useful rules of thumb

[Bakayar]

We all know that being out in the wild is dangerous and hazerdous. and that it takes time and effort to learn every aspect of survival, for every part of the world, etc.
so this thread is for rules of thumb that might help people who dont know much about nature, or to simply serve as place holders in the bank of what you know until you can learn more about the subject in question.
to expand on what i mean by the rule of thumb: generalisations that can be applied to most situations. for instance: stay away from any plant that has thick milk-colourd sap, its poisonus. or snakes with diamond patterns are dangerous.
post anything you think is useful even rhyms, apart from the obvious of course.

[Magpie_Tendencies]

We all know that being out in the wild is dangerous and hazerdous. and that it takes time and effort to learn every aspect of survival, for every part of the world, etc.
so this thread is for rules of thumb that might help people who dont know much about nature, or to simply serve as place holders in the bank of what you know until you can learn more about the subject in question.
to expand on what i mean by the rule of thumb: generalisations that can be applied to most situations. for instance: stay away from any plant that has thick milk-colourd sap, its poisonus. or snakes with diamond patterns are dangerous.
post anything you think is useful even rhyms, apart from the obvious of course.

I think the better rule of thumb would be "see a snake, back away slowly and quietly. They're dangerous".

I'm not going to be getting close enoguh to check if it has a diamond coloured pattern.

Just sayin'.

[samguy700]

useful rules of thumb:


if all else fails: murder/rape/suicide i m not kidding, what have you got to loose?

[Magpie_Tendencies]

Seriously though, 'leaves of three, let it be'.

Might be poison ivy.

[negz]

Generally, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.

[@@@]

watch where you step.

[Ivy Mike]

If you see more than 3 instant loans/tattoo/obscure minority restaurant/bars/shelters in 2 minutes of driving check to see if your doors are locked.

[Joe Camel]

large pieces of coral attached to the head with wood screws can, from a distance, make a small child look a lot like a deer.

Nirvana reference, right?

RIGHT?!?!?!

[Caramello Koala]

An easy way to tell if a steak is cooked as desired is to press one of your fingers against your thumb and feel the padded portion of your hand below your thumb. If you press your thumb and index finger together the padded portion should feel like a rare-medium rare steak, if you press your middle finger to your thumb the padded part of your hand should feel like a medium cooked steak etc.

[I Ate Your Bees]

Nirvana reference, right?

RIGHT?!?!?!

i think it was originally Jack Handey

[Ecopirate]

Honey, in its pure, filtered but unprocessed form, is one of the best natural topical antibiotics in the world.

Apply honey to a wound, followed by a light covering of bandages. The honey will seal the wound, yet is hydrophobic, and thus does not penetrate. In addition, I have heard anecdotally that it is a mild painkiller, especially for burns.

The real power behind honey, however, is its natural antibiotic and antimicrobial properties. As it breaks down, it turns into pure hydrogen peroxide, which, as we all know, is often used as a disinfectant. Of course, it's rather harsh when applied in large doses, however the honey breaks down slowly, provided effective, but gentle disinfection.

Ironically, honey, though incredibly useful outside the body, is a fairly useless food inside. Its sugars are empty calories, it has no other nutrient properties really. Better to go with agave syrup or maple syrup.

[Ecopirate]

Wild-caught salmon is, unlike some fish, inedible raw. There are numerous parasites present in salmon that can only be killed by freezing the fish for at least a week. However, cooked it is amazing, healthy and such a cultural icon that many pacific northwest tribes actually rely heavily on the salmon for their symbology. It has a high concentration of healthy fats and fatty acids, in addition to being a lean meat itself.

Avoid Atlantic salmon. Almost all, ~90% of atlantic salmon are farmed, have a much lower nutrient content than wild-caught, and in fact are so nutrient weak that they have been "enriched" by chemicals for both color and nutritional value. In general, you're safe eating Pacific Salmon, ~85% of which are wild.

[Azure]

There’s no need to be afraid of strange noises in the night. Anything that intends you harm will stalk you silently.

[Ecopirate]

You can make fiber cord by taking really any woody, strong grass or the like and splitting the stems lengthwise down the center. Allow them to dry for a couple of days and then, with a flat, dull edge (Like a chisel, the back of your knife, or a thumbnail in a pinch), and draw it down the length of the woody, pulpy side. The pulp will come off, leaving a pristine, green fiber, great for bringing together for rope or twine for snares and the like. Well-made fibers in the wild are often better than nylon ropes, due to their weather resistance and natural endurance. Paracord is, of course, your best option in many survival situations. Nettles are very good for use toward fiber.

[Ecopirate]

This is not recommended for testing, but in case of dire survival situations, you can test a potential food for edibility in a series of steps:

1. If it has any pungent, bitter smells, discard it immediately.
2. Place the food on the inside portion of your elbow. This is a sensitive area of skin. Wait for about 10 minutes. If it burns, causes a rash, or anything unbecoming of something edible, toss it.
3. Wash your hands after steps 1 and 2, and pretty much after any test.
4. Wash your hands after any and all tests.
5. Mushrooms are a bad choice in any case. While having a high mineral content, they have few calories, and are dangerous most of the time.
6. Wash the potential food, then touch it on the flat of your tongue. If it comes away burning, chemically bitter, or generally unpleasant, put it aside. Wait 24 hours after this test (Yes, YOU CAN wait that long without food). If you experience no untoward effects of nausea and/or other side-effects, the food may be unpalatable raw, but edible cooked, and may not be poisonous.
7. If it tasted fine, and passed the 24 hour test, take a SMALL bite. Proceed with the same test.
8. If it failed palatability, but did not seem poisonous, do the same test after cooking it.

As I mentioned, this is not recommended, but what I learned for dire survival situations.

[zingalong]

Anything that intends you harm will stalk you silently.

What about something that wants to harm you which sucks at stealth? or say, a person trying to run over your tent with a car?

[Azure]

What about something that wants to harm you which sucks at stealth? or say, a person trying to run over your tent with a car?

If a car is able to drive up to, and over your tent...you're a shitty camper.

[jimany]

Avoid Atlantic salmon. Almost all, ~90% of atlantic salmon are farmed, have a much lower nutrient content than wild-caught, and in fact are so nutrient weak that they have been "enriched" by chemicals for both color and nutritional value. In general, you're safe eating Pacific Salmon, ~85% of which are wild.

Good to know... Because I often catch farmed salmon in the great outdoors.

If a car is able to drive up to, and over your tent...you're a shitty camper.

There are tons of great places to camp that you can drive to...

[I am]

The way to tell fabric content is, pull a few threads off a garment, and hold them over a flame. If they don't burn, it's wool. If they burn slowly, it's cotton. If they torch, the fabric is synthetic

[AngryOnion]

The rule of thumb.
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2550/does-rule-of-thumb-refer-to-an-old-law-permitt
One my mother used say"if a fly falls into your drink don't worry about it because you cant pee bigger than you are"
Does that count??

[ArmsMerchant]

There is a lot of good, useful stuff here-- but if I had more time, I'd delete the cutesy-ass bullshit.

BTW, the leaves three thing also applies to poison oak--the leaves are trifold, but more rounded off and less shiny than poison ivy.

[Bakayar]

The satan spawn plant known as the black jack -it grows in africa- is a good mosquito repellent when burnt
always carry at least three kinves when out in the wild
The liver and heart of any animal is generally safe to eat raw, so long as they dont appear diseased, or have been left in the open too long.
90 percent of dark berries, blue, black etc. are safe to eat

obscure info:
the liver of a polar bear contains lethal amounts of vitamin A, avoid eating it if you find one
if in a jungle, cover up your fingers as vampire bats are most likely to feed off of them.

[JoePedo]

We all know that being out in the wild is dangerous and hazerdous. and that it takes time and effort to learn every aspect of survival, for every part of the world, etc.
so this thread is for rules of thumb that might help people who dont know much about nature.

The most important rule??

Leaves of three, it toilet paper be.

Seriously... you wouldn't want to wipe your ass with anything else, would you? (hint : for the total noob, scroll up a bit, lol)

Other than that, let's see...



* dandelions and the non-thorny parts of a blackberry leaf are edible. You'll never go hungry again.


* If you are starving to death and find a mushroom, look under the cap. If it has pores, its genus is Boletus, if it has gills, it is not.

If the pore sponge is orange or red, it comes from the only subgenus known to have any toxicity - muscarine, a toxin which causes primarily drooling, nausea, and severe gastrointestinal cramping, but is still less severe than any fungus with "angel" in the common name. If the poor sponge is not orange or red, there are no discovered[/b] toxic boleti in its subgenus. It will either be culinary, unpalatable but edible, or you will die having a new mushroom species named in your honor.


* If you encounter a mushroom whose growth is fresh and in good condition, yet the bottom of the cap is dissolving into a black, inky goo, you have found some member of the Corprinus genus. The only toxic members of corprinus effect their toxicity by affecting alcohol metabolism, and if you don't drink alcohol for a week or so afterwards, it will probably impart no negative side effects.


* If you, through desperation or stupidity, are relying on mycology for survival without actually having studied mycology, avoid any mushroom with a round bulb at the base of the stem. This is the Amanita genus, and is responsible for around 90% of fatal mushroom poisonings.


* Never eat any mushroom which is grey to brown and less than four centimeters tall. Not only are about 95% of the world's undiscovered mushroom species in the "little brown mushroom" category, but the world's leader in fatal poisonings to the amanita genus, deadly galerina, is also in the little brown mushroom category.

As a bit of trivia, the term "little brown mushroom" as a category actually is used in mycology, and due to the usual difficulty in applying any sort of identification to the millions of species without the aid of expensive genetic sequencing, is usually used in the same sense and humor as the term "UFO."


* While gastrointestinal infection is always possible - bears do shit in the woods, you know - the chance of contracting a water-borne illness is actually partially proportional to the number of industrial cattle farms upstream.


* Sleeping on a slightly elevated place is the best way to avoid waking up in a puddle of water.


* With a judicious mix of deciduous leaves and pine pitch, one can in fact make a fairly watertight roof.

----
Naturally, since the entire list here sums up to "get giardia and eat unidentified mushrooms, lolololol," it's not reccomended outside an emergency situation where the alternative also involves death. However, when you [u]have to drink unfiltered water and eat unidentified mushrooms, the above is the most surviveable way to go about doing shit which is frankly dangerous and suicidal.

[SHARP]

The sun rises in the east and sets in the west (as someone already said, but they left out that) on the northern hemisphere it'll point due south @ 12 o'clock noon, on the southern hemisphere it's vice versa.

Keep your feet dry, change your socks when they get wet. Wet socks can be dried by your body heat by hanging them on a piece of string around your neck, under your jacket.

If you take off your boots while you sleep and can't fit them under your shelter, turn them upside down and place them on a couple o' sticks you've driven into the ground, to keep out the rain. Also, there should be less of a chance something nasty hides in them, but shake them well before putting them back on anyways.

Always carry a roll of fishing line as it can come in handy, forget about the nylon varieties but use a braided line. Personally I use FireLine in 0.2 mm - it has a breaking strength of 10.6 kg if memory serves, but there's several other more or less identical brands/qualities out there.

However crazy it may sound, superglue can be used to seal up cuts that'd otherwise need stitching.

Learn what knots are good for what jobs.

Put drip strings on the paracord that keeps your hammock suspended, in case of rain the water will drip off before reaching you. Of course your poncho should be suspended above your hammock, to shelter you from the sun/rain/shitflinging monkeys.

Meh, that's all I can be arsed to post for now...

[Equinox]

Put drip strings on the paracord that keeps your hammock suspended, in case of rain the water will drip off before reaching you. Of course your poncho should be suspended above your hammock, to shelter you from the sun/rain/shitflinging monkeys.

Meh, that's all I can be arsed to post for now...

Oh god, I lol'd.

[I Ate Your Bees]

if you are desperate for fresh water in a dry, hot area, dig a decent size hole in a sunny area and fill it with green foliage. put a container to collect water in the middle of the hole and cover with a sheet of dark-coloured plastic (handy stuff to have). put a small weight, such as a rock in the middle of the plastic to direct water into the container. the leaves will sweat and condensation will drip down the plastic into the container.

another approach is to wrap black garbage bags around green branches to collect condensation.

[Thought Riot]

Buy nice boots and break them in.

[SHARP]

Gun powder as a fire starter will most likely result in you still being wet and cold as it burns too fast to be of any real use, lint and the curly bits (I can't remember what's called in English) from when you whittle a stick down to get a tent stake, will catch on and keep burning long enough for the flames to catch on something bigger.

Always keep your knives sharp, if they're dull they're nothing more than pointy pieces of metal good for poking holes in whatever, but as long as they're sharp, they're tools that could save your life.

If memory serves, around 75% of your heat loss (when dressed) will escape through your head and hands at 0°C if those parts aren't covered, so keep your head and hands covered when it gets really cold and you're trying to survive.

Bugs are literal protein bombs, to my knowledge only a few spiders and scorps could present a problem, and they shouldn't be dangerous to ingest after the stinger/fangs have been removed, and the animal fried.

Generally speaking, animal trails has a tendency to lead to fresh water, but depending on where you are, you might have a long walk ahead of you.
Wild animals in areas where very little water is present, wastes less time on roaming around to feed, than animals in regions where water is plentiful.

If you camp in an area inhabited by predatory animals large enough to kill you, make sure to either a) get out of reach, or b) do like many of the terrestrial spiders and secure the surrounding area with trip wires connected to something that'll let you know when something's approaching.

Come to think of it, that last one goes without saying, but I've been amazed by the amount of airsofters I've played against over the years (that should've known better), that just didn't understand that "securing one's rear with loads of tripwire activated mines" is what could've saved their asses, or at least postponed the moment where I'd gotten through and taken them out of the game.

So, stay alert, and early warning systems - however primitive they might be - is well worth the effort if someone or something is out there...

EDIT:

Buy nice boots and break them in.

This is true...

OP: Your feet keeps you fighting, get a pair o' boots that work, and break them in!
The first couple of days/weeks may be pure and utter shite, but nothing beats having a pair 'o boots that fits you...
Also, remember to take care of them, and they'll last longer.