Ahh ... right to the heart of the matter.
Fortunately, we don't have brown/grizzly bears in Colorado, and the local black bears are not generally aggressive. We also have a lot of mountain lions, but they are rarely seen. It's true, one occasionally hears about weird attacks or other events, but the probability is minuscule; they almost all occur in jam-packed national park campgrounds where food/trash is regularly found. Not in the backcountry. When I first started backpacking, I did carry bear spray. However, even at the time, I had serious doubts about whether it would really be effective during an actual attack. Hundreds of nights in the wilderness later, I no longer bother to carry it. Some people do, and some people carry a sidearm as well. Not to be glib, but spending time in the backcountry involves calculated risks. One can't possibly carry everything needed to be perfectly comfortable and safe. And since my approach is minimalist, I have pared back to the essentials. Severe weather, injury, and serious navigational errors (and combinations of the three) are my biggest concerns.
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