Food scents are all over your body regardless of where you cook and you not will fool Mr. Bear any easier by cooking away from your shelter. And yes bears do sometimes come out of hibernation in winter looking for food. Maintaining a bare and clean campsite is crucial and will go a long way in preventing any midnight visits.

Also it is still a good idea not to cook or leave a fire burning in your shelter if it is made of mainly dry wood and debris.



Heating rocks in a covered cast iron fry pan over a campfire then placing the pan into the tent on a solid and stable piece of wood = a nice warm night. I did this every night in the cooler months when I lived in a tent out in the woods and beside a river for almost 9 months years back.



Most likely many tunes will change...:)

That's why you use sheets of bark from a fallen tree instead of dry leaves or grass to cover the shelter. The bark is a lot less prone to catch fire. In the areas I camp, there are often fallen trees that you can peel the bark off in sheets with use of a hatchet or machete. Any loose dry stuff goes under me for insulation. I usually take a wool blanket which is adequate to arrest any sparks that come from the fire. I don't build a huge fire, and being conscious of the wind direction and where you place your shelter can largely mitigate the spark hazard.

When my friends and I go primitive camping, each of us has a small canvas tarp about 7' X 9'. When there's four or so of us, we'll throw up a small wigwam and put the fire inside. One of those tarps and two wool blankets is usually adequate in pretty cold weather. If there is less than four, we'll pitch a three sided lean-to with the fire in the middle.

Tom

I wonder if making a fire bed then once the dirt is on building a debris shelter over it is feasible? I guess it depends on whether you have the time to put both of them together? Seems like the best of both worlds though.

On paper and for demonstration purposes, firebeds look good. The problem is when you really need one, the firbed will be made under less then idea conditions and materials. These factors may mean that the firebed though dug down and covered still emit smoke and gas from the wood smoldering. Trying to sleep on top of this with your lungs and eyes burning from the smoke and gas makes for a real sleepless night....There are much better ways of keeping warm with fire then this method.

Our weather will be below zero in the next few days, and warming up to 15 deg by the time I am in the field. The only tools I will have are a folding knife, and a contractor trash bag. I will carry a gortex bivy and bag as a back up.

We will have one good fire going all night long away from the shelter.

The ground is frozen solid. I will have access to snow, leaves, grass, and some bark. Very few conifers. I carry a messenger bag with me at all times and I want to test living with it alone for 2 days.

I am thinking build up a large bed to get me off the ground and fill the contractor bag with insulation.

Depending on the material I may try a fire in/near the shelter.

Anyhow thanks for the tips I will post an AAR after.

Fire beds, like desert sills and tree wells, look really, really spiffy on paper. But how much time was spent setting that up? Now lets try it in sub-zero weather, with a few feet of snow on it. Heck, let's just try it with hard frozen grown. You're digging a shallow grave, then building a fire at the bottom of it.... yeah....

I would do it differently. But you also don't say where you are- I do snow, lots of snow, freezing rain, and so cold the whimpering on your jacket is the thermometer zipper pull wanting to come in where it is warm. *laughs*

I'd do a snow trench, and use the debris under it and on supports to make a roof. Then do a cul de sac a few feet away with a platform for a small fire, which is used for heating water to go in the bottles. Those go in the shelter with me.

Sounds like fun, but if this is your first attempt at survival shelter building, given the conditions you describe I would suggest having more of a back up plan than a bivy / bag (hot hands , tarp, space blanket, tent, that type of thing). Probably wouldn't need it but if you did, you'd really need it.

If conditions deteriorate dramatically, you may not have the luxury of first time mistakes...we all make them that's how we learn.

Give yourself a cushion to make the lesson less painful.

The rest of the gang here would probably tell me to chill out and quit worrying ("you sound like my mother").

Nah Samhain, I was thinking the same thing. For a first time in the ideal conditions listed, I think there needs to be a plan B.

The cost of no plan B can indeed be very high.

Thanks for the concern. Not my first time building shelters. First attempt at sleeping overnight in one with out my bag and bivy. I will be with guys who are trained in this and that have medical training.

I may end up not sleeping much and doing a lot of burpees but thats ok. We will have a central fire going.

I am in the Midwest US. 6 inches snow low of 10 deg.

Sitting in that tree stand for 12 hours waiting for the perfect deer kind of gets me prepared for dealing with the cold.