Aside from brushing elbows with the famous, I was able to meet many new festival visitors and demonstrated various ways to make fire using friction, percussion, and solar methods. For lunch I prepared fish for baking by covering it with mustard green leaves then covering that bundle with clay and placing it on coals. It normally takes about 45 minutes to bake with abundant coals but with the modest amount that I had generated the time had to be extended a bit. The results were great. I handed out chop-sticks to the adventurous folk who eagerly waited to pull off a piece of tender fish.

One of the fun aspects of this event is that I get to erect my Cheyenne style teepee and my 5 foot long fish “pillow” on a tripod. Both of these displays draw lots of interest for “photo ops”. I try to let the photographers get in their family photos too and occasionally become the photographer for them. Of course it is an honor to be a subject of their photos and I would like to thank all of the folks who share them with me as I get so involved that I forget to take me own photos of the event.

The Brushy Mountain Apple Festival is held the first Saturday each October. Perhaps I’ll see you next year?!?

I explained that my instruction is different than the more recently publicized Prepper trend in that I focus on more immediate short-tem emergencies such as when a person because of circumstances becomes stranded. I teach how to stay alive, how to find help or become found. In tandem with that, I show ways to exploit the resources on hand. This approach provided the other end of the spectrum from the bunker approach that Stephanie wanted to present to her audience.

The extent of my provisions for our discussion fit into a 20 gallon bin. The items were geared toward a power outage scenario in an urban setting which accommodated for loss of heat, light and water, but I also show Stephanie some local edible plants that she sampled. I demonstrated how some trash items could be useful when you don’t have proper tools. while searching for edibles I came across a beer bottle and demonstrated how to remove the bottom by hand so that the piece of glass could be used as a knife. I also mentioned how car headlights could be used to start a fire and how a plastic Gatorade bottle could be used to make soup by rotating it over an open fire.

Having the correct tools for the job is always preferred but it also pays to know how to improvise when you don’t. Thanks to Stephanie, her viewers now know that there are ways that they can prepare for catastrophic events on a shoe-string budget whether “bugging out” or “bugging in”.

I packed up my supplies into several bins and headed to Winston Salem for the video taping. Once I arrived we spent about 3 hours with discussion, set-up, presentations and demonstration that ended up with about 2 minutes in the finished piece. Kudos to photojournalist Chris Petersen for his creative camera work and editing.

My focus was to show folks how to stay warm, have light, and how to cook using various methods without the electrical power in which most folks have become dependent. The segment also included a visit to a local store Great Outdoor Provision Co. showing various equipment and supplies available for a power outage situation.

In the end, we hope that the information provided will help viewers to be better prepared when power outages occur. You can view the teaser “Tonight at 5: When the power goes out” and the full segment “When the power goes out: Survival tips” on the wxii12.com website. Take a peek and perhaps there will be tips that you might want to implement for your own preparedness plan.

Bagworms are often found on evergreen plants such as juniper and cypress. They weave a cocoon that incorporates bits of surrounding foliage and are almost perfectly camouflaged. As those bits begin to die, they turn brown and stand out among the green surroundings. The earlier they are discovered, the better. The cocoons’ season usually begins in May and ends late June. The cocoon is surprisingly tough and pretty much has to be cut open in order to get the grub inside.

So, next season if you notice these cocoons in your trees or bushes, don’t think “pests”, think “bait”. Click HERE to see the online video.

The chain of events began last month when I heard that WXII Channel 12 Weather Man and Producer of “Austin Outdoors” segment, Austin Caviness, would be appearing in my area at a local YMCA while participating in a program called “Transformation Nation”. I felt that my bushcraft and survival skills would be of interest to his audience so I attended the event with the purpose of introducing myself and my website to Austin for his consideration. He was in fact interested and asked me to contact him later so that we could discuss details. Actually connecting with such a busy person is not always immediate, but my persistent calls finally paid off and this week when we finally connected we worked out plans to get together in Winston Salem the following day.

In preparation for any possible subject or demonstration my vehicle was “loaded for bear”, jammed with equipment, kits, and firewood. We met at the WXII television station and traveled a short distance to a park where we video taped the contents of the 2 minute segment “Living Off The Land“. The videographer Jeff did a great job capturing the event and Austin is a great sport and willing to try new things. Having done industrial video in earlier years, I can really appreciate the fine job that they did in creating the segment and the seamless editing. Now, we just have to work on my last name…