Could You Survive on Berries and Insects?
Do you have any bushcraft skills? If you were to become lost in the wild do you have the skills necessary to erect a shelter, start a fire, locate some water and find some nutritious food? And would you be able to recognise what is safe to eat?
Living, as we do, in our supermarket served modern world many people have lost touch with the sources of their food. Some children grow up in our modern cities without any hands-on experience of where their food actually comes from. I once met a young man who had no idea that burgers were made from beef. I don’t know what he thought they were made out of.
If you are lost in the wild there are no all-night supermarkets selling soda and snacks. You really need to be able to identify what is safe to eat and what is potentially harmful. You may have seen Bear Grylls surviving in some of the most inhospitable locations on the planet where he always finds and eats whatever he can find. Something you may have noticed is that Bear is never without his bushcraft knife, an essential survival tool.
Wild berries can be an excellent source of nutrition. Our ancient ancestors would have gathered nuts, berries and grain when in season and eaten these routinely. There are many wild berries which are actually deadly poisonous.
Yew berries, for instance, are the cause of a high number of poisonings every year. They are very bright scarlet in colour with an indentation at the base, about 8 to 10mm in diameter. The berries look deceptively appetising leading many young children to eat then.
Deadly Nightshade is another berry that results in many visits to the emergency room each year. The clue is in the name. Also known as Belladonna this plant also produces berries in September and they taste quite sweet, making them attractive to young children.
Insects can be a valuable source of energy, but many find the thought of eating them distasteful. Most insects are actually edible, but some taste better than others. Most insects are actually very high in protein but low in fat.Crickets, grasshoppers, mealworms and wood grubs are all a safe bet. You will find that most insects taste better when barbecued and you can even grind them up to make an insect flour.
Game, including birds, rabbits and other small animals is always good to eat, but can be enormously difficult to catch. This especially true if you are lost in the wild without any form of weapon. In these circumstances some form of trap will possibly provide the best chance of catching an animal.
You may be thinking that this will never happen to you and you will never be forced to eat grasshoppers for dinner. But it really could happen to you. All you have to do is stray from the main path through a forest, as I once did, and before you know it you are disoriented and lost. That’s when you’ll wish you’d paid more attention to Ray Mears Extreme Survival.
