Wilderness Survival: Living Off the Land with the Clothes on Your Back and the Knife on Your Belt

by Mark Elbroch, Michael Pewtherer

Do you have what it takes?
You're alone in the wilderness with nothing but a knife and the clothes on your back. Will you survive? Do you have the skills to feed, clothe, and protect yourself? Mark Elbroch, a master tracker, and Mike Pewtherer, a wilderness survival instructor, put those questions to the test when they embarked on a 46-day, unprovisioned, unequipped journey into the fields and forests of the northeastern United States.
Wilderness Survival is their highly practical and uniquely observant introduction to survival in the deep woods. Mark and Mike tested generally accepted truths, questioned conventional solutions, and distilled the best techniques for making fire, obtaining shelter, finding water, and hunting with primitive weapons. They give

* A life-saving handbook of survival skills that explores man's place in the natural world
* The secret to surviving in the wilderness as part of nature--not its adversary
* Explanations of more than 30 wilderness survival skills, including hunting and gathering food, fashioning tools, and preserving and storing food

Genres: Survival, Nonfiction, Nature

288 pages, Paperback

First published April 13, 2006

Reviews

[Joe Spoto · Rating 4 out of 5]

A journal about the author's time practicing the survival skills. In-between the journal entries are instructional pages detailing survival skills.

[Johnny Rokkets · Rating 1 out of 5]

In all honesty, I couldn't muster the desire to finish this book. I borrowed it from my local library without first reading any reviews or information on it. I was under an assumption that this was more along the lines of an instruction manual of sorts, and what I got was a story about a couple of fellows who ventured out into the great wide open and practiced wilderness living. I'm sure if I had done my research on this book, I probably wouldn't have bothered with this read. I found that when the story wasn't being constantly interrupted with extraneous and sometimes irrelevant "survival" info (making temporary tattoos with sun warmed pine pitch?!?), it was flat out BORING. Between the authors leaving their camp to make a run into town for pizza, to fabricating a bark canteen, to a host of other inane details of daily camping routines, I quickly lost interest. If you want a camping story with some bushcraft skills that you could almost find in any Boy Scout den, then this may be your cup of tea.

[Wizardeyes · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is awesome and hilarious and informational as well as a really great story. I felt like I was there with the characters as he described lots about the experiences he had in the wilderness. I appreciated the lessons the author learned and I think I'll bring alot of this knowledge with me on my own trip into the backcountry.

One con--although minor. Every few pages, there's an informational essay on one topic or another involving survival-- skinning animals, making rawhide, weaponry, etc...The essays on survival really broke up the story...I'd maybe like to see the essays and the guy's story separated.

[Jake · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, I recommend it for people who like wilderness survival.