Recommended Reading

[Wayne]

Hi all.

I am trying to put together a comphrensive list of Bushcraft related titles. What books do you think should be on a top 50 list?

 

[miniac]

Wayne, I have some books for your list;

Ray Mears bushcraft, obvously.
The SAS survival handbook by John Wiseman, although the man traps are a bit extreme!
Survival tips by Clive Johnson. A collection of tips in one big book
Mors Kochanski, bushcraft, Got it but havenot read it yet
Scouting for boys 1908 by Baden Powell, strange but a funny read with some top campcraft skills

Hope that helps, Rob..

 

[Daniel]

Hi,

Wildwood Wisdom by Ellsworth Jaeger!

Do the books have to be 'skills' books, or do books such as Walden by Henry David Thoreau count?

Dan

 

[R-J]

Bushcraft - Ray Mears for sure
Bushcraft: Outdoor Skills and Wilderness Survival - Mors Kochanski, another given
Advanced backpackers hand book - Chris Townsend
Food for free - Richard Mabey
Primitive technology, a book of earth skills - Socity of Primitive Technology
Dharma bums - Jack Kerouac (not so much practical bushcraft, more spiritual bushcraft)
The Green Pharmacy: The Ultimate Compendium of Natural Remedies - James A. Duke
Harvesting Nature's Bounty: A Guidebook of Nature Lore, Wild Edible, Medicinal, and Utilitarian Plants and Animals - Kevin F. Duffy
Primitive Living, Self-Sufficiency, and Survival Skills: A Field Guide to Primitive Living Skills - Thomas J. Elpel
Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants in Wild (And Not So Wild) Places - Steve Brill, Evelyn Dean

does that help? you mentioned books, i couldnt help my self . bit of a bookcrafter...

 

[JM]

Vivre en pleine nature, Francois Couplan

An extremely ecologist, practical and soft approach to "Living in full nature" with a well documented plant part (the guy is an ethnobotanist). Compared to this guy, even Ray Mears feels like a military ! Also, he does not value gear for more than what it is useful to, what a change, specially compared with the pre-cited ! Obviously there are a few down side, you need to understand French, and it is targeted at french wilderness, therefore there is no tracking or trapping (illegal), and the plants also are rather focussing on the local flaura...

 

[swamp donkey]

I have six books which moved from my father book shelf to mine When I was about 10 all of which I still have . Some have been read to the extreme and are held together by fresh air. I can safely say that these books have shaped my entire life over the last 36 years. I have read many books since then and own a couple of thousand but these six are the ones I return to time and again.

They are:-

1. Scouting for boys 1908 edition,

2. Every Boys hobby annual , 1927 edition,

3. Wood craft, Owen Jones and Marcus Woodward , 1911 edition

4. Woodland crafts in Britian, H.L Edlin 1949 edition.

5. The worst journey in the world, Apsley Cherry Garrard 1922 edition

6. Woodcraft and camping Nessmuk, 1920 edition

6. Sledge Patrol, David Howard 1957 edition

Read them if you can.

 

[Kepis]

Got given a book recently it's called "how to S**t in the woods", it's got some funny tales in it, but it is basically a book about, well read the title

 

[outdoorcode]

Got given a book recently it's called "how to S**t in the woods", it's got some funny tales in it, but it is basically a book about, well read the title

I'v read that too, amusing and pratical too

 

[falling rain]

Hi Wayne how's tricks?

One of my all time favourite books is 'Deep Survival' Laurence Gonzales - no bushcraft tips in this one, but an absolutely fascinating insight into how the human mind works when faced with difficulty, danger or a survival situation. I've read it several times and I highly recommend it.

 

[Jon]

Outdoor Survival Skills
Larry Dean Olson.
The ways of the American Indian. Flint, sinew, rawhide.

Bushcraft: Outdoor skills and wilderness survival.
Mors Kochanski.
Canada in the winter

Outdoor Survival Handbook
Ray Mears
British Isles

Bushcraft
Richard Graves.
Australian but very good. Huge amounts of information

The Winter Wilderness Companion
Garrett and Alexandra Conover
Using sleds on frozen waterways, sleeping in woodstove heated tents. Inspirational

Woodcraft and Camping
Nessmuk
American classic

Camping and Woodcraft
Kephart
lots more info than Nessmuk

Tom Brown jnr books on observation and on tracking. (sorry can't remember titles).

 

[arctic hobo]

6. Sledge Patrol, David Howard 1957 edition

Howarth's other war books, The Shetland Bus, now also a Norwegian film (where almost everyone plays themself) called Shetlandsgjengen, or "The Shetland Gang", and We Die Alone/On Mourra Seul, which details a story referred to in the above title, which is also a Norwegian film called Ni Liv, or Nine Lives. All four come with my very hearty recommendations.
I'd also recommend, for the bushcrafter, Harold Gatty's How to Find Your Way Without Map or Compass, which is excellent in every sense of the word, and also covers an area of bushcraft which us in this forum seem to discuss very little, if at all.
And for those interested in turn of the century polar escapades, I've read every book I have laid eyes on about it, and I would say that of the Scott biographies, Sir Ranulph Fiennes' Captain Scott stands out as the best, and Francis Spufford's I May Be Some Time stands out as the worst

 

[miniac]

On the subject of polar expedition books Sir Ernest Shackletons "South, the Endurance expedition" is one of my faves
Channel 4 did a DVD starring Kenneth Branagh which I found good watching

 

[Stuart]

many of the best books have already been mentioned, but a few of the less obvious which i would recommend looking for are:

Primitive Technology: A Book of Earth Skills Edited by David Wescott
Primitive Technology II: Ancestral Skills Edited by David Wescott
Primitive Wilderness Living & Survival Skills by John & Geri McPherson
Primitive Wilderness Skills, Applied & Advanced by John & Geri M.
Woodsmoke, The Best of Edited by Richard & Linda Jamison
Woodsmoke: Primitive Outdoor Skills Edited by Richard & Linda Jamison
Woodsmoke: Collected Writings Compiled by Richard & Linda Jamison
Outdoor Survival Skills by Larry D. Olsen
Deadfalls and Snares by A. R. Harding; Paperback
The art of travel, by Sir frances Galton
Arctic manual, by Vladjimir Steffanson
The art of tracking, The origin of science: by Louis Liebenberg

 

[OllieS]

how about:
Bushcraft-Ray Mears
the SAS handbook- Chris Ryan

 

[demographic]

I enjoyed reading through The SAS Survival Handbook by Lofty Wiseman and the fact that it's avaliable as a Collins Gem pocket sizes book makes it better for plant identification.

Food For Free (in Collins Gem size of course ) is worth a read also.

 

[stevo]

Here are some of my top books and why... I'll leave out flora identification books, and just stick to the books I can stop reading over and over again!!

1. Mearsy.....'Bushcraft', for the inspirational value

2. Mors Kochanski.....'Bushcraft', For the practicallity and depth, (but not the diagrams....anyone understand them?)

3. Theodora Kroeber's books on 'ishi: the last wild Indian of North America'. I think there are three. Amazing story of an American Indian from a forgotton tribe in California, stumbling into civiliasation at the beggining of the 20th c. All fact, great insites into Indian life.

4. The Bowyers Bible series. How to build traditional bows........love it!!

5. Paul Rezendez.......'Tracking and the art of seeing'.....trust me, the man is a legendary tracker!!

6. Preben Bang and Preben Dahlstrom.........'Animal tracks and sign'...........Great sign tracking book for Europe....by far the best, try to get the older version which includes bird signs......got mine at a charity shop....4 quid.....steal!!

7. Laurens Van der Post's books about the last remaining bushmen of the Kalahari desert........well written......good insights into bushman lifestyles!!

8. John Krakauer.....'into the wild'....partly because i've been to Alaska, and partly because it is such a well written account of the reasons behind a young man might want to walk into the wild with virtually nothing!!

and the rest.......... GET stuck in!!

If anyone can recomend any books of similar subject to the ones I've mentioned for me to read, please feel free to tell me.......love books about the wilderness!!

stevo

 

[bilko]

Currently reading..
The good life, up the Yukon without a paddle.
I'm not realy one for reading much but i can't put this down. It's a true story about a husband and wife from cornwall who up sticks and canoe up the Yukon in Canada and settle there in the bush.
It's funny, sad, informative but most of all it gives a real insight as to what it is to live the bushcraft life. They are normal people who's only bushcraft experience was a Ray Mears woodlore course in preparation to the journey. Ray Forewords it too.
By dorian Amos.
Google it as there are links with extracts and pics

 

[jamesdevine]

I second that Bilko the good Live is excellent. My wife has read it four times and loves it to bits.

James

 

[Abbe Osram]

If you like real life storys as the "Good life" I highly recomment you the book:

The Final Frontiersman
click here

The Last American Man
click here

cheers
Abbe

 

[Doc]

I enjoyed The Good Life too, although I don't think it would make it on to my personal top 50.

For practical value, RM's Bushcraft is fantastic. Everyone's got it, you can buy it in Waterstones, but despite all that it is genuinely good. I have found that I don't fully understand the information until I've actually done that particular task practically. As a self training manual it is superb. It does seem to end a bit suddenly though - I can't help feeling the first draft was longer!

Mors Kochanski's book is also excellent, though heavily weighted to boreal forest.

Thoreau's Walden may be hard work, but really should be read, to remind us why we go to the woods in the first place. The Dover version is something like £3.

Sigurd Olson is my favourite wilderness/bushcraft author. His books are more about wilderness philosophy and 'connectedness' (I find this all a bit difficult to explain) and strongly recommended.

Calvin Rutstrum's classic 'The New Way of the Wilderness' is excellent, although a bit dated, being written in the 50s. He writes on how good new inventions like dried mashed potato and DDT are. I bet in 2050 people will look at how current authors praise, say, goretex, and laugh.

I do not wish to open the Tom Brown controversy again - I do think anyone reading his books should be aware there is a controversy though. Is that ok?

Another member recently lent me Bill Mason's Song of the Paddle. Despite the title, this is about 75% about wilderness living and 25% about canoes. Difficult to get but recommended.

In terms of fiction, Jack London's various stories from the Northland are well worth a read.

Into the Wild is about a young man, who having read London and Thoreau decided to live of the land in Alaska. He then went and did exactly that, and despite a fair display of recklessness did so with reasonable success before finally dying. There are a few inaccuracies and quite a bit of speculation in the book though.