Wilderness and Urban Survival Guide
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Food in a Survival Situation
Introduction You can live for several weeks without food but food is what provides energy to your body and replenishes substances that your body burns during physical and mental activity. The average person needs 2,000 calories per day to function at a minimum level. Any less than this and your body will cannibalize and burn…
Poisonous Plants
Successful use of plants in a survival situation depends on positive identification. Knowing poisonous plants is as important to you as knowing edible plants. Knowing the poisonous plants will help you avoid sustaining injuries from them. Plants Poisoning Plants generally poison by: Contact. This contact with a poisonous plant causes any type of skin irritation…
Water hemlock or spotted cowbane
Water hemlock or spotted cowbane Cicuta maculata Parsley (Apiaceae) Family Description: The Water Hemlock, also known as spotted water hemlock, spotted parsley, spotted cowbane, and the suicide root, is perennial herb in the carrot family. It is very difficult to distinguish it from other, similar looking plants. Water Hemlock may grow to 1.8 meters (6…
Trumpet vine or trumpet creeper
Trumpet vine or trumpet creeper Campsis radicans Trumpet creeper (Bignoniaceae) Family Description: The large, vigorous, woody Trumpet Vine or Trumpet Creeper may climb to 15 meters (45 feet) high. It has pea-like fruit capsules. The oval leaves are pinnately compound, growing opposite to each other, 8 to 12 sharply toothed leaves per 12 inch leaf…
Strychnine tree
Strychnine tree Strychnos nux-vomica Logania (Loganiaceae) Family Description: The strychnine tree is a medium-sized evergreen tree with a short, thick crooked trunk, reaching a height of about 12 meters (36 feet). The wood of the Strychnine tree is white and dense and durable with irregular branches covered with a smooth, ashen colored bark. Its deeply…
Rosary pea or crab’s eyes
Rosary pea or crab’s eyes Abrus precatorius Leguminosae (Fabaceae) Family Description: The Rosary Pea plant (also known as Jequirity, Crab’s Eye, Rosary Pea, John Crow Bead, Precatory bean,Indian Licorice, Akar Saga, Giddee Giddee or Jumbie Bead) is a small, slender, high-climbing vine that twines around trees, shrubs, and hedges. It has alternate compound leaves 2-5…
Poison Sumac
Poison sumac Toxicodendron vernix Cashew (Anacardiacese) Family Description: Poison sumac is a woody shrub or small tree that grows to 8.5 meters (28 feet) tall with rough, scaly bark. It has alternate, pinnately compound leafstalks with 7 to 13 smooth edged leaflets per leaf. The leaflets are oval to oblong, taper to a sharp point,…
Poison Ivy and Poison Oak
Poison ivy and poison oak Toxicodendron radicans and Toxicodendron diversilobum (previously Toxicodendron diversibba) Cashew (Anacardiacese) Family Description: These two plants are quite similar in appearance and will often crossbreed to make a hybrid. Both have alternate, compound leaves with three leaflets. The oil in the plants is the primary culprit and all parts, at all…
Poison hemlock, fool’s parsley
Poison hemlock, fool’s parsley Conium maculatum Parsley (Apiaceae) Family Description: The poison hemlock plant (also known as Beaver Poison, Herb Bennet, Musquash Root, Poison Parsley, Spotted Corobane, and Spotted Hemlock) is a biennial herb that may grow to 2.5 meters (8 feet) high. The smooth, hollow green stem may or may not be purple or…
Physic nut or Jatropha
Physic nut Jatropha curcas Spurge (Euphoriaceae) Family Description: The Physic nut, or Jatropha plant, is a shrub or small tree found in the American tropics. Also known as Barbados Nut, Purging Nut, Black Vomit Nut, Physic Nut, or JCL, the plant can reach a height of 6 meters (20 feet) with spreading branches, stubby twigs,…
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