attack, but it’s also a more humane solution for protecting yourself in the wild. A bear affected by a deterrent will have no difficulty returning to a normal state of health and physical comfort after a few hours. Nature can resume its course, and you will have gotten away from a dangerous animal without actually putting it down.

Bear sprays formulas are generally easy enough to use once you get the hang of it. It’s best that before you go hiking or camping with an actual container of bear mace spray, you practice using it with a training can. After all, if and when you will be faced with an actual charging animal, you need to move fast.

That speed will not come from the spray can’s ease of use but will stem from your own familiarity with the spraying mechanism. Number 6 on our list of recommendations above is one of these training sprays, we highly recommend testing it out and learning to use it before graduating to actual pepper spray.

For most bear spray brands, the mechanism is activated like this: there’s a safety clip that needs to be tugged, flipped, or removed. After that, the button that actually sprays the formula can be fully used and the contents of the can are ready to be dispersed.

Once you remove the safety clip, you point the spray towards the animal if it is right next to you, or towards the middle of the path between you if it is charging. Next, press the spraying button and keep it pressed in order to discharge the bear repellent substance, just as you would use a regular spray. You can choose to do it in shorter bursts if you prefer, or if you’re worried you will exhaust the entire contents of the can too fast by spraying continuously.

Obviously, you should only use bear sprays when a bear gets close to you (closer than 40 feet) and you feel in danger. But there are 3 different scenarios for a bear-human encounter, and a repellent spray should be used differently in each. Let’s take a look at these 3 situations.

1st scenario: The bear is close by (40 feet)

What to do: Resist the urge of using the spray at such a high distance. It won’t work: bear sprays are not meant to scare away bears in your vicinity, but to deter bears that are actually coming to attack you. Spraying it in their general direction from a distance will not affect them and may even attract them closer. You can only start using the spray when the bear is 30 feet away from you. Once the animal starts closing in, you can spurt short sprays towards the middle of the path between you. This should deter it from coming even closer.

2nd scenario: The bear is charging (20 feet or less)

What to do: Aiming the spray can downward and ahead of the bear (the middle of the path between you), keep spraying short puffs. Make it so the bear has to pass directly through the pepper fog if they want to get closer to you. If the bear continues to charge and gets too close, the deterrent should render them incapable of attacking anymore. If the bear is already too close (less than 15 feet), you can aim directly towards its face and eyes.

3rd scenario: Bear is on top of you and attacking

What to do: We know this sounds scary and be assured that there is a very little chance that it should ever come to that. Still, just in case a bear appears out of nowhere and begins to attack you before you had a chance to start using your spray from a greater distance, here is what you need to do. Spray directly towards its face and keep spraying continuously until you can curl up and protect yourself. Once the bear is paralyzed you can move out from under it and run away or go get help. Research indicates that even if you get to this scenario, using the bear pepper spray will allow you to get away with only minor injuries, if any.

The best bear repellents are officially recognized (by government guidelines and regulations) to be the most effective way of protecting yourself against a bear. They are even more effective than firearms: according to a study linked below, firearms can protect you from getting attacked during a bear encounter only in 50% of cases, while a bear mace spray is effective in over 90-92% of cases.

As an added bonus, unlike firearms or other weapons, bear sprays causes no actual permanent damage to the animal. Much like pepper spray used against a human attacker, the formula will only stun the target, causing irritation and mild paralysis, until you can safely get away. Then, after a few hours, the animal will make a recovery and will be able to resume their life in the wild as before. If anything, the bear will learn from such an encounter to stay further away from humans. This will be good for the bears and for people as well, so there’s no harm done.

Regular pepper spray was invented in the 80s for self-defense and it was formulated for use against humans. It delivers a strong punch meant to temporarily stun and cripple a human attacker until their target can get away or call in the authorities.

A bear deterrent spray is formulated in a similar way, but its concentration is much higher, intended for a large and aggressive animal that needs to be deterred immediately. It will render it harmless until you can quickly move out and find another camping area far away from the animal. A pepper spray would be ineffective if used against a bear, while a bear deterrent would be too much if used against a human (and could cause permanent, serious damage). Therefore, you could say that the only difference between pepper spray and bear spray is the scale and intensity of the formula.

Bear sprays are not required as a mandatory safety measure, even in areas that are known to have plenty of bears around. It is entirely up to you if you choose to have a bear repellent spray with you as a protection measure. Our recommendation is to invest in one, for better peace of mind. Even if you don’t run into a bear, it’s better safe than sorry, right?

A bear canister, on the other hand, is indeed required before you can enter such areas. A bear canister is a food box specially designed for storing food and other typical camping items that attract bears. As long as you use a bear canister you will not attract bears to your campsite. Here is more advice on storing food around your campsite.

Bear sprays are most definitely legal and they are also FDA approved, so you can make sure that they’re both effective and safe to use. Still, you should keep in mind that some natural parks and reservations are allowed to restrict and forbid the use of bear mace spray. Some areas have protected or endangered species living within their perimeter and if visitors use sprays in their proximity it could be harmful to the animals.

So, what can you do in this case? First of all, make sure you enquire about the rules in the area you plan to hike or camp in. If a spray is restricted there, you should know ahead of time, instead of risking a fine or worse. Second of all, if the use of bear mace spray is indeed forbidden in the place you’re planning to go to, you need to have a back-up plan should you encounter a dangerous animal. For example, you could join a guided tour with a larger group of people, and so on.

You may find that ordering sprays online is sometimes restricted from air shipping, which may lead you to question its legality again. Don’t worry: bear sprays are most definitely legal across the United States, even in the states where the use of self-defense pepper spray is illegal. Actually, in such areas, there are even cases of people keeping sprays in their homes for the purpose of fighting attackers should there be a break-in.

But even if it is completely legal, bear sprays are restricted to be carried by airplane. All this means for you as a customer is that you’ll need to wait a bit longer until your parcel is delivered if you order your repellent online.

Also, if you need to travel by plane in order to go on the hiking trip of your dreams, this may also be a problem. You are not allowed to carry bear mace spray by plane, anywhere: not in the checked bag nor in your carry-on bag. So, if you want to go hiking in another state, make sure you travel by other means than an airplane or buy your bear pepper spray from local stores before you start your hike.

While hiking and camping, the bear pepper spray container needs to be carried at hand, in a specialized holster on your belt. This way, should the need arise, you can react fast and use it before the animal can actually hurt you or anyone else in your party. A fast react time is essential, so keeping it in your hiking backpack or in the car trunk while away from it will not do.

Until you actually get to the hiking or camping area, you can carry the bear mace spray in your other luggage or in the car trunk. As long as the safety lid or clip is not pulled, there is no risk for the liquid to get discharged. Still, as a precaution measure, it’s best if you wrap up the container in a paper box or bubble wrap, just to make sure traveling and bumpy roads don’t cause any damage to it.

Then, when you get to your destination and you’re ready to go out there and experience nature, just remove it from the extra packaging and place it in its intended holster and around your belt. You’re now ready to venture into the bear country!

As mentioned above, bear spray only hurts the animal in terms of irritation and mild paralysis, but the effects are temporary. It’s effective just to allow you enough time to make your escape and to deter the bear from coming close to humans in the future. While the bear should be able to get back up and feel comfortable again in a relative short time, it can take a few hours for the irritation caused by the pepper spray to completely wear off.

In extreme cases, depending on the animal and its overall health or age, the effects of the bear pepper spray can last longer, for up to a few days. Sure, it’s uncomfortable and it does cause the animal a certain amount of suffering, but there’s no permanent damage involved. Considering that you still have to defend yourself somehow, it’s a much more humane option than firearms or weapons that would actually wound or kill it.

You may wonder in this case why bear sprays are forbidden in certain areas, if it’s true that they cause bears no permanent damage or injury. Depending on the natural park or reservation you visit, there may other animals in the area that could get hurt by the use of bear mace spray. Usually, when there is a restriction in the use of bear pepper spray somewhere, it’s because of a need to protect smaller animals that inhabit the same region.

Just like self-defense pepper spray, bear spray is highly irritant and even more so due to its higher concentration. The point of learning to use one by testing out a training bear spray can is precisely meant to avoid this kind of accidents when some of the product ends up on your skin. Still, if you find yourself in such a situation, don’t worry, it’s still manageable.

First of all, if this happens during a bear attack, your main priority is still neutralizing the animal. Bear through the sting of the spray on your skin (if you can feel any) and focus on ending the encounter. Then, you can tend to the skin area that got contaminated with bear pepper spray.

To treat the affected area, you can first soak a tissue in milk and lay it gently on the skin that got exposed to the pepper spray. Leave it on for 10-15 minutes and the milk should take some of the sting away. Also, make sure you remain calm: nothing bad can happen because of this, it will just be a bit uncomfortable until you manage to remove it all.

Note that the milk will not remove the pepper oil from your skin completely, it will just take the edge off from the burning sensation. After you leave the milk-soaked tissue on your skin for a bit and start feeling better, you need to wash the area with a grease-removing product. Dishwasher liquid and water should be enough to remove the pepper oil from the skin.

You may still experience increased skin sensitivity and tingling on that spot for a few days, but no need to expect any major consequences from this contamination. Just like a sunburn, it won’t be pretty, but it will pass. Still, it can be pretty uncomfortable while it lasts, so make sure to avoid it.