HUNTING & TRAPPING ANIMALS
Most people, when trying to imagine how they might react if faced with a survival situation, immediately focus their attention on the problem of obtaining food. However, filling one’s belly rates pretty low in the list of wilderness survival priorities … following shelter, water, and — especially in cold climates — fire.
The fact is that almost any reasonably healthy human being can get along for quite a few days with no food at all … and would suffer only hunger, and perhaps attendant stomach cramps, as a result of doing so. Therefore, the time for the survivalist to begin foraging for edibles is only after his or her more urgent needs have been taken care of. Now, in most parts of North America, the most easily collected survival foods are wild plants. However, since many native vegetables aren’t available in the winter months, I’ve decided to discuss methods of gathering animal foods here. The techniques that I’ll focus on are hunting (with a simple throwing stick) and trapping.
Finding Food for Survival
Naturally, when eating is a matter of life or death (as it could be if you were stranded for an extended period of time), an individual can’t allow his or her dietary preferences to get in the way. You should know, then, that virtually all mammals are edible (in fact, when skinned and cleaned, very few animals can’t be safely used as food). It’s
