I’d like to ask the folks here to help me with some brainstorming. I thought it would be interesting to come up with a list of survival reference information. By reference info I mean facts and figures that most people don’t use every day or commit to memory, but would be very useful to have in a survival situation. For instance, when using bleach for water purification, I don’t remember how many drops per gallon now, never mind after a hurricane hits.

I wouldn’t get too much into how-to’s unless they are simple tasks that have some hard to remember detail or formula. Here are a few things that come to mind at the moment:

finding north with an analog watch and the sun
wind chill chart
list of poisonous plants
emergency telephone numbers (call the head of FEMA directly and ask for a trailer to be sent to you)
magnetic deviation “east is least, west is best”
medicine contra-indications (don’t give asprin to a child or a bleeding victim?)
table of generic vs. trade names of OTC medicines (you want some Tylenol but your fist aid kit only has acetaminophen)

I dunno, what can you folks add?

Here's an awesome book to read that has a lot of good info in it, and a lot of pictures. It may give you some better ideas, I haven't got a cheat sheet, which is an excellent idea. I know that for compass heading is easy, just stick a stick in the ground and place a rock on the shadow, wait 15 min later and put another rock on the shadow. Put your left foot on the first shadow rock and the right on the last shadow rock and your facing north.

Camping &Wilderness Survival

What are you asking for? How to do those things, or a handle list of some common knowledge type things?

Here are a few you might want to add:

* radio frequencies (ham repeaters, police, EMS, and military)
* working/available fallout shelter locations
* state CCW info states with reciprocity
* important websites
* bill of rights/constitution

I don't see how a list of poisonous plants would be useful. You would also need some detailed pictures and descriptions to identify them as well, and the vast majority of people, even on this forum, would not be able to scavenge a significant amount of food from wild plants anyway. If anything, descriptions of wild edible plants that are common in your area would be more useful, but still not much for the above reason.

I don't think knowing the exact wind chill would be of any use either. If you're cold, thats all that matters, and you know you need to get warm.

As for generic vs trade names, unless someone's allergic to one, it doesn't really matter(the packaging or FAK inventory should indicate the use and dosage of all meds in the FAK).

Sorry for the criticism, I can't help nitpicking.

Meline - I was thinking "a handy list of knowledge type things"

For instance, imagine one of those pocket sized give-away notebooks you get with trig tables, time zones, area codes, math formulas, unit conversions... But with survival-specific info instead - what would be in it?

BTW, constructive critcism is welcome!

Telling time to sunset by number-of-fingers technique.

Phone numbers for poison control, public utilites, animal control,

Standard table of tangents to calculate heights or distances.

Ways to stay warm (hot bricks, furniture fort, lexan hot water bottle for sleeping bag, etc...)

Proper orientation of debris shelter to wind.

Useful cordage plants.

Where water/food can be found in workplace.

Proper tire inflation pressure.

How to fix a flat tire (repair as well as replace).

Best local radio stations for news/traffic/weather/emergency info.

Where to find water (dry stream beds, seashore, homes).

Important knots (bowline, truckers hitch, lashing).

Burn times of common cannon fuses.

Calculating wattage loads of electronic devices so you don't overload your generator.

Distance and common weather patterns between you and sites likely to be nuked.

Cricket chirps to temperature conversion.

How to jumpstart a car.

Ground to air signalling.

Proper wood choices for spindle and hearth for fire bows.

Location of nearest natural salt lick.

Dosages of medicine for babies.

-Blast

A copy of Doug's cheat sheet, more knots, basic weather indicators. Map of the area (even if just good road maps).

For other items is this a wilderness kit (if so, where and what anticapted duration), bug in gear, bug out gear, car kit? I ask because cordage plants doesn't mean much in the city, nor does a map of the local subway system mean anything more than tinder once you are out of dodge.

I wasn't going to narrow it down to urban/wilderness/bugin/bugout - I was curious to see what would spill out once I opened the topic.

I was thinking more general (continental US) rather than local (maps, etc.) although you could provide blanks to fill out for local telephone numbers and other customizable info.