Four Letters Re: Coban Wrap a Must for Medical Kits

JWR,
Thank you for all your efforts. I pray they are never needed but fear otherwise. We run a safety training and supply company specializing in custom first aid/survival kits for various customers. We agree that Coban is wonderful stuff. A hint for the budget minded preppers use a vet supply house or feed store and buy “vet wrap”– same stuff at lower price. – A.K.S.

Jim:
Coban is not a panacea for your wound dressing needs.  While it does offer self-adherence,  ease of use, durability, availability, selection of sizes and colors, etc.  There are a few flaws with this material.  The first and most dangerous is while this material is self adhering, it is also progressive in nature, e.g. it will continue to tighten over the first few minutes on it’s own.  This means there is a learning curve to the proper application of Coban and serially (several times) monitoring to ensure the extremity distal (further from the heart) has not been subject to neuro-vascular compromise, this is easily done by determining light touch sensation, capillary refill, pulse and movement.  Second, it is not typically re-usable nor as durable as a simple Ace bandage.  

I have used both daily as a Physician Assistant in both Orthopedics and Emergency Medicine and both have their advantages/disadvantages, but if I had to chose, I would pack a few aces. – Charles T.

 

Hi,
I love Coban! We use it at Appleseed [rifle marksmanship training] weekends to hold pipe insulation to rifle stocks to build up cheek rests. It is great to bind anything you don’t want to mar with duct tape. We purchase it by the case from veterinarian supply houses, it is much cheaper and comes in MANY fun colors. Look for it as vet wrap. – Elizabeth B. in Colorado

Mr. Rawles,
I just wanted to echo Frank L.’s enthusiasm for the class of medical products generally known as self-adhering bandages.  In 2010 I earned my EMT certification for prep skills and I work in the EMS world on the side.  We use the self-adhering bandages for many applications.  They not only perform compression, but will also adhere when wet.  They are excellent for holding a dressing in place and are superior to medical tape for such applications.  I helped provide medical coverage for a church youth camp at a beach with 2700+ students and another 700+ adults.  We used a case of this stuff for sprains, lacerations, abrasions, and holding ice packs in place.  I keep several rolls in my personal medical gear at all times.  Avoid storing in high heat as prolonged exposure to hot temps will degrade the adhesive.  Thanks. – Old School

Economics and Investing:

Income tax will exceed 50% in California, Hawaii, and New York City

R.B.S. sent: Why You Might Only Be Able to Get Part-Time Work in 2013

Kevin A. sent: Double Your Money Selling Old Pennies by the Pound

109-Million Private Sector Jobs Paying for 88-Million Government Jobs/Welfare

Items from The Economatrix:

The European Threat To The US Recovery

The Fiscal Cliff Is A Mirage, But A Real Cliff Is Ahead

Most Accurate Forecaster Sees Lethargic U.S. Expansion

Odds ‘n Sods:

Marilyn R. sent this: Fed-up Homeowner Catches Thief in the Act with Homemade Security System.

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I just heard that until December 31st, the complete set of the excellent Homesteading for Beginners DVDs is currently being offered for $30 off retail. FWIW, we use a couple of their large clothes drying racks here at the Rawles Ranch, and we love their videos.

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Chuck keeps flinging around more legislative Schumer: Charles Schumer Makes A Move In The Senate To Deny Veterans The Right To Own Firearms . (Thanks to Jon E. for the link.)

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Detroit, Michigan descends further into societal collapse: Robbers With AK-47s Hit Two Detroit Gas Stations and Execution Style Slayings Leave Four Dead In Detroit and Detroit 2012 Murders Outpace 2011. (Thanks to H.L. for the links.)

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I stumbled into this 21-minute gem on YouTube: Stop That Tank – Classic Cartoons – Walt Disney (Boyes Anti-Tank Rifle)

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“Hear my cry, O God; attend unto my prayer.
From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock [that] is higher than I.
For thou hast been a shelter for me, [and] a strong tower from the enemy.
I will abide in thy tabernacle for ever: I will trust in the covert of thy wings. Selah.
For thou, O God, hast heard my vows: thou hast given [me] the heritage of those that fear thy name.
Thou wilt prolong the king’s life: [and] his years as many generations.
He shall abide before God for ever: O prepare mercy and truth, [which] may preserve him.
So will I sing praise unto thy name for ever, that I may daily perform my vows.” – Psalm 61 (KJV)

Notes from JWR:

Today we remember Pearl Harbor Day. The sacrifices made that day were great (2,402 lives), and the sacrifices that followed in America’s involvement in World War II, even greater. We are still indebted to that generation.

—

Today we present another entry for Round 44 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:

First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) a $300 gift certificate from CJL Enterprize, for any of their military surplus gear, E.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $300 value), and F.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo. and G.) A $200 gift certificate, donated by Shelf Reliance.

Second Prize: A.) A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training. Together, these have a retail value of $589. B.) A FloJak FP-50 stainless steel hand well pump (a $600 value), courtesy of FloJak.com. C.) A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $300, D.) A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials, E.) Two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value) and F.) A Tactical Trauma Bag #3 from JRH Enterprises (a $200 value).

Third Prize: A.) A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21. (This filter system is a $275 value.), B.) A large handmade clothes drying rack, a washboard and a Homesteading for Beginners DVD, all courtesy of The Homestead Store, with a combined value of $206, C.) Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy. This is a $185 retail value, D.) A Commence Fire! emergency stove with three tinder refill kits. (A $160 value.), and E.) Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security.

Round 44 ends on January 31st, 2013, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Survival Bikes, by Banjo

Lots of people are getting out of their cars and onto bikes these days, because of the high cost of gasoline , parking hassles, and concerns about staying physically fit. When natural disasters or terrorist acts strike, people repeatedly find that a good bicycle is a fine thing to have. On a “bang for the buck” basis, the bicycle is one of the finest travel machines Mankind has devised. When the motor vehicle was still in its infancy, armies the world over were putting their troops on bicycles. The armies knew they could move a lot of soldiers, with gear, impressive distances in impressively short times.

I highly recommend bicycles as part of your preps. A bike for each member of your family or group is best, and having ridden around on them quite a bit, I have some definite opinions on what’s best to look for in a “survival bike”. It should be durable, comfortable, versatile, and easy to work on. I should note that my experience is in the US, so if you’re outside the US you might want to translate what I recommend to your local area. But I think the kind of bike I recommend is fairly universal.

First, any bike is better than no bike at all. Secondly, your survival bike should be one you’re familiar with, ride often, and are comfortable on. It will be your every-day, or at least one of your everyday bikes. If you have more than one it may be your “winter bike”, or the one you do grocery errands on, or putt around on your local trails or unpaved roads. Consider it a mule who’s an old friend who you can always count on.

So, what’s best to get? Let’s work from the wheels up. These days you’ll see a lot of skinny bikes with skinny wheels and little, skinny, tire valves. These skinny ones are called Presta, generally need a different pump head, are more complicated to use, and are generally on skinny wheels on the kind of bikes I don’t favor. We don’t need to win a bike race here, and we don’t need European-standard valves. I also say avoid the old skinny-tire 10-speeds, the one your Dad may have bought in the 1960s and left you, for instance. These have Schrader-valve wheels, but they’re an older standard for “vintage” skinny-tire bikes, and tires and tubes can be hard to find, in limited choices, these days. Leave all this skinny-tire stuff to the racers, messenger kids, and vintage-bike enthusiasts. Stick with the Schrader valve, the Schrader valve is found on car tires, pumps that fit it are found everywhere, and in the US it’s by far the most common, proven, and user-friendly valve type.

What I recommend is, you get a bike that has 26″ wheels. That’s the standard in the US and is found on cruisers, a lot of “city” or “commuter” bikes, and on the tons and tons of mountain bikes that are out there. You want something you can get tires and tubes for everywhere, fill up just about anywhere, and there are pumps widely available.

An older mountain bike is what I recommend. What goes under the name “mountain bike” these days is most often something I’d avoid. The reason is, almost all of them have suspension, springs and shock absorbers, on them. Those are to be avoided. They have their place, but on a general-purpose bike all they do is make the ride mushy, wasting your pedal-power, make the bike heavier, and add complication and expense. Sure, they cushion the bumps, but that’s what pneumatic tires were invented for. The high-end bikes are very expensive, and made for “downhill” riding, going fast and bouncing over stuff. You won’t do that with your bike, you’ll lift it over that log etc. The big-box store cheapo mountain bikes are made to look “hi-tech” and are heavy, inefficient, and really not much fun to ride. Any big-box store bike isn’t going to last, and at their low cost they’re still too expensive. This is why I like older, “hard-tail”, mountain bikes. When mountain bikes were a new thing, people were willing to pay a premium price for them. Also, the manufacturers weren’t sure how roughly they’d be treated, so they tended to build them really well. This was the age of quality steel frames (look for Cromoly or Cro-Mo, on a sticker on the frame) with lugged construction which means at every joining point, the steel is double-thickness. Look up “lugged bicycle frame” on a search engine’s images, it’s a very handy thing to know how to identify.

These older, non-suspension mountain bikes have often been living in garages for a decade or two, and since a lot of people don’t appreciate what they are, you can get them reasonably. They often have stainless-steel spokes on the wheels, and often the wheels are made by Araya, a Japanese wheel maker well-known for making motorcycle wheels. These are signs of quality to look for. In fact as a rule-of-thumb, if the spokes aren’t stainless-steel, pass on it. Stainless spokes will have a dullish shine and feel smooth when you run your fingers down them.

I recommend garage sales and thrift stores and so on for price, over Internet sites because I feel the prices trend high on sites where someone has to go through some effort to list it and describe it, and likewise there’s a large, well-informed public scanning the ads. You want the bike that gets pulled out for the garage sale “because we’ve had that old thing forever” and so on. Just remember: look for quality.

You’ll want to look into bike fit, seats, various rack and pannier systems, etc. You can go fancy on racks, but the humble folding wire jobs that hang off of a rear rack are better than nothing by far. At the high end you have Ortlieb panniers, and then there are many types of homemade panniers made out of buckets and ammo boxes and so on. There are lots of plans online. A basket on the front looks a bit nerdy but they’re extremely useful. Put one on and you’ll wonder how you got by without it. Trailers, and those made by Burley are generally the best, are an additional thing. You can carry 100 pounds in a Burley Nomad, for instance. Again, look for them used, as they’re quite pricey new.

Now some more about tires and tubes and wheels. After all, they really are where the rubber meets the road! First, you may have heard of a product called Slime. If you have “goat head” (Tribulus terrestris) weeds growing in your area, Slime is going to be a must-have. You can get tubes with it already installed, or you can put it in – the directions on the bottle are very easy to follow. You should know how to fix a flat anyway, and 26″ wheels seem to be about the easiest to work on, as far as changing out tires and tubes. I recommend learning how to patch a tube, using the old-school patch kit with the “vulcanizing” cement in the little tube. Tubes are expensive these days! I’m about to go back to my old rule from my college days: Re-tire a tube after three patches.

Used bicycle tubes are extremely useful for all kinds of uses, so don’t throw ’em out. For tires, with Slime, the tires you get with the bike should be fine, assuming they’re not old and dried out (look for cracking in the sides of the tires). There are some highly regarded tires with Kevlar in them for hard usage like touring, or police-bicycle work, like the Schwalbe Marathon. If you’ve got to have “the” tires and have the budget, by all means get ’em. But you can get tires in all price ranges. Don’t forget rim-bands, which are little strips of rubber or plastic that cover the nipples (bases) of the spokes inside the rim – uncovered, those will eventually wear through the tube and give you a flat. Remember that the tube needs a little TLC; if you get a flat, you must remember to check the tire to make sure the thorn, piece of glass, etc., that caused the flat isn’t still in the tire.

You can buy bike stuff in a bike shop of course, and it’s good to patronize your local bike shop just like any small business. But if you’re on a budget or stocking up, that big ‘Mart can’t be beat. Or your local hardware store. There’s a large population of people who go around by bike and are on a budget, and “dime stores” and their descendants generally have a bike department with basic tires, tubes, lights, all the things utilitarian riders need.

I suggest stocking up things that wear, like tires, tubes, grips, rim-bands, seats, pedals, cables, brake pads, all kinds of “consumables”. Tires don’t store well in the sun, so a dark part of the garage is much better. The rubber actually ages just from exposure to air, so if you are really serious you can put a bunch of tires, tubes, and rim bands in a 55-gallon drum or something with nitrogen (sold at car-parts places to fill tires with) or at least an oxygen absorber.

I want you to get the best bang for your buck, so I really suggest you check garage sales, church sales, places like that for bikes and parts. Lots of small things like a decent seat … that’ll run you a minimum of $20 at a bike shop and often quite a bit more, are often found looking for a home at a garage or church sale for a few dollars. Grips, tubes, really every little part, will show up at bargain-basement prices. What I’m leery of and think you should be, is the large commercially-run “swap meet” or “flea market” because a lot of stolen bikes show up at those. You can being a smartphone and check against the listings on the National Bike Registry (NationalBikeRegistry.com) but what if the owner didn’t register theirs? You just can’t tell. One suggestion is to get a bill of sale and take a photo of the seller’s driver’s license, and if they won’t let you do that, steer clear. Be careful in the jungle of deals-too-good-to-be-true.

Helmets are a personal choice in most areas, also in a lot of areas they’re not a choice if you’re a minor. I’m not going to recommend buying a used “lid”, fortunately there are a lot of them out there new at reasonable prices. A more expensive helmet may be lighter, cooler in hot weather, or the one worn by this year’s World champion, but it’s not necessarily any safer than a sensibly-priced one. The one opinion I have about helmets is, if you wear one, might as well get a light-colored one, like yellow. It will increase your visibility to drivers, although in tough times you may not want to be seen so easily. That’s when you get out the camo tape.

Lastly, if you have to visit one bike site online, check out Sheldon Brown’s site. Sheldon has passed and will be missed, but his bike shop has kept his work online because it’s so helpful, friendly, and comprehensive. In fact it can be almost overwhelming so the other resources I recommend are videos on YouTube, and classes, generally free, held by your local bike shop or bike club.

Short and sweet:

* Bikes have moved armies, officially and un-officially. They can move you.
* 26″ wheels, with Schrader valves, by far the most common in the US; that’s desirable.
* Get an older mountain bike, no suspension, Cro-Moly frame, stainless steel spokes.
* Learn to use Slime
* You can build a fine stable of bikes from thrift, garage, and church sales.
* Stock up on consumables, like tubes and tires.
* There are a few things you always buy new. Bike helmets are one of them.
* Learn more from Sheldon Brown, YouTube, local shops, clubs, and groups.

Letter Re: In-Extremis Travel; Red Light, Green Light, Yellow Light

JWR:
Regarding the recent article by “Will Prep”:

The otherwise well written article with lots of good information overlooked mentioning amateur (ham) radio as the very best mode of communications when he asks: “What will I do for Communications?” Any General or higher class ham with a few radios that he/she uses on a regular basis will have no problems with communications!

“Will Prep” must have lots more spare cash than the average person to even mention satellite phones!

Thanks again to JWR for this great site! Keep up the good work. – Ken M.

Economics and Investing:

The Coming Derivatives Panic That Will Destroy Global Financial Markets. [JWR Adds: I’ve been warning you about derivatives since 2006.]

R.B.S. sent: Obama Slaps States That Don’t Comply With Obamacare

Also from R.B.S.: More Signs of Silver Shortage

Items from The Economatrix:

Shopper “Fatigue” Hurt Retails Sales Last Week

Home Prices Up 6.3% In October From Last Year. [JWR’s Comment: It is remarkable what hundreds of billions of Dollars created out of thin air and the fantasy land ZIRP can create, in the short term. ]

“We Are In The Midst Of The Keynesian Depression”

US Households Already Went Off Their Fiscal Cliff And Breached Their Debt Ceiling–US Quickly Approaching Another Debt Ceiling Limit Aligning With The Fiscal Cliff

Odds ‘n Sods:

You gotta love Texas: Burglar calls 911 to save himself from gun-wielding homeowner (Thanks to T.J. G. for the link.)

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James C. sent this sign of the times: Missouri Farmers Fight Rise In Hay Thefts

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File under: Jackboot Mega Overkill: FBI and State Police Conduct Massive Manhunt and Raid Against Prepper Who Was Angry Over Obama Reelection

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Sasol to Build the First Ever Gas-to-Liquid Plant in the US

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I just heard that Ready Made Resources now has the PS-24 FLIR Scout thermal imaging scope on sale for $1,895, with free shipping.

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“There aren’t any great men. There are just great challenges that ordinary men like you and me are forced by circumstances to meet.” – Admiral William Frederick “Bull” Halsey Jr.

Notes from JWR:

Jenny of The Last Frontier blog has reported the tragic death of her husband, in an accident. Please keep Jenny and her two young sons in your prayers. She mentioned that they are moving back to their homestead for the rest of the winter. I’ll post word if I hear about a memorial fund. (She hadn’t been posting to her blog much in the past couple of years because of the high cost of flying in propane for their genset. She and her husband built their Alaska homestead on a limited budget.)

—

Today we present another entry for Round 44 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:

First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) a $300 gift certificate from CJL Enterprize, for any of their military surplus gear, E.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $300 value), and F.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo. and G.) A $200 gift certificate, donated by Shelf Reliance.

Second Prize: A.) A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol and a SIRT AR-15/M4 Laser Training Bolt, courtesy of Next Level Training. Together, these have a retail value of $589. B.) A FloJak FP-50 stainless steel hand well pump (a $600 value), courtesy of FloJak.com. C.) A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $300, D.) A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials, E.) Two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value) and F.) A Tactical Trauma Bag #3 from JRH Enterprises (a $200 value).

Third Prize: A.) A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21. (This filter system is a $275 value.), B.) A large handmade clothes drying rack, a washboard and a Homesteading for Beginners DVD, all courtesy of The Homestead Store, with a combined value of $206, C.) Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy. This is a $185 retail value, D.) A Commence Fire! emergency stove with three tinder refill kits. (A $160 value.), and E.) Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security.

Round 44 ends on January 31st, 2013, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Arctic Survival Footwear, by Richard M.

In a survival situation whether this is a crashed airplane, lost on hunt or a collapse scenario where normal items become scare, inexpensive or both knowing how to construct your own arctic survival footwear could be the difference between life and death, comfort or pure agony!

I was reading this old book called “THE ARCTIC SURVIVAL GUIDE” written by Alan Innes-Taylor for the Scandinavian Airline System in 1957, it has a lot of good info in it, and I believe most of it is the same info that is in some of the old US AIR FORCE Arctic Survival Manuals from the same period. Among the various survival techniques described in these books are some very primitive yet effective techniques. These include:

MOOSE HOCK SHOES
One way to get a nice pair of shoes is to use a method of footwear as old as the caveman.
For this you can use the hock skin of caribou, moose, elk or any large game animal.
Basically look at the animals foot, where the bend is that area above and below is what you are going to use, tailor it to your own foot. 
CUT A: Will be the area above the bend that will be body of the boot that goes up your leg, make sure it is long enough to make it med calf so it will be like a legging of sorts
CUT B: Will be BELOW the Bend and will be sewn up to keep your toes from hanging out!
• You will want to cut Areas A & B all the way around and deep.
• Separate from the Leg and pull it off over the hoof, you now basically have a L shaped piece of hide.
• In a less immediate survival situation you could clean and tan the hide, for long term use.  In a survival situation, try to scrap the loose bits of meat off as best you can, but this is about survival and getting home, so a little left on there is ok, just not optimal.
• At part B (the bottom end) sew that up with whatever you have (This is why a Paracord Belt would be great! the fibers from a piece of paracord would work perfect!)
• Then poke holes with the bottle opener/leather punch (if you have  a Leatherman handy) or just holes from a knife will work fine to create holes for laces.
• Then take the laces from the destroyed boots if possible or paracord(see another use, I’m not kidding about how useful that stuff is buy Spools!)
You know have a decent footwear.  Don’t discard this as “gross” or too “primitive living”, try walking on a nice day through the woods with just socks, now imagine that in Arctic, cold weather survival situation!
Since the Moose provides you with four hocks, you can make two pairs of these shoes, and be able to change them out whenever you need to, definitely take advantage of the material to make a second pair.

Note:  The Book “ARCTIC MANUAL” which was written by  Vilhjalmur Stefansson for the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1944,  is an excellent resource for many different arctic survival needs, recommends caribou for homestead/primitive living boots.

“The sole, shoepac type as always, is of August or September bull Caribou, and form the back skin.  October hides are sometimes used but as said, the skins get thinner as the season advances…August or early September bootsole is so durable that on snow exclusively, or on snow and grassland, one pair of soles will carry you a thousand miles at least.”
Pretty neat stuff right?

Your Moose hock shoes will work fine, but what they lack is insulation, this leads me to the next thing to consider…

GRASS LINING/INSOLES
Simple grass has been used by northern natives and hard living European hunters/trappers, etc for a long time to help augment the insulating factor of your socks, or to preserve your socks as well.
The biggest killer in an arctic environment is not the cold as much as it is inaction or getting wet.
When you walk around for awhile you start to perspire (sweat) For a quick walk in the woods, this is ok, but in a true survival situation you will want to slow your pace enough to keep you warm and conserve energy as well as to control your perspiration.  If you have good insulating boots and socks your feet will perspire, making your socks wet and when you stop that wetness will turn ice cold.

Grass insoles are good for three things
• Good dry grass will absorb the perspiration and your socks will be dryer
• The Grass will add another layer of insulation to keep your feet warm (as you get colder your body will make sure the core stays warm and your extremities such as your hands and feet will get much cooler)
• The grass can provide more cushion to your feet AND insulation if you are wearing improvised footwear like the moose hock shoes mentioned above.
How to make the insoles
• You will want to take ANY tall grass that grows throughout the north.  Grasp large handful in both hands (the guide mentions a “sheaf” of grass, basically enough so both your hands, on on top of each other, aren’t touching) twist it in opposite directions.  take that bundle and fluff it up into oblong shapes so it is “fluffed up” like a nest (this is so there is air insulation in between the grass).
• Make sure this oblong shape is “foot like” but wider than your actual foot and a inch thick, carefully put that into your shoe/boot.

GRASS LINING
If you have socks (hopefully a couple) use this to further your insulation.
• Put your first sock on
• Using the same method for the insoles put that in your second larger sock and roll it down so it is very short
• Carefully put your foot in, and try to have overlap over the edges onto the top of your foot with grass.
• Pack loose grass around the open space all the way up the sock, rolling it up as you go.
Now the picture in the book shows parachute fabric as the outer layer, this is a military manual and is for pilots that have to bail out of their aircraft, so they would have this available.  This same method would work perfectly with the moose hock shoe, depending on the size of the moose and the room you have inside.
At night or long periods of rest take these out and dry them.  Discard them if possible in place of new grass if you can find it.
If you cant find dry grass, make a wooden “grate” and attempt to dry the grass on that, you could take rocks and put them in the fire to warm them and then place them under the grate to dry the grass or just set them near enough to dry but don’t let them catch fire of course!
 
The Hudson Bay Duffle

Another form of insulation for boots or improvised footwear could be the “Hudson Bay Duffle”

The Hudson Bay Company had a trade with the Natives for insulated socks.  They would make triangular pieces of fabric from soft blankets and sell them for use inside of Moccasins.
All you need is some piece of cloth cut into a triangle, and you stick your foot in that with it pointing towards one point of the cloth.
Edge 1: Is the point in front of your foot
Edge 2: Is the point to the left of your foot
Edge 3: Is to the right of your foot.
• Edge 1 would go straight over the top of the foot
• Edge 2 and 3 would be wrapped OVER the instep
The “completed” Duffle would look rough but useable.
This would then be eased into the moccasin and firmly lashed. DONE

This has a few advantages over socks:
1. Depending on material it could be washed and dried quickly
2. Foot can be placed differently to help even out wear, and avoid holes that may form in the heel
3. It can be made from any soft material, from jackets, to multiple shirts, blankets, etc.
You can definitely use this if you have an extra blanket in your pack that you can cut a piece from, then use Grass as an insole and then put inside the Moose Hock shoe.
I would definitely try to get your hands on these books if possible, check out local libraries or see if libraries in other areas would loan them to yours so you can check them out. 

Letter Re: Coban Wrap a Must for Medical Kits

Dear James:
I’m a long time reader and love the SurvivalBlog site. I really wanted to point out one little thing that  I think is a very important item in any kit: Coban Wrap. (Sold under several brand names.)
 
I’m a former medic and now live in the northeast on the water. I have young kids and we do some of boating and spend a fair amount of time on the remote rocky beaches of the area. When we got here earlier in the year I put together a little first aid kit focused on multi-use items and scalability and try to keep it with me especially when we’re far from emergency services. I broke into the kit a lot this summer and the one thing that stood out was how glad I was to have Coban.
 
Coban’s a self adhering wrap and I’ve been impressed its versatility for a while. This last summer I used it many times.
Here’s what it came out of the kit for this summer (these are off duty situations):

  • Foot laceration. Happened in the ocean, nasty cut. Coban kept pressure on and sand out. It really helped with the long walk out.
  • Compression wrap on a metal door to forearm collision. Was told it helped a lot.
  • Ankle sprain.
  • As [the equivalent of] an Ace bandage on my own sprained knee while wade fishing. This got me through the half mile walk home over a very rocky shoreline.
  • Stabilization of a large fishhook in a young girl’s foot. Seemed to calm her down and let her parents get her to the Emergency Room.
     

That’s what I actually used it for in just one 2-month period as a civilian… In more dire trauma situations it’s an extra hand when there are multiple wounds and holds things together a lot faster than tape. Many problems big and small can be addressed with a roll of Coban and a trauma pad and I keep both of them even in my smallest kit.
 
Suffice to say that I think the versatility of Coban is worth noting especially since it is rarely supplied in stock first aid kit lists. I’d urge folks to consider adding it to their kits.
 
Best Wishes, – Frank L.

Letter Re: Making Our Bug Out Bags Work: Shaving Weight

Hi James:
I can attest to the veracity of the recent article Making Our Bug Out Bags Work: Shaving Weight. My journey to cut weight was spawned by a previous article from your blog.

This past May I went camping and hiked 22 miles in 3 days with my bug out bag. The weight was around 41 pounds which is considered light by most standards. I’m 31 years old and in pretty good shape, run 10-15 miles a week and exercise. But just that amount of weight was tougher than I expected, it exhausted me, and caused me to get blisters on both feet.  So for all those people with 50-70 pound bags I suggest they wake up to reality and actually test out their system.

Since then I’ve cut the weight of my pack down to 28.5 pounds total, with four days of food and one day of water, sleeping system, tent, pad, first aid, minimal gear, rain gear, clothes to sleep in, and a 2nd change of clothes.  My base pack weight (minus food, water, fuel) is 17 pounds. I can tell you that is a huge difference. I’ve also started walking with my pack each week to build up those back muscles that rarely get used. Yesterday alone I did 6.2 miles without a problem and the week before I walked a total of 13. 

I suggest everyone with a bug out bag go walk 5 miles with it as it currently is. Upon returning I bet everyone will be ready to cut weight! “Ounces Equal Pounds and Pounds Equal Pain”. – Regards From Joshua H.