KEEP IT SIMPLE: Keep tackle to a minimum, but use an arm guard and a release device to protect your arm and fingers. Make up a repair kit which includes glue, bee's wax, duct tape, nylon wrapping twine, spare bow strings, spare points and fletching. You are not interested in tournament shooting, just acquiring meat, so practice instinctive shooting. That is shooting without sights. A good instinctive shooter can hit with surprising accuracy. Sights just slow you down, and again, most of your shooting will be at short range. With a little practice, you should be able to hit knotholes at twenty or thirty yards. All you're going to do is get up in a tree and chuck an arrow into the first game animal that passes anyway. You don't need a computer guidance system for that.
Make up a few arrows with blunt points. It does no good to shoot a small animal or bird with a broad- head arrow as it will pass right through them. The animal or bird will likely escape before it bleeds out. The blunt point, on the other hand, will knock them out instantly. Back in the old days before fancy tackle, I used to drive a .38 brass cartridge case over the end of a 3/8 inch Port Orford cedar arrow for use on small game. The important thing is don't get carried away with gadgets as you won't need them. A bow, a couple dozen arrows, an arm guard and a release is all you really need. Oh yes, never carry more than six broad-heads mounted at any one time. They are just too dangerous.
Lately, there has been quite an interest in exotic weapons such as the crossbow and blowgun. They do have their points. A crossbow has a short horizontal bow and shoots really hard. For those unfamiliar with archery, a crossbow might be just the ticket as they are almost like shooting a rifle. However, it's hard to cock one in a tree or even in the bushes. Therefore, a second shot is slow coming. Me, I'll take the short hunting bow as it is light, fast, has only one axis, and doesn't take up much room.
Blowguns are more useful than you might think. Of course a poison tip is best for hunting. Oddly enough, Garlic Oil in the blood stream is deadly poison. A drop on the tip of a dart is all it takes to stop small game. The range is short, maybe 20 yards or so, but a lot of small game can be had at that distance or less. Perhaps, the greatest asset of a blowgun is that it is quiet. You can take several small animals or birds in one place without the others ever knowing what is going on. Make sure that your darts are brightly colored so that you can find them if you miss. By-the way- the blowgun is an excellent indoor weapon to practice with. You can use an ordinary dart board as a target. You will soon find out that a dove sized target is quite easy to hit.
An adult spring-air rifle is another good bet as a backup weapon. There are many good .177 caliber pellet rifles that will drive such a pellet through a three pound coffee can at 30 yards or so... I'd say that a reasonable shot could collect a shopping bag full of dove or quail in about a half an hour with one of these. One associate of mine took his hunting one morning and returned with eleven out of the twelve rabbits he jumped. The nice thing is that you can carry a tin of 500 pellets in your shirt pocket. Again, with the acquisition of a suitable pellet trap, indoor practice is quite feasible.
Anyway, carrying a heavy rifle and adequate ammo on an extended journey would be quite tiresome, especially when there are so many other necessities to tote. That is why I say to take some practice trips and spend a few weekends in the open. You'll soon find out what works for you.
PROCURING PROTEIN: Still on the subject of procuring protein, let's not forget fishing. It might be well to put together a small, unpretentious fishing kit, containing a few basic supplies. It should contain mostly hooks, swivels, lead shot, and fishing line. Forget rods and reels and all the other junk that anglers drag around. A fly or two or maybe a couple of spinners is enough. Again, you are not interested in sportsmanship, you want to eat. Most offen fish will take bait, especially live bait, better than lures anyway. A ten-cent piece of fly paper might bring you more fish than a hundred dollars worth of fancy plugs. A little bottle of anise oil would be worthwhile as certain fish (Bass) are attracted to it. However, worms live in dirt. Fish like worms. There is plenty of dirt where you are going. So dig up some worms and other fat, juicy bugs, and you have fish bait. Find a green stick, tie a piece of line to the end of it, attach a hook and worm, and you are fishing. Don't waste money on floats, a piece of wood, namely a stick floats just fine. Oh yes, fish expect to see sticks floating...
FISH OR CUT BAIT: Save entrails from birds and small game for fish bait. Some bottom feeders such as catfish prefer bait on the rank side, so let some sit in the sun a bit until it gets ripe. Above all, don't buy too many tuna hooks, as most fresh water fish will be caught on little quarter inch to three-eighths hooks just big enough to hide in a kernel of corn. By-the- way, I've caught some great trout on nothing but corn.
Now, if you really get hungry, set out a trout line or a net. A trout line is just a piece of heavy line stretched across a slow moving creek or stream. You tie on several leaders (short pieces of line about three feet long ) and attach baited hooks to them. The hooks dangle in the creek or stream. During the night, fish pass and take the bait. In the morning, remove fish and place in frying pan.
Oh yes, don't forget crayfish crabs or craw dads. These little crustaceans can be found in multitudes around lakes and ponds or quiet places in streams. All you need to catch them is a piece of meat, a short piece of line and a stick. No hook is necessary. Just dangle the meat in the water near one of these varmints and it will grab hold. When it does, just pull it out of the water.
Once we were camped on the edge of Woods Canyon Lake up on the Rim and noticed a plethora of crayfish cavorting in the water. I built a fire and set a bucket of water on to boil. While the water was heating, I cut a stick, tied on about three feet of line and attached a piece of chicken to the free end. When the water boiled, I started catching greedy little crayfish on the chicken and dunking them into the boiling water. They let go the instant they hit the hot water. Then, as soon as they turned red, we scooped them out and ate them with hot sauce. It was an assembly line processes.
There is a lot of food available in most any country, even desert. You just have to be able to recognize it as food. Most city people are accustomed to eating packaged foods and have little idea of what natural food actually looks like. This is why I suggest reading several books, written about your intended area so that you can learn what is available and how to acquire it. Even a desert rattle snake is edible, tasting somewhat like chicken. Just don't eat the head or tail. Snakes can be caught right behind the head with a forked stick. Hold the head down with the short forks and cut the body off. I always either bury the head or place a heavy rock on it to prevent anyone from stepping on that poisonous item. Clean and gut the snake like another food animal, saving the skin for a hat band. Don't keep the rattles as they too are poisonous, and the powder that comes off the rattles can blind you. The meat is white, tasty and tender. It's good roasted, fried or stewed.
TIMING: Remember, once you are on the land, you'll be there for an undetermined time, so pay attention to the cycles of nature and write them down in your little black book. This is a major key to survival. Anytime you find food animals amassing it's probably a part of a cycle, so take note of it. For example, Salmon always run up-stream to their place of spawn at the same time each fall. If you are aware of this, you'll head for the river to intercept them. Most antlered animals begin the rutting season in the fall, and its a good time to keep track of when as they will come down from the mountains to mate and eat the fall harvests in order to store fat for the winter at the same time each year. You'll know when they are coming and be ready for them.
ASTRONOMY: The battery in your watch will probably wear down in a short time, so it would be a good idea to learn to track time by the moon and sun. The moon runs in 28 day cycles from full to full. There are approximately 12 full moons to the year. Watch the sunrise and sunset on June 21, the longest day of the year and December 21, the shortest day of the year. Mark the place where this happens and you'll know mid summer and mid winter and be able to count the moons until a given season. The sun rises in the east, then passes through the southern sky finally setting in the west. At noon, the sun is at the highest point in the southern sky. The winter sun stays low in the sky, the summer sun rises high in the sky. Once you watch these events for a while, you'll know the seasons of the year by the height of the sun in the sky. Eventually, as you mark these celestial events, you'll have your own Stonhenge.
Make a circle on the ground, bordered with small rocks. Place a large rock at mid-summer sun and mid- winter sun. Place medium-sized rocks at each of the full moons. Before you know it, you'll have a natural calendar. It won't be totally accurate, but it will tell you when to expect the salmon and elk. What the heck, it worked for the Indians Yes, my grandmother was named "Many Bells". How do you think I know all this stuff?
Anyway, pay attention to and study natural cycles as they are pertinent to your survival. One major difference between the Neanderthals and the Cro- Magnons is that the latter were aware of natural cycles while the former were ignorant of them. Salmon bones were found in the latter's caves while none were found in the former's. Wouldn't it be a shame to sit starving a mile away from a salmon river, ignorant of the spawn? Learn about and keep track of the cycles in your area whether they be bird, animal, aquatic or vegetable!
FINDING NORTH: It is well to include a good oil- filled lenstatic compass and a pair of calipers in your kit along with some good plastisized topographical maps of your area. That way, you can tell where you are going and the lay of the land. You will also know where are the major roads, railways, cities, towns, water holes, tanks, mountains, valleys, rivers, ponds and lakes. Of course, there are the old standbys such as telling direction by the sun and stars and moss always grows on the North side of trees in the forest. In fact, it wouldn't hurt to check out a navigation book or two just to get the idea as to how it all works. Remember, this is a series of ideas, not a true reference manual. The information here is meant to spark your interest in important subjects not totally explain them. To do so would require yards of paper.
TAKING OF WILD GAME: Learn the times of year that animals, fish and birds are most edible. For example in hot country, rabbit may have yellow fever during the summer. Never eat rabbit until two weeks after the first frost. Shellfish may also be poisonous in warm weather. There is an old saying "Only in the months with R". All months containing an "R" in their spelling are cooler months. The hot months have no "R". In Mexico, and southern countries, there is a chance of disease from all water animals during the warm months. Take time to find out what is safe to eat and when!
CLEANING: Gut and skin all meat before cooking. Gutting is accomplished by making a shallow incision just below the breast bone, just enough to get your finger under the muscle. The intestines of all animals are encased in a membrane, and the trick is not to cut the membrane. Once under the muscle, cut with the sharp side of your blade up or cut from the inside out from breast bone to the middle of the belly. Then make a "Y" angling off to either side, leaving a flap at the middle of the belly to hind legs. Continue cutting free the genitals but not the tubes. Cut around the anus and pull through. The reason for the flap is that most rutting animals urinate upon that area to call attention to themselves. Quite frankly, urine does not improve the taste of meat. Therefore, we remove that area along with the penis and anus. Oh yes, on rutting animals, such as deer, there are musk glands on the insides of the hind legs. it would be well to cut wide around them so that they don't taint the meat. In fact, remove them first.
Now, split the breast bone cartilage and open the rib cage. You should now be able to cut the esophagus near the neck and roll the whole gut bag out of the animal in one piece. This will take some practice. The nice thing is that you can disassemble large animals the same way as small animals. Once you undo a few small animals, the larger ones will be no mystery. Fish and birds work about the same way. About now, you'll be better understanding the value of truly sharp edged tools such as your skinning knife, ax, saw, chisels, bits and such. Without these, you are doomed. Take time right now to become a really competent tool sharpener!
