The Survival Weekly Dispatch - Volume 11, Issue 26

Happy Independence Day!

Jul 03, 2024

Hey folks, thanks for checking out the newsletter this week. I’m writing this on Tuesday afternoon and today is the one-year anniversary of when I landed in the hospital for a few days. It still surprises me to think about how fast that all happened. Literally one minute I’m taking photos for an article and the next I’m trembling and shaking like the temperature suddenly dropped 60 degrees. Turns out I was battling two infections without realizing it and my body was trying to tell me it needed help. You know it’s bad when nurses and doctors start throwing around terms like “septic.”

After a few days on IV antibiotics, I was sent home. It took a couple of weeks before I started to feel like myself again. I’m ever thankful my wife was there to help at every step of the way.

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Prepper Tip -- My friend Jayberry Miller owns and runs Tuff Possum Gear. When it comes to gear, he knows what works because he’s out there testing and refining designs constantly. I mean, the dude started crafting his own packs and such because he couldn’t find what he wanted and needed elsewhere. Rather than sit and complain, he learned how to build backpacks and similar gear literally from the ground up and began making his own.

I tell you that so you understand he has the background and experience to speak with some authority on the subject of equipment.

Recently, Jayberry shared a post on Facebook speaking about what he calls “Talismans of Safety.” It dovetails nicely with what I’ve said before about the “better than nothing” mindset.

What Jayberry said was that a lot of people tend to purchase survival and self-defense gear because it gives them a feeling of safety. But a lot of that gear hasn’t actually been pressure tested and may not work in real world conditions. People carry these items because it makes them feel good to do so, not necessarily because they are confident in their ability to use them.

Make sure what you carry for survival, defense, and similar purposes will actually do what you need them to do. I mean, in a very real sense we’re carrying these items so that we can depend on them to save our lives, right?

I’m not suggesting that you need to run out and spend top dollar on everything. But you for darn sure should be familiar with everything you carry and know what it will and won’t do for you. Avoid gimmicky nonsense and stick to what’s been proven to work.

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Spencer Milligan died last week. Most of you are wondering, who? He was an actor. While he had guest spots on several shows through the 1970s and 1980s, he was best known for playing Rick Marshall, the father on Land of the Lost.

I loved that show as a kid. If we’re being honest, it probably had a pretty big influence on me at the time. I was already starting to become interested in wilderness survival and similar disciplines, so it wasn’t a big leap to go from there to imagining what life might be like if I were stranded in prehistoric times.

Land of the Lost was never destined to win any awards for special effects, but the writing was pretty advanced for a silly kids show. And don’t forget the Sleestaks….

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My good friend Craig Caudill has a new book coming out titled Traditional Bushcraft. In it, Craig shares 24 different projects, from trap triggers to furniture. For each one, step by step instructions are provided, complete with photo illustrations. While you can order it from any bookseller, including Amazon, if you order it from his store, he’ll sign it for you before sending it your way.

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I spend more time than I probably should surfing through prepper-centric social media. One of the more popular topics is to discuss the contents of different custom-made survival kits. People like to show off their bug out bags, get home bags, and such.

Something I see over and over is where someone will have something like 7 or 8 knives in their bag and a dozen different ways to make fire, each more esoteric than the last, but maybe one water bottle and maybe a couple of granola bars for food. In other words, they’re very heavy in one area and nearly non-existent in others.

Now, I’m a knife guy, as most of you have probably figured out by now. I own far more blades than any human being would ever need in several lifetimes. Yet, I cannot envision a realistic scenario that would require me to truly need to have 8 different knives with me at once.

Granted, I’m not the one carrying their pack and they have every right to put all of those knives and whatever else they’d like into it. I just don’t see the logic behind it.

My advice is this. Be realistic and practical as much as you can with your preps. Whether we’re talking about bug out bags, food storage, or self-defense, keep both feet on the ground and be reasonable.

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Of all the books I’ve written, Prepper’s Long-Term Survival Guide remains my favorite to date. I added a ton of new content for the revised edition, as well as made some needed tweaks throughout the original manuscript. Consider this to be sort of the "Author's Preferred" edition.

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We wanted to do something a little different for our hike this week, so we went to a park we’ve not visited in about six years. Man, it was just gorgeous.

Survival Tip – Flexible Utility Tools

Flexible utility tool is a fancy term for a piece of fabric that can be used in several different ways. This could be a simple bandana, a shemagh, or perhaps a sil-nylon signal panel like this one.

Here are just some of the ways you can use a flexible utility tool.

--Signaling for rescue

--Scarf in cold weather

--Provide shade in hot weather

--Fashion it into a bindle to carry small items, such as when foraging food

--Use it as a cravat bandage to secure a broken arm

What’s nice is that these are lightweight and take up very little space in the pack. The signal panel linked above is 30 inches on a side when fully open, but packs down into a pouch that’s just two inches by three inches.

While very few multi-use items are outstanding with each of those uses, the flexible utility tool does a pretty good job overall.

Prepper Survival Guide and Backwoods Survival Guide

For those new to my little corner of the Internet, I am the Editor in Chief for both Prepper Survival Guide and Backwoods Survival Guide magazines. Here are the covers for the current issues that are available in stores right now.