Survival 101

1. Survival 101 11/11/2011 Practical skills you will hopefully never have to use but will still use anyway to impress and bore your friends For external use only. This product is not known in the state of California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm. Chris Fox (248) 229-9011

2. Survival Priorities The human body needs five essentials to live. The first two are always top priorities. The others may change priority depending on your condition, local weather, and your location. • Attitude: Above all else, your attitude is your most important asset. Your will to keep going and to find solutions can never be allowed to dwindle. If you start to get depressed or discouraged, remember that you were put on this earth for a reason. Whatever that reason is, it wasn’t so you could come this far just to be buzzard food. • Air: You can survive for up to around three minutes without air. After the three minute mark, oxygen deprivation will begin to cause nerve damage. Remember, breath in, breath out, repeat. Always repeat. • Shelter: No matter the terrain or climate, keeping dry is key. In cold weather, sweating can lead to hypothermia at night. Extreme cold weather can collapse lungs and kill you much quicker. In the desert, staying out in the sun can cause severe burns and will quickly dehydrate you. Keep in mind that deserts are always portrayed as hot. At night, most deserts can get cold enough to frost over. In wooded area, protection from mosquitoes and other biting insects is the second highest priority. • Water: Under ideal conditions, you can survive up to three days without water. High heat, low humidity, and physical exertion will lower your three day window. The easiest way to be absolutely sure how hydrated you are is to examine your urine – it should be clear and odorless. A dark yellow color or a foul smell means you are all ready dehydrated, even you may not even feel dehydrated. • Food: In most cases, you can survive three weeks without food. • Vitamin B and Magnesium will help to keep you alert. • Vitamin C will help prevent illness. • Vitamin E and protein will help you heal wounds and maintain muscle mass. • Zinc will help fight an illness or infection that has all ready set in. • Screw your diet. Fat is essential is a survival situation. Without it, excessive diarrhea will occur which can lead to dehydration and possibly death.

3. Stay or Move & the 5 W’s The constant dilemma for a survivor is whether to stay in one place or to move. Ask yourself the following questions to determine the best course of action. If you answer YES to most of these questions then stay where you are. • Does anyone else have the foggiest clue as to where I am? • Am I in no immediate danger of being incinerated, crushed, eaten, or otherwise going to bleed profusely? • Am I injured to the point where I can’t move? • Can I signal anyone from here? • Do the 5 W’s work in my favor at this site? When selecting a site to build a shelter, you must keep the 5 W’s in mind: • Weather: Is my site going to be under water if it rains? Is my site going to be buried if it snows? Is my site out of the wind? • Wood: Is there wood available to build a shelter if I have to? Is there wood available to build a fire? • Water: Is there drinkable water nearby? If I’m near a river or an ocean coast, is there a risk of waking up under water in the middle of the night? • Wigglies: Is my site on top of a snake’s den? Is my site going to attract scorpions or spiders? Is my site on top of an ant mound? Is my site in prime mosquito territory? • Widow Makers: Is there dead branches or big freaking rocks precariously dangling above my site that could come crashing down any second, mashing me into a gelatinous ooze of bloody pulp and broken bones?

4. Universal Edibility Tests If you know nothing about edible or medicinal plants, use these tedious yet simple steps to determine if any plant is edible. If at any point of this test you experience pain, numbness, itching, nausea, swelling, headaches, hallucinations, bleeding, or unpleasant discoloration of the skin, STOP the test immediately and do NOT eat the current plant you are testing. Complete each step in sequence and move onto the next step if and only if you do not experience any of the above symptoms. Complete the test from start to finish with only one plant at a time. • Take a piece of the plant you intend to eat, break it open, and rub it against your wrist. Wait 30 minutes. • Take a piece of the plant, break it open, and rub it against the outside of your lower lip. Wait 30 minutes. • Take a piece of the plant, break it open, and leave it pinched between your lower lip and your lower jaw. Wait 30 minutes. • Chew on a piece of the plant about the size of your thumb nail for 10 minutes and spit it out. DO NOT SWALLOW THE PLANT. You may swallow the juices. Wait 30 minutes. • Eat a piece of the plant about the size of your thumb nail. Wait 30 minutes. • Eat the plant in progressively larger portions. Never exceed a portion larger than your fist in a 24 hour period. Grasses should never be eaten. You can chew on them like gum and swallow the juices, but do not eat grasses. If the grass seeds are red, purple, or black, then it is either toxic or has been poisoned and should be avoided. Note: Step one should be used to determine if a plant will make suitable toilet paper. If you are dumb enough to use a plant with thorns as toilet paper, you completely deserve what’s coming to you.

5. Universal Edibility Tests If you know nothing about insects, use these simple guide lines to determine which insects are edible. If an insect, arachnid, or ‘bug’ in general meets AT LEAST ONE of these requirements, it can be assumed to be poisonous and should NOT be eaten – no matter how desperate or curious you may be. • Slow moving • Brightly colored • Bad smelling Notable bugs: • Millipedes carry trace amounts of cyanide. • Horse flies carry anthrax and should only be eaten when they are still maggots. • Slugs have been known to carry rat lung worms which will cause meningitis and ultimately death. • Grass hoppers can carry tape worms. If you are going to eat them, grasp them at the shoulders with one hand and the head in the other. Pull off their head. Their stomach will remain attached to the head, taking the worm with it. Roast grass hoppers just to be safe. • If snails have a black or green liquid that comes out of their shell, they are poisoned and should be avoided. • Most scorpions and spiders are edible. Their venoms are a protein which can be broken down in the stomach. They should NOT be eaten whole if you have an ulcer or wound in the mouth. It is always best to remove the stingers from scorpions and the fangs from spiders before eating them. Both are usually more palatable when roasted. • Bees should not be eaten. Large quantities of them can however be boiled to make a coffee substitute.

6. Primitive Navigation East South West North Even if you carry a GPS or smart phone, it is always best to carry a traditional compass. Button compasses aren’t as reliable, but should at least give you a rough idea of which way you are heading. If you compass is on a key ring, always remove it from the key ring before using it. If all else fails, you can revert to these navigation methods in either hemisphere: • Day Orientation: You will need a stick and two stones. • Jam the stick into the ground so it is vertical and will not fall over if the wind blows. • Place one stone at the end of the stick’s shadow. • Wait 20 minutes. Leave the first stone alone. You may be bored, but just leave it. • Place the second stone at the end of the stick’s shadow. • Place your left foot in front of the first stone and your right foot in front of the second stone. You are now facing north. • Night Orientation: You will need two sticks of slightly different length. • Place both sticks in the ground far enough away from each other than you can fit your palm between them. • Select any star you want and that can be easily seen for the next 20 minutes. • Lay on the ground with your face closer to the shorter stick. Level your view so that the star appears to be touching the top of both sticks. • Wait 20 minutes. Do not move or change your view point. • Note which direction the star moved relative to the two sticks. Easy reminder: UP and EAST are the only direction that both start with vowels • If the star moved up you are facing east. • If the star moved down you are facing west. • If the star moved left you are facing north. • If the star moved right you are facing south.

7. Solar Stills If you can not find drinkable water, have no means to purify water, and will be staying in one place for a while, building a solar still will allow you to gather potable water with minimal effort. Ground Solar Still: You will need something to dig with, a cup, a stone, and a clear or white plastic tarp. • Select an open sunny area. The location should be in sunlight at all hours of the day. • Dig a hole deeper than the cup is tall and slightly smaller across than the tarp. Deeper and wider is better. • If available, place green non-poisonous plants in the hole. • Place the cup in the center of the hole. • Stretch the tarp across the hole. • Pile dirt, sand, stones, logs, or anything else to keep the tarp in place. Do NOT pierce the tarp. • Place the stone on the tarp directly over the cup. • Over the next few hours, the tarp will create a green house effect, heating up the exposed earth in the hole. Water in the ground will evaporate and collect on the tarp. It will run down toward the stone and collect in the cup. • You can drink the water either by pulling the tarp aside and drinking from the cup, or by inserting a straw or tube underneath the tarp into the cup.

8. Solar Stills Continued Plant Solar Still: You will need a green broad leaf tree that you know is not poisonous or trying to stab you with something and a plastic bag. • Select a non-poisonous tree with broad leaves. If nothing else is available, use an ever green tree. • Slide the bag over a small section of a branch. • Tie or strap the bag tightly around the branch, effectively creating a bubble at the end of the branch. • Over the next few hours, the plant’s natural respiration cycles will secrete small amounts of water. The water will collect in the bag. • Check the bag every few hours and drink as needed. Be warned that the water will have somewhat of a tea flavor.

9. Backpacker’s Oven Regardless of the kind of stove you are using – propane, butane, isobutane, white gas, kerosene, gasoline, alcohol, or solid fuel, this technique will allow you to use your stove in harsh weather and will also improve the fuel efficiency of your stove. You will need four sticks or stakes and an oven bag. • Dig at least a square foot hole by 6” deep. • Place your oven in the hole. Place your cookware on it as usual. • Slide the oven bag over the stick/stakes. Skewer each of the corners of the bag with a stake. • Stick the stakes into the ground over the hole so that they hold the bag upright and pin it to the ground at the same time. • The bag will shield your oven from the elements and create a green house effect, trapping warm air around your stove. This technique also works well with small key hole fires. Note: Digging the hole allows you to reach under the bag to stir your food without disturbing the bag and releasing hot air.