Wilderness Deficiency

Wilderness Deficiency

I had half-written a blog post earlier this week, and trashed it, because I was rambling and not making my point. Today, I stumbled across an article that helps focus the issue I wanted to bring attention to: the benefits of being outdoors. I think it can be broader than that, though, a communion with nature, solitude, even meditation in the midst of the natural world can be of enormous benefit to us, regardless of the practice of wilderness skills, which is what I'm mostly focused on here.  But the point is, get outdoors - it's good for you.

From The Nature Conservancy:

I too am scared of nature sometimes. I’m guilty of listening to the stories of one-in-a-million accidents and giving into irrational fears. Heck, my cousin has Lyme disease. What if my daughter, Kareena, got Lyme disease? Or what if the unthinkable happened—a drowning, a broken neck?

But then I realize: No one discusses the successes. Getting up the mountain or through the rapids is not news. But in truth, the risk of a freak accident is, by definition, miniscule, and the benefits of persevering are enormous. Being outside provides a sense of accomplishment, no matter what you’re doing—hiking, looking for bugs, kayaking. And it offers real biological benefits that far outweigh the risks.

Parents and grandparents have intuitively known about these benefits for years. Now, the medical community is getting behind them too.

Full Article 

One thing I've noticed about life in these United States, is that we've made it a challenging experience to actually get outdoors. There's a permit or fee just about everywhere you go. It's not near where we live, since most of us live in cities now. It takes effort to crack time out of our busy schedules. It's temporary, meaning you can only go for a short stay... long treks in true wilderness are getting very rare. Nevermind trying to live out there, unless you've come into enough money to buy yourself a piece of remote land, bought the permits to build a dwelling there, and can afford the taxes and upkeep. The days of going to the mountain to ponder life in a cave for months are unobtainable in this country, in this time. So the best we can hope for is to sample it, get a little taste now and then, and hope it's good enough for our soul in the long term.

I read the article the other day about a woman getting in trouble for letting her kid play in the park unsupervised. Such play-time was a staple for me as a child, as I've written before. It's sad that we seem to be exerting conscious effort in moving away from the very activities that produced generations of rugged people, and now we're finding some really solid reasons to go back to that kind of activity, but our policies and laws try and sell us on the illusion of total safety and control, if only we're willing to deny our kids the freedom of exploration, of risk, and God forbid, discovery of the real world, and not our manufactured artifices we dull them with every day.

City Mouse, Country Mouse

City Mouse, Country Mouse

As a man in my 40's, I remember a distinct difference between city living, and country life. I was raised in Portland Oregon when I was a child, but always spent time in the summer at my grandparent's homes, which were far more rural. One set lived near the water in Washington, with woods just behind the house, the others lived in Oregon farm country for a few years, raising filberts and grass (as far as I could tell when I was 7). The difference between these two great summer vacation choices, and my home in the city, was obvious to me even as a young boy.

In the city, there were pretty distinct boundaries. I couldn't go past the end of the street alone, I could go to the corner store with a friend (3 blocks away) and we'd walk to school in a loose herd, but there were real limits. Playgrounds were concrete, stone, and asphalt. I had a mud hole in the backyard, where I was free to dig in good weather, provided I rinsed off before coming in, and there are still probably a dozen matchbox cars buried in that lawn the current owners know nothing about. I remember getting a pocketknife at some point, but not being able to do much with it there in town. As an only child, I ended up spending a lot of time indoors, entertaining myself with model cars, and a vivid imagination.

But when I went to the grandparents, it was a different story altogether. My physical boundaries expanded, my unsupervised world grew, and my activities were naturally outdoor-oriented, even if there weren't any friends to play with. I learned about trees, water, boats, fishing, knife use, fires, and maybe a few fireworks. It was like living another life, when I stack the memories up against each other now, many years later. What struck me, was the kids who lived out by the farm, or up against the woods, whose home was those places, taught me a lot by their familiarity with it. They were used to doing things differently than I did them in the city, and we're all familiar with the old story of the mice, one who lived in the city and one who lived in the country. They each specialize in different things, and live very different lives.

What's this got to do with Scouting?

We have a Scouting program to help get our city-fied kids out in the woods once in a while, and try to teach them how to do things in a more natural environment.  If we're lucky, some of it sticks. There's only one problem: all the available places to camp, especially here on the East Coast (but I hear reports of it out West as well) have so many rules, so many restrictions, that one is forced to endure a thin copy of what used to be a "rugged moment" in a boy's life.  You can't cut your own firewood, you can't pick up dead wood even, lest the fungus have nowhere to grow with the heavy use these campgrounds survive, but you can buy a bundle of wet firewood for $8 at the camp store if you like. Oh, and don't bring it with you, there's a beetle problem and we don't want people spreading invasive and destructive species. So we get just enough to heat up a foil dinner and maybe roast a marshmallow, and probably lit it with some match-lite charcoal, and didn't put much thought into fire lays, or starting techniques, or whittling fuzz sticks or even finding and preparing tinder and kindling in any meaningful way. The tent pitches easily on flat ground, where ten thousand have been pitched before. The cooler has fresh ice, so we don't worry about managing our food for a simple overnight. We're at home, except there's not much of a roof over it... but for all intents and purposes, we've not really left our mindset behind and because of that, there's little room for a new one to creep in.

This hit me in the stomach the last evening of our High Adventure this summer, when one young man told me that his big lesson of the week was the importance of woods tools, and how he'd never really had to use them before. This is one of my high-flying Eagle Scouts. A natural leader, charismatic, achieved and decorated, and as experienced as any kid coming through our program. And he'd never really had to use an axe, or a saw, or a knife, for days of firewood prep just to boil water for dinner, or dry his clothes, or keep warm at night. Now I understand our Wilderness Survival High Adventure is a bit challenging, but it's just built on a set of basic Scouting skills, and I was surprised to learn that these skills were not as common as I'd assumed they were, and the youth were not nearly as practiced in them as they ought to be by the time they're finishing High School and getting ready to enter the world as Men.

It exposed a weakness, in my opinion, of city-based Scouting programs. That weakness is, the ease of which we assume we're doing a good job just because we're getting them out camping every couple of months, and that they're getting through the advancement to Eagle Scout. But these alone do not make a man prepared to deal with the outdoors, not really. It takes more focus on the things they actually learn. It takes repeated practice at things that, because of our limited camping options, are becoming harder and harder to do. That means we, as leaders, need to put in some extra effort to make sure they have the opportunities to really learn and put into practice the basic skills that we assume Eagle Scouts carry around with them.

How to accomplish this? I think the mental discipline is the hardest part... to be aware of how we might be missing something, and then actively plug the gap, is the first and greatest challenge. Survey the boys' skills. Put them to the test, challenge them to skills and see if they have it, or fail for lack of either real teaching, or for lack of practice at what they might have once learned.  Bushcraft skills are perishable, like so many other skills that require good hand-eye coordination, focus, and discipline to accomplish safely, efficiently, and effectively. Theory is great, but observation under real conditions is priceless, and a variety of conditions for every outdoor task is needed to provide a well-trained and capable Scout. then we must create an environment where they can have these opportunities. I have a fire pit in my backyard, and plenty of cuttings from trees and bushes in a pile. Inviting the boys over to practice preparing that wood for a small cooking fire, and then making them start the fire over, and over, and over, where I don't care what they cut or how they cut it, or how many times they burn up what's in my pit... that's something I can do to get them more practical experience. It just doesn't fit our model of "meet at the church Wednesday night and nothing else," a rut I'd like to break out of more often.

But we're all busy. I get that, but it's no excuse. If we're to be responsible leaders of young men who want adventure, want challenge, and want success, I feel compelled to suggest we rise to the occasion, and go that extra mile to make sure they have the opportunity they need to learn what's expected of them, in a meaningful way that will stick with them as they enter adulthood.

I challenge the leaders of youth programs out there to take a good look at their program, and find the holes that might go overlooked. Fill them with practical learning opportunities, and watch your boys respond to it. Everyone wins.

On the growing of Men

On the growing of Men:

There are moments when we have to cast off our comfortable habits, get outside of our institutions, bend a few rules, and take matters into our own hands. A couple weeks ago, I went out in the woods with 3 other motivated men, and 15 teenage boys, for our Eagle Island Wilderness Survival High Adventure trip. These boys were challenged in ways they have never seen in polite society. They were challenged to work together just to get a drink of clean water, to rely on each other for the comfort of their sleep, the quality of their food, and the character of their fun. Nature threw in a couple surprises for us, and we engineered some stress of our own to keep it all interesting, but by the end of the week, 15 young men left the island with more self-confidence, a better appreciation of teamwork, an ability to be self-reliant, and a gratitude for the comforts of home they might not have had going out.

When I wonder if my youth programs have an impact, I need only think of the story a mother told yesterday about one of her sons who attended this camp 4 years ago - he is now in Ghana, serving a 2 year mission there, and she is convinced that the hardships he faced on my trip then, prepared him for the struggles he faces now. I can think of no greater reward than witnessing the practical application of the bushcraft, survival, self-reliance, and self-confidence skills I've tried to teach over the years.

A hearty Thank-You is owed to the other men who assisted me, kept things going when I myself got ill, related to the boys in ways I couldn't, and complimented my style of leadership with their own, providing a broad spectrum of excellent examples for the youth to look up to. I also want to thank the boys for rising to the occasion, and making it a positive experience for everyone, and for bringing their "A Game" when it came to behaving with courtesy and respect, when sometimes that was the hardest thing to do while wet, cold, hungry, and tired. You all have my respect for making it through a very challenging week.

Trip Report: Eagle Island Wilderness Survival High Adventure

Trip Report: Eagle Island Wilderness Survival High Adventure

For the last 8 years or so, I've run a high adventure trip for 3 or 4 Scout troops who operate together more often than not, for lack of large memberships. Because we're not paying BSA overhead, I typically end up spending a small fraction of what a trip to an official BSA camp costs. This year the ratio was 1:6. That's right, we spent 6 times as much money to send the same number of boys (in the younger age bracket) to Goshen scout camp, than it cost me to take 15 boys out to Eagle Island. And I think these older boys had a better time.

This is the story...

15 young men between 14 and 18 years old, up at 5am on a Tuesday morning. Blowing off the last so-called day of school, nothing happening so we took 'em. I had my chuckwagon (old dodge van) with 2 canoes lashed to the top, and a trailer behind with 3 more, and 7 kayaks. Food for 20 people for a week, and a little program gear (table, shelter, my hooch, etc.) for the leader camp.

We hauled out to West Virginia, by way of the town of Paw Paw. Had a safety brief, put them out on the water, and I proceeded to haul ass to my parking spot nearby our island. I call it Eagle Island, because the first time I visited, I saw a bald eagle take a fish from the river not 100 yards from me. I considered it a good omen. It's part of Maryland Wildlands, abutting a state forest, and when I called the rangers and asked about the hunk of land with a different shade of green on the map, they told me it was pretty much at my disposal - no way to collect fees, they didn't mind us making fire and cutting small trees for projects, perfect for my wilderness survival high adventure.

So I get around to my spot, which is on a CSX road, under an abandoned bridge. There are private lots on the river there, and most are posted, so I try not to park in front of their space. I drag my canoe down the hill, and float over to my island, check out what the last couple years have done to it since I've been there. It's low enough, most of it gets flooded at high water... so leave no trace is less emphasized here. It also means there's no shortage of driftwood and trash, other people using the place and leaving their junk and garbage - there's no way to clean the whole river, so we tidy up as we can, but generally leave it no worse for our use, refuse-related at least.

The boys have paddled for 7.5 miles to get here, and when they do, we get them wet and test the waterproofing of their gear. One of their first challenges is to start setting up camp, get a fire going, and start purifying water. We're drinking out of this river all week, so every drop needs to be treated, filtered, boiled, somehow made safe. No excuses.

Day one is pretty light, I get them organized into teams, let them settle in, explore the place a bit. Make the boats safe, get dinner into them.

Wednesday morning, however, is a different story altogether.

First thing we have them do, is work with fire. To be rescued, one must be seen. Be seen from space, I say. The first challenge was to build a signal fire, which could produce good contrast smoke visible against the sky. The boys snapped to it, and got hot fires going quickly. Being adaptive users of their environment, they immediately seized upon some of the river trash to help - old tires. There are hundreds of them on the banks of the river, scattered about. Most are pretty damn old, but they have a half-life of a century at least. Grab one of those, and toss it on the flames, and in about 5 minutes you have a good smokey signal fire reaching up to the sky. As soon as I see it's taking off, I have them kill it, so as not to pollute too much, or attract actual attention we don't want. Good times.

The next challenge is to improvise the purification of water. Sometimes, you just don't have a pot you can boil it with, your filter's broken, your pills lost in the river - pick an excuse, sometimes an emergency leaves you with little but your wits. I gave them a container, but a rule that they were not to boil the water over fire.

The solution is hot rocks. Get a new fire going, get the rocks screaming hot, and start adding them to the quart of water, until it comes to a rolling boil. Allow to cool, then the team must drink the quart to finish. The smart kids took the container down to the river to cool it off faster, and then put a t-shirt over the top so strain out the soot and sand. What's funny, is after a week of boiling, pumping, etc., they all agreed that the rock water was the tastiest of all they had, all week.

That afternoon, they were challenged once again with fire, this time, carrying it. They were required to start a fire in one location, and then carry a flame or ember capable of starting a 2nd fire about 200 yards through an obstacle course which took them up terrain, through heavy overgrowth, down a slope, and across open water to the sandbar they'd made their signal fires on. What made this one great, was that just as the teams were getting ready to build their new fires, the skies opened up and started dumping... I mean dumping rain. It must have been some of the hardest rain I've ever seen, just sheeting down, so bad you couldn't see far through it. Three of the four teams got their fires going despite it, which was admirable. Of course, they'd not prepared their camps terribly well for such a downpour, and some shelters suffered for it. Experience is a meaner teacher than I ever could be.

Thursday, we stepped away from fire for a bit, and worked on making things. The first was, a ladder or tower, to simulate the need to get up high and survey one's surroundings. All of these challenges, mind you, must be completed with only the contents of the boys' personal survival kits, and fortunately some carried some cordage, enough to get through this challenge at least. Duct tape got involved in one tower.

We also worked on signalling, using tools other than fire this time. We sent a leader half a mile upstream with a radio, so he could report on what he saw or heard. BIG LESSON TIME: Those high-pitched, shrill whistles everyone gets, do not carry over distance at all. You'd make your ears bleed next to one, but only half a mile away, 2500 feet or so over flat water with no obstructions, they couldn't be heard over the talking of the boys in their lower-pitch noise. There were one or two whistles that worked, those which produce a split tone and a harmonic in low frequency, and that carried. Flares work, big bright ponchos work, yellow and orange life vests sort of work, just jumping around does not. A signal mirror, properly used, works great, and some shiny knives were made to do as well - and a flashlight, pointed right at the guy, was visible against shaded brush. The best audible was a low-pitch holler, though, and the best visible seemed to be large orange panels.

The boys were next challenged to make their own cordage, something one might be faced with when something needs to be built, and one's paracord in the pack is used up, gone, or insufficient to the task. They were taught how to weave a 2-ply opposing twist from grass or bark, and they were required to make a 5-foot length which could be tied in a knot, as to suspend a bucket with about 5 or so pounds of weight. Not quite as easy as it sounds, but they learned a ton about the use of natural materials and how weak spots can ruin the project.

That afternoon, at their constant insistence all year, they were provided an opportunity to hunt, trap, fish, or gig. Despite my reluctance to do this (not that I'm squeamish, but the business of killing and gutting and cooking requires commitment I wasn't sure they had... these are city boys, after all) they were given instruction on several forms of hunting and trapping earlier in the year, and a refresher on site, and given the afternoon to produce something. Every event had points on the line for teams, so there was an incentive to at least catch and cook a small fish, or frog, but every team reported no success at the end of the day.

Friday, being the last full day on the island, was our Total Survival Scenario. Teams were brought in for a meager breakfast, then sent to fetch all the boat. We took them a hundred yards downstream, and had them swamp the boat with their personal survival kits, until everything was soaked, then led them up the steepest, muddiest hillside to the island we could find. They had to get their boats up out of the current as well, which took some doing. Once up on dry land, we simulated an injury per team, and had them perform first aid. The rest of the day was mainly taken up with fulfilling the other requirements for survival - building a shelter (which they were to sleep in that night), purifying water all day, cooking their lunch and drying their clothes which required a fire, attempting to signal for help, and so forth.

This is where it gets interesting. The dominant small tree there is the Paw Paw tree. The fruits were not yet ripe, but we were all using our knives to work with the bark, which is very fibrous and makes great improvised cordage.

It also is quite toxic. Not to the skin so much, but extract of the bark juice used to be sold as an emetic 100 years or so ago. This, we did not know.

While the boys were keeping busy, we were preparing them a feast to celebrate a week of hard work. Food safety was observed, we even tried to clean our knives, at least as much as a rinse and a wipe can do out there. It wasn't enough, and the oils in the sap got into our food. While the food itself was cooked well, and delicious at the time, about 5 hours later like clockwork people started getting sick, myself included. And I mean sick. Projectile dry-heave sick. Stomach cramps, dehydration, the works. It was horrible, and lasted all night. I didn't get any sleep at all, shat liquid death about 8 times into the next morning, and generally wanted to die.

Since about 6 boys were also in a bad state of affairs, and the morning's activity was to be primitive fire-making (a physically intense exercise which I was simply not up to) we called a halt to formal activities, and focused on making the ill comfortable, and slowly packing up camp. Around lunchtime I started shuttling cars with another leader to the pick-up point, and the boys put out to river for the 4 mile float down to meet us. Fortunately there was a gas station in the middle, where I bought them out of gatorade, and started pushing fluids as hard as I could, just so I could function. One visit to a proper toilet helped my mood immensely, and we finally got everyone home by dinnertime.

So I owe them a Saturday campout, locally, where we cover the last day's program, but they seem to have had a great time, illness notwithstanding. I've heard since, that it was hard, really hard, but good. I heard feedback from the boys about the things they learned. Some had never really used woods tools seriously before, not at this level. They had a great appreciation for the comforts of home. They certainly learned the importance of teamwork, of listening to people's ideas, and relying on one another in a high-stress environment.

And that's what Eagle Island was for us this year.

Knives

I suppose I'll start with one of the more controversial topics I've ever come across, and get it out of the way.

That is, the subject of knives.

It must first be said, that I am a knife-maker. It is a professional hobby of mine, insomuch as I do it occasionally and not full-time, but I treat it with high regard for quality, in my research of metallurgy and historical metalwork, and in how I deal with customers. I take it seriously, and have now for over 15 years.

Arguments pop up here and there, on forums, on facebook, and even in person at camp, which is the best knife for a particular use, or overall. Debates on steel, its chemistry, what hardness is best, the difference in heat-treating methods, etc. Endless preference for one grind or another.

To all who love an argument, I will say this first: Most people simply cannot tell quality from a visual inspection. It's not possible to see inside the steel of a knife with your eyes, short of damaging it somehow, or performing destructive testing on it to define its limits. Marketing and selling the sizzle is the job of every knife manufacturer, and the airwaves are cluttered to a fault with misinformation, half-truths, and rapt persuasion for commercial products. The lay-person can use a knife, and know what they like about its performance, but at the end of the day, the core quality of steel is unknown until it's too late. That's why reputation is so important, and brands will do almost anything to develop and protect it. In the modern age of social media, their zealots do half the work for them, encouraging what I see as the uninformed opinions that shout down objective truth.

I also see a lot of questions about the "ultimate metal," often from people taken in by entertainment, fantasy, or just wishful thinking. The reality is, that steel is the ultimate metal. There are thousands of alloys, and different ways of heat-treating them for very specific tasks. Any single application won't do every job perfectly, but there's a perfect blend for every job these days. Following that, shape and geometry is driven as much by the chemistry of the steel as it is by the intended use. An antique Viking axe in my collection weighs about twice as much, and is overly thick in some places, than a modern equivalent should be. This is not because the ancient smiths didn't understand conservation of material, in fact they probably understood it far better than most modern smiths. It's that the material they had available at the time had a certain performance envelope, and so the shape, size, and weight were driven by that, and its intended use, rather than just whimsical design or a fluke of the hammer that forged it. Steel is a marvelous material, and our modern abilities to create a wide range from simple carbon steel, to exotic blends meant for very specific applications means the consumer has a dizzying array of choices, and thoughtful consideration is needed to make the choice appropriate for their needs.

So what's a woodsman to do? Simply put, find what you like, learn how to use it, and take care of it.

Knives perform 3 functions, generally speaking. They pierce, they slice, and they chop. I've tried to raise the question politely, and have yet to find unbiased or unemotional discussion on just when the recent fad of batoning came into popularity. I consider it abuse of a knife, when what you're really doing is treating it like a wedge, and that's an entirely different set of requirements for metallurgy, heat treatment, and geometry. I understand the utility of the method in dire need, but consider it a last option as opposed to a prime quality in a manufactured blade.

To pierce is to stab, and that requires a sharp tip, with enough reinforcement for whatever the knife is intended to pierce. Most often it's soft material like skin and meat, sometimes it's wood, as when preparing a fire board for bow or hand drill. It should never mean pounding into a tree, disrespecting the grain of wood, or heaven forbid, stabbing at rocks.

Slicing is exactly that, using the length of the blade to separate one thing into two. Again, most often this is meat or skin, or skin from meat, sometimes bone from flesh, and quite often bark from wood.  Slicing is done starting at the heel of the blade, and finishing near the tip, using a smooth draw motion.

Chopping is the rapid separation of one thing into two, and should be done with a stable base (like a cutting board), material soft enough to be chopped, and a firm grip of both the knife and the material being cut. While chopping through logs and 2x4's is possible with well-made knives, it's an abusive test popularized by the American Bladesmith Society to weed out bad work, and is generally not an appropriate use of a knife in everyday practice. I find that when something needs chopping that's beyond appropriate scale of the knife in hand, a better tool is an axe, thought-problems of "which single tool do you want in an emergency" notwithstanding.

Back to my advice on what to do, I think it's important first to understand how to use a knife safely and properly. It's a difficult skill to teach, but a good training exercise is to carve a lot of wood. Make "try sticks," carve relief patterns, carve 3-dimensional objects, carve love spoons, carve whistles, and carve food of every variety. Do this, and you'll start to understand what works and what doesn't. Very quickly, one begins to appreciate that the shape of handle, it's comfort during hard use, is just as important as the blade itself. The shape of the knife will lend itself to certain tasks more than others, so a nice, simple all-purpose shape is best to carry in most environments. A knife ought to be a multi-tool, capable of making dinner, or making shelter. While one can carry specialized tools for every conceivable task, it's a far better skill to learn how to use one or two tools very well, under any circumstance, and excel as a generalist.

To conclude, I'll share my weapons of choice for the woods. For a knife, I prefer a simple Mora in a hard sheath. They're inexpensive, I've only seen one picture of a broken one, and I've used mine for a wide range of projects (shelter building to minor surgery) with great success. Because of their economy and size, a backup can be carried in the case of loss or damage, which would require carelessness or abuse on the part of the user. I also carry a simple pocketknife, which I keep surgically sharp, an Opinel No. 8, for fine work only. In the Eastern Hardwood forests I generally haunt, I also like a Tramontina machete of either 14 or 18 inches in length for brush-clearing and light de-limbing, and I like a mid-size scout axe for any serious chopping, which only happens around a base camp I have vehicle or boat access to, not for lightweight backpacking where I'm making a smaller footprint.

Everyone will have their favorite tools, and some are impressed by brand, some by testimony of performance, some by price alone. Again, find what fits well in your hand, what you can use all day without blisters, what you can afford, and most importantly, what gets the job done. The rest is just oh so much personal taste being flaunted around, at the end of the day.

Happy camping.

Introduction

Hello, and welcome to “35 Years of Scouting.”  My name is Chris, and I want to share a little of what I've learned since I first put on a uniform and started treating outdoors skills as something more than just playing in the backyard.

As a Cub Scout, I started learning about tools, and thought a pocketknife was the neatest thing ever invented.  I started learning about teamwork and leadership, and working with a group to accomplish a goal. As an only child, this was very important to me, and I have to thank my parents who did an awesome job of running those dens and events when I was little.

I can still remember the day I put on a Boy Scout shirt… that tan cloth was a rite of passage out of childhood, and things started getting serious. Dad took a job overseas, so most of my Boy Scouting was done in Europe, where I started learning first aid, survival skills, cooking, camp craft, and took a real appreciation for our international brothers and sisters.  We worked with German and English and Dutch troops a lot, their different ways of doing things, and that gave me a real sense of respect for a multi-cultural approach to things.

I earned my Eagle Scout at the age of 17, and remember clearly the challenge posed to me at my court of honor… to give back more to Scouting than was given to me. I might be letting the cat out of the bag here, but it’s a trick.  It’s impossible to do, because every time you give something of yourself, you grow even more, learn even more, and so you can never give back more than you gain in the process. That hasn’t stopped me, though, and I’ve been working as an adult leader for well over 20 years now, with every age group and in nearly every position available to a volunteer Scouter.

So with that introduction out of the way, let me thank you for joining me as I chat about my experiences, my observations, and my concerns for the young men I work with today.  It’s a rough world and I think we owe it to our boys to prepare them as best we can, by acting as good role models, teaching them valuable skills and ethics, and challenging them to realize their potential.  My self-interest in this is I’ve got daughters, and while I work with them on many of the same issues, and don’t teach them any less than the boys, I hope the men they choose to be with someday are of quality, and I hope my work can improve the field a bit.

We'll discuss modern bushcrafting, wilderness survival, general camping, anything that comes out of the tradition of Scouting that we can all take advantage of today. 

Thank you and welcome to “35 Years of Scouting.”