Lets say that your walking down a hiking trail, you do not see this big snake on the trail, step on it, and it bites you right on the leg. So what do you do?

Post your comments in the snake bite quiz thread of the forums.

In a wilderness survival situation, its important to know what kind of diseases and parasites you could be exposed to.

Some possible parasites and diseases include:
Protozoan
Cryptosporidiosis
Giardiasis
Typhoid
Polio
Hepatitis A

To discuss this article and video, visit this thread in the wilderness survival forum.

First things first – if you do not know what it is, do not eat it. Its that simple, eating plants found in the wilderness is a gamble. Know what the plant is before you eat it, there is no second chance.

The fruit of the various species of plant called huckleberry is generally edible. The berries are small and round, usually less than 1/4 inch in diameter, and contain 10 relatively large seeds. Berries range in color according to species from bright red, through dark purple, and into the blues.

In taste the berries range from tart to sweet, with a flavor similar to that of a blueberry, especially in blue/purple colored varieties. Huckleberries are a favorite of many mammals such as bears and humans. In the Pacific Northwest of North America, the huckleberry plant can be found in mid-alpine regions, often on the lower slopes of mountains.

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This video gives examples and a description on stagnated water. Its important to be able to tell the difference between stagnated water and water that is safe to drink. This video was filmed on a 6+ mile hiking trip trip with my son and my nephew.

We had been on the trip for about 4 hours and were walking along a pipeline. My nephew stopped and asked why the water was a funny color.

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Some wild animals and birds eat the Yaupon Holly, but the berries cause vomiting in humans. The latin name is Ilex vomitoria. Anything that has “vomit” in the name should be avoided. From the information that has been found on this plant, the berries are not poisonous – its an overload of caffine that causes the vomiting. The dried leaves can be boiled into a tea, but drink in moderation.

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Around 1993 or 1994 the time had come to get rid of the 3 and 4 man tents.  When a man is young he pays little attention to weight, because he is “tough” and can carry that load.  When a little age gets behind him, little things start becoming more clear.  One of the questions that presents itself, why should one person be strapped with carrying an oversized tent, when everyone can carry their weight and their own tent.

While on a trip to Academy Sports and outdoors, there was a certain Wenzel Starlite one man tent on the shelf.  After further inspection the decision was made to buy the tent and give it a test run.

Fast forward 14 or 15 years.

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In March of 2008 two of my 2 children, aged 11 and 13 each received a coleman tasman X32 mummy sleeping bag as a gift. The sleeping bag was suppose to help prepare them for an upcoming cool weather camping trip. The point of the trip was to expose the kids to cool weather, but not really cold “below freezing” weather. The over night temps were supposed to get into the upper 30s. And since we had sleeping bags with a comfort rating of 32 degrees and liner, I thought we would be well prepared.

On the morning of March 9th, my daughter Kristian who was 11 at the time, and my son Korey who was 13 at the time headed out to a region of Piney woods in east Texas. “Piney woods” is a term used to describe an area with a lot of pine trees. After parking my Toyota 4-wheel drive truck at the end of an old logging road the kids and I hiked for about 20 – 30 minutes to a small stream. The camping spot had been picked months ahead of time due to its location close to moving water.

The stream was not too wide or deep, at the most it was about 2 feet across and about 4 inches deep. The stream was to be used as a source of water for cooking or drinking, just in case we used all of the water in our bottles.

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The original design for the Katadyn hiker belonged to PUR.  The PŪR brand was created by Recovery Engineering, Inc. which was sold to Procter & Gamble (P&G) in 1999 for approximately $213 million.

The PŪR outdoor products line was sold to Katadyn USA in 2004. P&G maintained the household products and continues to manufacture and sell them. PUR was one of the premier makers of outdoor water filters until their outdoor line was sold in 2004.

One thing that made PUR filters stand out was that some of them came with Iodine made into the filter.  As the water was moved through the filter, Iodine would break away from the filter and mix with the water.  This would kill any viruses or bacteria that were able to pass through the filter.  The filters ability to kill any bacteria or viruses made it into a purifier.  As anyone with any real outdoor experience knows, a purifier is better then a filter.  The draw back to this design, the water had an Iodine taste to it.  Using a charcoal filter may have helped remove the Iodine taste from the water.

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