Boy Scout Wilderness Survival

I was just going through a box of my old Boy Scout stuff and found an old wilderness survial merit badge book. As I was flipping through it I recalled the six things repeated during the course:

Shelter
Fire
Rest
Water
Signal
Food

I was thinking that I have used this list in order, while in military schools and civilian practice (fun when the wife let's me go out in the woods with friends). If you look at the time it takes for someone to be found this in my opinion is pretty good. Just wanted to see other ideas....

Just to remind our readers:

The list is not a fixed you-must-do-it-in-this-order list of prioritys.

The one you need first on that list is No1.

I honestly don't know if I found this list somewhere or its something I came up with, but I wrote it down years back:

1. health (psychological stress, traumatic and environmental injuries)
2. personal protection (clothing, shelter, insects, fire)
3. signaling (fire, whistle, mirror)
4. sustenance (water and maybe food)
5. location & travel (using a map, compass, GPS)

and these are in order of typical importance.

Almost all the Scouts in my son's small (16 boys) troop have earned the Wilderness Survival merit badge. They see it as a challenge - a kind of rite of passage.

My son hasn't taken it yet as he's nervous about the overnight in a shelter. He's mostly worried about mosquittos, rain, and cold.

They are pretty strict about the limited list of items the Scouts are allowed to bring along during the summer camp overnight, though I myself have never seen that list.

I've gone as an advisor on the overnight, I'm also a WS MB counselor. You're right, they don't let them take very much. In fact, they won't let them take many of the Scout Essentials that they are taught to have with them whenever they are on a hike. They won't let them take things like any type of cord, wire, rope, (makes it too easy to build shelters.) They can't bring firestarting material, food, shelter...

I think they basically were allowed the clothes on their back, a poncho, water bottle, flashlight, and in our case they were allowed (required) insect repellant. (Risk of EEE from mosquitos and Lyme Disease from ticks is pretty high around us. Deet's a way of life.)

Now, we wouldn't suggest they ever go out like that, but, in this scenario, they are really encouraging improvising. I think the guys all come back pretty proud of themselves when they realize how well they have done with so little to work with. I included some pictures of shelters some of them built this summer in an earlier post in July:
http://forums.equipped.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Main=9256&Number=101036#Post101036

Clothes on their backs?
Thinks...........
It might be a good idea to encourage a little lateral thinking by the participant's. Paracord lace's.
Pulltag compass.

Wonder if the DEET is flamable?

Good time to show them how to make a bowdrill.

Out of a dozen or so, only one used their belt to lash things together (of course, for most teenagers, they don't know how to use a belt the way it was intended!)
Another 2 figured out that they had laces on their shoes. One of them was so frayed that they used it for dry tinder!

I don't know if Deet is flamable, but, the combination with spray propellant seems to make a nice torch of sorts. (At least until the flame gets back to the finger on the plastic tip of the spray can )

You're right though, the idea of only letting them take the bare minimum, is so they try to improvise. To a certain extent, it works. The next day, we do a "post-mortem" examination of what happened the night before, it's always interesting to see what they perceived, and learned, compared to what we saw.