If you were to end up in the middle of nowhere in some sort of disaster situation, and you knew any sort of rescue was several weeks away, what sort of shelter would you build to protect you and your family from mother nature. Assume you are in the middle of a woodland area with large animals such as grizzly bears and wolves, and you are without any weapons besides a knife, so the shelter should provide you with protection from these creatures. What would you do?

Try to find a cave or rock den for shelter, and pray a lot. Have a 24 hour fire, with "torch" branches/logs handy.
Some sort of tree shelter would be a 2nd choice.

Well, before I go anyfurther, I have to ask-

Where am I exactly? Flat woodland, like the taiga or the canadian north? Hilly woods, like the Appalachians? Mountain forests, like in Olympics? That will tell me what I need to build.

What do I have with me? An axe? A hatchet? A shovel, an etool, a trowel? That will tell me what I can build.

How do I know that there is no one looking for me for several weeks? In a few (2-3) weeks, if uninjured, I can easily cover 150 miles. If I see city glow, and I know no one is looking for me, I'll head towards it until I run into a river or hear humans, then head towards the human noise or go down stream until I find the ocean, at which time I hang a south. If I find a road, I camp next to it while seeing if I can figure out which way is more heavily travelled (frost damage, wanged up rails and signs, figuring that most litter goes to the vacume of the car so it is more likely to be on the side of the road that the car it was tossed from is traveling, etc). I say that becuase you can't go 100 miles in any direction without finding a road or seeing human settlement.

I also think you overestimate the aggressiveness of most animals. Humans bring most of thier problems on themselves with bears, and unless you are in Siberia, wolves couldn't care about us. Catamounts I would worry about, and the fire won't garantee keeping them spooked.

Good questions. Let's say this is taking place in an area like the Appalachians. You have with you a knife, axe, saw, and shovel.

As for the point about walking back to civilization... this is a question about long term shelters. While it might be practical to just walk back to civilization, that isn't what I'm really looking for here. Assume maybe that there was a large scale disaster in the nearby cities, so you have taken refuge in the woods until civilization stabilizes and it is safe to head back.

Well, first let me say I think you greatly underestimating the available space, and the population it can support without external supplies. After three weeks without food shipments, in all likelyhood there won't be a single wild animal bigger than a rabbit alive between NYC and the Candian border. Everyone's plan is, head north to Vermont/New Hampshire/Maine/Upstate. Speaking as a Vermonter, we'll probably be eating flatlanders before they eat our deer. DO NOT head to the hills unless you have family there who can vouche for you, becuase if the sit is as bad as you say, then we aren't getting our supplies either, which come from warehouses in the Boston-Manchester area. Every rural area is like that. The cold hard reality is, every community in the civilized world is 120 hours from the stone age. Hospital supplies, fuel, food, these all depend on resupply every two-three days.

Second, wolves aren't a problem. Neither are coyotes, so long as you don't keep trash in camp. Which is what would attact a bear. You'll have more problems with feral dogs and moose. Moose don't care, and ferals are crazy, they aren't afraid of anything, and people are stupid enough to think they can reunite the poor lost doggy with it's owner. Until it bites them.

With what' you've given me, head for highish ground or go to the edge of a swamp. Fewer people that way. Clear for a cabin or longhouse. Start with with a temp shelter in either case, and build off of it until it makes a good shed, then start work on the big house.

The senario, no offense, is not really feasible. There simply isn't the distance needed to isolate the rural areas from something going wrong in the nearby urban areas. The storm that hits Boston might have rub me over four or five hours earlier. It it goes due east from the Berks, three hours. Weather isn't localized. If you want to really be away from a storm, it has to be geographically little and stationary, like a tornado.

Even though it isn't the answer you expected, it is the reality answer. A disruption will be localized, like Katrina and Andrew or a quake, which means outside relief will go in under 120 hours. OR it will be big, like a civil war, which means you are better off not going into the countryside in conditions where people will get clannish and asking outsiders things like "what can you do?" before they throw you out

I am no expert. I am not even an amateur. But I would sleep in a tree if possible. Set up a hammock up in a tree and I think that would keep you safe from large ground animals.

How high were you thinking of putting that hammock? There are only four kinds of animals you need to worry about in the woods at night:

-The ones that will trip over you, like moose.
-The hungry ones patient enough to wait for you to get out of the tree, like feral dogs.
-The hungry ones that like to climb trees, like catamount.
-And humans. Either other people, or the kind that roll over in thier sleep and fall out of thier hammocks. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />