Rough Camping & Survival Tips

[Ridge Runner]

@Ridge Runner - that sounds like a WALT DISNEY idea or if you are trying to be “Squirrel Friendly” then spreading around bread & peanuts is a good idea but it certainly isn’t entering into a “Squirrel Contract” where they agree to leave your other food alone. Any tips for feeding Bears?

It's what works for me as the coons and squirrels don't bother my camp. When I don't put out an alternative the buggers terrorize my camp.

If your taking what I said about making a contract or pack with the critters literally perhaps you need to get a life, or at least get out and away from your keyboard more often.

It is illegal to bait bears in Tennessee. However, during the bear hunting season, should a bear invite itself into my camp while I'm fixing myself something to hot to eat. There's a good possibility it will be getting a ride to my home
in the bed of my truck ....with a couple of extra holes in its body.

 

[HankBuck]

It's what works for me as the coons and squirrels don't bother my camp. When I don't put out an alternative the buggers terrorize my camp.

If your taking what I said about making a contract or pack with the critters literally perhaps you need to get a life, or at least get out and away from your keyboard more often.

It is illegal to bait bears in Tennessee. However, during the bear hunting season, should a bear invite itself into my camp while I'm fixing myself something to hot to eat. There's a good possibility it will be getting a ride to my home
in the bed of my truck ....with a couple of extra holes in its body.

@Ridge Runner - jeez Ridge….get a sense of Humor, at least one as funny as your Squirrel camping tips or harder nuts to bust !

 

[BigSteve57]

Never underestimate raccoons and squirrels!.

Attended or unattended coolers; raccoons (plural, cause there is seldom just one) who are use to people will sneak around your camp at night and can easy open any cooler...even latched...in literally seconds, and while you are sleeping nearby.

Squirrels on the other will knaw and /or claw their way into tents and pop-up campers' canvas to get food,.....even while unsuspecting campers mill around camp.

I've been the victim of multiple raccon night raids.

I am easily amused watching squirrels raiding campers' tents, campers, and picnic tables. Squirrels will watch campers move from inside their tent or camper to the "eating/ outside area", then the squirrels with tactically enter the rent or pop-up camper through a hole the squirrels have made. When the campers' go to their tent or pop-up camper the squirrels will run out and go after food in the "eating/outside area".

When the campers start squealing/screaming the squirrels will scurry off to find another unsuspecting camper/campsite.

In my observations squirrels don't mind barking dogs in or around campsites the squirrels intend to raid. On the other hand campersites with cats around are avoided by squirrels.

Over my many years of camping whether, but especially in parks, I have learned to pack 1 loaf of bread and/or bag of peanuts per day while camping as "insurance payments". Usually a 1/2 loaf of bread or peanuts in the morning will "insure my camp won't be "raided" by squirrels during the day. The other 1/2 loaf is distributed at a safe distance, at night, around my campsite as "payment" to prevent my campsite from being raided by raccoons.

Just an observation, during the night deer also have a tendency to sneak into and check around unsuspecting campers' campsites for: bread, cheese crackers, peanut butter crackers, plain crackers, most any fresh fruit and vegetables, plastic containers (jars) of: jams, jellies, and peanut butter.

Interesting. My wife and i tent camp in a 10x10ft springbar tent. One of our biggest worries was our expensive tent being chewed by rodents. So we sprayed with mint rodent repellent and set traps around the tent and around the tires of our suv. We also never ever had food in the tent. We trapped a bunch of mice. One guy in a campground in Florida told us he traps between 10-20 mice PER DAY. All he said he does is set up a dozen Victor traps and baits them with a bit of peanut butter.

We've never had any damage from squirrels, raccoons or mice while camping. Still, I hate rodents.

EDIT: I'm going to pack a Conibear 110 on our next camping trip. It does a super job on squirrels.

 

[observe]

The year was 1907, twenty years before his famed disappearance, and British explorer, Percy Fawcett, was floating down the Rio Negro in a long boat, surrounded by his indigenous crew.
Sources say, he saw the beast’s great triangular head lifting from the water near the bow of the boat and opened fire.
He would strike the creature in the back and after a small struggle the snake was dead.
“We stepped ashore and approached the reptile with caution. It was out of action, but shivers ran up and down the body like puffs of wind on a mountain tarn. As far as it was possible to measure, a length of 45 feet lay out of the water, and 17 feet in it, making a total length of 62 feet ...” Fawcett wrote in his journal.
Percy Fawcett was known for being a no nonsense and “scrupulous matter-of-fact military man”.
He was working for the Royal Geographical Society when he recorded this encounter, mapping out the Abuna and Acre rivers.
So is it possible that giant snakes exist or recently existed in the deepest parts of the Amazon? After all, the largest snake ever recognized by science was found in that general area….
???/?
?????

 

[observe]

 

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[observe]

 

[observe]

??

 

[Ridge Runner]

Interesting. My wife and i tent camp in a 10x10ft springbar tent. One of our biggest worries was our expensive tent being chewed by rodents. So we sprayed with mint rodent repellent and set traps around the tent and around the tires of our suv. We also never ever had food in the tent. We trapped a bunch of mice. One guy in a campground in Florida told us he traps between 10-20 mice PER DAY. All he said he does is set up a dozen Victor traps and baits them with a bit of peanut butter.

We've never had any damage from squirrels, raccoons or mice while camping. Still, I hate rodents.

EDIT: I'm going to pack a Conibear 110 on our next camping trip. It does a super job on squirrels.

Check with state trapping laws. Even setting traps to protect your campsite could be considered: poaching, trapping out of season, illegal baiting, etc. Plus other legal actions should someone's pet be injured or killed by a trap.

 

[BigSteve57]

Check with state trapping laws. Even setting traps to protect your campsite could be considered: poaching, trapping out of season, illegal baiting, etc. Plus other legal actions should someone's pet be injured or killed by a trap.

True enough. Thanks for the reminder.

 

[BigSteve57]

View attachment 660847

My Beretta 92FS will actually fail to cycle properly without a firm grip resulting in stove pipes and failures to feed. It took me a while to figure that out. I imagine other semi-auto handguns would do the same if a weak hold absorbs too much of the recoil necessary to reliably work the action.

 

[HankBuck]

Check with state trapping laws. Even setting traps to protect your campsite could be considered: poaching, trapping out of season, illegal baiting, etc. Plus other legal actions should someone's pet be injured or killed by a trap.

@Ridge Runner - if the only traps set are “Mouse traps” they are exempt from State trapping laws, do Not require a trapping license in any State, there is No trapping Season for mice in any State. Whether it would be covered under some Campsite or Park “rule” ?? Can’t imagine a problem ever from setting a Mouse trap near your tent but then there is always “California” and might be a Felony, fine, & imprisonment there.

 

[Ridge Runner]

@Ridge Runner - if the only traps set are “Mouse traps” they are exempt from State trapping laws, do Not require a trapping license in any State, there is No trapping Season for mice in any State. Whether it would be covered under some Campsite or Park “rule” ?? Can’t imagine a problem ever from setting a Mouse trap near your tent but then there is always “California” and might be a Felony, fine, & imprisonment there.

Interesting. My wife and i tent camp in a 10x10ft springbar tent. One of our biggest worries was our expensive tent being chewed by rodents. So we sprayed with mint rodent repellent and set traps around the tent and around the tires of our suv. We also never ever had food in the tent. We trapped a bunch of mice. One guy in a campground in Florida told us he traps between 10-20 mice PER DAY. All he said he does is set up a dozen Victor traps and baits them with a bit of peanut butter.

We've never had any damage from squirrels, raccoons or mice while camping. Still, I hate rodents.

EDIT: I'm going to pack a Conibear 110 on our next camping trip. It does a super job on squirrels.

@HankBuck

I was referring to @BigSteve57 Edit. See the highlighted Bold Italicized text.

Standard Small Spring Mouse Traps shouldn't be a problem. However, those Larger Spring Traps Designed to Trap Rats can also catch/kill squirrels. [Good for getting rid of those nuisance squirrels in the attic]. Not sure what, if, any effect these type rat traps would have on raccoons.

 

[Safari Dave]

A porcupine destroyed quite a but of stuff (including MY favorite backpacking chair) when my son and daughter-in-law were backpacking in the Rockies a couple of years ago.


They did everything they could (because the were in grizzly country) to get every scrap of food far away from their tent, but the porcupine was undeterred. (got part of a backpack (sweat residue?), my chair, any maybe even a little of their tent.)

Mousetraps might be a good way to go.

I've had good luck with protecting vehicles with rodent repellent spray.

 

[Safari Dave]

I've had the pleasure of trying to use a muzzleloader on several humid and rainy days.

I don't think it was bow & arrows that made the Indians lose, I think it had more to do with numbers...


Could you imagine trying to get a flintlock to work in the rain in 1770?

Give me a bow any day!





BTW - I picked up a few statistics the other day...

American Indians voted for Trump more than any other demographic group - 63%

Also - American Indians prefer to be called "American Indians" much more than any other term used to describe them.