I had always heard that you should carry pepper spray and have bells on your clothing so you don't surprise the bears when hiking in bear country. You can tell what kind of bears are in the area by their scat. If there are black bears, the scat will have, berries, grass, roots and maybe the bones of small mammals. If it is grizzly scat, it will also have berries, grass, roots, bones of mammals, bells and pieces of pepper spray cans in it...
