How To Survive In The Wild: Food

The Boy Scout motto is, "Be prepared". Good advice, if you don't mind doing all the work being prepared requires. I kind of glossed over that part when I was a scout. Not because I didn't think it was important, I just kind of figured I could borrow what I need or get help from someone else. Those prepared guys really were prepared for everything. I pretty much brought only the necessities, which was normally candy bars and chips. Hey, a kid had to eat.

  That was then though, and recently I have started to pay a little more attention to being prepared. See, this summer I really have developed a slight obsession with hiking. You would think as an adult I would pay more attention to safety and being prepared, but nope. The first time I went hiking it took me five hours to finish the trail and all I brought was a small bottle of Gatorade.

  Now that I have been to around 11 different parks and have seen how easy it is to get lost, being prepared is starting to enter my thoughts more and more. My main problem when it comes to being prepared for anything is, I like to travel light. Hence, carrying just a bottle of Gatorade. I know I should bring a few granola bars or PowerBars or pretzels or something that I can live off for a few days if I were to ever get lost. But like I said, I like to travel light.

  Not wanting to carry my own food left me with really only two options. One. I can bring someone with me and when we get lost I could eat them. Like in that movie, Alive. By the way, did anyone else notice that in the movie, the first thing they ate was the dead peoples butts. Gross. Two. I could study up and eat from Mother Nature's buffet. I hear she has an awesome salad bar.

  It took almost an entire weekend, but after checking out 13 books from the library and reading about half of them, I felt I could survive for months if fate should ever lead me astray. I was loaded with survival knowledge, but I am the type of person who forgets things pretty quickly if I don't practice what I learned.

  I didn't want to forget what I learned, so I asked some friends to blind fold me and drop me off deep in the middle of a forest. Granted the kidnapping me out of my bed and beating with socks full of soap wasn't something I requested they do, but I was told it added to the experience. My friends have a lot more experience with the outdoors than I do, so I went with it.


The Wild Corn Dog

  Being so deep in the forest without any way of contacting someone really had me nervous. Especially since I was having trouble finding any of the roots, bark, plants or bugs the guides told me would be edible. No worries. I figured I would just broaden my search. And after an hour or so of searching, near a lake I hit the jackpot.

  Remember when I said Mother Nature had one heck of a salad bar? Well, apparently that salad bar comes with a few meat items as well. Did you know corn dogs could be found in the wild? I didn't either and still wouldn't if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. The entire lake was surrounded by them. They grew on long stalks and gently blew back and forth in the breeze. Oh man, I could have eaten them all, but I didn't have any mustard. You can't eat a corn dog without mustard. It's just not right. So, instead of eating them, I just gathered a couple to bring home with me. I have them sitting on my counter in my kitchen. I was going to to put them in the refrigerator, but they weren't in one in the wild, and I wanted to eat them as I would there.

  I am slightly relieved to know that if I were to ever lose my way in some big forest or park that not only can I have to rely on plants and bugs to survive, but also wild corn dogs. During future hiking trips I will definitely keep an eye out for them. Who knows, I might even get lucky and find wild hamburgers or wild soft pretzels. Keeping my fingers crossed.