Maryland Survival Newbie ... advice?

[GreyFox1987]

Hello, my name is James... and I am a couch survivalist ("Hi James")

I am a Maryland resident who likes to do things like riding a mountain bike on country roads, go fishing at the Liberty resevoir, and shooting stuff (when I can afford ammo). I was turned on to survivalist stuff mostly from playing Metal Gear Solid 3 (sounds dumb, I know). However I do recognize the seriousness and complexity of preparing, learning, and practicing skills such as starting fires safely, preparing food that I catch in the field in a sanitary manner, finding edible plants, staying warm and dry (meaning layering to avoid sweat), and basic shelter building. I am starting to do research on how to build shelters with only what's around me. I am also awaiting the arival of the book "SAS Survival Guide by John Lofty" which I intend to be the 1st of many in my research reading. While I do my reading, I want to prepare a backpack of basic multifunctional equipment that will aid me in surviving in the woods in PA, MD, and VA.

My kit starts with my Every Day Carry stuff which includes the following:

1. Magnesium Firestarter Keychain
2. Bic Lighter
3. Coast/Lensar LED flashlight
4. C.R.K.T. M16-14ZLEK
5. Cell phone with GPS app
6. Iron Clad gloves

My Bicycle kit expands upon that with a columbia backpack that holds the following:

1. Hoodie (MD Terps!)
2. rain coat
3. mini tackle box (Hooks, weights, bobbers)
4. Leatherman Multitool / plyers
5. Electronic Cigarete for calming my @++ down
6. Napkins
7. Old AUS6 bud k Tanto (dull as anything, use it for batoning)
8. waterproof container for matches
9. basic 1st aid kit (1 roll gauze, bandaids, neosporin, burn ointment, 3 gauz pads)

And my Bike can mount my flashlight, and fishing rod! as well as hold a waterbottle.

I want to know what you think of what I have so far, and give me Ideas for a Bugout bag (Seperate kit to pack in an Alice frame pack).

Things I was thinking of are:

1. Ontario 18" military machete
2. Replacing bud k knife with Ron Hood/Buck Punk knife
3. 1st aid kit in coffee jar
4. Military style canteen
5. Layering clothes (idealy put in space bags to save space & keep dry)
6. Crasins, 2 or 3 cliff bars, and unsalted Pnuts (protien)
7. Some kind of skillet to cook and eat out of
8. Anti-bacterial soap bar
9. (If I HAD to.... Cold Steel SF or Spetznaz shovel)
10. Paracord
11. Money & Passport
12. toothbrush

Things I already own

1. Medium ALICE backpack (in GREAT condition)
2. Matching Rothco camoflage sleeping bag
3. a Marlin .22 (looks like an M24sws) and a Marlin 336 iron sights, and Uberti .36 bp revolver
4. 2 military belts that can be used as tiedowns

I would like to know what's good, What's not needed, what's still needed, and what books would be usefull to me in terms
of surviving my local area forests. Keep in mind I am not a crazy person, I am trying to make this a useful hobby right now.
If you know of any local clubs in the Carrol County MD area that could help, that would be cool too

 

[baldtaco-II]

I won't be much use here because I don't think of “bug out bike” or warhorse or anything like that when I think of my bike. However, I do use my bike as a platform for all sorts of outdoor stuff whether that be a simple get high over night, a photographic base, or whimsical fishing.................... As a gist: I like panniers. Nothing fancy, just a way to make moving / swapping / using gear better than having it strapped to me. At the heart of it is a big ole Tupperwear box. Stuff I need to keep dry like clothing goes in that. As does a sleeping bag or a blanket if I'm going for a picnic. It is also the basis of my kitchen food prep / bait prep / fiddle mechanisms /counter top / blah area. As a general purpose device a FAK also lives in the panniers as do whatever tools I require to keep the bike going, plus spare tube, pump and whatnot................................Tools that invariably live in the panniers include a folding saw and a folding trowel. The saw is way more useful for making stuff than a big chopper. Personally, an Ontario 12” would be more than sufficient for anything I do. Invariably I use something half that size, but I'm not splitting wood to post pictures of on forums or trying to warm a village so my needs vary from many. If anything I'd pay more attention to the working beater knife that you'll use to process fish, cut up food, make fuzz sticks and so on. I like a flexible Victorinox fillet knife with Fibrox handle for that. It'll urinate on any Mora at all three tasks, and we know what a buzz there is about though recently. The trowel isn't just good for making snake hole fires and whatnot it's a first rate tool for digging up bait and levering shellfood off rocks, all that stuff. .........................String, I like string. Paracord is groovy and all that but a plain old ball of hairy string will do loads. I like bungee [shock cord] too. I buy it off the roll and make up my own lengths. It's not only good for holding stuff on the bike but it makes putting up a roof very fast too.................Spark rods, matches, dryer lint and all that doesn't rank very highly to me. A bag of PJ balls and a couple of cheapo lighters take priority over any of that. I smoke so my primary lighter and some twigs is all I need. The cheapos and PJ balls are back up. If I'm down to the spark rod in my FAK then I would have had an incredible run of bad luck and it really is time to go home. …..........A length of kitchen roll deals with eyes, nose, and arse as well as cleaning up fish guts, wiping sandy hands, blah. A little kitchen sponge is a handy thing to have though for a trivial weight penalty...........................Headlamps. There is no outdoor activity that I do that I would be without a headlamp to take part in. I've got a pair of Magicshines on the front of my bike chucking out 2000 lumens, I still take one.................................. Cooking wise the options are vast. You don't need anything more than a skillet or a mess tin if you're going to cook over a fire. I prefer stoves for convenience both in terms of speed, effort, control, and flexibility. Having to set fire to something just to make a cup of coffee is a PIA, especially if it is raining. I use both liquid fuel [unleaded] and canister stoves depending on the weather. The smallest cannister stoves are very light and very handy but they aren't great in all conditions. Better cannister stoves have a remote cannister. You might also want to consider a modification from butane [or butane / propane mix] to propane. Propane cannisters are heavier but you can refill them, plus you don't have to carry an extra cannister just in case like you sometimes do when you have a half full butane one. Propane is also a hell of a lot cheaper to run. Best of all though is that propane will keep working at temperatures well below that at which butane cannisters have given up the ghost...................Anyway, that's some of my basic default core.

 

[bigcountry1315]

Get the U.S. Air Force Survival Handbook covers a lot of bushcraft and survival skills.Or Stay Alive Survival Skills you Need by John McCann.Read up on the subject before investing a lot of money in equipment that is no good or not needed.Me I have way too much gear but I live up in the big woods so I can get far away from other people when I want to. I enjoy going out and woods bumming with my 454 Casull on one hip and one of my custom choppers on the other.

 

[GreyFox1987]

To BaldTaco,
The Bugout bag is seperate from bicycle bag. I have a corolla. The purpose of the
Big Bag is to allow me to have a larger cache of stuff in the event that the wild would
Be my only viable place of refuge from some sort of opressive force. That force not being
Govt. related of coarse (infered would void my hiding spot). Rather like government goes
Super broke, and people go nuts. Like I said this is for practice as a hobby. Probably will
Never use these techniques outside of hunting trips.

When you mentioned small knife for fish and game, would the 5.5" buck knives punk be too
Cumbersome for these chore tasks? And the machete was for light chopping of things in the
3 to 4 inch thick range and for heavier batonning. I want to mainly use knife for small wood
tasks, and turning critters into food.

 

[baldtaco-II]

To BaldTaco,The Bugout bag is seperate from bicycle bag. I have a corolla. The purpose of the Big Bag is to allow me to have a larger cache of stuff in the event that the wild wouldBe my only viable place of refuge from some sort of opressive force. That force not beingGovt. related of coarse (infered would void my hiding spot). Rather like government goes Super broke, and people go nuts. Like I said this is for practice as a hobby. Probably willNever use these techniques outside of hunting trips.When you mentioned small knife for fish and game, would the 5.5" buck knives punk be tooCumbersome for these chore tasks? And the machete was for light chopping of things in the 3 to 4 inch thick range and for heavier batonning. I want to mainly use knife for small wood tasks, and turning critters into food.

GreyFox1987, holaI'd rather not be drawn on the first part of what your saying and I'll jump in at the “hobby point”...................I think you need to load up on the aspects that are likely to interest you most. I'm not going to try to find fault in that Buck design but I will say that for my taste if had a big beater blade too I'd put a strong loading on the hunting aspect of the knife design and give up some utility value. Certainly if I were to be investing $180, that I think is about the RRP of that Buck I'd probably stretch a bit more and look at a pedigree hunting design. For example a Boker Dozier Arkansas Hunter in CPM D2 has a fit and finish of a high quality knife made a hard way, with bolster, liners, glazed polish, in short all the signs of quality one might want present in an investment piece. In contrast, that Buck is made from a tough steel usually used for swords and even at the elevated hardness I doubt could come close to giving CPM D2 a contest at processing game. Aside from the fact it probably has a good heat treatment it isn't in the same league in terms of quality with just a couple of slabs whacked on it and some kind of coating to keep manufacturing costs low. In fact, this situation is a bit arseways round. That Buck being a simple spring steel will rust really easily when some of that coating wears off, especially if you are going to cut up critters and fish. Those types of steel demands more attention to finishing properly on a buffer than any other type. They always used to have the labour put in for that reason but people cut corners now and paint them. Anyway, I digress there. The point being that whilst I'm sure that Buck could be made to work quite well 'cos after all it is a happy enough looking utility pattern, your interest in flesh processing , and the fact you've got a big beater with you for the rough stuff, does make me think you should look for something a bit more optimized for the task. I don't think you need to spend anything like that to achieve that either, that Dozier was just an obvious example to me up around the 200 too.....................................As bigcountry1315 said, it would be a good idea to plot up a bit more on what you are likely to enjoy and get a flavour of what works, what doesn't, and what you really need before committing to something you may regret after a couple of months.