Ultimate Guide to Wilderness Living: Surviving with Nothing but Your Bare Hands and What You Find in the Woods (Ulysses Press; 2008)

Forget reality TV stunts like eating bugs, the Ultimate Guide to Wilderness Living provides in-depth instructions and step-by-step photos of real survival skills--exactly what one needs to stay alive in the woods. The book first covers immediate needs like starting a fire, erecting temporary shelter, and finding food. Then it goes beyond other survival books by explaining advanced techniques for long-term living in the wild -- using only those things found in nature. The authors show how to make tools by chipping stones, fashion a bow-and-arrow out of tree branches, weave baskets, fire primitive pots, build a semi-permanent shelter, and even tan hides. Finally, the authors explain how to bring all these skills together to live in the wilderness for days, weeks, months, or even years. Self-Reliance Cover 1 Title page 5 Copyright page 6 Contents 7 Foreward 9 Introduction 11 1 Primitive Fire and Cordage [1] 15 Bow Drill and Hand Drill 16 Simplified Directions for Making a Bow Drill 16 Parts of a Bow Drill 17 Bow 17 Drill 18 Fireboard 20 Bearing Block 20 Using Your Bow Drill 21 Some Observations on Using the Bow Drill 30 Hand Drill 31 Parts of a Hand Drill 32 Using Your Hand Drill 33 Some Observations on Using the Hand Drill 33 Cordage 37 Making Cordage 39 Plants for Cordage 40 Animal Material for Cordage 45 Rawhide for Cordage 46 A Coupla Fire-Making Tips 47 2 Primitive Tools—Making and Using Them [35] 49 Basic Flintknapping 50 Safety 52 Flint 52 Techniques of Working Flint 54 Rules 55 Platforms 61 Support 63 Discoidal 64 Bipolar 65 Some Notes 66 Recommended 67 Whew! 67 Shell 67 Sandstone 69 Heavy Blunt Instruments 69 Wood 69 Stone 70 Bone and Antler 70 Bone 71 Antler 71 Digging Stick 73 Wooden Awl 74 Celt 75 Hafting 77 Adze 80 Vise 81 Working with the Tools 82 Preparing a Fire Board and Hand Drill 82 Making a Primitive Bow 83 Finis 86 Wooden Bowl 87 Mano and Metate 87 Mortar and Pestle 88 3 Primitive, Semipermanent Shelters [75] 89 What a Shelter Keeps Out (and In) 90 Shelter Basics 91 Site 91 Floor 92 Walls 92 Roof 92 Smoke Hole 93 Entrance 94 House Materials 94 The Wickiup 95 The Lean-To 97 Thatched Wickiup 100 Generic Shelter 106 Wrap-Up 114 4 Makin' Meat – 1 [101] 115 The Primitive Bow and Arrow 115 Anatomy of a Bow 116 The Primitive Bow 119 Tools 120 Material 120 Finding the Stave 121 Curing 121 Making the Bow 123 Heating and Bending 127 Final Working 130 Back the Bow with Sinew 135 Glue 137 String 143 Arrow 144 5 Makin' Meat – 2 [145] 159 Obtaining Sustenance in Nature 159 Deadfalls, Snare, Fish Trap, Atlatl, and More 159 Hantavirus 160 The Trap Line 165 Gathering 184 Atlatl 186 Insects 190 Meat Preservation 190 6 Deer from Field to Freezer [181] 195 Field Dressing 196 Skinning 202 Removing Head 205 Cutting Off Legs 206 Sinew Removal 207 Removing Loin and Tenderloin 209 Cutting Up of Carcass 210 Meat Cutting 211 7 Primitive Wilderness Cooking Methods [201] 215 In the Coals 216 Broiling 220 Baking 224 Boiling 227 8 Primitive Wilderness Containers [221] 235 Baskets 236 Materials 236 Warps, Wefts, and Woofs 236 Twining 238 Basket Weave 239 Coiled Basket 243 Bark Container 246 Cordage 250 Stone Container 251 Animal Parts Used as Containers 252 Wood Container 257 9 Primitive Pottery [247] 261 Quick Run-Through 261 Clay 262 Temper 266 Construction 269 Firing 277 Firing Method #1 278 Firing Method #2 280 Firing Method #3 281 Firing Method #4 281 Firing Method #5 282 Firing Method #6 283 Last Words 283 Notes on Aboriginal Pottery 285 10 Brain-Tan Buckskin [273] 287 Brief, All-Important Summary 289 A Simple Breakdown 292 Materials 292 Skins 295 Framing and Fleshing 296 Surface Preparation 300 Braining 306 Sewing of Holes 309 Finishing 311 Smoking 315 "Hair-on" Supplement 319 Sewing with Sinew 321 Index [312] 326 Resources [315] 329 About the Authors [316] 330 self-reliance;,wilderness,survival;,survival,skills;,primitive,living,skills self-reliance,wilderness survival,survival skills,primitive living skills

EVERYTHING THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT SURVIVING IN THE WILD

"During my first years of learning survival I took a course in survival and primitive earth skills taught by John and Geri McPherson. I was excited by their unbelievable passion and their intrinsic understanding of survival. Their teachings took me from understanding basic skills to a full-blown love for the ancient technologies that humans developed to survive. John and Geri are the real deal. They don’t just teach this stuff, they live it. I loved the experience with them so much I came back a second time a few years later. Now that I have traveled the world as Survivorman—experiencing and filming survival in every ecosystem there is—I can sit back and watch my shows and see John and Geri’s teachings peek through in every situation. I have been able to understand survival because of John and Geri, and can highly recommend this book.”
—Les Stroud, AKA Survivorman

Packed with in-depth instruction and photos, Ultimate Guide to Wilderness Living teaches you the skills need to survive and live in the wild using only those things found in the woods. Learn how to:

•Ignite a fire with a two-stick hand drill

•Erect temporary and semi-permanent shelters

•Chip stones and bones into primitive tools

•Trap animals and hunt with a bow and arrow

•Fire pots, weave baskets and tan buckskin

•Prepare and cook wild foods

The comprehensive guide to surviving in the wild by two of the foremost experts in survival skills and primitive wilderness living. Survival experts John and Geri McPherson live on forty-six acres of undeveloped land in the flinthills of Kansas. For years, they have taught primitive survival skills to US military special forces, including A-Teams, Rangers, Seals, and others. Packed with in-depth instruction and photos, their Ultimate Guide to Wilderness Living teaches you the skills need to survive and live in the wild using only those things found in the woods. This volume teaches you how to: Erect temporary and semi-permanent shelters Ignite a fire with a two-stick hand drill Chip stones and bones into primitive tools Trap animals and hunt with a bow and arrow Fire pots, weave blankets, and tan buckskin Prepare and cook wild foods Much more "During my first years of learning survival I took a course in survival and primitive earth skills taught by John and Geri McPherson . . . They don't just teach this stuff, they live it . . . I have been able to understand survival because of John and Geri, and can highly recommend this book." —Les Stroud, AKA Survivorman A detailed resource to wilderness survival eschews the popular practices of reality television shows while outlining step-by-step strategies for a range of topics, from foraging for food and erecting temporary shelter to making fire and fashioning tools. Original. A guide to surviving in the woods. It covers immediate needs like starting a fire, erecting temporary shelter, and finding edible plants. It shows how to make tools by chipping stones