Depending on the situation you face, there are critical skills you need to plan on implementing.

The list below covers the basic survival skills and while you should learn beyond just the basics, if you do master them you will be in a good place in all but the rarest of events.

Improvised Shelter

Well, this one is a no-brainer: At some point you’re going to need a place to rest, escape the weather, or hide out from eyes in the sky for a couple days during your travels. Though some elaborate shelters can be built from the forest or brush or even hillside, a single or two-person backpacking tent will do the trick for most people. If for some reason you lose your tent during your travels, a tarp or a poncho and whatever you can find on site such as a shallow cave or a downed tree can be used also. Use overhead branches to shield yourself from the rain or sun; use the landscape as a natural windblock and also as natural camouflage. Since we’re talking about post-collapse, knowing how to easily camouflage yourself and your shelter safely off trail are essential.

Building shelter in a post-collapse world means more than just sheltering from the weather; it means sheltering from bad people that may be combing the landscape. Think like a hermit and hide yourself somewhere on a hillside or dense growth of trees, using moss, grass, twigs, and even dirt or mud to create insulation if needed. The best shelter in a post-collapse world, while traveling, is a shelter that no one knows is there. Remember that.

When you poke your head up to look around and do some recon, have your head covered in brush, as the shape of a human head is easy to recognize; remember, sometimes you want to avoid being seen at all costs.

If you have binoculars don’t be looking in the direction of the sun as the glint of the sun on your binoculars can be seen from a far distance away, potentially alerting someone to your position.

Fire

Making fire encompasses the multitude of ways of starting it, maintaining it and then putting it out (which many people tend to overlook); after you’ve put out your fire, hide the fact that you ever had a fire to begin with. Leave no trace. Bury the ashes from your fire well under ground and then spread dirt and arrange brush so that no one can tell (without digging down) that you ever had a fire there. Don’t leave any clues for possible trail robbers or trackers to find, if someone happens to be looking for either you or for someone to rob.

As far as getting a fire started, you shouldn’t rely only on the bow drill method. Though it’s a good survival skill to have, it’s also time consuming and not dependable for a wet environment. Make sure you have at least 3 ways of making fire in your bug out bag, including having lighters (in a waterproof container — pill bottles are great for carrying lighters), blast-matches, waterproof matches, flint and steel, petroleum jelly cotton balls or even a 9V battery and steel wool.

Water

Though most bug outs shouldn’t take more than a few days, water is one of those things you shouldn’t have too much of in your bug out bag because you can find plenty of water along the way (unless you live in or near the desert, then you may need to pack a lot more water than normal). Water procurement can be done several ways; it can be filtered with a portable water filter, it can be boiled to kill parasites and bacteria that can make you sick, and it can also be collected and purified with water purification tablets; this last method is the most time efficient method but because of limited pack space in your bug out bag, but it shouldn’t be the only method you use. Having a portable water filter and also a small pot for boiling water are essential.

Here’s why: At some point you’ll run out of water purification tablets and then a few weeks later that portable water filter will have used all it’s life. The good news about water purification tablets is that you can pack a lot of them; they don’t weigh very much or take up much space. You can also have a back up portable water filter if you use one of the smaller brands on the market, such as Lifestraw (mentioned in other articles), giving you several more weeks of water filtration.

Finding sources for fresh water: Acquire the best maps in advance and then study each map so that we can create routes that take us near sources of fresh water — lakes, rivers and streams. This is how desert nomads of the vast deserts of the Middle East and Africa and also the Native Americans who lived in the desert southwest states of the U.S. could survive and travel through areas that would otherwise be inhospitable to humans. Desert nomads and Native Americans both knew where water could be found in remote areas and then chose their routes accordingly.

Navigation

In theory, the bug out process is straightforward. A couple of hours, to a couple of days, to a couple of weeks of walking and you reach a fully-stocked bug out retreat where you can live in peace for months or even years; well, that’s the hope anyway. You have to get their first.

And this is where the deadly challenge of survival happens in a post-collapse.

When chaos breaks loose, a lot of things can go wrong that can deviate you from your original route. This is where your navigation skills as well as your preparedness come into play:

Printed maps

GPS (if it’s available)

Offline maps on your phone (if you can download numerous, terrain specific maps beforehand)

Finally, knowing how to navigate using a compass or the stars.

When it’s all said and done, printed maps and a good compass are going to be your best bet. Navigating by the stars doesn’t work during cloudy weather, and depending on GPS or a smartphone to store maps is a bad idea for a long term situation. At some point, the batteries in your phone are going to die or those satellites that make GPS possible may become inaccessible. Map and compass are a proven and reliable long term survival tool and can work for you in a post collapse world.

Topographic Maps: A useful and necessary skill is knowing how to read a topographic maps; knowing what those contour lines represent on a topographic map, as well as the different colors, will help you understand elevation changes and the types of terrain you can encounter in a region. You’ll be able to see the elevation of the terrain, the vegetation and, of course, the bodies of water, lakes, rivers, streams, coastline, etc. With a topographic map, you can determine a route that will help you avoid populated areas, reduce the chances of a robbery out on a trail (by helping you avoid trails all together), and also determine whether or not you’ll encounter a ridge, canyon, valley, or mountain too steep to climb.

Hunting and Trapping

Funny enough, trapping isn’t just a skill you learn for catching rabbits and squirrels out in the wild. It can be just as useful in “bug in situations” to catch mice and other rodents that may take a shot at your food stores. Keep in mind that trapping requires a lot of patience as well as knowledge and practice. The question is, do you really need it? Well, if you’ll be bugging in or if expect to have a short bug out, you probably won’t. However, things can always go wrong.

Your bug out may take longer than expected so you might have to spend a week or more out in the wild. Your bug out location can be compromised by the time you get there. Your food stockpile may be spoiled due to one of the five food storage enemies: light, oxygen, moisture, temperature and the aforementioned rodents. You just never know what could go wrong and force you to find alternate food sources. For some people, those capable, that means hunting and trapping.

Since learning key survival skills that help make the Green Berets so adept at what they do, you should also learn one of the traits a true Green Beret is known for: overcoming fear. If you have a fear of bears, for example, in a post collapse world it’s time to overcome that fear and start seeing black bears and grizzlies as food to feed you and your family.

Scouting and Recon

If everything goes to plan, you’ll hunker down inside your home or your bug out location without any bad people showing up to upset things. But what if it doesn’t go according to plan? In reality, who knows how many bad people might be in your proximity, such as desperate crooks, angry mobs and thieving, violent neighbors from down the street.

First, try to work with your immediate neighbors on keeping a “neighborhood watch” along with a way to notify each other about any approaching threats. That may be three fast bursts on a whistle, or a really long drawn out whistle blast that repeats.

In some inner cities, gangs have been known to whistle repeatedly to notify others that someone is in their territory. Consider adapting that same tactic for your own neighborhood.

Reconnaissance on factions and militants – With several factions possibly fighting for territorial control in some areas, you should at least know who’s claiming “influence” over your territory. That’s just one example of why you need to scout the surroundings to gather valuable information about what’s happening around you. Some of the things you might want to notice:

What is happening in surrounding neighborhoods?

What is going on at the local municipal airport or train station, if there’s one nearby?

Are there any factions or militants that have claimed local buildings, and if so, can you tell what their intentions are from a safe distance away (preferably where no one knows you’re “spying” on their activities)?

Schools … Are they being used as refugee centers and to provide emergency first aid and or emergency housing? Or has a faction or militant group moved on to school grounds and claimed it as their own?

Open spaces

Market places

Patrols … Are factions or militants going neighborhood to neighborhood and are they well intentioned? … Or … are they just scouting the neighborhoods during the day to see which houses would be an easy target for a robbery later that evening?)

Some good scouting and working with your neighbors to recon what other neighborhoods are doing nearby can help spot trouble before it shows up unexpectedly and catches you all by surprise.

A few pairs of good binoculars could go a long way.

Stationing a couple look outs (helpful teenagers, who can rotate in shifts) in the tallest trees in your neighborhood is also recommended.

Bartering and Negotiation

Whether the dollar is going to be worth anything post-collapse is hard to say, but you should be able to barter and negotiate regardless. You can barter your food, your water, your ammo and even some of your abilities such as building at home water filtration systems (with everyday materials), woodworking, plumbing etc. Keep in mind that one thing we’ll all have a lot of post-collapse is time — so it’s better to barter your time and skills than your limited stockpile.

Look Like a Gray Man

When you need to make your rounds anywhere, and want to avoid being robbed, take on the appearance of a rough and tumble homeless person or (if you’re an older male) 1970s era Vietnam Vet who’s had a rough go in life and has spent a few years on the streets. If someone says something to you, or tries to corner you, just stumble on by with a distant look in your eyes, not even seeing them, and even swat at an invisible “voice”. It comes down to this: If you look or seem a bit off your rocker any possible bad people may just look the other way, which is what they’ve been doing for years beforehand to people with these kinds of disabilities. Looking and acting a bit off your rocker is an easy way to get ignored by society at large. Try it sometime. Men, grow out your beard and hair, coat your arms, hands, and fingernails in dirt and even some grease (which you can find on the motor of any vehicle), create some bags under your eyes, put some stench on your clothes, practice mumbling to yourself and looking down at your feet. Take off your shoes and walk around in a pair of dirty, torn socks or just go barefoot and make sure your feet are dirty when you do.

Diplomacy

Whether you’re bartering, being kidnapped or trying to diffuse a conflict, you can’t do it if you let your emotions dictate what you say and how you behave. This is something peacekeeping troops such as the Green Berets and the Blue Helmets are taught in order for them to ensure that, no matter where they end up, the locals will get along with them and with each-other. Green Berets are also called “warrior-diplomats” and, in a sense, that’s exactly what we should be as well. A sincere and friendly, yet no-nonsense countenance can go a long way to help make this happen. Being liked and respected, through great diplomacy, can open doors and get you places.

Basic Medical Skills

Things like giving first aid, performing CPR, carrying a wounded person or splinting a broken limb can literally save your life or the life of a loved one in an emergency. If you don’t know where to start, I suggest a first aid course and additional studies on survival first aid and application.

This list is by no means comprehensive, but it covers the basics for almost any type of survival situation or SHTF moment.

By mastering them, you put yourself in a much better position to not only come out unscathed but to navigate whatever you are facing with confidence.

To learn more about more skills you need to master, please visit Backdoor Prepper.