The ‘Survival Rule of Three’ states that in inclement weather we can only expect to survive three hours without shelter.
It is because of this, that shelter is prioritized before water in most survival situations and is one of the first survival tasks that one would undertake in a true survival situation.
While there are multiple shelters that one can construct, the debris hut is probably one of the simplest to build often requiring no tools or cordage.
What is a Survival Debris Hut?
The best way to describe the debris hut is that it is a pile of leaves and other debris that is held back from crushing you by a ridgepole and a whole lot of sticks.
The debris hut is not unlike any other shelter except that it requires no cordage or tools and relies on leaves and forest debris to provide insulation.
Related: Emergency Shelters When You Are On The Move
How Does it Work?
There are three ways in which we can lose body heat, convection, conduction, and radiation.
- Convection is where the body loses heat through the skin by way of cold air or water moving across it. When you feel the chill of a cold wind, that is convection stealing your heat.
- Conduction happens when heat moves from a warmer object to a cooler object. Since the ground is cooler than we are our body heat is conducted into the Earth when we lay down on the ground without insulation between us and the dirt.
- Radiation is the heat that radiates out of our body. If you look at a human through thermal imaging you can see that we radiate heat which warms the air around us.
The debris shelter serves to insulate us from the ground, keeps out the cold wind and water, and traps the heat that radiates from our bodies.
Location
Where you put your shelter is arguably as important as the shelter itself because a great shelter in a bad location can negate all the advantages a good, insulated shelter can provide.
When selecting a shelter site look for the following:
- Flat, dry, and level ground.
- Plenty of shelter building materials.
- The 5 W’s.
Related: 12 Things You Need to Know Before Choosing Your Bug Out Location
The Five W’s of Shelter Selection
Wind – Be aware of where the prevailing wind is blowing and orient your shelter, so the wind does not blow into your shelter.
Widowmakers – Look up at the branches above you. Dead branches may break which can fall on your shelter causing severe injury or death.
Water – You need a source of water close by but not too close. The air temperature around water is often lower than areas further away and higher up.
Also, walk around the area and look for any evidence of water moving through your camp area. The last thing that you want is a river flowing through your shelter at 3 AM.
Wood – Fire is almost as important as shelter and fire requires wood to burn. Aside from fire you also will need wood for the shelter construction.
Wildlife – Avoid setting up near game trails or anywhere you find tracks or scat.
Building the Survival Debris Hut
To construct this shelter, you will need an area that has an ample supply of wood and dry leaves. For the insulation from the ground, it is also helpful to have access to evergreen boughs to lay down as a bed.
One point of note is that as with any shelter construction this is going to require a significant calorie expenditure. It will also take a lot more time than you think to construct so plan on starting several hours before the sun is due to set.
Step One – Now that you have a suitable location, you will need to set up a ridgepole. You will have to find something to lay one end of the ridge pole on which can be a fallen log, stump, or a fork in a tree. You may get lucky and find a fallen tree that is perfect.
The goal here is to have enough room to lay comfortably under with a bit of headroom. In this type of shelter, your body heat is going to heat the shelter so you will want to minimize the amount of air space inside.
Step Two – Figure out where your bed is going to be and then insulate the ground where you will be sleeping. Pile evergreen boughs at least 4 inches thick when compressed then test that you can still lay comfortably under the ridge pole.
I omitted the bed for the purposes of these photos as to not cause any undue harm to live trees in the collection of evergreen boughs.
Step Three – Lay sticks against the ridge pole tight together which will form the walls of the shelter.
Test out the shelter again before moving on.
Step Four – Gather all the leaves, sticks, boughs, and other forest debris you can find and begin piling it up on the shelter’s frame. Do not underestimate the volume of debris you are going to require.
The goal is about one foot of debris on your shelter but if the weather is colder the amount of debris needs to be at least two feet or more.
Step Five – When retiring to your shelter for the night the entrance needs to be filled in with some more debris but do not seal yourself in completely leave a little room for some airflow.
Some Things to Think About
Some Things to Think About- This shelter design requires a lot of debris so think about this before selecting a site for your shelter.
- It is a good idea to practice building a debris shelter before needing one in a real emergency.
- Dry leaves are best, but the circumstances may not allow for this. Try not to use wet or green materials to insulate the inside of the shelter or as your bed save all the driest materials for the inside layers of insulation.
- Be extremely cautious with having a fire near this type of shelter. Before you go to sleep at night fully extinguish all fires and do not use a candle or smoke inside the shelter. If the shelter catches fire escape is going to be exceptionally difficult.
Related: 3 Quick Shelters (The Last One is Invisible!)
Building one of these shelters takes a lot of time and calories.
While building one of these shelters can and will save your life in an emergency it is not anything that you should rely on, instead build and bring an emergency shelter kit with you every time that you head out into the woods.
You may also like:
13 Shelters That You Can Build With A Military Poncho
Woman With MS Survives in the Wild With Just a Knife and the Plants She Found (Video)
5 Wilderness Survival “Rules” That Are Actually Myths
On the other hand, just carry two light weight 8′ x 10′ waterproof tarps. One goes over you and one goes under you. String one over the pole show in the article and fold the other one half under you and one half over you.
Mo bettah if the tarps have grommets but if not, you can tie looped string to the corners for tie-downs on the overhead tarp. If they are waterproof they will shield you from rain whereas the forest trash hut will quickly allow water to seep and then pour through. Nothing like being wet AND cold in the great outdoors.
If you are out in the woods and need to construct one of these, it is my opinion that you are so unprepared that you are going to die anyway. As the author said, these take a lot of energy to build. You should be conserving that energy to use to get away from the reason why you are stuck in the woods without shelter.
i know, your plane crashed on a routine flight from Nome to Fairbanks and you had no survival gear in the plane. In that case, your best bet is to stay with the a/c and use your energy to start a fire. Your pilot did file a flight plan before he left Nome didn’t he? ASAR will follow the flight path and if you are by the wreckage with a fire going you will be a lot easier to spot.
Oh, by the way, if your pilot was bush flying in Alaska and didn’t have survival gear on board, I would bad-mouth him far and wide if I got back to civilization. No responsible pilot flies in Alaska or any other area with extensive wilderness without survival gear always on board.
On an academic level, this is handy info to have but as I stated earlier if you have to build one of these you are really in a world of hurt.
Tarps are great when you have them. They sure make waterproofing and windproofing much easier. Do not discount the value of the debris shelter in extreme cold temps. I once built a debris shelter in just under 4 hours. I would say it was not hard work calorie wise but it was constant movement. The first night I slept under it with nothing more than my clothes and a wool blanket, as a test. I was cold through the night ( 14 deg F ) and did not sleep well at all. The next day I added about 6inches of foliage on the already 12 inch thick roof. More importantly I added 6 inches to the meagre 2 inches to floor insulation. This took another couple of hours at most. The second night I slept undisturbed, in the same cold 14 deg F temperatures. I was even able to remove my coat and boots. I have tried sleeping just under a tarp in much warmer temperatures and found it to be cold. Without an undisturbed sleep, a person can become very fatigued and make bad decisions. A debris shelter can offer insulated warmth that can only be achieved using a tarp along with fire. Then we can talk about managing fire all night long to keep warm….
This for left coast Chuck. Knowledge is power. I sincerely hope you never find yourself in a situation that a debris hut is your only option for survival.
I sincerely hope I never find myself in such a situation also. It means that I have screwed up big time or have grossly misinterpreted a situation so as to be forced to leave my home bare-handed. In such a situation it would be best if I saved the last bullet for me because beyond a doubt I am going to die a miserable death otherwise.
If I am going to be Small Foot, the elusive denizen of the forest, I would hope that I could construct something more durable, given I am apparently going to be in the area for a while.
A below ground shelter with a fire pit at the back of the shelter and a latticed doorway to allow sufficient oxygen to maintain the fire pit but keep out inclement weather would be a significantly better long term hidey-hole in the woods than the hastily constructed shelter described in the article.
Even a single tarp over a paracord line with a small Dakota fire at each end of the tarp would be a better shelter and provide sufficient warmth to keep one from freezing to death and deter curious animal life from investigating.
Not much to deter curious human life forms, but hopefully the bivouac location chosen would be sufficiently isolated to preclude such investigation.
So if that is your only choice for shelter in an EOTW situation, you had better start on 15 Rosaries, 25 Hail Marys, and 25 Our Fathers because your bahunkus is in a really tight sling.
LCC, why post negative limitations on acquiring knowledge? Your tunnel vision perspective will NOT cover all situations all the time, such as when out hiking, fishing, or hunting, most people carry minimal additional gear with them, and I do not know of anyone or anytime I would carry your “two tarps” unless I was planning on camping out. I think it would be much better to learn about debris shelters, and IF you happen to have tarps or other materials available, you combine the knowledge to make an even better, more weather resistant and insulated temporary shelter.
LBN, it is knowledge and wisdom that causes one to carry a tarp as EDC when in the forests. I carry a day pack even for short day trips in the woods. I don’t hike trails on government parks, I explore wilderness areas. In my day pack I carry a Kalinco 10’X10′ tarp made of 210T polyester with a waterproof coating. It weighs under 2 lbs. The tarp along with my bivy sack and Bic lighter could save my life in harsh environments. I built debris huts a few times when I was a kid. When I got my first job cutting grass at 11-years of age I bought a little canvas pup tent. I’ve made a bit more money since then and now own North Face tents in different configurations from a one-man ultra light to expedition grade Summit Series, sleeping bags and pads, and a fantastic Clark jungle hammock. I only carry the primo gear on special outings, the tarp stays with my EDC hiking gear. I still say “unless you fell out of the sky” you should have a tarp with you in the woods. Even when he fell out of the sky, I’d bet DB Cooper had one with him.
Hidden home, very good. Post SHTF the less visible we are, the less vulnerable.
One thing, if the weather is below freezing, and the leaf layer thick, spray water over it. Not enough to soak thru, but to create a shield to prevent animals or people from attacking from the sides or rear. Beaver do this, adding soft mud to the den after things begin to stay frozen.
If using a large space, it is possible to have a very small fire going. Inuit heat igloos with a single lamp. While 55 F may not sound toasty, it’s better than the -50 F outside.
As fer us, here in the Southwest, yes, it would be great to do in the mountains, but our leaf little is made up of dead cactus pads 🙂 Water, adobe, and a woven hut, coat it well, crawl in and rest.
Another if you have a few decades is the juniper hut, a hut made by growing juniper in a tight circle, then weaving the top in place. Some I’ve seen are centuries old and still alive, still tight. Cottonwood trees can be done the same. This design has been used all over the world, AKA Forest House.
niio
Red: You overlook yucca leaves which are fairly common in the Sonoran Desert and the Lower Sonoran Desert. Those leave are great for interleaving with each other to form all kinds of forms that can be used for shelter.
HOWEVER, a pair of stout leather gloves are necessary for our soft White Eyes hands to handle the sometimes razor sharp leaves. I would have to give considerable thought to how I might handle yucca leaves without such gloves. Otherwise, might just as well scratch a hole in the sand and cover myself with the excavated sand.
There is a scientific geological name for the desert floor with its sand and small rocks but that scientific name escapes me at the moment.
LCCL Yes, and thanks! and always wash your hands after using them. The sap is a good soap! I don’t use gloves, but I suspect you have to deal with Joshua Tree, which has ‘way short leaves. We have banana yucca in the yard and leaves can be 3 feet long. when repairing something, the needle at the tip is great, and the long cords with needle are good for putting together a shelter. Dead ‘logs’ from yucca are good for support uprights, but too flimsy to last long as beams. Aside form that, if they not dead, they will sprout eventually and show the pattern in the ground over the shelter.
do you mean desert pavement? We have too much animal activity here to worry over it.
A prosperous and healthy New Year to you and the family. niio
I built one of these in High School, just for fun. It is a lot of work, I’d go a little bigger than the one shown, though I’d be more likely to build a lean to if all I had was brush and sticks. Lots of great youtube videos on primitive hut building.
My question is, 3 hours w/o shelter and one is dead? The G.I.s fighting across Europe in the winter of 44-45 and across Korea in the winter of 50-51 have left us hundreds of written accounts of living in the rain and snow in uncovered foxholes with poor or no winter gear and no fire at all for days and weeks at a time and very few died of exposure. If lost in the wilderness I would think of 2 things only, water and fire, and the main purpose of the fire would be to make a big enough smoke cloud that the area fire manager would have to send somebody to check it out. Very few places in the lower 48 a fire will go unnoticed.
Mike: We called them forts, for some reason. Some were brush and grass huts, and one was underground with a sod roof. Merry Christmas 🙂
In Marine Corps cold weather training we used a candle to warm our snow cave and our two-man shelter. My shelter mate thrashed around and kicked the candle over and burned a hole in my shelter half. He said, “Oh, sorry I burned your shelter half.”
I said, “No, you burned YOUR shelter half.” We had to pay for gear that got damaged through carelessness. And paying for a shelter half on $33 a month because of his clumsiness was something I wasn’t about to do.
It is really amazing how much heat in a semi-enclosed area a single candle can generate. We had a snow storm the first night of cold weather training that was deep enough to cover the two-man tents so that only the tent poles stuck out of the snow. We were up before reveille due to the fire and got to see the scene before anyone else. Fortunately, we never used the two-man tents the rest of the training but made snow caves tor resting at night. You don’t really sleep when it’s that cold at night and your only shelter is a snow cave with a candle.
At that point in history, the armistice in Korea was only a couple of years old and both sides still bristled with armed forces glaring at each other. The best estimates were that we were going to have to take the Chicoms on again in frozen North Korea. Little did we know that the next misbegotten adventure would be in the jungles of Vietnam.
It is difficult to say “Merry Christmas,” so I will say remember the reason for Christmas and hope for more enlightenment from the season for the folks who claim to be leaders so that this silliness passes swiftly in the coming year.
LCC- As a just in case, I keep a few canned emergency candles in the car glove compartment this time of year. Now I know they’ should work pretty good should I get stuck on the Long Island Expressway or the Belt Parkway! You can get pretty stuck just about anywhere around here in bad weather. The only difference is how fast the help comes! Learning from experience is always the real kicker isn’t it? Especially when things don’t go quite right!
CC: If you light a candle to heat your car while awaiting emergency help, be sure to crack a window about a half inch on each side of the car, preferably one front window and one rear window on the opposing side. It won’t really let that much cold air in and will insure that you are still breathing when help finally arrives.
Also be careful where you place your candle. You don’t want to set your car on fire like the doofus I had to share my tent with at Pickle Meadows (USMC Cold Weather Training Battalion)
LCC – Yes always good to have circulation and fresh air! Winter hazards are something that one should carefully think about and plan for regardless of where they may be driving or driving to. A Multi function carbon monoxide detector that fits into a car cigarette lighter or USB port is good to have especially this time of year. Sporty’s has some that are inexpensive single use and disposable.
A hapless hunter here in SoCal did that a few years ago. Deer season in parts of SoCal opens in September. For someone who grew up in Southeastern PA, hunting deer in a short sleeved shirt and maybe shorts is surreal.
Anyway, the hero of this tale became turned around and couldn’t figure how to get back to where his car was. So, he lighted a signal fire. The only problem with signal fires in SoCal mid-September is that everything is tinder. Even the evergreens are dried out although they may still be green. You guessed it. His signal fire very rapidly alerted fire crews all over SoCal that there was a major fire going in the San Bernardino Mountains. He got rescued before being consumed with flames and was also presented with a very large bill for fire fighting costs.
So if you happen to be hunting some place where the weather report was for temps in the 90s and humidity in the very low 2 figures, be really, really careful with you signal fire. You may attract a whole lot more attention than you really want. Right now it is a frigid 78°F. I am not dreaming of a white Christmas because that would be ash falling down in large flakes, not snow. Not even dreaming of a green Christmas because the last time we had any moisture from the sky was early May. We had a rain cell come close to the coast but it evaporated due to the dryness of the air. It actually rained but the moisture was sucked dry by the dry air and didn’t hit the ground.
IvyMike- I agree that that three hour number is not right as well because “There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing”.
IvyMike, if you are really stranded in the wilderness, exposure can kill you quick. I grew up in Oregon, and even if temperatures are above freezing, getting wet and a constant wind can kill you within hours. If all you think about are water and fire, then I hope nobody depends on you in a real-world survival situation, you will fail.
Very interesting. I like the sticks and adobe idea. In other countries similar construction is known as wattle and daub, usually roofed with river reeds or leafy branches.
If you do have to build a shelter like this…while considering the debris for your roof…you should also consider pine needles if their available. I didn’t notice any in any of the photos. In my experience they seem to be easier to stack than leaves for a roof on a shelter.
Mail: Good idea! Pine helps mask your scent if you’re tracked with dogs, or just have starving stray dogs around, and they’ll be common after SHFT. niio
This article reiterates all I was taught so thanks for the refresher. Probably most useful for a day hiker who got lost or separated than a full blown SHTF situation but you never know.
On a side note it was 44degC here yesterday, another scorcher today. Hypothermia is not a concern for me right now so Happy Christmas and stay warm and safe everyone.
🙂
And Merry Christmas to all of you down under in the Land of Oz 🙂 niio!
Ginny: It’s raining! Well, more like ice pellets, but love! niio
Merry Christmas.
An evergreen with branches to the ground is a decent shelter if weather is dry. A rock overhang may be dry but hopefully not facing into the wind. A hillside away from the wind may be a good choice. A debreis shelter isn’t bad if on the move and leaves are deep and available.
My choice was under low branches of an evergreen in gathered up deep leaves piled on a thick layer of evergreen branches. Burrow in the leaves on the springy branches. With more time build a sheltering angled wall of branches to reflect heat from your fire. Than add side walls. Then another facing reflective wall. If staying, then enclose and build a fireplace beyong the roof but enclosed with a stone or mud and wattle chimney.
Here on the desert it was a dug in pit home with a 3/4 roof over or a center smoke hole. Dig, leaving a sleeping ledge / bench. Cut in steps. A hogan was an 8 sided home with dirt and tree trunk upright walls with a tree branch roof sometines plasrered with mud. Staying there, build walls with Adobe block. Roof with poles and branches or build round bringing sides in to make a dome. Shelters depend on materials and lay of the land.
LCC I carry 2 tarps in the car fir sgelter or lay out a blanket on a tarp and roll up in it. 2nd tarp if i don’t stay in the car.. lay it on the ground and after rolling up in a tarp and blanket, pull the loose end over the top. One end of the part pulled over can be propped up on a stick. Think blanket rolled enchilada in a pup tent.
ClergyLady: Merry Christmas! Just as long as the three bears don’t come across you and Baby Bear exclaims, “Look, Mom! Look Dad! Burritos!” I read something interesting yesterday. A Christmas Carol was written as a political piece against the liberals of Dickens’ day. It went against the belief the world is overcrowded.
It’s raining!
Blessings!
Considering that A Christmas Carol was published only 9 years after Thomas Malthus died, It seems likely that it might have been written against the theory that earth was overpopulated. Malthus’ theory created a lot of stir that lasted for a long time. Some subscribe to the theory even today. There are a lot of reasonably sounding arguments pro and con to a significantly reduced population. I hope we never find out whether we really are better off with only 10 million humans inhabiting the earth.
Hope everyone was able to pass Christmas Day comfortable with long distant contact with loved ones. Hardly a welcome substitute, but consider less than 30 years ago you would have to have been content with trying to reach loved ones by long distance telephone while everyone else in the country was trying to do the same. “Sorry. All line are busy right now. Please try again later.” Remember that infamous message?
For all the bumbling, fumbling and outright lies, we still live in marvelous times.
Query: Did Fauci really get inoculated or was it faked? The photo I saw of the action had his arm and the possible syringe shielded by the person supposedly administering the shot. Then Fauci can’t remember which arm it was. I am not overly sensitive to shots but a day later I am pretty definite which arm got punctured and I am older than Fauci so theoretically, his memory should be better than mine.
Then the question flits through my suspicious mind: If he faked getting a shot, why? Why didn’t they show the needle plunging into his arm? We certainly have seen enough other folks getting their arms punctured with the needle. Why wasn’t Fauci’s purported shot show live in living color? Does he pass out when he gets a shot? By the time they reach age 80, someone who purportedly has spent his whole working life in the medical field would certainly be accustomed to getting a shot to point where they wouldn’t pass out when faced with a needle.
Inquiring minds want to know/
LCC: Yeah, Malthus’ uber liberal ideas inspired a Christmas Carol. It shut up their eugenics idiots for quite a while and brought about a religious revival, even more alienating the liberals from the population. It wasn’t until the Labour Party, which backed Hitler in WWII, took over the education system that anything charitable was kicked out. niio
LCC – Merry Christmas to you! This vaccination is a gift! Every vaccination brings us all closer to herd immunity! When it’s your turn, thank God and the President and roll up your sleeve! Never mind the good Dr Fauci. He’s an idiot!
CC: I agree with you. Yes, some people had a bad reaction, but as I understand, it’s a smaller percentage than most vaccines have. Fauci? Freaky Fauci is infatuated with femenazi hillary the genocidal psycho. He always said he’d do anything she asked. niio
Red- Folks who have recently had Botox cosmetic procedures have had problems, but nothing that they are saying could not be well managed. So, remember no Botox for awhile
CC: LOL! Donno why, but in my family we don’t do wrinkles. But, the hands take a beating. Part of an aloe leaf, crush, work the juice into the skin and left it dry a while. niio!
Red – Instead of taking the lead on anything, it’s time for the good Dr Fauci to take leave! He’s been dancing on the head of a pin throughout this pandemic. Politicized and polarized, he has exhibited an inability to think clearly and has disassociated himself from the consequences of his bad decisions and he speaks it all with such convincing authority!
CC: Fauci is on a great list of people the left admires, right up there with Hitler who was man of the year with them.
niio
Red – He is a dedicated, bureaucratic,swamp creature with all “the papers”,(is, educational degrees), to prove it!
LOL! What a picture that brings up!! Been there, done that! One summer about 75 years ago I was berry picking/picnicing with family, got caught in sudden rainstorm. 6 of us kids squeezed under a 6’x8′ tarp draped over the berry bushes. We kids had fun until the rain turned cold and the wind started blowing the tarp away. We hung onto it, barely. Lost the picnic basket though. Mom got a neighbor to come for us, thankfully.
Merry Christmas!! Thanks for neighbors!
I don’t snowboard or apre ski, but the family does. They tell me that the base of evergreen trees on the slopes can become hazardous as hallows form around the base of the tree where people trans versing the slopes can fall in and /or be swallowed up! Pick that evergreen with caution in winter conditions.
Many Europeans chose to send their preschoolers to outdoor schools, or “wild-kindergartens”, where they focus on learning about what is outside in their natural surroundings rather than inside playing with toys. This would be a good fun seasonal project with all children or even the grand kids!
CC: Yes! niio
On an interesting note, I read sometime ago that they have found that children who spend at least 30 minutes outside each day have better eyesight as adults. It’s a crime what some city schools here do to kids by locking them up inside all day and then the parents just go along with it too.
CC: Interesting. NHK just had a program on similar programs in Japan where pre-schoolers go to an outdoor preschool where they learn math and reading while in a natural setting with animals and all sorts or climbing and crawling through devices to exercise on. The whole school day for them is playground/learning time. They also learn a lot about animal life and how to care for animals, something they can’t do at home as only the extremely wealthy can afford a large yard and then it is a formal garden type of thing, not a large expanse of grass for kids to play on.
School yards in Japan are all dirt. Japanese kids get a lot of exercise in school, culminating in the year end Ondokai, a day spent in various outdoor contests, 3-legged races, relay races, there is heavy emphasis on team sports. Everybody doesn’t get a medal for participating. The Japanese believe that competition is good with winners and losers.
LCC- Good for them. It’s such a shame that they just don’t get it here. Sports enthusiasts will always tell you that they like to play with people who are better than them, be it skeet shooting, tennis, golf, horse shoes, or whatever, that way they are challenged to improve their game and learn something new. Giving out medals is no way to play the game if one wants to strive do better.
LCC: It was once traditional to hold kindergarten outdoors. The children’s garden, in point of fact. 🙂 Meanwhile, I haven’t post anything for close to half an hour but get a notice I’m posting too fast niio
If my German ancestry serves me correctly, Kindergarten means children’s garden as a literal translation.
Don’t sweat the watchdog. Its bark is worse than its bite. Just wait a second or two hit the back button and repost. It will go through.
If there is a lot of activity on the site, not just this portions of it, the reviewing mechanism gets behind and has happened is a much earlier post is being reviewed at this one comes up and it switches on the watchdog feature. At least that is my analysis of how it works — or doesn’t, depending upon your viewpoint.
Unless you fell out of the sky with no parachute, you should always have a light weight tarp with you in the woods. Consider it as an essential of your forest EDC pack.
Oracle, depends on what you are doing and why you entered the woods. I always carry a knife and reliable means to start a fire even if it gets soaking wet (Ferro rod), but other than that it depends on the specific circumstances. I may carry a stainless-steel water bottle and filter if I think I may need it, some condensed high energy snacks, and anything small and lightweight I think might be useful, but I am not going to pack my “grab and go” bag for easy day excursions. Now if I was hiking in to go hunting and/or fishing, and planning on staying out for several days, that is when I pack a lot of additional gear determined by the conditions I expect to encounter.
Minimal gear, and knowledge combined with resourcefulness has suited me well in several hazardous situations. Packing around a lot of gear might be suitable for some situations, but often is not really practical. Everyone has to make those decisions for themselves.
Oracle: Always good advice. Happy New Year. niio
Thanks, Red. Happy New Year to you as well.
Cooked rice or raw for the rice pudding?
My family has done it both ways – need an extra cup or two of liquid and extra cooking time if starting with raw rice, and a need to keep checking to make sure the rice doesn’t go dry before it’s done cooking.
I saw a youtube video of a woman who had a teepee.
She dug a trench from outside to the center of the teepee.
Covered the trench with rock and dirt except for the ends.
Outside end, she made a sort of dakota stove.
Inside she made a rock structure that would allow smoke to go upwards and heat rocks at the same time.
Heat from the Dakota type fire pit would run through the ‘underground’ trench, into that rock structure, and escape through an opening in the top.
She could have skipped the central rock mound and continues on out past the other side of the teepee and vent it that way.
The rocks and ground would heat up (and dry out), and act as a ‘heat battery’ of sorts.
If one had the time and materials to build such a setup, running that tunnel under your shelter or tent would be a good way to get and keep warm.
Fire/smoke on one end, smoke out the other end, should keep curious animals away.
Of course if your shelter is very temporary, this would be impractical.
CS: Practical for any home, as well. You can always chip a hollow line from outside to the fire pit in a teepee. That brings in fresh air to the fire without stealing heat from the room. A good fireplace will always have something like that. A cousin told me he doesn’t bother to screen it because snakes and insects encounter a thin layer of ash and retreat. I think I’d like a screen, anyway. Just in case 🙂 niio
First time I’ve heard of a Dakota stove. Please explain?
I see that the author recommends 1 to 2 feet of leaves and branches and other debris as the outer layer, but I imagine that any wind stronger than a healthy breeze is gonna strip away a lot.of.that before morning. Could be a whole lot of work for not much return.
Throw a tarp over it and tie it down.
Charles, I agree, you have to assess your situation and act accordingly. Building a temporary shelter with a lot of loose materials in windy conditions is pointless, you’d be better off finding some sort of overhead cover, making a windbreak, and hunkering down under and behind it, trying to stay as dry as possible.
I am so surprised to hear ANYONE say the Covid VAX is a gift!! OH, MY GOSH!! Have you not heard yet that the latest reports state that HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of American have died from the Covid-19 mRNA shots and their boosters? We actually know several people who have been seriously injured by the vaccines, too, one of them being our own niece who was totally paralyzed at age 38, directly from the Pfizer 2-dose “vaxxes”. Those are NOT vaccines! They do not work, either. What they majorly do is change your DNA away from what God gave you and make you much more susceptible to the next round of COVID or any other virus that comes around! Those poisonous vaxxes are also going to make you much more susceptible to 5G radiation! Since God created your immune system from birth, why do you want to turn it over to the Deep State that has been pushing these vaxxes. I even heard Jordan T. Walker, the head of R&D for Pfizer talking about how the vaxxes are messingup menstrual cycles for young women, which means a lot less fertility or infertility! It’s all part of the Depopulation Agenda of the Deep State! You need to read up on the latest investigations of the C-19 vaxxes side effects and find out just how many people have died or been made disabled for life! Personally, we did not have that bad of a time getting over Covid on our own, and now we have NATURAL IMMUNITY, which is far superior and doesn’t weaken in 6 mos., either.
Jess, I agree, natural immunity is the way COVID-19 should have been handled, with NO Mandates of any kind.