In the UK, you are right, there is nothing much between sitting cold, wet, miserable hungry, scared, on your own, for three day until you are rescued. Or sitting next to a nice warm fire with a brew and a dry place to sleep for three or four days whilst you are rescued. The first is survival the second is bushcraft, if you cant tell the difference by now then there is no point being here, you may as well go join a survivalist forum. Just make sure that you wear something bright orange, so no one mistakes you for food and shoots you, or a government agent coming to spy.
if you think that then you are as good as dead as its the same stupid rubbish arguament put across everytime this subject comes up online, once you get face time with someone its a totally different discussion. sitting in the cold prehyperthermic but still beating is surviving, lighting a fire and building a debris hut is survival, whittling a spoon while waiting for rescue is bushcraft. first you survive then you flourish if the flourish part has to be called bushcraft then so be it but telling people that only learning half the subject makes for a purer learning experience is dangerous as people are a lot dumber than we give them credit for. just ask the mountain rescue teams or coastguard.
proper bushcraft should be no different to survival as in a native format its the same thing. its only when western cultures get their hands on it they have to justify it as special. its like mac and pc which is best. who gives a monkeys if both do what you want them to.
when this topic comes up which it will allways do the answer is not to slag the poster off as usual as it just shows you up as feeble minded. if you consider bushcraft to be the next step up from survival then thats fine but dont forget the basics is whats some of us are saying as without them people can get themselves into a lot of trouble. you dont teach edible plants till you teach the safety tests. if bushcraft is supposed to be native and ancient skills brought back to life then why is there so much ventile and titanium involved?
this site carries the name but theres very little true bushcraft on here its just a huge umbrella for dying skills and crafts for that I heartily applaud it. as to survivalist sites well bushcraft can learn a lot from those too as a lot of the techniques are decended from the ones used by the mountain men and native indians.all the questions on here about foraging and food storage are not historical british subjects except for the few unless you get hold of the foraging guide printed in ww2 by the ministry of food. but that comes under renactment if you want to be purist about it ww2 did do wonders for british jam making though.
bushcraft is a marketing term invented by someone who is very good it and has the tv to back him up, the fact that he tried to stop this site proves it was a purely commercial interest, mors wasnt which is why people werent flocking to the woods 20 years ago and thats from the guy himself who admits to writing a survival book. its nothing new as by the current definintion its timeless. by practise though its just amalgamating things from around the world and using them to take the place of something we have no cultural history of unless you are a romany. now gypsycraft would be a very small forum indeed as last time I checked the average caravan doesnt get broadband. bushcraft books are a quarter the size of survival books for good reason - there's less information in them but the brand image makes them sell a few more copies - on ebay its just like adding sas to everything from underpants to toothpicks. all the kit sold and used is adapted from elsewhere and rebranded not allways for the best.
the scout association has it about right you start off learing survival skills then you come back to do bushcraft and then nomad. survival skills as a badge though is 30 odd years old the bushcraft bit was known as backwoods. all of it though was taught as standard and included in the handbooks as field craft.
one thing frequently pointed out is the hostility being so one sided possibly being an insecurity thing as the survival fraternity would rather everyone knew what they needed to know instead of what some people thought they should. the bcuk banner at the moot said 'camping in comfort' which is what it was, tents or hammocks and fires. socially it was great and I look forward to meeting some of them again. 90% of the participants looked just like every scout leader on camp I've seen for 30 years.
back to topic though - ron and karen hoods set out to make their niche and have done a damn good job of it - bushcrafters should watch them if they can as there's few good resources out there. in the same way survival types watch bushcraft videos to learn new tricks or refresh old ones as to them its the same and allways will be.
the best way to avoid 'conflict' is just to accept that there is no difference and if you have a survival manual on your bookshelf then you cant object can you? I've bought several different bushcraft books because the pretty pictures make it easier to teach kids or adults what they want to know. every good self proclaimed bushcrafter I've met has a good solid survival background which they bring forward into their bushcraft by being imaginative and economical. the bad ones are just kit junkies with serious skill deficits. fortunately most are willing to learn what they are lacking and generally the first step is to give them a few more books to read.
I've just been reading the syllabus from several different sites and the differences are semantic - survival course you learn shelters, tracking and trapping. the bushcraft course you learn how to construct a natural shelter, learn native tracking skills and aboriginal trapping techniques but you dont get a free tin to keep your fire kit in and it costs more
the commonest backlash I've noticed for military and survival types is 'they just dont get it' or 'they just wont let it go' let what go? common sense! - we do get it though. we get it and we see right through it, understanding it for what it is and making use of it accordingly as a resource like every other site out there.
if you dont like a healthy debate then dont join in, and certainly dont join in if you cant be objective - ask this on a survival site though and you will get probably get 'same thing really' as a reply
do not ask it on a military site though as you will be offended.
