Survival at Sea
Ulysses
I'm a sailor, and it has occured to me that while I don't think that
society will crumble in two years, or any time soon for that matter, I can
think of several plausable situations where I would not want to put into
my intended port and be forced to sail much farther than intended to find
safety. In any case, I was wondering if anyone knew anything about long
term survival at sea (specifically finding balanced food sources) and the
possibility of self-sufficiency at sea.
U
ph...@philsmith.org
odys...@ithica.org (Ulysses) wrote:
The 2 best, IMHO, books on sea survival are : "How To Survive On Land
And Sea" by Craighead & Craighead, and "Survive The Savage Sea" by
Robertson. Both are currently available through Amazon.com. A good
book on open water voyaging would cover the maintenance aspects of a
boat far from shore.
Bob Gilbert
On Wed, 04 Feb 1998 13:57:34 -0800, odys...@ithica.org (Ulysses)
wrote:
>I'm a sailor, and it has occured to me that while I don't think that
>society will crumble in two years, or any time soon for that matter, I can
>think of several plausable situations where I would not want to put into
>my intended port and be forced to sail much farther than intended to find
>safety. In any case, I was wondering if anyone knew anything about long
>term survival at sea (specifically finding balanced food sources) and the
>possibility of self-sufficiency at sea.
>
>U
Well Ulysses,
You sure can ask a broad and undefined question.
If you are a sailor I will presume you are familiar with standard
maritime survival kits which include food, water, some medical
supplies, etc. Most include solar stills. You might want to consider
getting a second. Water is far more important than food.
You will want to be familiar with using the flares and signaling
mirror. The ocean is a big place.
Are you talking about trying to live for extended periods of time out
on a boat? Then solar stills and onboard food supply. Concentrate on
grains and dried vegetables. Big supply of vitamins.
Basic fishing gear. You're floating above a source of food. Solar
cooker for when there is enough sun. Otherwise eat it raw. A safe
enough practice for salt water fish. Honest, raw fish doesn't taste
particularly bad.
Check for books in your local area and learn to identify the many
varieties of edible kelp. Snag floating beds of vegetation and
investigate them. It is not uncommon to find small crab, snails and
other edibles hitching a ride.
Keep your senses around you and you have two basic problems. Fresh
water ... very important. If it is sunshiney and warm, both direct
sun and reflected light from the water can dehydrate you quickly.
Keep a sunshade of some sort over you as much as possible. Your other
problem is weather. I will suppose you know how to navigate troughs.
Beware, if you haven't been on the open ocean. I have been in storms
where green water has broken over the flight deck of an aircraft
carrier. If you haven't seen a true ocean storm, you can't imagine
it. Needless to say, if you are talking cold weather and water. You
really have a problem. Survival time in 34 degree water is a matter
of minutes.
A story.
During WW2 a British ship was sank. One survivor. A Chinese
gentleman who had worked aboard in the laundry and as a tailor. He
had his clothes and an empty wood lifeboat.
I forget exactly, but he managed to live either 4 or 6 months before
being rescued.
The fellow kept his boat very clean. In early morning hours, if
nothing else, he licked dew which collected on the sides. If it
rained, with his boat clean, or relatively so, he had an instant water
barrel.
He said that he used finger nails and teeth to chip away wood, it took
some time, until he extracted a nail. Which he bent, using teeth
which he chipped and cloth to protect his hand. He did have a small
section of rope on the boat and patiently extracted the small fibers
to make a line. His first attempt at fishing, he bit pieces from his
fingers. Wasn't very successful.
He was getting very hungry and and didn't have much water, just the
dew on the boat sides. So he was conserving his strenght. During the
height of the sun he draped his outer shirt over his head and arms and
remained as still as possible. After a few days, a sea bird which had
been drifted over him for some time, decided to land on the boat. The
bird was nervous at first by the man was patient and waited.
It took until the next day. But finally the bird was careless enough
and came close enough so that the man managed to grab it.
Being thirsty, he drank the blood from the bird and ate the eyes.
Stripped the feathers and ate some of the bird. He kept some, pulled
it into strips of me he laid out to dry. Kept the bones.
Using a couple of cracked bones (for hooks), more line, a couple of
feathers for flash and action and some bits of entrails for bait he
set out a couple of lines and started fishing again. The bones worked
better than his makeshift (and dull) nail hook. The feather and
actual bait on each line also improved things. Soon he had a fish.
Not much of one, but a fish.
And so it went for the following months. Mostly fish. Sucking as
much juice from them as possible and eating the eyes for water
content. Eating the flesh, occassionally laying some of the meat out
to dry. For a change of taste as he put it. Occassionally he would
lay a bit of meat or entrail on a spot on the boat. And stay as far
from it as he could. This way he was occassionally able to tempt a
sea bird to come and eat it. After a couple such feedings often the
bird would grow to trust him. At which time he'd catch the bird and
eat it and have more bones for the making of fish hooks.
By the time he was found the fellow had collected enough bird wings,
which he dried and tied together that he had formed a small
sunshade/roof to help protect him from the sun and rain.
The ship's doctor who first examined the man after his rescue was
rather amazed that the fellow was in good shape and had in fact lost
little weight from his ordeal.
Later, when asked if he had any words of wisdom, the fellow simply
said, "Keep your boat clean and if you see a bird, be very, very
patient."
Little story comes from a publication I read years ago. A DOD study
of people thrown into various survival situations. They were trying
to determine why, in similar situations, some lived and some died.
They had many examples to study from the war. They finally came to
the conclusion that the only real common denominator was mental
attitude. Essentially it appeared that the mental attitude of simply
being unwilling to give up made as much as a 50 percent difference in
a human's ability to withstand hardship and deprivation. Was more of
a critical factor than physical condition or anything else they could
find.
Bob
"Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors
--and miss."
---- Robert Heinlein
Gregory Lawrence
There's another book that wasn't mentioned called:
"Sailing the Farm". I don't remember the author, but it
was one of the few books on survival carried by a local
nautical store. It's about living at sea and harvesting food.
Ulysses
In article <34da16e5...@news.pclink.com>, mgil...@pclink.com (Bob
Gilbert) wrote:
>On Wed, 04 Feb 1998 13:57:34 -0800, odys...@ithica.org (Ulysses)
>wrote:
>
>>I'm a sailor, and it has occured to me that while I don't think that
>>society will crumble in two years, or any time soon for that matter, I can
>>think of several plausable situations where I would not want to put into
>>my intended port and be forced to sail much farther than intended to find
>>safety. In any case, I was wondering if anyone knew anything about long
>>term survival at sea (specifically finding balanced food sources) and the
>>possibility of self-sufficiency at sea.
>>
>>U
>
>Well Ulysses,
>
>You sure can ask a broad and undefined question.
>
>If you are a sailor I will presume you are familiar with standard
>maritime survival kits which include food, water, some medical
>supplies, etc. Most include solar stills. You might want to consider
>getting a second. Water is far more important than food.
>
<<snip>>
Thanks bob! great info, and what a story! I've never heard of anyone
surviving that long without supplies of some sort. Amazing what people
can do. I'm familiar with normal deep water conditions, but that's the
kind of thing I was curious about. Sailing tends to be a snooty sport,
and as such they don't usually tell you how to eat live birds and such :)
oh, and I feel kind of stupid being called Ulysses. My name's John, I
just have that up there to stop spam and flames. thanks again,
John
STEVEN TUCKER
Well as a Coast guardsman with 11 years of service and growing up on the
water, it is MHO that as far as survival at sea there is no such thing
as "long term self sufficiency" one way or another as humans we must all
make it back to the beach at some point. Granted how long you can stay
away from the beach is determind by how much of the beach (food fuel
parts etc.) you bring with you. Two men on a 300' freighter will last
much longer than 100 people on a 40' open hull sailboat aka. a Hatian
cruise ship.
Water is the key, with a good electric reverse osmosis water maker on
the boat and maybe a a good manual handpump reverse osmosis water maker
as a backup you can extend your duration at sea by a large margin. To
this I would add a supply of vitamins and dried fruits. Fish is a great
sourse of protein but it is not a compleat food sourse, this is why the
british navy were and still are known as limeys, becuse limes store well
and provide a sourse of vitamin C, to prevent scurvey. So unless your
boat is big enough to farm on, you will need to find a safe beach
somewhare. But with a little preperation and some thought you can extend
this period to years.
Good luck
Steve
Ulysses
In article <34DFDA...@bellsouth.net>, STEVEN TUCKER
<tuck...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>Well as a Coast guardsman with 11 years of service and growing up on the
>water, it is MHO that as far as survival at sea there is no such thing
>as "long term self sufficiency" one way or another as humans we must all
>make it back to the beach at some point. Granted how long you can stay
>away from the beach is determind by how much of the beach (food fuel
>parts etc.) you bring with you. Two men on a 300' freighter will last
>much longer than 100 people on a 40' open hull sailboat aka. a Hatian
>cruise ship.
>Water is the key, with a good electric reverse osmosis water maker on
>the boat and maybe a a good manual handpump reverse osmosis water maker
>as a backup you can extend your duration at sea by a large margin. To
>this I would add a supply of vitamins and dried fruits. Fish is a great
>sourse of protein but it is not a compleat food sourse, this is why the
>british navy were and still are known as limeys, becuse limes store well
>and provide a sourse of vitamin C, to prevent scurvey. So unless your
>boat is big enough to farm on, you will need to find a safe beach
>somewhare. But with a little preperation and some thought you can extend
>this period to years.
>
>Good luck
>
>Steve
>
Ok, clearly farming on my boat is not an option, and fish don't provide
all the necessary nutrition, but what about other things in the sea?
Certainly there's plenty of seaweed near the coast, which can be quite
nutritious, though I don't know what types are good to eat. Also, what
about planktin? I know that sounds odd, but I remember reading about some
guy that would drag a silk bag behind his boat to pick up planktin.
Probably not terribly tasty, but you might be able to make an all right
soup out of the little guys. I think they're supposed to be fairly
nutritious as well. Of course something like this would have to be well
researched. I'd want to know that I was getting all the proper
nutrients. Do you know if anyone has catalogued what besides fish are to
be eaten in the sea and what their nutritional value is?
I agree, humans do have to come in to port at some point, especially if
something goes wrong with the boat, and maybe it's not possible to get
proper nutrition from the sea, but damn, it would be great to just go
where the wind takes me without having to worry about surviving to the
next port.
John
Carl A.(Bart) Stiles
Great idea and I do agree. I keep remembering the Sterling
Hayden book "The Wanderer". Great early "rebel reading" from
my youth.
The plankton is an interesting concept, and would like to
hear more about it from "people who know".
I know the "Red Tide" is probably one to avoid, but on the
other hand, Indians used to scrape the Algae off of the
rocks and eat it like beef jerky. Very high in vitamin A (
dangerously high like the liver from Polar Bears ), but a
great source of energy and other nutritional goodies.
Isn't Plankton what sustains most Whales?
Looking forward to more on this topic.
C.A.S.