Bushcraft shelters in winter - no tent/sleeping bag

[Erbswurst]

If you get lost in England and have a charged head lamp it's surely sensible to stay on the legs all night if it's cold.

But if you are really in the middle of nowhere I think it's better to sleep at night by the fire and walk during the day, because that is more energy efficient in the long run.

 

[n00b]

I have up to 5 cats in my construction trailer if it gets cold.

Ha - at first I thought you meant you put them in there to use for warmth, to stick them in your clothes like Ozmundo

 

[n00b]

If you get lost in England and have a charged head lamp it's surely sensible to stay on the legs all night if it's cold.

But if you are really in the middle of nowhere I think it's better to sleep at night by the fire and walk during the day, because that is more energy efficient in the long run.

I'm thinking about becoming nocturnal for the whole winter. Giving it some serious thought.

 

[Erbswurst]

Due to my job and personal preference I lived nearly like this as a student. There is a high risk to become depressive if you don't see enough sunlight

 

[n00b]

That's what puts me off. But I live outside and want to see how much I really need to carry. Hence this thread. Being nocturnal and relying on activity to keep warm seems better than waking up every hour and a half to fuel the fire.

 

[Erbswurst]

I think your assumption is wrong.
It's no problem to feed the fire every 90 minutes. We did it for thousands of years and still can learn it easily. It's an absolutely natural thing for humans, like swimming for example. You have to learn it and afterwards you simply can do it.

I have domesticated ducks here. They have to learn and to train how to fly because they are relatively heavy. After they learned it they simply fly, of course, because they are birds. That's quite comparable to swimming humans and keeping an eye to the fire.

It's absolutely usual among German boy scout leaders. They have fire heated tents, some kind of Sami Kota, and otherwise a rather light equipment and simply use the fire. No problem at all for nobody. Among my friends it was the most usual in the world.

Last winter I heated the wood stove in my construction trailer and used an old two seasons bag. Under me in the bed box I had the Snugpak Special Forces sleep system, but didn't see any need to pull it out. We got around -15°C here. I had just half rotten poplar and filled the stove a few times each night. No problem.

 

[Kav]

There is this semi conscious and Ill thought out bushcraft fantasy.
I’m a Youtube Bushcraft Hero. I will post a ‘ caught in a storm with minimal gear’ episode. I will demonstrate advanced skills and
Alpha Male ‘ The more you know, the less you need’ Mors Kochanski testicular fortitude.
Congratulations! At best, you just spent a miserable night that would purge all sin within a medieval monk. At worst, some idiot will go out thinking this is Bushcraft and die.
Rolls over in my winter rated down bag, heated flask near feet, belly full of food, fire fueled long enough to give a solid five or more hours of sleep and coals in the morning to brew tea or coffee.

 

[TeeDee]

The moral is we can, we've just been weakened by convenience

Only the survivors of the experience to be fair.

Survivorship bias - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[TLM]

The idea to leave no trace is really weird.

Not really if one is in a crowded area, it is taught here by the scouts. Of course in my case it was slightly reinforced by a few Border Patrol sergeants ...

Getting by without too much gear just by your skills is well embedded in local "erä" tradition, difficult to translate but it is a combination of trekking, orientation, hunting, fishing. You are supposed to have the necessary equipment with you it just isn't very much, like sleeping bags are not included but a tarp or lean to is (if you had one ...).

 

[n00b]

local "erä" tradition

This sounds interesting

 

[n00b]

I think your assumption is wrong.
It's no problem to feed the fire every 90 minutes. We did it for thousands of years and still can learn it easily.

I like your optimism. This is how I think too. Surely in Britain - especially southern Britain where I am - it's possible to recover the ability to sleep outside without gear. Like you say it's in our DNA. Although by the looks of it not everyone's. Maybe the genome split.

 

[n00b]

There is this semi conscious and Ill thought out bushcraft fantasy.
I’m a Youtube Bushcraft Hero. I will post a ‘ caught in a storm with minimal gear’ episode. I will demonstrate advanced skills and
Alpha Male ‘ The more you know, the less you need’ Mors Kochanski testicular fortitude.
Congratulations! At best, you just spent a miserable night that would purge all sin within a medieval monk. At worst, some idiot will go out thinking this is Bushcraft and die.
Rolls over in my winter rated down bag, heated flask near feet, belly full of food, fire fueled long enough to give a solid five or more hours of sleep and coals in the morning to brew tea or coffee.

I find that alpha male youtube crap offputting too. But each to their own. I just feel like a goon carrying so much.

 

[n00b]

The idea to leave no trace is really weird.

Not really if one is in a crowded area

In a crowded area sure, you have to keep up the pretense in cities and tourist hotspots that there is still a wild to visit. Good for mental health. But as an ideological commitment extending to natural shelters in the actual wild, it's a destructive mantra in my opinion.

 

[TLM]

But as an ideological commitment extending to natural shelters in the actual wild, it's a destructive mantra in my opinion.

I kind of agree there.

 

[Erbswurst]

The scouts usually teach to try to avoid and hide but also how to read traces.
And to be responsible, respectful and thankful.

That's something different to the order to leave no traces, what's absolutely impossible. The sentence is pure nonsense. It's a PR slogan, nothing more, and a pretty stupid one on top.

 

[Pattree]

There is a high risk to become depressive if you don't see enough sunlight

People differ. I’m told it has something to do with chemical make up/genetics/culture.
In my case, I suffer no ill effects from being nocturnal. I worked a night shift for several years in my sixties. There were a group of us who volunteered for permanent night work when the company couldn’t find enough people to operate a rotating shift pattern. These days I live a compromise. I rise at around 10pm and sleep around 2am but then I don’t have many time commitments.

All of us who are healthy can endure a night out soaked to the skin and cold (not freezing) but why on Earth would we want to? Our species learned to keep warm before it risked migrating away from the equator.

What we do “outdoors” is a compromise. “Shelter” starts with a thermal base layer and two pairs of socks. It extends outwards through fleece or similar mid-layers to an outer hooded jacket, hat, technical pants plus salopettes, boots and poncho. Why spend the energy and a huge amount of time (ref: videos posted here) making a shelter when a tent is just one more layer on top of your kit!
( I can’t see building a shelter as meritorious, necessary or heroic but I do recognise that it can be fun for those of us who enjoy practicing the skills and keeping them alive. Bushcraft is identity as much as it is anything.)

pee ess - I play a tactical game of strip poker!

 

[n00b]

All of us who are healthy can endure a night out soaked to the skin and cold (not freezing) but why on Earth would we want to? Our species learned to keep warm before it risked migrating away from the equator.

The point of that would be to harden up in case it ever becomes a necessity. There's definitely value there. But for now what I'm asking about is using only materials available in the wild, not to endure an unpleasant night but to be comfortable right through the winter. Our species didn't have the industrial revolution til hundreds of thousands of years after they left the equator, so obviously this is possible - or was, once. I want to find out. Why? Because I don't like slavery!

 

[Pattree]

Hmmmmmm.
Way things are going I think I’ll practice taking a sauna and get used to it in case it ever becomes a necessity.

 

[Ozmundo]

Like a lot of slogans things like “leave only footprints, take only pictures” have a place to promote an pain but are not very good on the details.

 

[Erbswurst]

With this sentence I am perfectly comfortable.