No matter what the situation, a fella’s gotta eat! And you can only survive on berries and spam for so long before you go crazy. If you trap or hunt an animal, you need to know how to gut it down to it’s edible goodies. Squirrels are one of the more prevalent varmints in North America and are easy to set traps for. Creek Stewart explains step-by-step how to field strip a squirrel in a surprisingly bloodless and efficient way.
How to Field Dress a Squirrel [via The Art of Manliness Blog]
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Cooking over an open camp fire isn’t exactly the most predictable way to cook. It’s easy to char the outside of a meal, while leaving the inside raw or under cooked. Cooking in a pan is even more unpredictable, plus you constantly have to monitor your meal to ensure it doesn’t burn. However, boiling water over a campfire turns out the same result every time – boiled water. If you have a thermos, you can add boiling water to your ingredients, let them simmer for a while and when you come back, you’ve got a properly cooked (read unburned) meal waiting for you.
http://www.thermoscooking.com/
Having the right tools is important to survival. Having a bow could be the difference between “making it” and starving to death. You may not be able to get your hands on a fancy compound bow, but Instructables user dejapong shows us how to build a makeshift bow for less than $20 worth of materials from a hardware store.
Make a Bow for Under Twenty Bucks [via Instructables]
Growing up, we had a yew bush in our front yard and my parents had to almost constantly tell me not to eat the berries from this bush. They looked so vibrant and delicious-looking that I couldn’t help but be tempted. It turns out that had I given in to this temptation I would have been perfectly fine as the berries themselves aren’t poisonous, but the entire rest of the plant is (It’s reputed that some bowyers have died from handling too much yew wood while making bows). There are many plants in nature that rely on their toxicity to survive. Unfortunately, we humans are incapable of detecting this poison where the natural world has ways of telling. So we have to rely on our wits to help us avoid these plants.
An easy (but tedious) way of determining a plants toxicity is to look for signs of other animals eating parts of it or observing the plant to see if any animals eat it. Some animals aren’t affected by poisons that affect humans so this doesn’t necessarily mean that it isn’t poisonous, it just makes it less likely to be poisonous.
If you encounter a plant that you think may be safe to eat, you should conduct the Universal Edibility Test on it to ensure that it is, in fact, safe to eat. The UET minimizes your chances of being injured or dying from contacting a poisonous plant. It is a long and tedious process, but it could very well save your life. You must have an empty stomach at the start of the test so you need to fast for at least 8 hours before you start.
At this point the plant part can be considered safe to eat, just don’t gorge on it.
Memorizing all the plants in an area can be tedious, and will do you no good if you are surviving in a different area, but that doesn’t mean that you’re totally screwed. There are some surefire ways to determine if a plant is poisonous or not:
There is a saying about berries that holds true:
White and yellow, kill a fellow.
Purple and blue, good for you.
Red… could be good, could be dead.
Additionally, a good way to determine if a red berry is poisonous is to look at how they’re grouped on the branch. If berries are grouped in bunches, then avoid them. If the berries grow individual off the branch, then they are probably good.
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Clearly, if websites were people, The Armageddon Blog would be good pals with Lifehacker. Or at least, follow Lifehacker around all the time talking about how great of friends they are while Lifehacker tries to ignore the creepy guy following him around. Yet again, there’s another article on Lifehacker that is relevant to the interests of this website. If I’ve drilled one fact over any other on the site, it’s that food is probably the most important thing to your survival. You’ll be able to scavenge food from houses and stores sometimes, but more frequently as time goes on, you’ll need to rely on nature for sustenance. Mushrooms are one of the more prevalent foods you’ll find in a forest, but they can be potentially dangerous (more so than any other plant you’ll come across). So how do you know which ones are safe? Alan Henry let’s us know a few guidelines for determining this:
If you spend any time outdoors, you’ve probably seen mushrooms growing under trees or in your yard, but if you’re out camping or just enjoy foraging, here are some ways to tell if the mushroom you’re looking at is edible.
[How Do I Tell If a Mushroom Is Safe to Eat?] via Lifehacker
There’s no avoiding it: Ketchup is a staple of the American diet. We drench our fries in it, put it on our burgers, some of us even dress our scrambled eggs in it. Ketchup gives us a way to add flavor to what might otherwise be considered a bland meal. Ketchup is a preserved product, meaning it will last longer than the tomatoes it is made from. Knowing how to make ketchup can be a useful skill when you start to resettle after the Armageddon event.
The original tomato ketchup was a derivitive of a fish sauce discovered in Malaysia during the 18th century. By the 19th century the tomato version had been created and consisted of tomatoes, salt, mace, nutmeg, allspice, clove, cinnamon, ginger, and pepper. As the recipe evolved, vinegar replaced salt as the preserving agent, making it sweeter. During World War II, GIs stationed in Southwest Asia saw a shortage of tomatoes and ketchup, so they invented a ketchup based on what they had available: bananas. Banana ketchup became so wildly popular in the area that it was commercialized and is still sold and used today. It is essentially the same as tomato ketchup just a bit sweeter.
The first thing you need to do is remove the skins. The best way to do this is shock the tomatoes. Boil them for about a minute and then put them in extremely cold water. This will cause the skins to seperate from the meat of the tomato and will allow you to remove the skins fairly easily. After removing the skins, cut the tomatoes open and scoop out the seeds and water jelly.
Simmer the tomatoes until they are mushy enough to be pushed through a sieve (usually about 30 minutes). Surprise, surprise – the next step is to run your tomatoes through a sieve. Add your spices to the tomato puree and cook between 200 °F and 325 °F for about 12 hours.
You will end up with about 60 ounces of ketchup for every 100 tomatoes you use. Remember to store it in sealable containers to prevent contamination and enjoy a little luxury in an otherwise bleak existence.
It’s a sad fact, but there are very few places in the world that you can’t find human garbage of some form or another. The silver lining to this dark cloud is that you can make use of this garbage in a post apocalyptic world. Over at Instructables, there’s an post on how to turn a can tab into a fish hook. It’s a simple procedure that only requires tools commonly found on a multi-tool.
[Turn a Can Tab into a Survival Fish Hook] via Instructables
At this point, it should be obvious that it is a universal truth that food will be incredibly scarce (unless you’re incredibly lucky or well prepared). You have to accept that you will inevitably have to gather or hunt any food you eat. The easiest way to hunt animals is to set traps for them because you simply build the trap and then occasionally check it for prey.
Traps and snares are designed to crush, choke, hang, or otherwise entangle the prey, commonly incorporating several of these principles together to better ensnare prey. In general, the simpler the trap the better. The more complex a trap is, the more points of failure you have to contend with and the less it fails, the more often you eat. So leave the Rube Goldberg machines in your pack.
There is no “catch all” trap that works for all species, you need to establish what type of prey is in the area and focus on one. There may not even be prey in your area. Look for the following in the area you’re in:
These clues will let you know if there is prey in the area, and what species are around. You will want to place your traps where you know animals will pass through.
The most important part of any snare or trap is to make it blend in with its surroundings. This will keep from alert your prey that something may be wrong. If you are evading pursuit or capture (from cannibals or zombies or a roving motorcycle gang of runaway midget circus clowns), camouflage can hide your presence in the area.
It is best to construct your traps away from the spot you want to place them. If you construct them in place, you will likely break nearby vegetation, make tracks in the dirt, and leave your scent all over everything nearby. All of this will cause the prey to be alert at the very least, and to completely avoid the area at worst. If you have to dig a hole for your trap, make sure to remove all fresh, loose dirt as this will further alert your prey of your presence.
Green wood and other live vegetation will ooze sap which produces a smell that will raise the hackles of any potential prey, warning them away from your trap. On top of that, that same sap will eventually dry and can potentially gum up the workings of your trap, allowing prey to pass through it unharmed.
Scent is a big factor in trap making. If anything smells wrong, your prey will become wary of the situation and potentially avoid your trap and let’s face it: you smell wrong. It is imperative that you mask your scent near the trap. You can try to remove it, but it’s a difficult process and, to be honest, not worthwhile. There are a number of ways you can mask your scent. You can use animal urine to mask your scent, but this is tricky because you need to use urine from an animal that isn’t a predator of the animal you are trying to trap, nor can it be from an animal not indigenous to the area. Unfamiliar smells will cause animals to be cautious.
Fires are a common occurance in nature and the animal kingdom treats them with a bit of non-chalance. Animals will only become anxious about fire if there is actual flame present, so using smoke in the trap area is a good way to mask your scent. You could go so far as to char your trap in order to lock in that smoke smell, just make sure your trap will still work after you set it.
Mud is also a good way to mask your scent. Swamp mud is the best because the scent of rotting vegetation lingers on the mud and let me tell you, that is a STRONG smell. Just cake your trap in mud. Again, make sure your trap will still work afterward placing the mud.
A trap by itself can be effective, but not a gaurantee. If you place a trap on a trail, an animal could decide to simply walk around the trap, leaving your stomach empty. What you want to do is set up some sort of way to guide your prey into your trap; make it more difficult to avoid the trap. This technique is called channeling. This can be as simple as putting your trap on the far end of a shrub that’s in middle of the trail, or as complex as constructing a funnel-shaped barrier between two trees. Most animals will opt to push forward on their chosen path than try to backtrack, so they’ll walk right into your trap unless they’re certain that it’s bad for them.
Baiting a trap is kind of like camouflaging your trap, but instead of hiding bad smells, you’re introducing enticing smells. You are trying to lure the prey into the trap with the appeal of food. This will greatly improve your chances of success if you can spare the resources. If you are trying to trap fish, you need to bait the trap or you will more than likely not catch anything. Try to bait the trap with something from the animals normal diet, don’t use something not indigenous to the area. Also don’t use anything in abundance (baiting with corn in a cornfield won’t get you anywhere). A lot of animals are big fans of salt, so you can bait your trap with some salt. Have you ever given peanut butter to a dog before? They go crazy for it! For some reason, animals love peanut butter so it makes a great bait. Make sure to leave bits of your bait outside the trap so that the animal will get a better smell and possibly a taste of the bait. If its something good, they’ll be more likely to fall into your trap.
As the name implies, a simple snare is the most simple of snares. It is simply a noose placed over a high traffic path for the animal. Once the animal puts its head in the noose, the noose will tighten as it continues to move. The more the animal struggles, the tighter the noose will get. This trap will typically only restrain the animal, not kill it so you need to check these traps more often to minimize the suffering of your prey. If your noose is made of rope, it is possible for the noose to loosen so it is recommended to use wire instead, as wire will retain its constricted size.
A twitch-up snare is a step up in complexity (as well as effectiveness) fromk the simple snare. Essentially, the prey gets its head caught in the noose (as with the simple snare) but then the animal is snapped off the ground, more than likely snapping its neck, killing it quickly. The easiest way to get this motion to occur is to bend over a sapling and attach it to some sort of trigger mechanism. I personally like to use a notched triggerbar set up. This consists of a stake in the ground with a notch in it and a piece of wood (the triggerbar) that fits snugly into that notch. Tie the trigger bar to the bent sapling and then tie the triggerbar to your noose. When the animal is caught by the noose, it will pull the triggerbar away from the stake, which will cause the sapling to snap upright, which tightens the noose around the animals neck, pulling it into the air and snapping its neck.
The squirrel pole is probably the most effective way to catch squirrels. It relies on the naturally agility and curiosity of squirrels. Place a series of nooses on a long pole leaned against a tree, so that any squirrels that climb the pole will have to walk through the nooses. Place them close enough together that a squirrel cannot fit between. If the squirrel is able to stand comfortably on the pole, they will chew on/through your noose, just for the sake of chewing it. Squirrels will cautious of your trap initially, but eventually will have to investigate. They’ll climb the pole, get caught in the noose, and then fall off the pole, snapping their neck or strangling themselves. This trap is nice because you can catch multiple squirrels with one setup.
These are just a basic few types of traps that you can build. There are a great number of different traps for any number of different types of animals to trap.
You’ve survived the initial disaster, scraped by on what bits of food you could find, and you’ve scavenged a healthy inventory of canned goods. What’s for dinner? Franks and beans again? After a while, you’re going to get bored with eating the same stuff day in and day out (a luxurious problem to have in this scenario, but a problem nonetheless). You can do some things to spice up your meals so they aren’t the same drab thing all the time.
In this day and age you can get nearly anything canned and if its in a store now, it’ll be there after the Apocalypse. From canned fruits and vegetables, to the more exotic canned meats. There’s even a company that sells canned bacon (shelf life ten years!). The point is that you can find all sorts of items in canned form and you can then mix and match these to make a more palatable meal than just eating a hunk of spam until you’re full.
At the very basic level, you can make a proper meal by just pulling out some canned meat and a vegetable for a side. You can go a little further and mix some things together. Got a can of stewed tomatoes, corn, black olives, and jalapeno peppers? Mix them up for some salsa (chips not included). Want to go all out? Add some none-canned goods into the mix. Remember the recipe for Bannock? Use that dough to make a shell and put a stew inside, cook it and you’ve got yourself a pot pie.
The key is to add a little something to your meal to make it different enough that it’s no longer a bland meal. Even just adding a shake of some seasoned salt or some other spice to a can of food can make it so much better. From personal experience, I added a few shakes of generic seasoned salt to a can of corn one time and I’ll never eat corn without it again. You can find all sorts of canned food recipes on the internet, unfortunately most of them have 15 ingredients, only one or two of which are actual canned food and the rest would be highly difficult to find post-Apocalypse.
