Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
11-27-2007, 05:29 PM
#1
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2007
Posts: 1
Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
Have you ever been lost in the woods for more than 2 hours?
If so, please reply telling me something about the situation and how it worked out.
Just curious. I was lost in the woods once and it took me three freaking hours to find my car.. sucked :-)
If so, please reply telling me something about the situation and how it worked out.
Just curious. I was lost in the woods once and it took me three freaking hours to find my car.. sucked :-)
11-27-2007, 05:41 PM
#2
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Rhode Island
Posts: 3,606
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
no but my buddy has i was able to talk him out on the phone . he would tell me the terrain and where the sun was . then i had him shoot the gun . then i was able to tell him where to go . I don't want to repeat that again . now he carries a gps with him
11-27-2007, 05:47 PM
#3
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Michigan
Posts: 3,476
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
Never 2 hours but close to 1 1/2 hours before.
Snow storms and cedar stands/swamps mixed with a myriad of beaver ponds are a pretty good way to get confused when your compass is in the truck and you find yourself in new territory.
I finally got out by sitting down and relaxing, calming down, and then climbed a tree to get my bearings. I could then see the tree-break by the river near me and was able to figure my direction from there.
Snow storms and cedar stands/swamps mixed with a myriad of beaver ponds are a pretty good way to get confused when your compass is in the truck and you find yourself in new territory.
I finally got out by sitting down and relaxing, calming down, and then climbed a tree to get my bearings. I could then see the tree-break by the river near me and was able to figure my direction from there.
11-27-2007, 06:35 PM
#5
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: Winnipeg, Mb, Canada
Posts: 1,309
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
If you got yourself out then you were just turned around for a while. If you had to have some one get you then you were lost.
11-27-2007, 09:55 PM
#6
Join Date: Nov 2007
Posts: 75
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
I wasn't hunting, but got lost in the woods in Colorado once as a kid. I'd have much preferred to have a gun. I was actually lost for about 8 hours at night. I was with a big group on a campout. One group stayed down by a stream while the others were up the mountain. I decided to go find the guys higher up, got turned around, and was basically lost all night.
My cell phone has a built in GPS and navigation built into it that works off satellites. Stays in my front pocket at all times.
I know the places I hunt all too well to get lost at this stage in life, but with the broom weed and grass so high (over my chin in places and I'm over 6 feet tall), I've gotten turned around quite a bit this year, but not lost.
My cell phone has a built in GPS and navigation built into it that works off satellites. Stays in my front pocket at all times.
I know the places I hunt all too well to get lost at this stage in life, but with the broom weed and grass so high (over my chin in places and I'm over 6 feet tall), I've gotten turned around quite a bit this year, but not lost.
11-27-2007, 10:24 PM
#7
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: central Illinois
Posts: 1,872
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
Wouldnt call it really lost but got turned around one night tracking awounded doe. Was in a real thicket [@ 40 acres of autumn olive}follwing the bloodtrail, It was so thick that alot of it was crawling thru the stuff becouse you couldnt walk. We came out on the wrong side of the thicket into apasture and had to hike around the thicket about half mile or so back to the truck.
Had a buddy get totally lost in a big timber . He got turned around and walked and walked, Finally close to dark he herd some chainsaws and came up on some guys cutting wood. They told him he was 2 miles from his truck and after agood laugh they gave him a ride back.
Had a buddy get totally lost in a big timber . He got turned around and walked and walked, Finally close to dark he herd some chainsaws and came up on some guys cutting wood. They told him he was 2 miles from his truck and after agood laugh they gave him a ride back.
11-28-2007, 10:23 AM
#8
Fork Horn
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Dallas, Texas
Posts: 194
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
Let's see......the year was 1970. Shot a doe in archery season and tracked it about 200 yards. When I arrived at the deer there was a black bear sow standing over her and she wasn't going to give the deer up! I went up a nearby tree ASAP and in the climb lost my wallet, my compass, my money, my pocket knife and 2 tickets to Grand Funk RailRoad.
Spent the night in that tree listening to the bear chowing down and in the AM she was gone......
Being in unfamiliar territory anyway, I was turned around and it was a cloudy, overcast day......so it took me the rest of the afternoon to figure out exactly where I was and how to get out of there and find my way back to our camp.
My only regret was losing the GFR tickets as I had a date with a babe to go see them.......she didn't believe me when I told her how I lost them........oh well........life goes on! True Story......!!
Spent the night in that tree listening to the bear chowing down and in the AM she was gone......
Being in unfamiliar territory anyway, I was turned around and it was a cloudy, overcast day......so it took me the rest of the afternoon to figure out exactly where I was and how to get out of there and find my way back to our camp.
My only regret was losing the GFR tickets as I had a date with a babe to go see them.......she didn't believe me when I told her how I lost them........oh well........life goes on! True Story......!!
11-28-2007, 10:47 AM
#9
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Indiana
Posts: 12
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
When you are lost, minutes feel like hours.....and when it's dark and you are in the woods, it is even worse. This happened to me during one of my first hunts. I left camp with three other hunters and the plan was to drop each person off at their stand so we all knew where each other were. I was the last one dropped off and by then I only had a general sense of direction of where camp was. This was in heavily wooded property in Michigan. In reality, I was probably within 500 yards of camp.
Well, dusk started setting in and I thought about heading back in. I should have started in earlier, because in no time it was pitch black. Let me tell you that a flashlight is little comfort in heavy woods with no moonlight. I kept walking in the direction of camp (so I thought) and after a while I think to myself, "I should have hit camp by now". I stayed very still but couldn't see or hear a thing. No glow of a fire, novoices, nothing.I kept walking a little more and came to a dirt road and then knew I was really turned around....there was no dirt road on the property. I headed back into the woods (probably not advisable) and thought about my options. I was seriously thinking about building a fire and just waiting until they came looking for me. Then I remembered that they said if I shot a deer, wait two minutes after your last shot and fire a single shot.....that would indicate that I got one and they would come out to help me field dress it. So I shot at the ground, waited two minutes, and shot again. About 15 minutes later I see some flashlights bouncing through the woods and I was rescued! Thankfully it was gun season....they wouldn't have heard an arrow!
Now I have a GPS, cell phone, survival gear, and use reflective markers. Haven't been lost since. I think the most sound advice is to stay put if you have no idea where you are.
Well, dusk started setting in and I thought about heading back in. I should have started in earlier, because in no time it was pitch black. Let me tell you that a flashlight is little comfort in heavy woods with no moonlight. I kept walking in the direction of camp (so I thought) and after a while I think to myself, "I should have hit camp by now". I stayed very still but couldn't see or hear a thing. No glow of a fire, novoices, nothing.I kept walking a little more and came to a dirt road and then knew I was really turned around....there was no dirt road on the property. I headed back into the woods (probably not advisable) and thought about my options. I was seriously thinking about building a fire and just waiting until they came looking for me. Then I remembered that they said if I shot a deer, wait two minutes after your last shot and fire a single shot.....that would indicate that I got one and they would come out to help me field dress it. So I shot at the ground, waited two minutes, and shot again. About 15 minutes later I see some flashlights bouncing through the woods and I was rescued! Thankfully it was gun season....they wouldn't have heard an arrow!
Now I have a GPS, cell phone, survival gear, and use reflective markers. Haven't been lost since. I think the most sound advice is to stay put if you have no idea where you are.
11-28-2007, 10:48 AM
#10
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location:
Posts: 6,357
RE: Have you ever been lost in the woods while hunting for more than 2 hours?
No, I have not. I do not think I am a superior human being and that others who HAVE become lost are lesser beings. I pay a lot of attention to orientation cues when I am out in the woods. I am pretty concerned and anxious about getting lost, and maybe that helps keep me on track. Where I usually hunt the ground is quite small -- 160 acres -- so getting truly lost is pretty much impossible. That said, I'm surprised that I can go into this rather convoluted piece of ground in the dark and walk along fairly complicated, scantily marked places to my choosen ambush spots with high degrees of success.
I went elk hunting for the first time in October 2006. One morning I had decided to hunt a place I had briefly scouted a couple of days before. To get there I hiked up a steep hill about 400 feet (elevation gain), cut into some heavy timber, and lurked on the edge of a clearing hidden back in the heavy timber at dawn to hope to find elk. When I got there in the pitch black it was snowing heavily. At the top of the 400 foot climb the open hillside closed into an upside down V-shape of trees. At the apex of this V was where I needed to cut over to find the clearing. There was a fence about half-way up this upside down V. It was snowing so heavily that it was actually flashing with lightning and heavy thunder, a lot. Well, I got to just where I wanted to be, in the dark, with little familiarity. But I did pay attention to the fence, the closing inverted V of the trees on that hill side. While hunting later I stayed generally on the ridge of this hillside moving up the mountain. These observances of the topography of the terrain and the arrangements of the trees provided me all the guidance I needed to keep oriented. On another day I had gone far up a hillside, winding back over some other parts of a mountainside, and I was concerned about finding my way back down in the dark. It turns out that it was pretty easy -- I just followed the ridge down and kept the ridge on my left going down whereas, generally but not always, it had been on my right going up. How could I get lost? By going downhill I was going to eventually come to the road where I had parked my truck. Even back in the wilderness such orientation principles can be followed, I think.
Notwithstanding my comments about using awareness of topography and terrain to remain oriented, I had a GPS with me with a waypoint associated to my truck and I also had a magnetic compass, in the event my orientation got messed up.
I went elk hunting for the first time in October 2006. One morning I had decided to hunt a place I had briefly scouted a couple of days before. To get there I hiked up a steep hill about 400 feet (elevation gain), cut into some heavy timber, and lurked on the edge of a clearing hidden back in the heavy timber at dawn to hope to find elk. When I got there in the pitch black it was snowing heavily. At the top of the 400 foot climb the open hillside closed into an upside down V-shape of trees. At the apex of this V was where I needed to cut over to find the clearing. There was a fence about half-way up this upside down V. It was snowing so heavily that it was actually flashing with lightning and heavy thunder, a lot. Well, I got to just where I wanted to be, in the dark, with little familiarity. But I did pay attention to the fence, the closing inverted V of the trees on that hill side. While hunting later I stayed generally on the ridge of this hillside moving up the mountain. These observances of the topography of the terrain and the arrangements of the trees provided me all the guidance I needed to keep oriented. On another day I had gone far up a hillside, winding back over some other parts of a mountainside, and I was concerned about finding my way back down in the dark. It turns out that it was pretty easy -- I just followed the ridge down and kept the ridge on my left going down whereas, generally but not always, it had been on my right going up. How could I get lost? By going downhill I was going to eventually come to the road where I had parked my truck. Even back in the wilderness such orientation principles can be followed, I think.
Notwithstanding my comments about using awareness of topography and terrain to remain oriented, I had a GPS with me with a waypoint associated to my truck and I also had a magnetic compass, in the event my orientation got messed up.