Your best day of foraging, tell me all!!!

[Andy B]

I want to ask poeple how they have feed themselves from the wild for an entire day, what they ate and how they cooked it.

I know from experience thats it easy to know what plants are good to eat etc but its the putting the info together that is the key. Being able to go for a hike in the woods and at the end of the day not be hungry, the stuff of dreams, for me anyway.

Please post your adventures of days when you have lived entirerly of wild food so that poeple like me can learn from example from more experienced bush grub experts

I can't wait.

 

[Kath]

I don't think I've ever honestly had a day when I was completely wild fed and didn't feel hungry at the end of it (or cheat with a power bar or something ) but then I think that probably has more to do with the high carb diet that I normally live on than the wild food. It's hard to acheive the same balance that we're used to in the wild.

So for now I find it's good enough to be able to pick up bits along the way to supplement ration packs.

 

[Stuart]

Justin time, Ed and myself spent two days living of the land down on the s. wales coast

we set up a snare line and caught 3 rabbits (one on the friday morning before ed and justin arrived, one on the saterday evening, one sunday morning) 12 crabs and found lots of jew ear and other edible plants near by

we ended up with more than we could eat!!!! :shock:
i think justin time went home with half a rabbit :-D

I'll try to dig out the photos and get some up

 

[Andy B]

Brilliant cant wait to see them.

 

[Kath]

we set up a snare line and caught 3 rabbits (one on the friday morning before ed and justin arrived, one on the saterday evening, one sunday morning) 12 crabs and found lots of jew ear and other edible plants near by

Do you find eating mostly protein is filling? It doesn't work for me - definitely a carbs person! :evil: I get very cold, especially in my sleeping bag at night, if I eat mainly meat & fish. Now if I could find a pasta tree... ):

 

[bushblade]

I want to ask poeple how they have feed themselves from the wild for an entire day, what they ate and how they cooked it.

I know from experience thats it easy to know what plants are good to eat etc but its the putting the info together that is the key. Being able to go for a hike in the woods and at the end of the day not be hungry, the stuff of dreams, for me anyway.

Please post your adventures of days when you have lived entirerly of wild food so that poeple like me can learn from example from more experienced bush grub experts

I can't wait.

http://outdoors-magazine.com/s_index.php?target=/s_article.php?id_article=124

 

[dtalbot]

Do you find eating mostly protein is filling? It doesn't work for me - definitely a carbs person! :evil: I get very cold, especially in my sleeping bag at night, if I eat mainly meat & fish. Now if I could find a pasta tree... ):

And of couse a prolonged fatless diet will do you no good at all! It is possible to eat all the protein you can hold and still become malnourished.
David

 

[Stuart]

very true especially with rabbit

I do find carbohydrates to be more difficult to obtain than protien and i definately need to spend more time on my plant identification, but we did eat a lot of young stingynettles (wondering how much carbs stingynettles actually have) and we also found sea beet

we had some bannock mix with us too

 

[Stuart]

ok I have found some photos!!

Please be aware that the following pictures show graphic scenes of dead animals, if this is not your thing please skip this post







Catching Crabs!! Thats Ed pulling them out

And boiling them!!

Snaring rabbits

And this is the evening stew being prepared by Justin time (who also found all the edible plants)

thats Rabbit in the bowl on the right, jews ear and I'm not sure what at the top and young stingynettles on the right

 

[Stuart]

wow my pictures keep coming out huge??? :shock:

 

[Jamie]

Keep telling you that you have to resize them Stuart :roll:
Will try and explain this weekend!

 

[falling rain]

we set up a snare line and caught 3 rabbits (one on the friday morning before ed and justin arrived, one on the saterday evening,

Stuart Do you need permission to set up a snare line ?
I've been reading a lot on here about you guys snaring and I've been having a go at it myself and now I'm wondering if I'm doing the right thing

 

[Kath]

Great pics Start!

Am I right in thinking there's some kind of illness people
used to get from eating purely rabbit meat? (Just a vague
recollection from talking to old boys round about who used
to live on nothing but rabbits years ago.)

 

[dtalbot]

very true especially with rabbit


we had some bannock mix with us too

Yep,
The northlands bushcraft book I've got even refers to a potentially fatal condition of 'rabbit poisoning' actually death through malnutrition due to no fat in the diet of people living only off very lean wild game.
Cheers
David

 

[Stuart]

Stuart Do you need permission to set up a snare line ?
I've been reading a lot on here about you guys snaring and I've been having a go at it myself and now I'm wondering if I'm doing the right thing

yes you need the permision of the land owner to snare rabbits, doing so without the landowners permition is illigal

there are also laws regarding the type of snare wire used and banning spring arms and positioning of snares on the entrance of burrows

if you wish to practice snaring I strongly suggest that you learn from someone with experiance to avoid catching foxes and badgers or causing unnessicary suffering to the quarry you wish to catch

Also if you do lay a snare line be prepared to check them twice a day and realize that your quarry may still be alive when you arrive and may need to be dispached quickly by hand[/b]

 

[Stuart]

Great pics Start!

Am I right in thinking there's some kind of illness people
used to get from eating purely rabbit meat? (Just a vague
recollection from talking to old boys round about who used
to live on nothing but rabbits years ago.)

yes you can effectivly stave whilst eating as much rabbit as you like if you eat nothing but rabbit

this is due to rabbits having very little fat and so providing little in usable calories to fuel the body (they are almost entirly protein)

 

[Adi007]

Great pics Start!

Am I right in thinking there's some kind of illness people
used to get from eating purely rabbit meat? (Just a vague
recollection from talking to old boys round about who used
to live on nothing but rabbits years ago.)

yes you can effectively stave whilst eating as much rabbit as you like if you eat nothing but rabbit

this is due to rabbits having very little fat and so providing little in usable calories to fuel the body (they are almost entirely protein)

it also fails to provide the necessary minerals and vitamins

I recall an old Welsh saying that used to go something like "for each rabbit in the pot, add two potatoes ..."

 

[sargey]

yes you can effectively stave whilst eating as much rabbit as you like if you eat nothing but rabbit

this is due to rabbits having very little fat and so providing little in usable calories to fuel the body (they are almost entirely protein)

and Dr atkins has made a small fortune from the idea! :shock:

cheers, and.

 

[jason01]

An old friend now living in Oz sent me this picture of lobsters he had speared by hand the other day, just to make me jealous!

He and I quite often went bivvying as kids and we've caught and eaten pigeon, rabbit, duck, pheasant, brown trout, pike and mushrooms in the past, though not strictly by bushcraft rules and we brought them home and put them on the barbie!

Except for a few berries in season I'd really struggle with plants

Jason

 

[Tumper]

yes you can effectively stave whilst eating as much rabbit as you like if you eat nothing but rabbit

this is due to rabbits having very little fat and so providing little in usable calories to fuel the body (they are almost entirely protein)

also remember that a low fat, high protien diet will cause your body to eliminate fluids quicker, release your stored body fats, and other toxins, placing extra stress on the kidneys. Very high levels of protien also plays havoc with your brain chemistry After a few days this can be dangerous, and in extreme, prolonged cases deadly.

It's a serious problem for survival in a tropical coastal, or Island scenario where the only readily available food is fish.

Trendy high protien diets may well enable rapid weight loss, but they put one hell of a strain on the body. I know a few blokes who have gone on the atkins, and all have lost weight, but all of them have also suffered side effects. My brother in law gave up after 5 days on the Atkins. He was suffering from cramps, and started to look like someone with hepatitis.