Nature Reliance School

Differentiating Between Oaks

2012-01-10T07:51:00.000-08:00

We often get into some deeper discussions in our blog beyond what you have before you today.

However, I think today's discussion will assist those that are new to the outdoors to see some things you have not otherwise seen the next time you head out to your neck of the woods.

Today we simply want to take a quick look at the differences between white oaks and red oaks.

There are many species of trees out there and one of the most prominent for us here in Kentucky is the oak tree. While there are many subspecies of the oak, we want to help you identify whether the oak you are looking at is of the white oak, or red oak variety.

To help folks remember, I usually say that "Reds are not Round". If you take a look at the leaves being held by my lovely children, you will notice that the leaf on the left, has rounded edges and ends, while the leaf on the right has more pointed ends. You are looking at a white oak on the left, and a red oak on the right. Please bear in mind that these two species can more definitively be defined and classified as well, but today lets not worry about that.

To further help you determine, lets take a look at a few other aspects of these two species.

White Oaks

White acorns taste better because of there are fewer tannins in them. These tannins are what give red acorns there bitter tast.
The cap of a white oak species most often covers about 1/4 of the acorn.
The acorns tend to be long and narrow rather fat and round.
They grow at the ends of the branches of the current years growth on the tree.

Red Oaks

The cap of a red oak species are usually nearly flat on top.
The acorns are short and fatter and almost round.
They acorns grow in clusters on last year's growth of branches.

Why does any of this matter? Well the easy answer is that most people that go on hikes enjoy seeing wildlife. Most wildlife that eat acorns prefer to eat the acorns from a white oak rather than a red oak. So if you are seeking wildlife for viewing or hunting, find yourself a cluster of white oaks and take a look around. Chances are you will see some tracks, scat, other disturbance or even the critter itself around you.

Seeing Rather Than Looking

2011-12-15T08:06:00.000-08:00

Several of my facebook friends have been circulating the photo you see to the left. There is a face within the photo that you may have a hard time finding (answer below). I want to take a look at a few things that may help you see more stuff in the outdoors on your next trip (or possibly on your next facebook outing).

To begin with, there is very little doubt to me that the face was photoshopped into the photograph. The shadowing on the face does not resemble the shadowing around it and the face is incredibly two dimensional. At the same time, this IS a 2D photograph which allows alot of things to be lost in translation from in-person viewing to seeing the photograph.

The super-cool author at a recent tracking class

In a general sense what most of us do is that we look at things, particularly in a woods setting like the photo above. In that particular picture, for those of us who are not used to the outdoors, the big pile of rocks might be the only thing that looks different. "It all looks the same", we might say. What we want you to do, is to not just look around you but to see around you. There are plenty of things to consider but all that I want you to consider in these photos today is what trackers and other like-minded individuals call disturbance.

If you take a look at the picture above with me holding a flashlight on the ground, you will see that there is a very intentionally placed shoe print (track) on a somewhat muddy surface. What I want you to notice is the area directly outside of the track itself. That area is light brown in color and almost shiny. Whereas the track itself is rather dark brown and not shiny. Imagine for a moment what that particular area looked like before the track was made. Then by considering what it looks like with the track in it, you will note that it is disturbed. If you don't see how leaves typically look when they are on the forest floor then you might not recognize that when they are stepped upon, turned over, or twisted slightly that they will indicate a disturbance.

Dude in camo

Take a look at the picture labeled as Dude in camo and ask yourself, "Why do I see his left arm and the binoculars so easily?" I love this photo because there are some things that are hard to see (his right shoulder) and others that are easy to see. You will notice the binoculars have very defined edges and are shiny whereas the things around them are not. The woodland pattern camo he is wearing on his left arm simply has broader patterns than both the vegetation in front of his chest as well as the straight line trees behind his left shoulder. These are just a few of the reasons you see the arm and binoculars. Some of you may have also seen the outline of both his nose and mouth under the camouflage veil he is wearing. This is because the lines of his nose and mouth, do not follow the diagonal lines of the veil, which in turn do not match the straight lines of the trees.......I could go on and on, but do you see these things? These things are not necessarily disturbance per se, however they are very different from the other lines around them and that is why you can see them rather clearly.

The next two photos were taken when I attended a Scout class in North Carolina under the instruction of Mr. Richard Cleveland of Earth School and Mr. Tom Laskowski of the Mid-West Native Skills Institute. I am no photographer so there is much left to be desired there. However I do think these two photos next to one another highlight what sort of things you can do when you purpose to hide something from sight in the woods.

What you are looking at is an opening to a very big hole that my my teammates and I dug. This hole was actually big enough for me to get myself and some of my gear down into it. We placed the vegetation that surrounds the black blob in the middle picture. There is both moss and trees and plants that were put there to in essence draw your eye away from the opening of the hole. This could easily fool the eye of those of us who did not know how to see it at the beginning of the week. By the end of the week of training however this sort of stuff stood out to most of us just as a pink elephant had been standing in the same place. This is because we had spent about 15-20 hours a day for the entire week looking for such disturbance.

So, to summarize.....look for disturbance, lines that don't seem to match up with others, very defined edges (the woods rarely have those), colors and value change, these and many, many more, are the things that will help you to see more on your next outing.

If you want some help them with this, then please come to one of our scout classes in 2012, or....better yet invite me over for lunch and take me out in your neck of the woods to walk around. I'll do alot of things for a good lunch with good company. :) I consider myself very much the beginner, but hopefully I can help you get started on seeing things rather than just looking at things.

Hiking in the Rain = Aikido = Being More Like Jesus

2011-11-22T07:49:00.001-08:00

I noticed on my facebook page today that there were quite a number of people complaining about the several days of rain we have had here in November 2011. Therefore I almost had to aggravate them all by putting up that I like hiking in the cold November rain.

I do actually love hiking in the rain, it was not just an empty aggravation. The most obvious reason is that I almost always have the place to myself (see comments above regarding complaints about rain). "Who in their right mind would go out in the rain?" Well,....either my mind is not right, or the answer to the question is me.

I remember many years ago, my family and I made a commitment to one another that we would spend time in the outdoors every weekend, rain or shine, hot or cold, busy or not busy for an entire year. And we did exactly that, no matter what the weather, we went out in it and hiked, had picnic, swims, rock throwing competitions. As I have said before, nature has a way of offering things for free that you cannot buy anywhere. I could not list the benefits that year offered us as individuals and as a family unit. Not the least of which, is that we now know that walking in the rain and getting wet, has a lot more flair to it than running in the rain, trying not to get wet, and getting wet anyway.

Most critters out there will wait out a rain, while at the same time, some critters will get up and move about because of the concealment that is provided by the rain. So there is still lots of interesting stuff to see and be part of.

I guess for me personally, it is a challenge taken on by not many. The martial artist and survivalist in me wants to be prepared for the worse. I train and teach others for self-defense situations, that may never occur. I train in and teach others how to survive in the wilderness, for situations that hopefully will never occur. All this training, and hiking in the rain, is there to help me grow as a person, to learn how to live with adversity and deal with it and not avoid it.

For my Aikido friends out there, it is like irimi, where when an attack is imminent and you enter in to it. For my Christian brothers and sisters out there, it is a lot like Christ the Messiah, going out to, the authorities that came to take him away to be crucified. He could have easily hidden and run. For my nature friends out there, it is like hiking in the rain, you know exactly what I mean don't you?

In My Daughter's Hand

2010-05-01T12:51:00.000-07:00

Originally written, October 1995

A leaf,

has died and fallen

to the land.

But now,

has come alive again

in my daughter's hand.

Don't be Afraid

2010-02-17T08:32:00.000-08:00

I am going to use this column to answer a simple question that came up during one of the survival classes I was teaching here in Winchester. One of the ladies that were present asked what was “out there” that we need to be afraid of. I am assuming the “out there” she was referring to was the woods, and hills of our great outdoors here in Kentucky. The answer is quite simple if you are the type of person who is rational and calm. That answer is nothing.

What I mean is that there are not any deadly species of animal, snake, insect, etc out there that are actively in pursuit of you here in Kentucky. Yes, we do have species of venomous snakes here in Kentucky and they could actually “bite” you, but it is not likely. I have some good friends at the Kentucky Reptile Zoo in Slade who make a living being around snakes. If you have never been to their facility you need to check them out. I don’t know if they still do, but I have attended a couple of their public programs and had many great conversations with them. They are the ones to seek out for information regarding venomous snakes. With that said, I think I can with confidence inform you on how to not get bitten by a snake. Stay away from them, don’t antagonize them, and most importantly just let them be! If you do happen to come across and snake then simply back away from it slowly, and move on.

In all honesty, that is the answer to staying safe while being outdoors. It is also a very ecologically sound way of making your way outdoors. Make it a habit of simply observing wildlife and not trying to have an interaction with it. Those things are around more than you realize and they don’t seek you out, nor do they purpose themselves to come after to you. It would be a nice gesture if you simply did the same.

As for spiders and such, keep the same thing in mind. Let them have their space and they won’t bother you. My family and I had a flower bed for years at our home that had many, many “families” of black widow spiders in them. They like certain spaces to build their webs in and we knew that was so we stayed away from their space, and guess what they stayed away from ours. I could spot one of them out in the flowers and make my way into the flower and bed and they would scatter back to their “home” for safety.

As for other bigger critters like bears and such, again keep in mind that you need to stay away from them. They are not prominent here in Central Kentucky but they are finding their way more prominently in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, many thanks to the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife! Two things to keep in mind if you are in bear country are to stay away from their food, and stay away from their babies called cubs. If you keep this in mind, you should on most occasions stay safe.

Poison ivy is always a concern and so is something like stinging nettles too. If you take them time to study your plants, you will always find jewel weed next or near these as well. The juices that come from crushed jewel weed, put onto the skin soon after contact with poison ivy, etc. almost always dilutes it to the point that it has no effect.

The biggest danger in the woods, and the way most people find themselves hurt is to be close contact with a species of animal we all know and love. This species is affectionately known as “the idiot”.

For you see it is this guy and/or gal, who wants to show off, or simply strut their dominance on a critter, or on a rock, or in a wild river that will get you in trouble. As I stated at the beginning of this article, simply stay rational and calm and you should be OK. If you have someone in your group that enjoys being the center of attention by taking ridiculous risks, then avoid being with them in the outdoors. In my opinion, nature and the great outdoors of the fin, fur, feather, and flora variety is one to be observed and marveled at, not necessarily dominated. Now don’t get me wrong, I enjoy a good venison steak over beef any day, but there are great ethics and responsibility that go along with hunting as well. (I suppose that will be another column for another day).

So in summary, enjoy what surrounds you! Don’t be afraid. There is much to see, and experiences and memories to make in our great outdoors of Kentucky. I hope to see you on, or off, the trail.

Boys will be boys

2010-02-02T14:55:00.000-08:00

The great naturalist Jon Muir once said, “When a man comes to the mountains, he comes home.” I agree, for it is in the mountains, hills, fields and trees that boys get challenged, often get pushed to limits and then find themselves not lacking. Obviously, I am no psychologist but much has been written on these things by those more educated on the psychology and/or sociology of boys becoming men. What I do know is that I just spent the weekend sleeping outside with a low of 3 degrees, climbing through caves, and jumping off very tall cliffs attached to a rope. I was joined by a good friend of mine, and our sons, mine is 11 years old and his is nine. Did I mention we had a blast?

For some of our female readers, most notably my wife (the mother of said eleven year old), this may all sound a bit, crazy. For those of you who think this, you may actually be right. I humbly submit to you that it is a good crazy though. I don’t know about boys growing up to be knights in shining armor. What I do know is that I personally like it (you do not have to agree) that we want our boys to grow up to be men. Part of doing that involves doing somewhat dangerous things such as climbing mountains, dangling precipitously off of ropes, paddling down dangerous rivers, etc. So it was this past weekend when I and my eleven year old son spent the weekend outdoors.

I remember once a trip that my own father took me on. We took a small overnight hike through a part of the Red River Gorge. I will never forget several things on that trip. One was that a small portion of our hike was alongside the side of a cliff in which at any moment I would fall off to my sure death and destruction, but I didn’t. We also only had a sheet of plastic and a very thin sheet blanket to cover us. I surely thought I was going to freeze to death during the night, but I didn’t. I put my shoes next to the fire during the night to dry them out. I kept putting them too close and was instructed by my dad and my uncle to pull them back or they would catch on fire. Well, you know what, I didn’t and they caught fire. I had to hike out barefooted. When we started I did not think I was going to make it out, but guess what I did.

So it went for me, nearly 30 years ago, and so it was for my son last weekend. Challenged and pushed to our self-imposed limits then finding myself, and my son too I suppose, meeting those limits and learning how to push myself through them. I am not saying that going out and climbing Mt. Everest is a good idea. I actually think that is a useless endeavor, but I do understand why they want to do it. Some people have limits and others know those limits and try to get past them. A friend of mine (actually he married into our family) is one of the Special Forces, Army ranger types. You know what I mean, the go-getter A-type personality who meets all obstacles head on and busts on through them. He told me a long time ago after graduating from Ranger school some very good advice. He said that Ranger school was not about learning how to be ten foot tall and bullet-proof. It was learning how to recognize where your limits are and then how to work through, or around them when the need arises.

Nature study and awareness skills can be done the same way. You don’t have to run a zip line, crawl through caves, or other like-minded fun to be pushed. It may be a challenge for you to know your birds. Don’t blow it off and say, “There are just too many, I can never learn them all.” Rather recognize that is a limit that you want to overcome, and work through or around it. You like the outdoors, and want to see some interesting sights, but can’t make yourself get a backpack and put 15-20 miles under your boots on a hike, then don’t. Recognize that as a goal and go out and walk a mile or two instead. Your may meet your goal of learning more about nature and the more natural things around you.

Yes, boys will be boys, and girls will be girls. We all need to meet our obstacles and go through them and if you cannot do that, then go around it instead. With that said, I hope to see you on or off the trail somewhere soon.

My love affair with trees

2010-01-27T08:33:00.000-08:00

Hey don’t tell my wife, but I am having a love affair. I am having a love affair with trees, really I am. No not in the sense that you are thinking, but I really do love trees. Again, not in a tree hugging sense that is prevalent for many political conservationists. What I really mean is that I like trees, a lot.

This enjoyment of trees for me started at an early age while I was on a particular squirrel hunt in the Daniel Boone National Forest, Pioneer Weapons area. I was around 12 or 13 as best I remember and had invited a friend to come. I won’t mention his name because this small story is a bit embarrassing for guys like he and I, I also think he reads our articles from time to time. I was told by my dad to go out a particular trail and sit down by “the huge white oak tree”. He said we could not miss it, because it was exceptionally large, and then gave very good details about where to find it. As my friend and I started on our little trek, we saw one of the finest whitetail deer bucks I have ever seen. I can still picture him now, some 25 years or so later. With that aside, we trekked on towards our white oak, not realizing that neither of us had the faintest idea what a white oak tree looked like.

My dad told us it was no more than a few hundred yards down the trail. After walking for what seemed like forever and not seeing this special tree, we determined that we had walked too far and in our minds were lost. Although in reality, we had never left the trail and were less than a mile from our drop off point. Nevertheless, in our minds we were lost and we started yelling and walking back towards our starting point. At some point we ran in to my dad, who had stopped along the way and was fortunate enough to bag a couple of squirrels. Lesson learned I suppose. On our way back my Dad stopped to point out the big white oak and how to identify it compared to the other trees. So began my love affair with tree. I would like to mention a couple of prominent species that are easily identified in our area.

Up until that point I thought trees were pretty much all alike. You know what I mean, kind of woody at the bottom, kind of leafy at the top. So I started a serious study of trees, and like a lot of outdoorsman, tried to develop a keen awareness of those that provided certain benefits. For example, there are red oaks and then there are white oaks, and then many, many subspecies of each . Animals, including humans, typically find that acorns from white oak species are more palatable. Both still tend to be bitter to taste at anytime, but by running them through 2-3 good rolling boils of water, you may find them easier to eat. Native Americans would dry and crush them into flour used for cakes, resembling flat cornbread of today. I have done this and found it to be A LOT of work, for a little food. This is one more reason to respect those that lived off the land for centuries before us.

You can use pine needles to make a good tea in the outdoors, you basically put the needles into water that has already been boiled and then let them steep. I particularly enjoy white pine needles over Virginia pine needle. Both have the benefit of providing lots of vitamin C, and beta-carotene.

No good article on trees in our area would be complete without at least mentioning the best of the best, the American chestnut. This species virtually covered our “neck of the woods” here in the Appalachians for centuries, before it died out. There were two distinct killers, the chestnut blight and the onslaught of settlement both here and in faraway places. These huge trees had fruit (nuts) on them that were much more than just palatable, considered a sweet-tasting for many. No preparation needed, just pick them off the ground and enjoy! Unfortunately, you can no longer find them in widespread growth anywhere. There are isolated trees through ought the Appalachians and even into the Northeastern US.

As I write this, I realize I could write another whole article just on the American chestnut, so you must wait until it appears to read more about how this beautiful species affected our economics, our diet, and the ecology of our surroundings.

Until then, pick up a copy of Illustrated Book of Trees by Wallace Grimm, it has been my go-to source for tree study for years now. Regarding the chestnut, I highly recommend the American Chestnut: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree by Susan Freinkel.

Also please don’t tell Derek Powe that I told the story of us getting lost on a squirrel hunt when we were kids.

Peanut Butter and Strawberries

2009-11-02T09:18:00.000-08:00

So I was making myself some breakfast the other day. I try to hit all the food groups when I eat, so on this particular morning, I was making myself a peanut butter and strawberry jam sandwich. This strawberry jam is particularly awesome because it was homemade by my lovely wife with strawberries we picked on a local farm.

As I was putting the super-duper jam on, a big blob of unmixed stawberry part came out and made its way to my sandwich. I was thinking to myself that if I left it that way one bite of my sandwich would be particularly sweet. The thought of this and when I might actually get that bite kind of hit me as being sort of random. My particular inclinination at that point was that this surprise bite would be rather negative, then it hit me that it would actually be kind of nice! THEN it hit me again that this mindset is what keeps people from wanting to get involved with and actually dig deep into nature study.

I know what you are thinking, "Did he actually equate nature study with a peanut butter and jam sandwich?". The answer is yes, so let me try to explain.

As I share some of these topics, particularly edible and medicinal plants with others. Everyone seems to want to categorize everything and put it into nice little neat boxes, categories, sub-categories, etc. Yes there are methods for doing so, and on more intellectual, scientific, and or deeper level one would have to do exactly that, to maintain some type of order to his/her study. But I believe that we each have to accept that there is alot of "randomness" in nature and simply be OK with it. For example, one of the things I have done through the Kamana program of Wilderness Awareness School is to have a "secret spot", or sometimes called a "sit spot". At this spot you simply sit and observe, every day. What often appears as random, will sometimes become a regular occurrence. What one might thinks is regular, will often times become random. It is rather enlightening to say the least. That raccoon that I saw one day in the morning, wasn't just happenstance, he was actually on his morning routine back to his home. I only knew this because of regularly sitting and observing.

If you start observing nature in both a large sense to try and take in the whole picture, and also at the same time focus on individual parts, you will begin to see this. Several years ago, I owned a farm that I cooperatively worked with both the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Department of Natural Resources, Division of Foresty. I learned so much working with those guys, one small thing I was shown by the forester was how different tree species will congregate in drainages, and other places where water is likely to be. Yes, I know how the sycamore likes water (almost all of have notices that), but he was showing me how different sub-species of oaks like water, vs. how other sub-species of oaks like the ridge tops.

To the untrained eye (mine in this case) I saw that as randomness. To his trained eye, he saw order. The wildlife biologist that I was working with had spent basically his entire Master's Degree study and thesis on turkey vultures, (please don't call them buzzards :)). What appeared to me as random birds eating road kill, became an orderly species, highly valuable species to the overall ecology of any place.

Again, randomness is OK. Order is OK. Most of us are not OK with random, because so much of our lives are in order for us (think fast food). So I write this to encourage our readers who overwhelmed with random.....be OK with it. Time, patience, and study of random, may very well lead to a more orderly study of nature.

Priority 2 of the Law of Three: Water

2009-10-13T17:25:00.000-07:00

As a means of review for those that have been following our articles, or for those that are new here today, I want to review very briefly the Law of Three, which states; in any given survival situation you only have three hours to live without body heat, three days to live without water, and three weeks to live without food. In our last column we discussed the needs and how-to of maintaining body heat. In this column we will take a look at obtaining water, more importantly clean water. I suppose that it goes without saying that just bending down and taking a drink from your favorite wilderness spot is luxury that we no longer have access to. Virtually all water has the possibility of being contaminated in many, many different ways. A friend of ours, who works for the Kentucky Division of Water, simply put it this way, you don’t want to know what all is in our water. This is so sad, but true.
One of the easiest and most efficient methods of obtaining clean water is to carry iodine tablets or drops with you when you go onto your next hike. To do this you need to have a water container of some sort, or find one in the woods. Again, keep in mind this is all in reference to a survival situation, not just your average hike in the woods. Fill the water container, and put in 5-10 drops of iodine tablets per every 32 ounces of water. You must also remember, and this one is easily forgotten, to put iodine around the rim of the bottle itself to cleanse it as well. Shake the container well, so that the iodine is dispersed evenly throughout the water, and then let is sit for at least 30 minutes. The water will definitely have an iodine after-taste to it, but it will still provide clean water for you.
Another option for you when you know you are taking your next trek is to have a water purifier pump. These little gadgets are worth their weight in good water! Each manufacturer is different but basically you have in intake hose, an output hose and a small hand pump that brings the water into the filter and puts it out into what ever container you have. Again, keep in mind that when using these pumps that you NEVER let the output hose into an unclean water source, or it will possibly contaminate the water as it goes into your container.
The other obvious option that goes along with cleaning water, but like these last two, requires you to have supplies on hand when you go into the woods, it to bring water to a boil as your method of cleansing. Most outdoors folk suggest bringing the water to a rolling boil for approximately one minute. If the water is cloudy or has a lot of other grey matter in it, you can further filter it with a bandana or t-shirt.
Those are methods when you find yourself lost in a survival situation and you went in prepared. But what do you do if you find yourself lost unprepared or maybe stranded in your own home, without water? Those are the questions I will address now.
One of the best things to keep mind is that dirty water, is better than no water at all. Once again, keep in mind in a general sense, that without water for 3 days you simply cannot survive at all. So if you find yourself out, or stranded in some way for 3 days, without water, you will start noticing obvious physical signs of dehydration. Some of the signs of dehydration are dry mouth, stop, muscle cramps, nausea and vomiting, heart palpitations, and lightheadedness. Your proper decision making capability will also markedly decrease which could easily because you to leave a shelter, erratically go through the woods, or many other things that could come from diminished thinking capabilities.
Some of the best sources for water in nature are rain and dew. You can gather them both easily from grass, or leaves, by wiping the foliage with a shirt or bandana and squeeze the water into your mouth to get the water you desperately need. There are also certain vines, such as the wild grape, that when cut will provide upwards of a gallon of water a day. Be cautious though, you must have your edible and medicinal plants skills going strong, because Canadian moonseed vine and wild grape look virtually identical. Wild grapes, which are awesome when you find them, and Canadian moonseed being poisonous! Misidentification could mean life or death in a survival situation.
As for in your home, in a disaster situation where you may be unable to leave, always have water on hand in some form of storage for you use. Water bottles or gallons of water, unopened are too easy to store and there for emergency use in whatever situation may arise. You also have a few gallons residing in your toilet tank as well. That is clean water, and again I mean the tank, not the bowl itself, no matter what your pet Fido thinks about it. Also in a severe emergency, you have many gallons of water resting in both your hot water tank, and in the pipes themselves, that you can easily get to.
So those are the basic methods for beginners, there are other methods such as solar still, hillbilly filter (my words) made from plant material and rocks, using animal skins. If you desire to discover those you can do your own research, or contact us, we would be happy to help you find your way into the woods!

Owl Eyes

2009-10-13T10:59:00.001-07:00

So I am going through this Naturalist training program that is put out by Wilderness Awareness School. I chose to use our week of vacation (camping) as the final week of study. My thought was that I would have access to new and varied surroundings in a much larger sense than I was accustomed to. That I did, it turned out to be a fabulous time of relaxation and study.

The thing that kind of "got me" was that the whole week was spent on awareness training. Awareness of your surroundings such as direction, wind, water, etc. Jon Young who developed the program provided the wonderful idea of a "trigger" that would bring you back to thinking of things whenever that "trigger" went off. Richard Cleveland told us the same thing in another way. He told us that throughout the day, to just stop and ask yourself "What am I missing?". Wonderful and sage advice from both men, both of whom were students and/or assistants to Tom Brown Jr. of the Tracker School.

As I was saying, the thing that got me through this awareness training was to have "owl eyes", I believe Richard would call this wide angle vision, in martial arts I might call this soft eyes. The premise is the same; to not concentrate on any one thing and to take in the whole picture, even into your periphery. Well, I did this all week. Even going so far in one exercise where it was suggested we find a perch and look down on activity, something like getting into a chair. Me being the geek that I am, I climbed a beech tree and found a good resting spot, and then "became the owl" as best I could. I saw alot, alot of things that I know I would have missed otherwise.

The whole week was spent like this, trying to have these "owl eyes". On our final day, as we were preparing our stuff to come home, a deluge of rain appeared. I was packing the camper, truck etc. in the rain, which is always a bit of a downer. A downer because not only are we leaving the woods and heading home, but heck it was in the rain. I took a break from packing and went out into the woods and had a good sit in the rain, to go over in my mind the things that I had learned, and putting through my mind how those things could make me a better person, back in the real world. How could I be a better father, son, teacher, naturalist, child of God, etc. etc. This is a typical response of mine when I have spent alot of time in quiet solitude. As I was doing this, I was meditating, in some way praying to God to help me do these things....to take these "learnings" to help others in some way. As I was doing so, and practicing my "owl eyes" I noticed soft, small movement just in front of me. As I left my "owl eyes" and had a bit more concentration, I found what you see in the picture looking back at me.

I would say that was a good finish to the week.....

Law of Three

2009-09-17T04:11:00.001-07:00

Last year, the news was filled with story after story, of someone being stranded in the outdoors in an inhospitable climate trying to survive.

Whether it was started because their car broke down, they took a wrong turn on a hiking trip, or time and distance got away while they were tracking an animal, getting lost just happened to them. It can also just as easily happen to you.

Many in the military special operations community and those that study survival methodology know that the “Law of Three” is one of the easiest things to help them prioritize their responsibilities when they have determined they are lost.

The Law of Three, simply stated, is that each of us cannot continue to live three hours without body heat, three days without water, or three weeks without food. Those are generalizations of time, for the purpose of easy memorization and recall. By looking at this Law of Three it easy to determine that in a situation where you are lost your top priority is to conserve body heat. In this column we will only be taking a look at the first of these three.

In a situation where you find yourself lost, one of the worst things you can do is panic. When you panic, you will start to move too fast, make irrational decisions, and therefore start to sweat. Sweating is our way of cooling the body down. This is counter to remaining with the Law of Three which states that we must conserve body heat first and foremost, without it we will succumb to hypothermia.

Secondly, if the weather is cold, you need to find or build a structure that will help you conserve body heat through the night. This can be as simple as taking extra clothing out of your pack, particularly a head covering, or building a survival structure. Survival structures will be covered in detail in another column, but you can simply build what some have termed a “squirrel’s nest” which is just a pile of leaves you crawl into, or debris hut which is much like a one-man tent made out of sticks and leaves, or lean-to structure. Also if you can find a rock overhang or fallen tree to crawl under and pack leaves or pine branches around, they both will serve as a great wind break for you and get you out of the elements.

Next priority to help conserve heat is to build a fire. If you happen to have a lighter, or matches (I always keep some of each in my day pack and car), you can build a fire. If you don’t have these with you, you can make a fire from hand, bow or mouth drill. These are skills that you need to study before you need them. They are difficult at best, under nice conditions, under duress, they become even more difficult.

The last thing you need to remember if you find yourself lost is to, stay in one place. Search and rescue teams typically lay out a grid on topography maps of your last known location. They then proceed to move out and search particular grids. Once a grid has been searched, they will mark it off as being searched. If you move around you may by accident go into a grid that has already been searched. If so, search teams may not find you until days later.

The last thing I would like to share about going in the outdoors is to have a plan of where you are going and when you should return. Tell someone not in your hiking or hunting party, what time they should alert authorities if you do not return. In these situations, time is of the essence. An early report to authorities and the use of these basic skills to conserve body heat, will help you be found before it is too late.

I hope to see you outside!

Edibles and Medicinals in the Wild

2009-09-17T04:10:00.001-07:00

You have heard (or simply remember) the story of your grandmother who said you could eat “poke salat” and it was OK, actually it was good for you. The truth is she is correct, sort of.

There is a bounty of edible and medicinal plants that surround us. They could prove to be very useful to our health and happiness, but you need to proceed with caution. Virtually all naturalists that utilize these plants regularly recommend a basic methodology for identifying and utilizing these plants. This involves two steps.

Step one is to utilize, at minimum, three sources when identifying these plants. There are two specific ones that I often recommend to people when they are getting started and those are, Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal by Steve Brill and Evelyn Dean and, Edible Wild Plants, Eastern/Central North America, by Lee Allen Peterson. Brill and Dean’s book has line drawings and is heavily researched with their own “hands on” approach. Mr. Brill has an exceptional ability to relate interesting tid bits into detailed information about both edibles and medicinals. He relates folklore, Native American customs, as well as his own experience finding many of these plants in New York City.

For those that are familiar with the Peterson series of guides, you know they great resources for a host of outdoor topics ranging from identification of amphibians, bugs, and mammals to trees and wild edibles. It is heavily researched and has wonderfully detailed drawings, and exceptional photography. It is also very compact and easy to throw in you day pack on your next hike.

As for a third source, just pick one. There are literally dozens out there. Simply browse one at the various online booksellers or visit a good bookstore and pick one that seems to fit what you are looking for.

Step two in this process is to get outside. This is one of those topics, that you can do a lot of reading on and studying pictures on the internet The only way to really grasp it, is to get outside and match pictures in books, printouts, or your digital handheld to actual living plants. My family’s methodology for learning was to read about one plant, its possible habitats, they way it looks and then go find as much of it as we could. I had an instructor at an outdoor survival school have each of his students choose a plant species after his lectures, and then go find a paper bag full of it. Then all of the students put together our species and made a great stir fry and salads with our species. After picking lambs quarters all afternoon, I can now see it on the side of the road as I drive at 55 mph!

The last step in the process is to actually utilize by ingestion or topical application of the various plants. There is another methodology to testing various plants that may come into question, either because your resources are vague, or unavailable. We will cover that in another column. Until then, I hope to see you outside!

Survival Methodology

2009-09-17T04:09:00.000-07:00

That’s right, survival! What is survival anyway? Thanks to Bear Gryls and the ever popular Survivorman, survival strategy and methodology has become a household topic.

Survival means to take the steps necessary to simply stay alive, typically in hard or otherwise inopportune circumstances. To many that means being able to conquer what nature throws at us such as, hard climatic conditions, being lost, or loss of a backpack. To others that means, making sure everyone stays safe and warm during a prolonged power outage. Perhaps taking a step in a different direction survival, to a certain age group, is learning how to cope with out texting for a few hours!

I would submit to you that all of these mindsets are true survival. Survival mindset is exactly that, a mindset. I have studied with experts and on my own for years in the art of survival methodology. Last year I took a class in survival in the beautiful Smoky Mountains, from an instructor who is known virtually worldwide as a “survival expert”. There is no denying that he is exactly that, an expert. He taught our group many things, from edible and medicinal plants to navigating without a compass or GPS, to building our own debris hut or survival shelter. What I discovered throughout the class was that the things he was teaching as survival were merely things I had been doing most of my life for fun!

What most people would call “survival” most of our grandparents and theirs before them, would simply call natural living. For you see, survival, is not learning how to conquer or defeat much of anything, it is rather learning how to work with the circumstances that a given situation puts you in. Now don’t get me wrong, there are times where someone may be lost and without quick access to shelter, water, and food. That may be a situation where a survival mindset is of the upmost importance. For example what is most important, food, water, discovering where you are, rest? There is definitely a priority list of things to go through in your mind when you find yourself in this sort of situation (which we will cover in our next column).

These are all skills that are now lost to us thanks to big box stores and easy access to food and the fact that water simply comes to us by turning a faucet. Please don’t misunderstand me; I enjoy these things as well. But, these are places and ways of convenience that we all take for granted I believe. Generations not to far removed from our own, pumped or gathered their own water from a well, or creek. Slaughtered and processed their own domestic animals, or had wild game opportunities around them as well. Taking it a step further, many generations before our own, Native Americans were a part of their environment, not conquering it. They thought of rivers as “the long human”, because these waterways were alive and vibrant to them and worked with them to keep them alive. Conversely they would never do anything to harm their sources of water. Even in my lifetime, I am now 40, our closest river has gone from a waterway that I played in as a boy, to one we would not dare drink from without lots of purification and cleansing.

The ability to work with the circumstances is above all most important. If you think to yourself, “Oh no, I am in big trouble”, then you are exactly that, in big trouble. If, on the other hand, you think something along the lines, of “I can do this” or “We will be just fine”, it goes a long way in your chances of survival in any given situation. When I travel alone, particularly in the forests and other backwoods of Kentucky I typically take a memento of my family, in the case I am lost or otherwise hurt such that I cannot find my way out. A remembrance helps in the mindset, of why one wants to return to normal life and goes a long way in keeping one’s spirit awake and alive for the hardships that may occur.

Survival, self-reliant living, relying on nature, emergency preparedness, are all buzzwords for these ways and methods that I look forward to exploring and covering with you in the future. Just so you know I am neither a “survival nut” nor a “tree hugger”, I suppose I am a little bit of both, or maybe better said, I am neither. Whatever I am, I look forward to getting on this trail with you and finding things together.

Direction Finding

2009-04-30T14:00:00.000-07:00

Greetings to you all,

For our first blog, please take time to read this recent notification regarding our next public offering.....

I am writing to announce some good news regarding Nature Reliance School. If you were not aware the first inkling of a website is now up, just a basic homepage thus far. Also, we have determined that our slogan, motto, cool saying, etc will be Nature Reliance School, Where Practical Meets Natural. Pretty cool huh!

We will be offering our first in a series of free workshops, “Direction Finding”, this Sunday at 2:30pm in Jacobson Park in Lexington, KY. Topics to be covered will include the following:

On the practical side of things,
Topo maps and how to read them.
How to use a map and compass to find your way.
Trianglulating your position
Google Maps
GPS
Geocaching

On the natural side of things,
Using the sun as a direction finder.
Mythbusters: does moss really grow on only one side of trees?
Why knowing N-S-E-W is important? (ie how to setup a campsite etc.)

I am sure a few other topics and questions will come up, I hope we will have time to cover them. I would expect this to last about 2 hours. PLEASE LET US KNOW IF YOU PLAN TO ATTEND AND SEND US YOUR PHONE NUMBER!!!!! If the weather turns bad, we will call those who plan to attend and cancel.

Please also keep in mind our next Survival Weekend is planned for May 22,23,24. Our first night discussions will be held at Bluegrass Budokai headquarters in Winchester, KY. If you will be driving far or simply want to hang out, you are welcome to crash at our dojo. We will head out on Saturday morning to practice outdoor skills both practical and natural. A brief general outline:

Friday Night
Direction Finding, Map and Compass, GPS
If you are lost how to set up markers and what kind so that you can be found.
If you want to stay lost, how to do that too. J

Saturday
Using the markers skills, we discuss on Friday
Water purification, both natural and practical
Edibles and Medicinals, there should be enough available for us to make a decent salad for dinner.
Shelter setup, lean-to, both practical and natural (due to comfort levels and bugs, you will be welcome to bring your own tent and sleeping pad if you wish)
And always, firebuilding, both practical and natural.

Sunday
Camoflauging, both natural and practical for the purpose of hunting.
Stalking and woods walking for nature observation or hunting
We will then put these skills to use, in a “capture the flag” game, to test the skills we learn out.
Finalize with a discussion on woods ethics, stewardship and conservation.

I will be sending out a flyer with this information on it, our location is yet to be set due to state fire season requirements. We will notify you as soon as we can get some clarification, if we don’t have the ability to build fire, I have access to private lands where we will.

But again, take advantage of the free workshop this Sunday and look forward to having some of you for our weekend in May as well. Also, if you are not already join our Facebook Group called Nature Reliance School, we notify you of events there as well.

As for the future, we have penciled in as free workshops, water purification, paddling (flat and rough water), knife building, night directional finding, flint knapping, and the list goes on. If there is one topic you may be interested in, let us know, if we cannot teach it, we probably know someone who can.

Craig Caudill
Director
Nature Reliance School
PO Box 4093
Winchester, KY 40392-4093
info@naturereliance.org
859.771.8313