I think a good first question to ask would be:
What exactly constitutes survival skills?
You obviously can't practice those skills unless you know exactly which ones you need to be proficient in.
Obviously, the first and most important survival skill is preparation. How well prepared you are in the event of an emergency situation in the woods can often mean the difference between life and death. Having the right tools, equipment, and training to use them is definitely important.
We could probably spend a long time debating on what exactly is the right equipment, but I generally carry with me:
- Navigational Aids: Map and Compass at the very least, sometimes GPS
- Weather Appropriate Clothing: Clothing suitable for the season. Even in the summer, I always carry rain gear on day hikes, and always carry long underwear on overnight hikes
- Ample Food: I tend to carry a little bit more than I think I'll need. I also bring enough trail mix/granola bars to snack on constantly during the day to keep my energy up
- Ample Water: I try to drink 4 liters a day while in the woods. It does mean I pee a lot, but the alternative, dehydration, is a lot more uncomfortable and can lead to dangerous situations regardless of the season
- Shelter: I carry a tarp with me on overnight hikes and some day hikes
- Light Source: I wouldn't go in the woods without a headlamp, even on a day hike. I also carry extra batteries
- First Aid Kit: Self explanatory
- Season-appropriate Hiking Gear: I generally always carry snowshoes, crampons, and an ice ax in the winter. Even if I don't end up using them, the extra weight helps keep me in shape and keeps me used to carrying the gear
In the woods, it's a good idea to remember the Rule of 3. Humans can generally survive:
- 3 Minutes without oxygen
- 3 Hours without shelter (in an exposed situation faced with hypothermia)
- 3 Days without water
- 3 Weeks without food
- 3 Months without companionship
When facing an emergency situation, you need to take care of these needs in order. Most often, people die due to a lack of oxygen in the outdoors through drowning. At the very least, the best survival skills you could have to prevent this from happening to you or others is a knowledge of how to swim, and how to perform CPR. Gaining a lifeguard certification couldn't hurt either. Having some common sense and knowing when to avoid crossing swollen or flooded streams or other water bodies is also beneficial.
Shelter is the next most important need to fulfill, and it is the lack of this that causes most people to succumb in the woods. Knowing how to make a shelter using materials that can be found in the woods, or carrying a tarp and parachute cord and knowing how to use it to assemble a shelter are essential skills. In winter conditions, this may also include having the foresight to bring a bivy sack or small tent.
Concerning fire; while I believe everyone who visits the outdoors should be proficient in building a fire, I feel that it is also important not to rely on fire as a main source of warmth. Heating your body from within with a steady intake of calories and water is much more effective than heating it from external sources.
The other needs I feel are less important to have the skills necessary to fulfill, since it takes longer for death to result from not achieving them.
It generally takes about 3 days for someone to die from lack of water; if you are lost in the woods for more than 3 days you probably aren't likely to survive anyway, with or without water. On another note, in the northeast, water is generally pretty readily available in the woods provided you aren't on the summit of a mountain. While it is a good idea to carry water purification, when given the choice between not having any water at all and drinking untreated water in an emergency situation, I'd drink the untreated water. Water born illnesses can take days or weeks to show symptoms, and if you haven't gotten yourself out of the woods yet you probably have bigger problems.
Similarly, I don't really view finding wild edibles in the woods as a necessary survival skill. It generally takes 3 weeks to die of starvation. In the northeast, if you simply choose a direction and start walking in the woods, you'll reach civilization long before those 3 weeks are up.
First Aid skills are extremely important to have as well. Everyone who spends time in the woods should at the very least enroll in a 2 or 3 day Wilderness First Aid course. If you ever get a chance, I'd highly recommend taking a week long Wilderness First Responder course as well. Having ample first aid skills will go a long way towards increasing the odds of survival of you or anyone in your group should someone become injured in the woods.
Finally, given an emergency situation in the woods, the main objective of you and your group is probably going to be to get yourselves out of the woods. To do this, you may need good navigational skills. Being able to navigate in the woods, using dead reckoning, map and compass, and GPS are all important skills to have. Regardless of an outdoors man's preferred method of navigation, I think it is important to be proficient in all three methods.
Of all of these skills, many can be obtained through taking courses offered by groups such as the ADK, AMC, SOLO, etc. Just about all of these skills, with the exception of first aid, can be practiced as part of a regular part of a weekend backpacking trip. It seems to me that the best way to gain proficiency in most survival skills, then, is to simply get outside on trips that are either within your comfort zone, or just barely outside of it. The more trips you go on, the more chances you'll have to practice and gain proficiency in preparation, making good judgment calls, setting up shelters, and navigating through the woods. The other skills, first aid and CPR, you'll hopefully never have to use in the woods, and so these are skills you may need to practice on your own. Taking a CPR class every year, and a first aid course every few years to maintain proficiency is also important.
I'm curious to see what others view as essential survival skills, and how they practice them.
