We do a lot of sourdough baking in the reflector oven when on remote trips.  It’s a great piece of low-tech, high-skill equipment that is worthless in the hands of someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing, but priceless in the hands of someone who does.  The best way to become proficient with it is to use it every day for a month or two.  You’ll soon find that you can cook anything in it that you can cook in a regular oven.  The key to using it is fire management; keeping a wall of flame equal in size to the front of the oven.  The batch of sourdough biscuits in the photo tasted as good as they look; the sourdough flavor mixed with a hint of woodsmoke.  A great addition to any meal.

We’ve had some great discussions about how the brain works in the learning process as part of our ongoing online course on becoming an instructor.  One aspect that we’ve only touched on briefly is the role of exercise in the learning process.  To simplify a complex subject into a soundbite, exercise is good for your brain and will help you learn.  But don’t take my word for it – watch and listen to Dr. John Ratey, the author of a book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain.

First, check out Dr. Rated on the Brain Science Podcast where he discusses his book and other related topics:

Brain Science Podcast #33: Exercise And The Brain

Second, watch this YouTube video where Dr. Ratey presents his ideas to the folks at Google for their Authors@Google series.

Authors@Google – Dr. John Ratey

I’ve often quipped that Jack Mountain Bushcraft’s courses have been my educational laboratory over the years.  I’ve watched the role exercise plays in learning, and while I’ve only recently delved into the brain science behind it, I’ve seen the positive impacts it has on learning.  If you teach in any capacity, you’ll be well-served to familiarize yourself with Dr. Ratey’s work.

Nutshimit is a word and concept from the Innu.  Previously known by the name given to them by the French, Montagnais, they inhabit a huge, sparsely populated region of Quebec and Labrador.

For many Innu, life in the village is marked by idleness and a sense of loss and alienation, in strong contrast to being in nutshimit, which roughly translated means “back in the country,” where life is active, rich and meaningful…

For many western societies, the shift (or dislocation) away from living in a deep relationship with nature, nestled in the rhythms of a culture adapted to a particular place has occurred gradually, gathering momentum over centuries…

In contrast, for the Innu and for many indigenous peoples, the shift from the traditional to the modern has occurred all at once, and largely without their consent…

Nutshimit is not a practice, but a place – a place where traditional Innu culture can be lived, and where the impositions of the dominant culture are less intrusive.  It is a place of healing, where families are able to reconnect, away from the pressures of village life.  And more fundamentally, it is a place rich with meaning, where the Innu language comes alive, where the stories that connect people to the places can be told in their full context, and where even dreams are part of the reality.

With so much of bushcraft and outdoor living the emphasis is on skills.  For the Innu, their traditional life is about place.  Only there can can the lifestyle, including skills, be lived.  For me, each passing year bushcraft becomes more about lifestyle and less about skills.   Put another way, the skills are the means, not the end.

Quote from chapter 16; Duct Tape And Rabbit Wire; Getting By In The Big Land by Larry Innes in the book Nature First; Outdoor Life The Friluftsliv Way, edited by Bob Henderson and Nils Vikander.

The question of how our bushcraft courses are applicable in the modern world comes up from time to time both in email and through discussions, so I wanted to formally address it today.

When examined from a sufficient distance so as to blur the specific skills, our courses teach four things: problem solving, leadership, self-reliance and confidence.  These are learned experientially, which means that they are lived all day, every day.  Unlike many formal learning programs, they aren’t abstractions discussed on a whim using hypothetical situations

In the classroom, on the field, and later in the business world, these are the building blocks of success.  More about each;

Problem Solving: Building shelters, lighting fires, and other common bushcraft tasks are problem solving exercises.  Given a few simple tools and the available natural resources, can you make yourself comfortable and build a life for yourself?  If so, you have to figure out how.  But figuring problems out is where most exercises stop.  In bushcraft, it’s less than half the battle.  The real learning comes with the execution of the plan.  This is where you learn if the solutions arrived at were any good.

Leadership: Leadership is often “taught” in courses where one is the leader for the exercise or the day.  I would argue that this is more often management than leadership.  Real leadership evolves when working toward an outcome with no direct path to get there.  It involves management, but also how to inspire and create a desire for excellence in those being led.

Self-Reliance: Self-reliance is a rare commodity in our world, and becoming rarer still.  Many people have difficulty thinking or acting without being told what to do and how to do it.  Those who can be self-reliant in their thoughts and actions, while few, are sought after.  Bushcraft is an incubator for self-reliance.  Beginning with the hands-on and tangible, it facilitates doing and thinking for yourself and results in an independence few experience these days.

Confidence: We start small on our programs, building as we progress.  The difficulty of tasks increases proportionally with skill and experience.  People who think they can do something occasionally fail.  People who know they can rarely do.  Our goal is to create people who know they can because they’ve done it before.  Developing the “I know I can” attitude can fundamentally change someone’s life.

So while we don’t teach bushcraft as a vehicle for personal growth, these are the transferable consequences of learning it.

I’ve been thinking for several years about putting together an expedition-style course for young men where we’d spend three or four weeks in the north woods canoeing and living outdoors.  It would be a similar, although less rigorous, curriculum that we use in our college semester programs, with a focus on academic subjects such as botany, zoology, meteorology, astronomy, anthropology, and communications.  The trick with these is to make them fun and interesting, which we have  a lot of experience doing.  We’d also cover more fun-sounding topics such as fishing, camping, canoeing and swimming.  It’s still a few years off, but coming soon.  My timing is guided by my 5-year old son.  When he’s old enough, we’ll be doing it.  So if you have a son around the same age and would be interested in this type of program in a few years, let us know.

During our first decade the guiding force behind our programs was to create courses we’d like to take.  As we enter our second decade, that focus has shifted slightly to include programs where our kids would learn and have fun.

There are many features that make our yearlong bushcraft immersion program unique, and to read about them you should check out the yearlong page as the purpose of this post is to list a few of the perks that go along with taking the yearlong, but aren’t a part of it.

Yearlong program graduates have an opportunity to expand their experience with our summer homesteading, sustainability and organic gardening internship.  At the end of the spring term, they’d stay on at the field school and learn all about growing food and taking care of the soil by actively doing it.

Yearlong program graduates also have an opportunity to be assistant instructors during our summer courses.  This can be combined with the homesteading internship for a busy and engaging summer of working with people, working with bushcraft and working with the land.

They can also participate in future yearlong programs as a teaching assistant, where they participate in the yearlong program again, teach what skils they’re comfortable with and continue to learn.

Another option is to join us for one or more of our guided trips as assistant guides.

Lastly, they get a lifetime discount on our courses and adventure travel trips that aren’t associated with the yearlong program.

When someone chooses to take a semester or yearlong immersion program, they’re not just taking a course; they’re joining a community of likeminded people.  We take our commitment to helping them learn and achieve their goals seriously by providing continuing learning opportunities such as these.

I love to explore new places.  I’ve covered a lot of northern Maine in my canoe over the last decade, and I’ve still only scratched the surface.  Sometimes I find those special spots where no one goes, the fishing is good and there’s a beautiful place to camp.  Other times I’m hauling over beaver dams and strainers, the bugs are fierce, and I arrive at an unknown spot to find that there’s no dry ground on which to sleep.  Without the pain, though, the pleasure wouldn’t be as memorable.

We’re taking a different approach to our Allagash trip this May.  If the water levels permit, we’re either descending Musquacook Stream and meeting the Allagash at the deadwater of the same name, or descending Chemquasabamticook Stream and meeting the Allagash at Long Lake.  Both of these streams will be new water for me (I’ve only poled up them from the Allagash as far as a few hours would take me), and while neither are very long, there are sure to be spots along them that will draw me back for years to come.

If I write about it after the trip and say the fishing wasn’t any good, you might want to consider getting there with a fishing rod.  (wink)

Thanks to a friendly piece of software this blog is now formatted with a mobile theme for viewing with the iPhone/iPod Touch, Google Android, Palm Pre and other touch-based smartphones.

Early spring is the season of travel on remote northern rivers. Swelled with snowmelt, a canoe is able to travel where the water is too low during the summer. This is one of my favorite spots in Maine, seldom visited, far from any logging road and a long way from town or a paved road. Note the newly made table on the left side of the shot and the reflector oven in front of the fire full of sourdough biscuits.

Something we emphasize on our courses is to know yourself and how you deal with different stresses that come into play on extended trips or even when you’re just working around camp. One of the most important deals with hydration; how much water YOU need and what happens when you don’t get enough. This is different than the textbook approaches that are in just about every book ever written about survival. Instead of giving a formula that you’re supposed to apply, we advocate paying attention to how you feel and your energy level while you maintain different levels of hydration. This way you’ll know how much you need, what the warning signs are that you’re not getting enough, and how to plan when there won’t be enough. You’ll know because you’ve done it before and watched how it played out. This is much more useful, but time consuming, than simply saying you need a gallon per day. We’re all different, depending on our body size, and past conditioning; an NFL lineman needs more water than a 5′, 100 pound woman.

I’ve watched people get afternoon dehydration headaches time after time. I’ve gotten them myself countless times, even though I know better. This year I’m trying a new approach, which is to have enough water bottles to hold my daily allotment. I’ll make filling them all part of my nightly chores, then to be well hydrated I just have to drink them all over the course of the day. Pretty simple, yes, but planning ahead is important, especially when you can’t just turn on a tap to get a drink.

When I was a kid I knew the company I wanted to work for. I knew what my job would be and the things I’d do. But I couldn’t get hired by that company because it didn’t exist. I had to build it. Here’s a timeline of some of the highlights of that journey.

1995. With an undergraduate degree in anthropology in hand, I headed north to Alaska for a 30-day primitive living practicum in the Alaskan bush. It culminated a decade of focused study of bushcraft and outdoor living, and turned out different, but more powerful, than expected. It’s where the idea for the semester course was born, but it took a few years of percolating on my brain’s back burner before it was ready to see the light of day. Following the experience, I stayed on in Alaska for a year before returning to the lower 48 and enrolling in a master’s program in education.

1999. Upon finishing graduate school, I started teaching week long bushcraft courses and guiding wilderness trips, putting off a formal teaching career for a year. I had been teaching and guiding part time for a few years, but decided to make the leap and do it full time. Led trips that year in Maine, New Hampshire and Alaska.

2000. Decided to create programs that bridged the gap between formal education and bushcraft. I was motivated to create a learning experience similar to the Alaska practicum, and the idea for the Wilderness Bushcraft Semester was born in a wall tent at 40 below zero along the Maine and Quebec border. Added the Florida Everglades as a paddling and fishing trip destinations.

2001. Ran the pilot program for the Wilderness Bushcraft Semester, then called the Earth Skills Semester Program.

2002. Ran the first 12-week semester course. Upgraded my status as a Registered Maine Guide to Registered Master Maine Guide. Added New Brunswick as a paddling trip destination.

2003. Added the college credit option to the semester course and added several destinations in Quebec to our paddling and fishing trip destinations.

2008. Relocated all of our programs from New Hampshire to Masardis, Maine. Created the yearlong immersion, tying the semester programs together into a more complete learning experience.

2009. Celebrated ten successful years as a full-time bushcraft instructor and guide, as well as 14 semester programs.

I haven’t been blogging much lately, as I’ve been a busy dad as well as working on a lot of the behind the scenes aspects of our 2010 season. But I have been adding content to our various outposts on the web, and this post will tell you where they are.

1. We’ve got a busy forum at the Jack Mountain Bushcraft Network. We recently passed the 500 member milestone, and we’re running our online courses (more like study circles) there. There are some spirited discussions, as well as great photos and videos posted by the members. If you have a question, it’s a great place to find the answer as the members have vast outdoor experience. It’s at: http://jackmtn.ning.com/

2. I’ve been adding about a photo per day to our Flickr photostream. It’s at: flickr.com/photos/jmbushcraft/

3. I’ve been adding photos and updates to the Jack Mountain Bushcraft Facebook page. I’ve also uploaded our videos there. It’s at: facebook.com/jmbushcraftschool

4. I’ve been active on Twitter. You can follow me at: twitter.com/jmbushcraft

5. While we haven’t uploaded any videos in a while, I’m planning a daily video blog for our spring course . You can check out our youtube channel at: youtube.com/JMBushcraft

6. I’ve also added our videos to our channels at blip.tv and Vimeo, so they can be watched there.

7. I’ve started posting our photos and updates on our Posterous. It’s at: http://jmbushcraft.posterous.com/

8. I’ve been adding links to our Delicious page. It’s at: http://delicious.com/jmbushcraft

9. I set up a google profile a while back, and it’s been incorporated into Google Buzz. It’s at: http://www.google.com/profiles/jmbushcraft

10. Our podcast has two audio recordings, and I plan to record more at the field school this year. They’re on Itunes and zune, and available on the web at: http://jmbushcraft.podbean.com/

11. Our Friendfeed page aggregates all of our social media updates and uploads. It’s at: http://friendfeed.com/jmbushcraft

12. I put up a page to act as the Jack Mountain Social Media Hub. It’s got a live version of our Friendfeed and has links to all of our social media sites. It’s at: jackmtn.com/connect.html

So while I haven’t been blogging much, I have been busy. If you don’t see us here, look for us there. Look for more blog posts coming soon

With the rise of the web and people being constantly connected, I’m concerned about the future of really experiencing things.

These days I see so many people constantly tweeting, shooting video, and documenting their experiences, especially outdoor experiences, that I wonder if there’s any authentic experience taking place or if the whole thing exists just as a big photo opportunity. If they couldn’t tweet it or put it on you tube, would most people even do it?

This gets at a deeper philosophical question.

Does the impact of reducing an experience into chunks of 140 characters, or making sure the sound is working and we’re in the frame, take away from the experience. Does it change a wilderness experience into a technology and performance experience that takes place in the wilderness?

Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great that everyone can have a blog and a youtube channel for free, and the access to information is amazing. But with so many people documenting things is there any room left for just doing them?

The big question is does the experience differ when it’s being filmed compared with when it’s not being filmed?

The dates for the fall and spring terms of our 2010-2011 yearlong immersion program have been set. The yearlong program includes the fall, winter and spring terms.

Fall Term: Wilderness Bushcraft Semester 8/22/10-10/23/10
– Immediately following the fall term is our practical exam, which lasts several days.

Winter Term: Winter Bushcraft Intensive 1/9/11 – 1/22/11

Spring Term: Canoe Expedition 5/1/11 – 5/28/11

Each of these can also be taken as standalone courses.

TV survival shows are about hardships and risk. With background music to set the mood, the feeling of jeopardy hangs heavily over the host as s/he negotiates within an inch of his/her life. The danger makes it sexy.

In the real world, bushcraft is much more about heritage and tradition rather than risk. The old masters I know never rush, never worry, and never have adventures. They just live their lives outdoors.

We’re adding a tuition financing and payment plan for our long term programs. All the details aren’t set yet, but will be in a few weeks. It’s part of our plan to make our programs available to anyone who has a strong interest in bushcraft and living a simple, outdoor life.

Last summer I found an old magazine a friend had left at my place. It was the summer, 2004 issue of Outdoor Canada magazine, and on the last page was a short article titled “Homage” by Gary Ball. In it he gives his list of the perfect qualities a guide should posess. I think he comes pretty close.

There are those who can hunt, fish and otherwise live off the land in the northern wilds all on their own. And then there are those who can’t. Therein lies the major distinction between guide and client. That and the fact that the client gets to choose the guide, while the guide only rarely has a choice of client. The perfect guide, of course, is much more than that, although it would be easier to nail wood smoke to a hunt camp wall than to develop an all-embracing job description. But if we could conjure up the perfect guide, what qualities should he possess? Consider the following.

• A skillful hunter, angler, stalker, marksman, game caller, butcher and skinner.
• Able to navigate the wilderness by instinct alone.
• A master of all forms of transport, from canoe and bass boat to all-terrain vehicle and four-by-four to horseback and dog team.
• Able to survive on bark and twigs – and make them taste good.
• A peerless forecaster, and reader of how the weather affects fish and game.
• Able to identify, by spoor and call, every wild creature in the region.
• A skilled entertainer, a character who can make clients laugh about a swamped canoe, an elusive trophy or a bush pilot who forgot to pick them up.
• Able to provide, from his tiny day pack, any gear the client left at home.
• Able to swallow a client’s jokes, tall tales and excuses.
• Able to identify any plant, then describe its uses in Aboriginal medicine, cooking and folklore.
• Able to read a client’s mind, to ensure that every moment in the field is as good as, or better than, what he or she had hoped for.
• And, finally, the perfect guide is tough enough to turn around and do it all over again.

Books on outdoor adventure can be read in the warm, dry, comfortable surroundings of the home. They entertain, but when finished they seldom change the reader.

Actual outdoor experience and wilderness travel is characterized by bad weather, bugs, difficulty and exhaustion. Their impacts are felt throughout life, changing the person.

Without the difficulty, there can be no accomplishment. It’s the difficulty that precedes the change.

Northern Maine’s St. John River is the premier wilderness trip in the US east of the Mississippi. This year we’re running it May 10-17.

The natives called it Wallastook, or “Beautiful River”. It’s the largest river in Atlantic Canada, but starts from a series of small ponds deep in the woods of northern Maine, this unobtrusive stream grows as it flows north to the Canadian border, widening as numerous streams and river branches empty into it. By the time it passes Allagash Village it is large, powerful, and dramatic. Unlike its tributary the Allagash River, there are no large lakes at its headwaters. This makes it very responsive to rain, and also quite low in the summer. Because of this characteristic, we run it early, while the river is still swelled with spring runoff.

In years gone by, the river was reached by traveling up the North Branch of the Penobscot and through a small canal just north of Big Bog that led to Fifth St. John Pond. The canal has since been overgrown by Alders, but the river remains pristine. The St. John is the only drainage in Maine to have Muskellunge (or Muskie), the coveted game fish that’s been described as “an alligator with fins”. There is also good trout fishing along the river, primarily in holes not large enough to support Muskie, and at the mouths of streams. Wildlife is a common sight along the river, as I’ve seen bears, moose, deer, coyotes, bald eagles, osprey, beavers, muskrat, and other critters going about their daily business. Another possible sight are the northern lights, which frequently light up the sky with amazing displays of shimmering light and color.

The flora of the area consists of enormous white pines, spruces, firs, and cedars along the riverbanks, with hardwoods on the ridges and higher country.

Excitement builds throughout the trip like in a good novel. There are numerous short, easy rapids and lots of quickwater. In the second half of the trip, we navigate Basford Rips and Big Black Rapids, and in the last few miles we descend Big Rapids as a thrilling climax to the trip.

* Big Black Rapids are a mile long, and although usually rated class II, they can be Class III at high water.
* Big rapids are two miles of class III whitewater, and can be more difficult at high water. They are the heaviest water we see, but since they lie at the very end of the trip we have the option of taking out above them. A mile below Big Rapids is the Dickey bridge, the usual takeout.
* Basford Rips lies above the Big Black rapids, and consists of two short rapids. I mention it here only because I have seen several people get hung up there on the same rock, which lurks low in the water and is difficult to see.

The run from Baker Lake to the Dickey Bridge is 104 miles long, with no dams, towns or carries.

The 2010 trip is part of our Bushcraft Canoe Expedition Semester. There are several spots open for people to just join us for the trip. We’ll put in at Baker Lake and take our time covering the 104 miles to Dickey. Challenging whitewater and the cold water of early May add to the experience. The nights are cool, but this means no bugs.

If you’re looking for a great trip in early May, consider joining us.

Thinking about taking a semester off from college and spending it in the wilderness? If so, compare the different approaches of our program versus the large, corporate wilderness education companies. If you’re looking for modern, high-tech outdoor education with programs on backpacking and mountaineering, then check them out. But if you’re interested in building a personal connection with the land and learning the traditional skills people have used to live in the wilderness since the last ice age, we might be a better fit. Compare for yourself:



Many more people are interested in the corporate approach, and it’s great that there are companies that run college semester programs that focus on it. We’re not interested in working with the masses, just those few who are looking to break away from the herd.

We’ve changed the curriculum of our guide training course for 2010, and renamed it the Riverman Course It’s the first week of our 4-week Canoe Expedition Semester, and takes place in early May when the rivers are swollen and the bugs are still sleeping.

This weeklong course prepares you for working as a professional guide and is crash course in canoeing and traditional camping. Our spot on the Aroostook River in Masardis is an outstanding place to learn the traditional arts of the canoe as practiced by Maine Guides for hundreds of years. Within seven miles of the field school we’ve got 5 different rivers of varying difficulty, as well as 18-mile long Squapan Lake. The canoe gods were smiling when they made it.

We’ll spend the week working on two different but related curriculums. First, you’ll learn and refine the skills of paddling, poling and lining canoes on increasingly challenging water. You’ll explore this beautiful area and learn the personalities of it’s waterways. The second curriculum focuses on the management and leadership of a group and the skills of keeping them comfortable. This isn’t a theoretical course on leadership like what is commonly offered through outdoor clubs; instead it’s a focused on the crucial skills that make or break a trip taught by professional, working guides. We’ll cover navigation with a map and compass, what do do if someone in your party gets lost, how to plan, pack and prepare meals over an open fire, trip equipment and how to use, care for and maintain it, and how to light a fire under any conditions. Learn to stand in a canoe, pole up and down rapids, cook over an open fire, read the river to determine safe passages and gain the most useful asset a guide can have; experience.

Participants will learn to:

* Plan, prepare, provision, pack, and guide a wilderness trip
* Efficiently paddle a loaded canoe
* Pole and snub a canoe
* Set-up and line a canoe through rapids
* Tie useful and appropriate knots
* Use an axe, knife, and saw safely and effectively
* Sharpen their axe and knife
* Light a fire in dry or wet weather
* Cook and bake over an open fire
* Navigate with a map and compass
* Take decisive action in case a member of their group gets lost
* Tie a tumpline onto a wanigan and a canoe for ease of carrying
* Bake with sourdough
* Safely manage a group in whitewater
* Set up tents and tarps

Course Schedule

Sunday: Arrive between 4 and 6 and set up camp. We’ll meet, have dinner and discuss the week.

Monday: We’ll start the week on the big water of Squapan Lake, learning the basics of poling and teaching such paddling strokes as the knifing J and pitch stroke for efficient forward motion.

Tuesday: We’ll add the moving water component on the Aroostook River. You’ll build on what you’ve already learned, then learn the way of the river and how it controls the boat. You’ll learn to work with this elemental force, poling upstream and snubbing down. We’ll also have a several mile float from the Masardis Trading Post back to the field school, stopping on the way to work on controlling the boat in Island Rips.

Wednesday: We’ll add in the skills of maneuvering on a smaller stream as we float down the Blackwater River and St. Croix Stream. The challenges here are narrow passages, beaver dams, strainers, and more. You’ll be challenged, but you’ll be ready for it as a result of what we’ve already accomplished.

Thursday: Thursday morning we’ll cover trip preparation and planning. We’ll go through the checklists we’ve developed, plan the meals, pack the gear, then head into the North Maine Woods where we’ll set up camp along the Big Machias River. We’ll work on poling in the river and camp for the night.

Friday: We’ll be up early and on the water for the long float back to town. It will take us most of the day to paddle and pole through the many rips and rapids of this lively waterway. Along the way you’ll see the beautiful scenery of this seldom-paddled north woods gem. When we get back to town we’ll head over to Blackwater Outfitters, where a room for the night and a hot shower are included in the tuition. After getting cleaned up we’ll have dinner together (not included in the tuition), then say our farewells before turning in for the night.

2010 Course Info:
• Dates: 5/2-5/8
• Maximum Size: 10
• Tuition: $850
• Minimum Age: 18

I’m headed back to Canoecopia in March for a presentation on wilderness survival for paddlers titled “How To Avoid Becoming One With Nature Through The Composting Process.” As such I wanted to be clear about what you won’t hear in my survival presentations:

1. Long, drawn out discussion of equipment; kit is secondary, knowledge is primary.

2. Acronyms that are supposed to explain it all.

3. Cute variations of the word survival (ex. thrival).

4. Proclaiming that the skills I teach are universal and will apply anywhere. They won’t.

5. Dogmatic or spiritual approaches to outdoor living.

The focus is on practicality, reality, and honesty. For a review and information on what’s in my presentations, check out Bryan Hansel’s Nessmucking blog.

I read an article from the Dallas Morning News on December 6th titled “Global Impositioning Systems; Is GPS technology actually harming our sense of direction?” by Alex Hutchinson. While I’ve often heard of people having no sense of direction, and have met a few that can get lost driving to the grocery store, I didn’t know it was a studied neurological phenomenon. It is, and it’s called either Developmental Topographical Disorientation or Topographagnosia.

After reading the article I looked online and found several sites devoted to researching and documenting Topographagnosia, most notably gettinglost.ca. From their site:

We are a cognitive neuroscience research laboratory dedicated to investigate the individuals’ inability to orient in an environment, a condition that is commonly known as topographical disorientation or topographagnosia… If you get lost easily and want to find out more about your lack of orientation skills, please explore this website. You will find useful information about how people orient and the research that we have done so far on this topic. Also, you may want to join our forum and meet other people with orientation issues similar to yours. Please visit our page “Test Your Skills” in order to have a complete assessment of your orientation skills. Your contribution is fundamental to our discovering more about this problem and learning how we can help everyone to find their way.

Having taught navigation professionally, both modern and barehand, for over ten years, I’ve noticed a greater reliance on gadgets with the passage of time. While I’ve thought about the reliance on navigational technology as a crutch, I didn’t know it could have a negative impact on spatail awareness and the ability to navigate. But after reading the article and more on the web, they make a convincing case. The quote that most stands out from the article is ”

Our brains determine how we navigate, but our navigational efforts also shape our brains.”

The forum on the Jack Mounatin Bushcraft Network (our online social network) has been increasingly active lately. Someone recently posted a question about natural alternatives to insulin:

What happens if you are Insulin dependent and end up in a survival situation without Insulin. Is there anything you can do? Are there any natural forms of Insulin you can seek out in a real pinch?

I was a wilderness emergency medical technician for 7 years, but there was nothing about this in the training. Does anyone have any ideas, other than consult a physician?

Is it better to know a little about hundreds of outdoor skills, or to know a lot about a few core skills? This is a heated debate, and the answer often depends on how you live your life. For the urban set, where bushcraft is a trivial pursuit, breadth wins you more kudos at skills gatherings.

For those who spend their life outdoors, whether as professional guides or in some other capacity, depth is more important. It’s been much more important to me as both a guide and an instructor.

With a shallow level of understanding, only the most cursory knowledge is known and it isn’t tested. You may discuss it, but you don’t own it. When you practice it, you follow the rules.

With a deep level of knowledge you own it. You’ve used it countless times. You’re familiar enough with the topic that you start getting creative with it, innovating or at least altering how you do it to meet your current needs.

This is the difference between learning how to light a fire on a weekend course and living with fire as your primary tool for several months.

The best short course, in my opinion, would focus on fire, tool safety and getting an adequate night’s sleep. When one knows these topics well, the others come much more easily.

First learn to be self-sufficient and safe, then expand out.