One of the tenets of prepping is learning how to live off the land. Specifically, learning how to source your own food. Whether you are stuck in a wilderness survival scenario with nothing else to eat or you plan on padding or replacing your stockpile with wild-caught and foraged edibles, it’s true that Mother Nature can supply you with what you need.
But, surviving for a weekend or a couple of weeks on an all-natural wilderness diet is one thing. Surviving long-term is another. Most preppers only think in terms of calories when you’ll still need vitamins, minerals, protein, and fat to support good health.
Since you won’t be able to simply order or pick up all the different foods you need to cover your dietary bases, you’ve got to adopt a different approach to surviving on a wilderness diet.
It’s a challenge, but one you’d be wise to take on now. Keep reading, and I’ll tell you everything you need to know.
Calories Are Only Part of the Survival Equation
For short-term survival situations, those lasting a few days or even a few weeks, it’s okay to think about survival rations only in terms of calories. Calories are raw units of energy, the biological equivalent of the fuel that an engine needs to keep running.
There’s nothing wrong with that, and much of the time it’s satisfactory. A good guideline is that an adult needs between 2,000 and 2,200 calories a day for optimal function, and you can get by with a little bit less for a long time before you start to suffer ill effects. However, if you are working hard to survive or in a harsh environment, you’ll need more.
But just like the engine I used in the analogy above, our bodies need a whole lot more than just fuel to keep running properly long term.
And again, just like an engine, the longer you defer necessary maintenance—like oil, coolant, brake fluid, transmission fluid, and more—the more likely a breakdown is to occur.
Vitamins and Minerals Are Necessary for Sustained Health
Continuing on with this analogy, vitamins and minerals are those extra elements that our bodies have to have to keep functioning.
Yes, we have an onboard reserve of sorts that our cells and tissues will continue to make use of even when we aren’t taking in more of them. But that reserve will be used up in time, and that’s when negative side effects start to occur.
Most Critical Short-Term Nutrient Needs
I mentioned earlier that calories are okay for your survival needs alone, at least in the short term. But that’s only a rule of thumb.
You don’t have to go very long without certain vitamins or minerals before seriously negative effects start to pile up on your body. Some of these will put you in a bad way; others are showstoppers.
One crippling vitamin deficiency you’ve certainly heard of around the prepper-sphere is scurvy. Caused by a pronounced lack of vitamin C, it can take hold in just a couple of weeks, resulting in pronounced fatigue, swelling gums and loosening teeth, joint pain, and slow healing.
One that most of us have experienced already in life is sodium deficiency, or hyponatremia. We lose lots of salt when we sweat, and that’s why it’s so important to take in salt as an electrolyte for proper rehydration.
If you lose too much salt and don’t replenish it, you’ll get a throbbing headache, your thoughts will get cloudy, and soon after that, you’ll start feeling really fatigued and nauseous.
Potentially compounding a lack of sodium is a lack of potassium. This is another issue that athletes often suffer from, and it causes severe weakness, muscle cramping, and, in severe cases, an erratic heartbeat.
Varied Foods Are Still Essential on a Wilderness Diet
It will be helpful to start thinking about your wilderness diet “food groups” as the following:
Greenery, Roots, Shoots
Survival mainstays that every prepper should know. Greenery and roots, of all kinds, are easy to find, easy to harvest, typically easy to prepare, and are a great source of vitamins, specifically A, C, and K, and often minerals like potassium, calcium, and sodium. Roots can be an especially good source of carbohydrates, too.
Survival mainstays include cattails, the shoots and roots of which are very starchy and nutrient-dense. Dandelions are annoying weeds but a godsend when you need food. All parts of the plant are edible, pretty tasty, and good sources of vitamins and minerals alike.
Nettles, including stinging nettles, can be cooked into something resembling spinach and are a great source of protein, vitamin A and C, magnesium, calcium, and iron. Care must be taken when harvesting them so you don’t get stung, though!
Wild asparagus is one of the best sources of vitamin K around and also contains significant amounts of folate. Wild carrots, aka Queen Anne’s Lace, is easily identified, tastes great and provides vitamins A and B6, and potassium, in abundance.
Cattail roots are a great wild edible, containing lots of vitamin C calories, fiber and potassium. And be sure to keep your eyes peeled for wild onions; another plant that is easy to identify and tasty. They’ll supply you with many B vitamins, calcium, phosphorous and more.
There are many more besides these, and these are just some mainstays you can reasonably expect to find everywhere.
Berries
No surprises here— all kinds of berries will be a welcome addition to your survival food plan. Blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, mulberries, wild grapes, and more are great sources of energy, minerals, and many vitamins.
You should also be on the lookout for things like elderberries. You don’t want to eat them raw because they can cause severe indigestion and potentially poisoning in high concentrations, but when cooked, they are perfectly safe and sweet.
If you can find a substantial berry patch in your travels, that will go a long way toward keeping you alive. However, many berries look alike and accidentally picking and eating poisonous imposters could be disastrous. We’ll talk more about positive identification of food a little later on.
Mushrooms
Mushrooms have a reputation as a high-risk wild edible, but they don’t have to be. Yes, it’s true that many safe types of mushrooms have ferociously dangerous, even deadly, toxic look-alikes, but there are just as many safe, nutritious, and tasty species that are very easy to positively identify.
For instance, morels, chanterelles, oyster mushrooms, chicken of the woods, and lion’s mane all have lots of protein, huge amounts of B-complex vitamins, and many have lots of vitamin D—a vitamin that can be hard to come by in other foods. They’re also quite filling and good sources of energy.
Best of all, most of these have few dangerous imposters, so with just a little bit of care, you can be confident that these mushrooms are safe to eat.
You don’t have to be afraid of harvesting wild mushrooms if you have the knowledge and experience to know what you’re dealing with, but this isn’t something you want to learn as you go if you catch my drift!
One mistake with a poisonous mushroom might be your last.
Nuts and Seeds
Another awesome component of any wilderness diet. Nuts and seeds tend to be plentiful, very easy to gather, and excellent sources of protein, fat, and many minerals like iron, calcium, and magnesium, along with other critical nutrients like omega-3 fatty acids.
Some of the most common tree nuts around are acorns. Acorns, eaten as is, will make you terribly sick because they contain high amounts of tannins, but by soaking them a few times and then boiling them, you can render them safe and delicious.
Walnuts are another great resource if there are trees in your area, though they can be difficult to break into. Your tools or even a couple of rocks can do the job.
Beech nuts are high in fat and protein, but also magnesium, potassium, vitamin B6 and more. They are also quite good and make for great trail food. Hickory nuts are another packed survival food, loaded with vitamin E, calcium and magnesium.
And don’t forget about sunflowers. They can be found growing wild near areas where they have been cultivated, and larger varieties can produce a huge volume of seeds. Those seeds are nutritionally dense and packed with sodium, selenium, and vitamin E.
Other wild-sourced seeds that are worth tracking down are pumpkin seeds, pine nuts (one of the best forage-able sources of vitamin K and zinc) and amaranth seeds. Amaranth seeds are notable for their entirely complete amino acid profile.
Once again, there are so many plants that will produce edible nuts and seeds. Make it a point to familiarize yourself with all of them that are available in your region so you’ll be prepared to make use of them during the warmer months.
Eggs
When it comes to survival foods, you can’t do any better than eggs. One of the densest sources of calories and nutrition you’re likely to find, bird and reptile eggs can also be really easy to gather. If possible, scramble and cook the eggs, but in a pinch, you can eat them raw.
Duck, goose, and turtle eggs can be a real blessing for survivors, and all of them are terrific sources of protein, fat, vitamins A and D, and most B-complex vitamins. All eggs are also good sources of choline, which is vital for nervous system health.
Insects
I’m probably going to lose some readers at this point. And no, this isn’t some global hegemony plot to get you to eat the bugs and live in the pod.
Insects have always been a food source in times of trouble or sheer desperation, and ounce for ounce they are a really good one, nutritionally speaking.
Just as importantly, they are far easier to catch than other animals and can often be found in large quantities.
Various insects like crickets, grasshoppers, and termites are safe and easy to eat with minimal preparation, reasonably palatable, and an excellent source of protein and healthy fats along with lots of other nutrients.
Depending on the species, you’ll get plenty of iron, zinc, phosphorus, calcium, and more, along with lots of B vitamins.
If at all possible, it’s always a good idea to roast or pan-fry insects to kill off any harmful parasites and germs they might be harboring. This also improves the taste and texture!
Honey
Speaking of insects, there is one insect product that pretty much everyone loves, and that’s honey.
Honey, of course, comes from beehives, and if you can find onein the wild and you can brave the bees to get to it, it will prove to be an extraordinarily good source of energy along with some trace B vitamins and a few minerals.
Consider also that honey has natural antimicrobial properties and can come in really handy for treating lacerations, scrapes, and burns.
Obviously, you might risk greater injury trying to get the honey, so if you don’t have protective clothing and a torch to use for smoke, you’ll probably want to pass on this…
Fish
I know lots of preppers who plan to rely on fishing in their neck of the woods for much of their nutritional intake in the wild, and this is a great plan.
All kinds are healthy, packed with protein and other vital nutrients like vitamin B6, B12, vitamin D, and omega-3 fatty acids along with healthy fat.
Compared to hunting, fishing requires a lot less energy and risk, and there are lots of techniques you can employ to catch fish passively using nets, traps, or shorelines. A little bit of time setting up multiple traps, lines, or bait stations could catch you an abundance of fish.
There are way too many species to even begin to talk about here, but everywhere there is water in North America, there are edible varieties. Salmon, trout, catfish, and more are all well worth your time and effort.
Meat
Popularly thought of as the best source of food in the wild, hunting is the other half of hunting and gathering.
It’s true that there are all sorts of edible and highly nutritious mammals out there, species great and small: squirrels, raccoons, rabbits, turkeys, and deer are well worth trying to bring down if you’ve got the weapons, ability, and resources to spare.
The obvious benefits with meat are calories and protein. It’s highly filling and extremely nutritious besides. Most wild game will be a great source of iron and lots of B vitamins like B3, B6, and B12.
Meat must be cooked if you have any way to do it for safety’s sake, and it had better be worth the investment of time and effort to bring it down, otherwise you’re actually setting yourself back. We’ll talk more about that in the following sections.
Prioritizing Your Food-Gathering Efforts
Another factor concerning your wilderness diet is how much you’re actually going to spend to get your food. And no, I’m not talking about cash. I’m talking about time and effort. Both of those have a cost associated with calories, a precious resource under the circumstances.
In short, you can be highly successful in hunting and gathering, but if you are constantly using up more energy than you are taking in, you are actually starving. Understanding that puts the situation under an entirely new calculus, doesn’t it?
So now the other variable we must keep in mind is how much we are willing to spend to get a given kind of food. Depending on what’s available in your area, how plentiful it is, and what sort of nutrition you need, you should plan and invest your time and energy accordingly.
The following are guidelines to help you plan your actions:
Gathering Is Easy
As a rule, gathering is going to be a whole lot easier than hunting, trapping, growing, or anything else you might try to get wild edibles.
Simply enough, plants don’t run away and can’t escape you. They can defend themselves in the form of thorns, toxins, or being in out-of-the-way locations, but assuming you know what to look for and how to safely harvest the plant, you are good to go.
But as nutritious as they are, the downside is that plant matter typically won’t provide enough protein, fat, and other nutrients, though what it does provide is still critically important.
Fishing and Trapping Are Efficient
From a sheer efficiency standpoint, fishing and trapping can be your best bets for getting your hands on high-quality protein. Even if you are actively fishing, you don’t have to do a whole lot except sit there and wait for a fish to bite. After a little bit of exertion, you’ll hopefully have the fish reeled in and ready to clean.
As mentioned above, you can also set up multiple shorelines, construct gill nets, or other fish traps to harvest fish en masse from suitable water sources.
Likewise, don’t neglect trapping. I know most of us He-Man preppers, especially those of us who are skilled hunters, imagine that we will just bag our dinner with a bow, rifle, or shotgun and call it good, but you can only be in one place at one time.
Setting up traps over a wide area and at likely paths, water sources, or food sources that animals will visit can save you a ton of effort and net you more game for less work.
Hunting Is Time or Energy Intensive
Speaking of hunting, however good you might be and whatever weapons you might have access to, don’t kid yourself when it comes to the actual cost of bagging big or small game.
The continent is no longer flush with huge populations of any wild animals, not compared to a couple of hundred years ago. Whether you are hunting from a blind or other fixed location, or actively stalking, count on it taking a lot of time and a fair bit of effort.
Wasting energy hunting only to come up empty is not only demoralizing but might wind up being a nail in the coffin for you.
This isn’t to say you shouldn’t try to hunt in a survival situation: as we discussed, animal protein is hugely important nutritionally. But you must be realistic about what it will cost you compared to other methods of procuring food.
Other Advice and Tips
If the wilderness diet is going to be your primary diet for any length of time, here are some other tips, tricks, and hard-earned wisdom that you need to know.
Learn What Your Region Has to Offer
Every region in the U.S., and everywhere else in the world, has its own wild edibles, be they plants or animals.
Learning on the internet isn’t enough; you need to get out there with an expert or with an actual guidebook and start finding this food yourself.
Different seasons will have different levels of availability, and weather events or other natural phenomena might impact animals, driving them to ground or even out of the area.
Only by getting intimately acquainted with what’s actually out in the world where you are will you have the confidence and the knowledge base to source your own food when you need it for real.
Always Positively Identify Your Food!
Despite being in truly desperate shape, despite being in the middle of a genuine survival situation, you can’t throw caution to the wind when it comes to wild edibles.
Eating a toxic plant, poisonous mushroom, or venomous insect might be the last mistake you ever make. Positive identification is always a must, as is knowing how to safely prepare certain foods for safety. Acorns, as mentioned, can be soaked and then boiled, for instance.
Some plants have safe parts and toxic parts. Some insects need dangerous parts or venom glands removed prior to eating. If you’re really in extremis, you can perform a standard field edibility test to reduce risk.
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