What's the best way to dispose of a body in the backcountry?

Question

Suppose you needed to dispose of a large carcass for one reason or another while in the backcountry... what would be the best way to dispose of it in the woods so that it wouldn't be discovered? You always hear stories of people burying bears that they've had to shoot, but I can't imagine digging a big enough hole in the rocky ground to hide a 500lbs+ bear. Especially if you weren't carrying a descent shovel. Is it easier to section the animal and bury the smaller parts? What about when you're up above the treeline? is covering it with rocks enough to hide it, or would you need to drag it into the trees and find some soft soil? I don't see anything on the Leave no Trace website that talks about this. Does anyone have any tips or stories about what they've done in these types of situations?

For reference; todays date is the first day of the month of april. — ShemSeger, Apr 01 '15 at 15:17
For reference: Resolutions should not take place before the second day of april, everything else takes away all possible fun. (Believe me, I am an expert by birth :P ) — imsodin, Apr 01 '15 at 15:24
Best sentence is: I don't see anything on the Leave no Trace website — , Apr 01 '15 at 15:48
For reference, where I am, today's date is the second day of the month of April. — Greenstone Walker, Apr 01 '15 at 20:51
@GreenstoneWalker - FALSE, you are on stackexchange.com, and SE operates on UTC time :-P It is still April 1st for 3 more hours. — ShemSeger, Apr 01 '15 at 21:00
I don't see any UTC time on my screen. I see "asked today" and "active today" and today is 2nd April. :-P — Greenstone Walker, Apr 01 '15 at 21:06
@ShemSeger Technically SE treats April Fools day as a 48 hour period. If any point of the world is on April 1st, SE keeps their April Fool's stuff up. — Adam Davis, Apr 01 '15 at 23:18
@GreenstoneWalker - I'm still trying to figure out how we can profit from the fact that since you are a day ahead, you already know what happened today for those of us still here. — JTP - Apologise to Monica, Apr 01 '15 at 23:23
@GreenstoneWalker - Click on the achievements drop down in the top left, the clock is displayed there. — ShemSeger, Apr 02 '15 at 00:10
@JoeTaxpayer, sadly, I can report that we don't have jetpacks in the future. — Greenstone Walker, Apr 02 '15 at 02:13
@nhinkle - The funniest thing is that technically, this question is not off-topic. This is a real problem that hunters and land-owners encounter, and Fishing and Hunting SE was merged with The Great Outdoors SE in May of 2011, so this is the appropriate site to earnestly ask this question. Some of the answers may not be appropriate outside of April fools, but the question as it's worded is still technically valid. — ShemSeger, Apr 02 '15 at 16:38
The best place to dispose of a body anywhere is on the second page of Google search results. — QED, Apr 02 '15 at 18:25
@LightningRacisinObrit well it's too late to edit the reason, but this is clearly a joke question. — nhinkle, Apr 02 '15 at 19:00
@nhinkle: I'll say it again, the original intent is irrelevant. This question is on-topic. — Lightness Races in Orbit, Apr 02 '15 at 20:01

score 19 · Answer 1 · answered Apr 01 '15 at 20:23

19

Throwing a dead body down a ravine in a rugged mountain area is a morally blameless act, much like throwing your biodegradable orange peel into a bush. Crows and coyotes will rapidly take care of it, leaving only disassembled bones, which they'll scatter. Just make sure to remove all the nonbiodegradable stuff, like clothing, credit cards, and so on. This also helps with not getting caught. It's easy for a search and rescue team to find someone if they're wearing a brightly colored tee shirt.

answered Apr 01 '15 at 20:23

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Today's (or yesterday's) bears really need credit cards and t-shirts being out in the woods? Quite sophisticated. – Wills Apr 02 '15 at 04:48
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To avoid mercury release in the environment, please also remove dental amalgams. The cleanest method is by using pliers, but if you're in a hurry, a hammer appears to be fastest. – Gras Double Apr 02 '15 at 12:30
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@Wills: they need credit cards to order the T-shirts online, because there's no clothes shops out there for them to buy using cash. They need T-shirts, because they're wearing trousers so as to have pockets to keep their credit cards, and a bear in just trousers isn't a great look. – Steve Jessop Apr 02 '15 at 18:11

jamesqf · Answer 2 · 2015-04-01T17:37:23.280

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You can just leave whatever parts you don't eat for the scavengers. Seriously, this is the outdoors, not Disney: critters have died, from time to time, and worms have eaten them* - which is why the woods are not cluttered with corpses. "...we fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table".

*Apologies to Will Shakespeare.

edited Apr 01 '15 at 17:37

answered Apr 01 '15 at 17:00

jamesqf

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-1 for violating "leave no trace." – djechlin Apr 01 '15 at 18:11
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@djechlin Let's remove animals and plants from The Great Outdoors then, for violating leave no trace. – gerrit Apr 01 '15 at 18:17
@gerrit it's a mandate on people, not flora and fauna who are already in the great outdoors. – djechlin Apr 01 '15 at 18:19
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Treating the topic seriously (I know ;-), when a tahr dies of old age, it's body is left in the wilderness. When a bear eats a fish, the remains of the fish are left in the wilderness. The decay of these items returns important nutrients to the ground. If you have shot an animal that is too big to carry out intact then there is nothing wrong with leaving its body in the wilderness. Just leave it far enough away from trails that hikers aren't going to be upset by the smell of decomp. – Greenstone Walker Apr 01 '15 at 20:48
@djechlin: And how is allowing the body to be naturally scavenged not "leaving no trace"? I suppose in rare instances it could fossilize, but fossils are perfectly natural. – jamesqf Apr 02 '15 at 03:26
@jamesqf it's not, that's a trace. https://lnt.org/ I'm not here to debate the standard. – djechlin Apr 02 '15 at 03:34
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@djechlin No but you did downvote based on it so now you get to defend your implicit assertion that following it is a mandate. – Lightness Races in Orbit Apr 02 '15 at 17:29
@LightningRacisinObrit see lnt.org. – djechlin Apr 02 '15 at 17:38
@djechlin: You can keep linking to that website over and over again and it won't change anything. inb4 "see lnt.org" – Lightness Races in Orbit Apr 02 '15 at 17:39
@LightningRacisinObrit won't change my downvote either :) – djechlin Apr 02 '15 at 17:39
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Wish I could downvote people – Lightness Races in Orbit Apr 02 '15 at 17:40
Be glad you can't... – djechlin Apr 02 '15 at 17:41
April Fool's day is over so I bid adieu to this thread. 'grats on a bronze badge despite my literalness :) – djechlin Apr 02 '15 at 17:41
@djechlin: Before we debate the standard (if we do), I think I might reasonably ask what justification you use for imposing your standard on me. – jamesqf Apr 02 '15 at 18:18

score 8 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 01 '15 at 15:28

8

Burn it.

True, campfires are not really a perfect example of leave no trace. But what you can do:

Carry the carcass far above the treeline, where there is no vegetation
Carry firewood to the same location (of course, only already dead branches and gathered from a sufficiently large area to be not suspicious)
Burn!
Whatever is left, carry out. If you can carry it up when it is full, surely you can carry the remains out. Don't forget to take the ashes, too.

answered Apr 01 '15 at 15:28

gerrit

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What about the smell, and the smoke? Would it be best to do this at night? – ShemSeger Apr 01 '15 at 15:31
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I've always understood leave no trace to mean there should be no trace after you finished whatever you're doing. Clearly as long as you exist you are observable in some way. – gerrit Apr 01 '15 at 15:33
So this should be fine as long as it's safe to start a fire in the first place. – djechlin Apr 01 '15 at 18:12
@djechlin That's one of the reasons why you need to start with carrying everything up to the area where only rocks and ice remain. The other reason is that this means no vegetation is damaged. – gerrit Apr 01 '15 at 18:18
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It takes a surprising amount of fuel to incinerate a dead body. The numbers I've seen are that you need one pound of gasoline for each pound of body; since wood has a lower energy density, you need much more of it. – Mark Apr 01 '15 at 23:00
@Mark The question did not indicate whether we're talking about a chipmunk, a human, or a moose. – gerrit Apr 01 '15 at 23:17
@gerrit, the same rule of thumb applies: about a pound of gasoline for a squirrel, about 1200 pounds for a bull moose. – Mark Apr 01 '15 at 23:22
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I have picked up the occasional annoying hitchhiker, so I can speak with some authority on this subject. Bodies - particularly fat bodies - will practically burn themselves if you do it right. What you need to do is create a wick and they will burn like a candle. Remove any cotton or synthetic clothes (woollen clothes are OK). Wrap the body in 4 or 5 tight loops of heavy rope. Splash a couple of litres of petrol on the body and rope, and light it. The subcutaneous fat will melt quite quickly and be drawn up into the rope which will act as a wick. May take several hours, but everything will go. – Peter Webb Apr 02 '15 at 13:24

score 7 · Answer 4 · answered Apr 02 '15 at 01:23

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According to my wife, who is an experienced backpacker, it’s insufficient to merely leave the carcass to scavengers. You also need to leave a Snickers, to attract bears.

answered Apr 02 '15 at 01:23

Bradd Szonye

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She adds, “Bears love Snickers.” – Bradd Szonye Apr 02 '15 at 01:25

score 5 · Answer 5 · answered Apr 01 '15 at 15:45

5

Eat it

Happy April Fools!!!!!!!!!!!!!

answered Apr 01 '15 at 15:45

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Which leads to the follow up question - "How do you eat bones and other typically inedible parts of a body?" – Adam Davis Apr 01 '15 at 16:03
@AdamDavis: Bring a dog. They love eating bones, even if it is not good for them. – dotancohen Apr 01 '15 at 18:56
@dotancohen - Bones are extremely good for them. Random fact: Scientists believe human ancestors were scavengers, and developed the first oldowan tools to help them crack open bones to get at the rich marrow inside. – ShemSeger Apr 01 '15 at 20:32

score 4 · Answer 6 · answered Apr 01 '15 at 20:55

4

the correct way to dispose of...er-hem,(ex-living tissue !),is to dissect it into smaller,manageable pieces,(portions ?),and bury them in the ground,not together,but separately.Make sure that when you bury them,there is at least 30 cm's of space above the meat,you need to add a capstone to every piece buried,and then compact the soil above that. Cover your handiwork with twigs,leaves and brush etc. The whole exercise is best carried out at sundown,so any vapor condensation is not immediately visible.By the way,how old(fresh) is the stiff ? body heat is retained for 2-4 hours after the kill,so if you dismember it too soon,bare in mind,vapor condensation will escape,and could be seen by others !!!!-This could be a bad thing....it may mean you have more digging and dismembering to do. The reason you need capstones above the meat is to prevent them from being dug up by scavengers,and there-fore exposing your dirty secrets to all and sundry. I definitely haven;t killed anyone and buried them in the woods,LATELY ....

answered Apr 01 '15 at 20:55

fred of the forrest...

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*Thing, you haven't killed anything. – ShemSeger Apr 02 '15 at 16:40
I disagree with much of this. If you allow scavengers to dispose of the carcass for you, there is an excellent chance that no significant portion will remain. Even if portions are later discovered, if you used appropriate methods and due care in rendering the carcass a carcass, nothing will be left to prove that its demise wasn't due to natural causes. – jamesqf Apr 02 '15 at 18:23
@jamesqf - Unless you shoot it in the head and leave a skull behind with a bullet hole in it. – ShemSeger Apr 02 '15 at 18:34
@ jamesqf, I disagree with your comment.If you leave the meat un-disturbed,natural decomposition will occur.Granted,it will take time,BUT,and it is a significant but,IT WILL REMAIN UNDETECTED..... – fred of the forrest... Apr 02 '15 at 18:48
@ jamesqf,sorry,I hit the wrong button,Istill have stuff to say... – fred of the forrest... Apr 02 '15 at 18:50
@jamesqf,wrong button,AGAIN !! ...as I was saying...it will remain undetected long enough for you to 'make your escape',leave the county/country etc.IF you've killed a beast out of season,or your husband/wife,or lost hitch-hiker,you really need to high-tail it outta there,pronto !.Your comment 'that there is an excellent CHANCE that no SIGNIFICANT portion will remain' well, let me tell you something,sonny,I don't want ANY chance of ANY portion of flesh/bone out in the open whilst I'm in the vicinity and the cops are about !!! If you care to argue,meet me in the Forrest,at sundown !hehehe – fred of the forrest... Apr 02 '15 at 19:07

score 2 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 02 '15 at 17:21

2

Depends on where you are. Near Las Vegas, there are plenty of abandoned mines where a body will almost certainly remain undiscovered for years. Talk to the local mob for specifics.

answered Apr 02 '15 at 17:21

Karen

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What's the best way to dispose of a body in the backcountry?

7 Answers7

Eat it