There are many types of shelters you can build in the wilderness and one of the easiest is probably the lean-to.  Basically it’s simply some sticks laid up against a cross member with whatever you can find to help make it water proof. In the field I’ve made small ones using my poncho and big ones using tarps.  I’ve even made them using nothing but what the forest has to offer such as wood covered with fir tree limbs angled in such a way to help shed water. If you put a fire in front of one with a heat relfector it will stay relatively warm inside.  If possible put the back of the lean-to into the wind so that if it rains it doesn’t blow right in on you.

This is a big lean-to made from a tarp. I spent a couple of nights under it.

One thing to remember about a lean-to using all natural materials is that it’s very difficult to make it completely waterproof, especially if you’re going to be setting it up as a quick overnight shelter.

Something to know about any type of wilderness shelter is that it takes a lot of work no matter how simple it looks.  That’s why it’s best to build your shelter with as much natural help as you can get.  If you have a fallen tree that looks like it will support the weight of some branches go ahead and use it.  It’s much easier than trying to set one up from scratch and that’s the idea behind the survival game.

The more calories you save doing one thing the more you’ll have for something else.  I usually think of it as, “spending calories.”  Do I want to spend 500 to 1000 calories or more setting up a shelter or would I rather spend them foraging or hunting?  Both are important, but if I can find a shelter already half made that might give me time to carve up some figure four traps that will hopefully put me ahead of the game.

Tools

The more modern your tools the easier it becomes as well.  You can build a shelter with no tools at all, but it’s a lot of work.  If you have your survival knife and a small saw your life just got a lot easier because you can now easily cut wood big enough and to size for your shelter.  Also, a poncho or large piece of plastic will go a long way towards  helping waterproof it if you happen to have these materials with you or can find them in the woods.

You’d be surprised what you can find in the deep woods.  There have been many occasions when I’ve been hunting or hiking way out in the middle of nowhere and thought to myself, “Man, I’ll bet nobody has ever set foot here before,” then came across a wine bottle or an old metal pail.  Keep an eye out for these kinds of things if you’re in the woods as they can help you immeasurably if you’re in a survival situation.

If you’re making your shelter with just what the forest has to offer you’ll find that birch bark cut in long strips and layered properly can provide pretty good shelter from the rain.  Did I mention that these kinds of shelter are a lot of work?  When you’re hiking in the back country and you decide to make a shelter from natural materials make sure you give yourself enough daylight to build it.

Practice practice practice!  If you wait until you’re in a survival situation to try and build a survival shelter of any kind you might be surprised at how much work it can be.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:  You need to practice your wilderness skills.  You can read about it all you want, but until you actually get out there with your knife and firesteel it’s all theory.  Easy to read about, but far more difficult in practice.

Have you ever built a survival shelter?  Tell me about it in the comments below.

-Jarhead Survivor

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The miracle of life, truly a fascinating time for a woman and her partner. It’s also a vulnerable, stressful time, with life altering decisions to make.  What factors should a prepper take into consideration when planning for the event?

I mentioned in a post last week that we considered birthing at home for Podling #2, but are currently planning on a hospital delivery. I want to share some of the thought processes behind the decision and touch on some of the risks inherent in both choices.  (I will mention, briefly, if you live in  or near a large enough metropolitan area, you may have a third choice, a birthing center. Those don’t exist in my neck of the woods, so I’m not as familiar with them.)

If you are unfamiliar with the legalities of birth, here’s a quick primer: Every state has different laws.  In Texas it’s legal to have a professional midwife attend your birth at home, even for multiples and breech presentations.  In Iowa homebirthing with professional midwives is not legal for any birth, but you can birth at home “unassisted” or you can go to a hospital and be seen by a Certified Nurse Midwife (CNM) or Obstetrician.  (There are midwives who attend homebirths in Iowa spite of the lack of licensing.)  Then there are states with everything in-between.

At home – Depending on your state laws and the outcome of your home birth, this choice could bring increased scrutiny by authorities.  That can range from EMT’s if something goes wrong, your OB dropping you as a patient or possibly even a visit from DHS. You may have to deal with the uneducated opinions of loved ones if you tell them of your homebirth choice. Birthing has become such a highly medicated event, that generations of women in the US no longer remember any other way. All of that should be weighed against the positives of homebirths.  Namely, complete freedom to labor and deliver exactly as the mother wants.  No Cover Your Ass procedures or restrictions. No limits to labor time. No limits to food/drink intake. No restrictions on labor or delivery positions.  No pressure for interventions like Pitocin, narcotics or surgery.

Cost is usually reduced for a homebirth.  My health insurance lists average birth costs at above $8,000.  (They don’t cover homebirths.) Most homebirth midwives charge in the $2-3,000 range, some even less, and going unassisted gets things down below $1k.  There are expenses even at home; you’ll need clean supplies for catching the various fluids, laboring devices like a birthing ball, birthing pool, etc. and general first aid/delivery supplies to deal with any tearing or pain as well as cutting the cord and suctioning the gook out of baby’s breathing passages.

You’ll need to make arrangements or plans for transfer options should an emergency or complication arise.  There are reasons women and children die in birth, things CAN go wrong.  If you are birthing at home, make sure the attendants know where/who and when to call for an EMT.

In a SHTF event, a homebirth may be your only option.  If the hospitals are full of pandemic victims or trauma patients from a large deadly event, you’ll be better off at home, so never rule it out as a possibility. Make sure you’ve done your research so you know what to expect.  I love Ina May Gaskin’s books for practical advice on natural at home birthing.  There are others out there though, find one that matches your situation. And of course have the preps on hand to handle such an event.

At a hospital - Going to a hospital increases your risk of interventions, surgery, and higher costs.  In large part due to the CYA procedures mentioned above, a short lis tof them includes:

Internal exams – Dr’s have to “track your progress” and will often insist on vaginal exams to do that. These can be painful, they can introduce foreign bacteria into the birth canal and generally throw a woman off her laboring  groove.

Limits to food and drink – Their thinking is if the woman needs a general anesthetic, (for surgery) the danger of inhaling undigested stomach contents if she vomits while anesthetized is greatly reduced.  Yea, I’ll let you figure out how often that actually happens.  But, they have to CTA so they deny ALL women anything other than ice chips.  This plays into the time limits they impose on laboring women, if you’re starving someone who’s working hard, of course their stamina will give out.

Labor “augmenting” drugs  – Dr’s (and nurses) prefer to follow timelines and schedules, no matter what is natural.  So, they have terms like “failure to progress” and “stalled labor” to justify pumping the laboring woman full of drugs.  Pitocin is the most commonly used augmenter. More and more often it seems to be used to keep women “on schedule” so the Dr can make a golf Tee-time.  There are dangers, please be informed before acquiescing to such augmentation.  I’m sure the fact that they get more money for every drug they prescribe doesn’t factor in at all.  Pitocin is also used to start labor in women who have gone over the guess-date.  Again, it’s back to the issue of wanting to schedule something that isn’t interested in the Dr’s vacation plans.  Most chemical induction methods have some pretty serious risks, risks I am not comfortable with, and would refuse. But, again, do your own homework.

Limits to labor and birthing positions – Women aren’t the only ones who have forgotten what natural birth looks like. Dr’s no longer like to crease their suits by getting down to floor level, so they prefer the woman push on her back in a bed so that the baby is nice and easy to catch. Nevermind that it works counter to gravity and often isn’t the most comfortable position to push in.

I could go on, but this post is getting long enough already.  Going to a hospital can be done though, know your preferences, and know your rights. Be prepared to say over and over again, “I refuse X procedure, write it in my chart and bring me the waiver.” Know how the cascade of interventions works and how to counter them so you lessen your risks of ending up in painful, expensive surgery.

In our case, the costs of a home birth vs the costs of a vaginal hospital birth were within a few hundred dollars of each other. ($2,800 vs $3,200) There are only a couple of homebirth midwives that moonlight in my rural area, and I didn’t click with any of them during interviews, so there was no pull to stay home to be with one of them. Our rental place is small, we have wall to wall carpeting covering every square inch, and we don’t have a couch or a tub.  So, comfort and ease of cleaning tipped me over the edge to the hospital decision.  It helped that the hospital we’re going to has an awesome CNM who we clicked with immediately and is dedicated to natural births and has a great relationship with said hospital.   I won’t have to fight every inch of the way for natural methods and respect.  I’m due late enough in the spring that I’m not worried about blizzards, and I’m strong willed enough to be close to narcotic pain relief without giving in to the temptation. So, it’s the right decision for us. It is good to know that we could birth at home if we needed to, hubby and I are both comfortable enough with the process to handle it, and we have all of the first aid supplies necessary for such an eventuality.

Would you ever consider birthing at home? Are you prepared for such an event?

- Calamity Jane

Personal political plug: If you are interested in seeing more freedoms for birthing mothers in your state, do consider joining up with your state’s midwifery association. I’ve done lots of work with our Iowa Midwives group, lobbying state legislators for state licensing of professional midwifes and increased support for homebirths as a valid and safe choice.

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The other day I was cruising around the web and stumbled on this video.  Rudy Reyes – a Recon Marine – shows us how to survive after a SHTF event.  He’s introduced as he makes his way into an abandoned city and his first obstacle is a half-raised bridge.  Undaunted he reaches into his trusty pack and pulls out a crowbar and rope.  He ties the the rope on and makes a few loops for climbing all the while telling us how valuable the crowbar is.  He then points out a good spot on the bridge and throws the crowbar aka grappling hook onto it and pulls it tight after securing a positive purchase.  He looks over his shoulder at the camera and says, “You have to have confidence in your abilities,” and then launches himself into space over the river and then climbs up to the rope to the bridge.

Seriously??

How many people out there do you know that could actually pull that maneuver off?  That scene is on the first video at around 4:00 minutes.

I’m confident in my abilities.  I rock climb and ice climb and I’m in pretty decent shape for a 48 year old guy, but there’s no way in hell I’d ever do something that stupid ESPECIALLY after a SHTF event where you’re unlikely to find a hospital or first aid station.  Which I’m pretty sure you’d need after doing something that dumb.

Now, Rudy Reyes was probably a good Marine and I have the utmost respect for his abilities and experience; however, where I take umbrage is the Hollywood folks trying to sell this stupidity to the American people.  You just know there’s some bonehead out there watching and thinking, “Oh hell yeah.  I could do that.”  And to be fair maybe there are a few people out there that could actually pull this kind of stunt off, but I guarantee they’re few and far between.

The whole video is full of crazy things like that.  Sliding down an empty elevator shaft, walking through a dark building to clear it from potential aggressors with a flashlight (can you say big fat juicy target?), jumping down into a sewer in the dark.  Why not just climb down until your feet hit the ground?  Using a parkour move to grab a ladder and other stunts like that.

The video does have some good stuff in that he runs around scavenging various things up to help him survive from places I never would have thought of, but for the most part if you try and do what he does you’ll find yourself floating down river or crumpled up at the bottom of an elevator shaft.  There’s an interesting concept in the 5th and final part of the video that shows him making home-made diesel fuel out of old cooking grease, which I’d like to try some time.  (But I wouldn’t use it in a motor that I needed that’s for sure.)

But who am I to judge?  Watch one or all of the videos and let me know what you think in the comments below.

How would you survive in a post-apocalyptic world?

-Jarhead Survivor

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