Survival Skills without camping?

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Robson Valley

Full Member
Nov 24, 2014
9,959
2,664
McBride, BC
The suberin waxes in birch bark light up even after a rain.
Any near-by conifer trees? spruce, pine, junipers? The driest twigs are right close to the main trunk.
A handful of those. Next, beat on them with a rock to pulverise them into fiber.
The wood resins are flammable too, helps with catching sparks.

Then you can cook up one pot of corn chowder.
Dice and fry 6 strips of bacon. Reserve the bacon but leave the grease in the pot.
Fine dice and fry a big onion. Got any tired old mushrooms in the back of the fridge? dice and toss in.
Add 2 cans mushroom soup and 2 cans of milk.
Add 2 cans corn kernels and all of the bacon.
Simmer for a while. I always figure that it needs salt and especially black pepper.
 
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C_Claycomb

Moderator staff
Mod
Oct 6, 2003
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Bedfordshire
Regarding "survival". There was a nice thread, many years ago on BladeForums, where someone pointed out that many people interested in "survival" were practicing all these wilderness skills, stock piling food and ammunition, and generally getting ready for the next time society falls apart. That situation being rather a low probability. Statistically, if you want better survival chances, get a non-slip mat to go in the bath/shower, securely fix all heavy items of furniture, book shelves, mirrors etc, to the wall, and cut back on alcohol and fatty food! :lmao:



For one of the best books about real survival, the mental side of it, I really recommend the book "Deep Survival - Who Lives, Who Dies and Why"
https://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/author/LAURENCE-GONZALES?cm_sp=brcr-_-bdp-_-author

https://books.google.co.uk/books/ab...p_read_button&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

Not expensive on the second hand market and so well worth it.
 

GuestD

Need to contact Admin...
Feb 10, 2019
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New Regarding "survival". There was a nice thread, many years ago on BladeForums, where someone pointed out that many people interested in "survival" were practicing all these wilderness skills, stock piling food and ammunition, and generally getting ready for the next time society falls apart. That situation being rather a low probability. Statistically, if you want better survival chances, get a non-slip mat to go in the bath/shower, securely fix all heavy items of furniture, book shelves, mirrors etc, to the wall, and cut back on alcohol and fatty food!

Reality. :camping:
Oh, and don't do D.I.Y on a bank holiday Monday.
 

TLM

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Nov 16, 2019
3,092
1,624
Vantaa, Finland
I prefer to think survival as getting out in one piece and kicking of natural mostly weather related things.

Then there are the urban non human ones like: -25C out and the heating goes out in our condo, one has about 24 hours to invent something before the plumbing starts to freeze, if it does, it would take some months before it would be habitable again.

Then there is the dark side but I guess that is another story and more towards Lofty's business.
 

Erbswurst

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Mar 5, 2018
4,079
1,766
Berlin
If you have a military surplus shop in your town you should have a look there for clothing and equipment. There you should try to get a military Goretex suit, the German army waterproof suit usually is sold in good conditions for round about 60 € for example, and you should look for used Cordura Nylon military rucksacks there. The British army uses nice little 30 litres rucksacks which are good for day hikes and you should look for a minimum 65 litres rucksack there where you can fit a complete trekking and camping equipment in.

You usually get there the best deals.

Other civil looking earth coloured equipment and clothing which I use my self I listed in this thread here:
https://bushcraftuk.com/community/i...00-500-trekking-trousers.153881/#post-1917036
The stuff ist good, cheap and durable.

For the first steps around the hose you don't need anything special but for longer tours it is better if you change your civil town clothing against professional outdoor clothing.
The stuff is fast drying, strong and designed different.

In this thread I collected some other good but inexpensive stuff for guys like you. Don't waste your money by buying expensive nonsense from the usual civil outdoor equipment market!

https://bushcraftuk.com/community/index.php?threads/low-budget-equipment-2019.152469/
 
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Robson Valley

Full Member
Nov 24, 2014
9,959
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McBride, BC
Heating at -25C. There's a "trick" that I saw just the other day. Absolutley got to try this.
Put 2 bricks on a heat-proof table. Piece of junk plywood from the shop.

Use those bricks to support the rim of an inverted, unglazed, 12" terra cotta plant pot.
Now, arrange and light three "Tea-Lite" candles under the pot. Couple of inches below the pot.

Apparently, the tealites are hot enough to make a respectable heater out of the plant pot.

Very little investment and I can always plant something in the pot.
I can grow 4 plants for my own use here.
 

Erbswurst

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Mar 5, 2018
4,079
1,766
Berlin
In Europe you can heat in autumn a little garden house with a few candles.

At - 25*C you need a wood burning stove or/and a military sleeping bag system.

I know that very well, I lived in a little garden house and we had a few years ago a few weeks temperatures between -20*C and -25*C in Berlin.
 
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GuestD

Need to contact Admin...
Feb 10, 2019
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Heating at -25C. There's a "trick" that I saw just the other day. Absolutley got to try this.
Put 2 bricks on a heat-proof table. Piece of junk plywood from the shop.

Use those bricks to support the rim of an inverted, unglazed, 12" terra cotta plant pot.
Now, arrange and light three "Tea-Lite" candles under the pot. Couple of inches below the pot.

Apparently, the tealites are hot enough to make a respectable heater out of the plant pot.

Very little investment and I can always plant something in the pot.
I can grow 4 plants for my own use here.
Sometimes referred to as a "Cornish heater"
cph11.jpg
 
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Robson Valley

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Nov 24, 2014
9,959
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McBride, BC
There's nothing new under the sun. In the city next week. Will try to find 2 pots. That way, I'll never break #1.

I am familiar with more than 1/2 a century of Canadian winters from -25C to -45C.
Outdoors, of course. At -20C, the temperature inside my kitchen cupboards can be as chilly as +12C.
I have oil-fired central heating and a Harman p38++ wood pellet stove that heat the whole house quite effectively.
 
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TLM

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Nov 16, 2019
3,092
1,624
Vantaa, Finland
The problem is not keeping me and family warm, it is how to keep the bloody building in condition when the heat hopefully comes back. I have Leka about two klicks away where I can get quite cheaply all the equipment needed for me.

Our summer cottage is done in a fairly freeze proof way. It has wood heating and is independent of the outside world.
 

Robson Valley

Full Member
Nov 24, 2014
9,959
2,664
McBride, BC
We had a regional power failure 1:45 PM in yesterday's -20C cold but sunny afternoon.
More than 100 miles of it along the only power line. Cannot be repaired with profanity.
Duration and cause unknown, of course.

My thinking turned to heat, light and hot food. Wanted to get set up before dark. Same as camping but 4 walls and a roof.
One lower kitchen cupboard is the storage for the camping equipment. Two-burner propane-bottle stove and so on.
Box of long candles, bag of tealites. Simple dishes, cutlery and a couple of cheap pots.

Total darkness by 4:30 PM these days. First step would be to go downstairs and start the inverter in the solar power system.
It's hard wired up into the main kitchen so there's light and coffee. I have a 9W LED light in the kitchen.
Pointed at the near-white ceiling, click!, the whole house is illuminated.

I'm old. I look like I'm well organized. That took many years in the making.
Start now = just accumulate one piece at a time and learn to use it with your eyes shut.
Candles and hurricane matches. Light from a single candle solves all kinds of puzzles.
Plan the candle holders for stability. We can't have them tipping over anywhere.

Stuck in the dark, your bathroom is the one room you can get into without tripping over anything.
That's where you should keep some sort of emergency lighting. I have a battery-powered LED touch light.
All I have to do is find it, touch the top, and I have solved the puzzle.

All was well, the juice came back on before cold and dark. Ran the dishwasher.
I can live happily ever after. I might just make up the Bahai Shrimp dish anyway.
 

Blufor

Member
Nov 27, 2019
20
11
38
Lancashire
Great advice, - I really admire this guy - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA incredible. is anyone else here at this extreme level of surivorship, using raw earth? I'd be immensely impressed, and have a question, how long do you think it took for this guy to get this proficient at surviving in the wild with NO modern tools. clearly, many others feel the same way as per his subcount indication.
 

Blufor

Member
Nov 27, 2019
20
11
38
Lancashire
Do you have a garden, @Blufor ?

I do, but its a concrete garden lol no grass or soil. I play around and have bonfires, lighting it with flint and steel, & cookng on open fires just to experiment a couple of times, seemed a precise art suppose. we young feckers are too used to modern life convenience as hazardous as that might be sometimes.
 
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Blufor

Member
Nov 27, 2019
20
11
38
Lancashire
If he doesnt want to go outside dont fret at him.

Why not stay indoors and learn a craft or something self sufficient?

(My first camp was with the Guides and it was dire. I didnt go for 30 years after that. But now I know how to be comfy).

(I got my non camping dad (82 and getting younger) to the Bushmoot. He had a big folding bed and lots of bedding, and slept like a baby.)


its not that I dont want to, I just don't think I can without suffering great needless discomfort. Theres a story about a guy that had the same youthful yearning to be out in nature, Chris McCandles or somesuch, and he was WOEFULLY unprepared and lacking wholy in ability - I'd never be stupid enough to throw myself in a deep end like that, but I understood that dudes yearning for a more peaceful, natural living for awhile.
 

Tengu

Full Member
Jan 10, 2006
12,781
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Wiltshire
You sound like you need a dutch oven.

Learning a craft involves no `Out of Doors Experience` (as a Friend once dubbed it)

I am too skint and too busy most of the time to get out much, but I make things. I am doing lots of preserves for Christmas at the moment.

And who wants to live in the wilds anyhow? Not many Archives out there, or so I am told.

But, we have a saying. No Archive Without Outside.

My adventure these days is keeping warm in a metal nesting box with no central heating.
 

Janne

Sent off - Not allowed to play
Feb 10, 2016
12,330
2,293
Grand Cayman, Norway, Sweden
You can try one aspect of ‘primitive living’ in your home.
Namely cooking from scratch.
Flour, water, salt and yeast = bread.
Meat, root veg, salt, water = casserole

I am not joking!

If you have a grill, preferably a charcoal one, use wood as fuel and cook on that.
It is not much difference preparing a meal like that at home or in the foothills of Kilimanjaro, dodging the lions, hyenas and snakes.
Except more comfortable.

Making stuff ( ‘craft’) has not much to do with real survival, apart being able to repair a broken item you carry, replace a lost spoon and being able to sharpen your blade and similar.

I make my own utensils when I am outside.
Spoon = a flexible piece of bark, a thinning twig, a root.
After eating, I sharpen it and use as a toothpick.
Then throw it away.
A thicker stick with a flattened (cut flat) end = stirrer.

I did not throw them away when my treks took me up in the higher Scandinavia mountains.
 
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Erbswurst

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Mar 5, 2018
4,079
1,766
Berlin
A concrete garden is a pretty intelligent thing. I often think about to asphalt my 1000 square meters and to coulour it green. ..:aarghh:

You could buy a tripod barbeque grill with firepit like the Landmann grill.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Landmann-Ltd-543-Charcoal-Barbecue/dp/B0002DF1UO

Or you make it yourself somehow, three bricks, a flat large bowl or a cutted old fuel or food oil barrel or something similar and a wooden tripod over it.

And than you could start cooking with that.

Probably not the most comfortable way to do it the next three month, but a nice project for the next spring.

Additional the 1,5 litres containing 12 cm Zebra Billy can would be a good option as a camping pot, because the very common 230g gas tins with screw ventile fit perfectly in, so you would have a good pot for the use in your "garden" which is very usefull for outdoor adventures and as a survival item as well.

That should be large enough to cook some pasta for two persons.

Different to my recommendations for trekking pots in the video thread this pot can be stored outside without smelling inside or get destroyed outside by corrosion like an aluminium pot.

It isn't as light as titanium or aluminium pots but a very common pot for bushcraft too. And in the rucksack it is portable as well.

Another thing that you could start to learn immediately would be to learn the knots which I picked up in the video thread.

That is something very usefull outdoors, but a nice project for the next month inside.

The first of April you will know them all and surely will be able to tie them with closed eyes.

Next summer you should start to sleep in your garden. Try to get a used original military field bed like this here:

https://www.genuinearmysurplus.co.u...-Super-Grade-British-Army-Camp-Beds-p80846628

You should construct an open shelter over it and heat it with the fire pit.

A simple thicker Evazote mat you have to put on the bed because if not you would get a cold back. Take that and nothing else, because you can use it later for camping and bushcraft too.
The best deal would be if you buy a used army mat.

For use next to your house you can buy a warm used army sleeping bag. The best would be a used complete britisch army or Carinthia german Army two bag sleep system.

Because often the fibres of the filling are broken they aren't recommended for trekking and hiking, because they loose ability to keep you warm, but don't loose weight.
For hiking that is ineffective, heavy and bulky.
But they are absolutly OK for such a use, for boats, cottages and camping out of the car. And you can get such stuff very cheap.

Which are the currently in Britain used available best options I can't tell you because I don't know British army surplus stuff. I am a German and we usually get mainly German stuff here. But as you can see here such stuff is cheap.
http://www.endicotts.co.uk/catalog/sleeping-bags-0

There are a lot of other military surplus shops in Britain. If you want to do that, you have to ask in the forum what would be the best option for you.
The members of that forum are playing regularly around at such homepages and are surely pretty well informed what's going on.

So you would create a nice survival camp in your concrete garden and could start camping outside.

If it becomes unpleasant you just go into your house and in your bed.

If it doesn't become unpleasant, what I expect, you are ready and well equipped to look for the guys of this forum at the next meeting.

Should you come to the conclusion, that all that was an idiotic idea you can sell the army bed and the surplus military sleep system for round about the same price you payed for it, via e-bay or in this forum.

That wouldn't work, if you buy new stuff.
 
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