Brings us to someone like Les Stroud. Before Survivorman, he spent a year living in the woods in a tipi with his wife. Not everyone gets a chance to do that(I asked, but she wouldn't go). Nor is it possible to shuck the bindings of civilization and live in the wild like Nessmuk. Anyway, I believe you learn by doing. Any training a person gets never becomes a skill unless it is used. I think training gets your foot in the door, but time in the woods under primitive conditions is the true measure of an expert. I just don't know how you could validate a claim.
One of the proteges of Mors Kochanski and occasional instructor (Jay Kilgannon) built an XXL version of Mors' super shelter to prove the concept. From the pictures, I am guessing it was about 10'x16'x8' high, perhaps larger. It was built from a base of large logs, bent alder trees and branches to form a tall arch, then a layer of mylar reflective blankets, then a layer of plastic. He had a small wood stove, bough bed platform and table and chair in it. He spent the
better part of a fall and winter living in it but apparently his girlfriend was not quite as enamored with it. Later in the winter, he said his friends took "pity on him" and offered up their houses for him to watch while they were on vacation.
After I saw Mors building the shelter, I later showed him the newer version of the AMK's mylar survival blanket (this was in 2007). He appeared to be quite interested in the material and noted how much more robust it was then the basic mylar sheets. I didn't tell him that it was about 5x the cost of the cheap mylar which would make his
super shelter fairly expensive!
Previous Topic
Index
