Prepare your fridge for a power outage before it strikes.
The deer that you’ve hunted and the fish that you’ve caught can be some of the most satisfying meat you’ll ever eat. At each meal you remember the place you were, and time you spent. But what happens when you lose power to your freezer during a summer power outage? With ancestral food preservation techniques, we can save these wild foods (and many others) and prevent wasteful spoilage. Here’s how.
What if you could make safe drinking water with nothing more than light? It may sound like science fiction, but it really is a fact. One of the most recent innovations in water disinfection is the portable UV light purifier. This device doles out a lethal dose of ultraviolet light, which kills or wounds many different types of waterborne pathogens. There are two main types of UV purifiers to choose from.
Living on one gallon of water a day may not be enough.
We all make mistakes. Lord knows I’ve made my share. But if times get tough, can we really afford to make too many of them? The paths to self-reliance and self-destruction may be just a few careless footsteps apart, if we don’t pay attention to details and reality. Make sure you’re not doing these five things, and you’ll have five fewer things to worry about.
Prepare your fridge for a power outage before it strikes.
It really is a luxury to have an appliance that makes things very cold (or freezes them) in the heat of summer. But it’s a luxury that many people have become far too reliant upon. What happens to the 100 pounds of meat and fish you stored in the freezer...after the power goes out...when it’s 100 degrees outside? It’s not pretty, I’ll tell you that much. I had a freezer break down in the mid-summer heat a few years ago. It was a freezer full of animal hides, feathers, brain-tanned buckskin in process, and the meat from two whitetail deer. The freezer was in an outbuilding, and I didn’t discover the mess until it had all liquefied and the stench was apparent from outside the building. I don’t want anybody to go through something like that, especially during a summer utility outage. So here are a few ideas about what to keep and what not to keep in your freezer, just in case your power goes out this season.
For a lot of folks, their idea of a repair kit starts and stops with a roll of duct tape. There’s nothing wrong with duct tape, of course. There are countless uses for it. But you may need a bit more. Since your gear can literally be your lifeline if you run into trouble, why not take gear repair a little more seriously by building a dedicate repair kit within your survival kit. Many of these kits have a gear list which includes a few multi-use items, like needles, duct tape and dental floss—all of which can be used for gear repair.
These dark berries are like sweet little gems from the wild. They are a delicious and nutritious source of food that we can forage almost anywhere, since they are found around the Northern Hemisphere. But there’s more to these berries than just a snack. Here are ten ways these plants can help you survive when times get tough.
Many Americans receive their water from private groundwater wells (over 15 million households, in fact). This water supply is drawn up from the wells by an electrically-powered pump located at the bottom of each well. And in the event of a power failure, the pump won’t run and your water will be stuck deep below the surface. This may seem like a hopeless scenario, but there are ways to pull the water to the surface. If you plan ahead, you’ll have what you need to easily retrieve this precious survival resource.
Some of the items we take for granted become essential in a bug-out situation
Stocking your bug-out location with several months’ worth of food can provide peace of mind during peaceful times, and provide lifesaving nourishment during a crisis. But food isn’t the only thing you need to stock. Consider the value of these six items—and consider what it would be like to go without them.
We're giving away three durable Daka pouches from Magpul. All you have to do is comment below (or on our Facebook post here) by 11 p.m. EST on Sunday, July 10, 2016, to be eligible. We will randomly choose three winners among our website and Facebook commenters. Stay tunned for more swag.
Leadership is one of those elements in survival that rarely gets recognized for its importance. Having a leader is also an inescapable reality when acting as a group. There will always be an “Alpha” male or female in any group, and they will naturally lead (or at least influence) the path of the group. Maybe they’re not qualified to hold such a critical position, but chances are good that they are just playing the role they were born to play. In an emergency, good leadership is more important than ever, and the people in charge must strive to perform at their highest level. History is full of examples of great leaders, and plenty of horrible ones. Understand that there is much more to being a leader than just making a few plans, barking out orders, or trying to keep everyone pacified. If the mantle of leadership falls on your shoulders during a bad situation, emulate the strongest leaders you know. Try to get somebody to volunteer a bottle of aspirin, too. You’re gonna need it.
Choosing the right trail camera is the first step toward getting good deer photos.
I just finished writing up a trail camera test that is set to run in the September issue. For the test, we partnered with Trail Camera Pro, a team that tests and sells cameras on its website.
TCP has the most advanced and thorough testing protocol in the industry (in fact, several trail cam companies consult TCP on how to design better cameras). Since TCP warranties the cameras it sells, it’s critical for them to sell the best cams to their customers, or their bottom line suffers.
The bow and drill is a tried and true method for starting a low-tech fire.
Friction fire is one of my favorite skills to practice, experiment with, and demonstrate. I particularly like to show the skill to folks who have never seen it done in person. In fact, some even scoff when I bring out a bow and drill kit, saying that they tried it as a kid and the whole act is impossible. But then, after I hold the new fire up for them to see, they start to wonder what else is possible.
Our ancestors started using fibrous materials for cordage a really long time ago, and I often wonder if they would be jealous of the variety of materials that we have at our disposal today for improvised string, rope, and other fiber needs. Lucky for us, we still have all the heritage materials that our predecessors used, and we have a wonderful assortment of high-tech materials which can be twisted into cord as well. Here’s how you can turn a variety of materials into useful cordage under any circumstances.
For almost half my life, I’ve been on some sort of backpack hunt pretty much every year. Through those experiences, I’ve had to learn quite a few lessons the hard way. By its nature, backpack hunting requires you to possess a certain level of self-sufficiency, and to be able to adapt to circumstances. This makes it necessary to have the gear to deal with different situations. Many gear items, like fire starters and water purifiers, are necessities that go without saying, but here are five other items that are always in my pack, and the reasons I carry them.
Don't fall for these common misconceptions about surviving the wild
