We’ve wrapped up our 16th wilderness bushcraft semester course and I’ve made it back from the field school in one piece.  I’m back to consistent internet access, and will be blogging and posting photos from today forward.  Although our email vacation message said that I got to town once per week to keep up with [...]

We’ve finished the first four and a half weeks of the Wilderness Bushcraft Semester, and have the second half remaining after our short break.  Highlights have included canoeing the Devil’s Elbow and the Aroostook River, building and living in shelters, cooking all of our meals over an open fire, most of them in a dutch [...]

Week 1 of the 2010 Wilderness Bushcraft Semester is in the record books.  We spent time eating a lot of wild foods, poling and paddling canoes, building shelters, lighting fires, cooking over the fires we lit, making crooked knives on the campfire, learning about off-grid solar technology, studying the weather, and much, much more.  Busy [...]

I’ve been researching the role of crafting on the learning process recently.  There is a mountain of how-to information on crafting, but most of it on how-to-do things; the questions of why and what are the impacts are aren’t as common.  Since crafting is one of the seven core elements of the Jack Mountain Bushcraft [...]

We use the logbook to track the individual progression of each student. However, there are some skills where a demonstration of the skill set is necessary for competence. You can either complete a task safely and efficiently, or you can’t. The practical exam process is about having a minimum skill level necessary to be able [...]

I read about the Windbelt several years ago and am excited it will be coming to market soon.  It will be a great complement to our off-grid solar system.  Unlike conventional wind generating technology, the windbelt generates electricity without a turbine using aeroelastic flutter; the same process that causes a blade of grass to vibrate [...]

A friend recently went on a fishing trip to Manitoba’s Big Sand Lake. This monster was the second biggest trout he caught there. Notice the Jack Mountain hat.  Some people are lucky when they fish.  Others work hard for what they get.  This fish, and his large cousin caught the following day, were the result [...]

I field a lot of questions about our off-grid solar power system at the field school, so here’s my super-simple primer on going solar. An off-grid solar system where you store energy to use with regular appliances (light, radio, laptop, etc.) at night or when the sun doesn’t shine is comprised of four parts. 1. [...]

It takes a minimum of 100 miles to learn how to paddle a canoe It takes a minimum of 80 miles to learn how to pole a canoe It takes a minimum of 100 friction fires to learn how to consistently make a friction fire It takes a minimum of 50 percussion fires to learn [...]

I just watched Thomas Elpel’s new dvd Classroom In The Woods; Primitive Skills For Public Schools.  It is a documentary shot on location in Montana where he and his team from the Hollowtop Outdoor Primitive School take junior high class on a 3-day primitive camping trip.  In addition to following the journey of the students, [...]

Assessment exists for the student, not for the instructor. At their worst, assessment systems put students in a competition with their peers.  At their best, they provide a way for students to gauge their progress and to see how far they’ve come, give them an honest accounting of where their skills fit into the bigger [...]

I stopped in to see my old friend Don Merchant at Pole And Paddle Canoe the other day.  In addition to our usual discussions about the weather, water levels, and just getting caught-up in general, he showed me a new, beefed-up 30″ collapsable bucksaw he plans to start offering soon.  After handling it for a [...]

A friend sent me this photo of his wooden canoe after a tough day on the river. You’re looking at broken ribs, half-ribs and planks inside a 20′ wooden canoe. The good news is that everything on a wooden boat can be fixed. That’s one area where these old boats are far superior to their [...]

I’m excited about the new flexible, adhesive PV solar panels, designed to stick to metal roofs, that are finally available. Long-time readers know that we’ve got a small, off-grid solar system at our field school in Masardis, Maine. It consists of one 80-watt panel, a charge controller and several 6-volt golf cart batteries. The panel [...]

Teaching bushcraft these days is as much about helping people to eliminate the extraneous as it is showing them something new. Put another way, it’s as much carving as it is building. Much of what passes for common knowledge in bushcraft and outdoor living is fantasy, created and fed by poorly conceived books, movies and [...]

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There are several definitions of bushcraft floating around the web, none of which I agree with.  The most common is the one used on the Wikipedia page that states that bushcraft is the long-term adaptation of survival skills.  I disagree.  Bushcraft goes way beyond survival skills. Bushcraft is the active component of our interaction with [...]

I was looking through an old notebook from the fall, 2007 Wilderness Bushcraft Semester course last night and I found a quotation I wrote down spoken by Mors Kochanski when he was here for the final week.  It was November 1st, 2007, and we were up late discussing the role of bushcraft and wilderness survival [...]

I’m adding a new section to our resource page of articles and downloads; podcasts.  I’m regularly sharing podcasts on learning, the natural world, ecology, and more with our students, and now I’ll be sharing them with anyone who is interested.  This is not the Jack Mountain Bushcraft Podcast.  We’re not responsible for recording or anything [...]

Spring and early summer were super busy, but I’m back in town and will be updating the blog with tales of our experiences in the woods of northern Maine.  I realize that those of you who have been regular readers over the years probably don’t like the intermittant nature of the posts while I’m at [...]

It was a funny spring weather-wise.  At the end of the first week in May there was already very low water in all the rivers of northern Maine.  We had just enough water to paddle the St. John River.  By the time we had covered the 113 miles from Baker Lake to Dickey, the water [...]

I’m back in town after a busy spring course.  I’ll be posting about some of our experiences this spring in the next week before heading back to the field school for several June programs.  It’s good to be back and away from the bugs for a few days.

We finished the Riverman course and now are busy getting ready for a week on the St. John river.  The weather is several weeks ahead of schedule, but it looks like we’ll just make it before the water drops to it’s summertime low. We’ve been seeing a lot of wildlife, including bears, moose, deer, snowshoe [...]

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided that this fall will be our last fall semester for a few years.  While they’ve been very successful and have been a life-changing experience for our students, they are also a difficult period of separation for my family.  While this has been challenging for my wife and I [...]

It’s been a busy early spring at the field school.  The road is impassable for the last half mile, but otherwise things are in great shape.  It’s been a lot of work getting everything ready for the spring semester, and I’m excited to be here. I’ll continue to be away from the web for the [...]

I’ll be away from the web for a while as I drive across the country and look to get the field school set up with internet access.  I’ll post when I’m able to.  Have a great spring and get out there and grab life by the throat!

I added a new look to the JMB blog that makes it easier to make changes and customize.  If you don’t like the new look, it won’t last forever as I’ll be adding to it as I learn more about the software.  So far so good, but the best is yet to come.

“Toddlers ask many questions, and so do school children – until about grade three.  By that time many of them have learned an unfortunate fact, that in school, it can be more important for self-protection to hide one’s ignorance about a subject than to learn more about it, regardless of one’s curiosity.”    – Jan Hunt [...]

Read a great post by Jeff Butler of Northwoods Survival on their Facebook page. What is interesting and what is essential?  This is a very important questions especially for people who spend a lot of time in the bush.  At NWS we look at it this way:  The ability to make fire by friction = [...]

Our job as a school is not to make you a bushcraft or survival expert.  It’s to teach you all the things you need to know, and to provide you with the necessary experience you need as building blocks in order to become an expert.  Actually doing it takes blood, sweat and tears on your [...]

Paul Sveum wrote and recorded this song a few years ago.  It’s our unoffical theme song, and we’ve used it in a bunch of our videos.  In addition to being a talented musician and good friend, Paul is a first-class bushcraft instructor who has spent several years working with the students at Northland College in [...]

The smooth waters of the Allagash reflecting the sky at dusk.

This morning I read an article on winter survival written by an individual who not only has no idea how to keep the body alive in the winter, but also had seemingly no experience in the cold without a truckload full of gear. It seems I have read hundreds of these, but maybe it’s only [...]

Sunday, February 4th, 2001 Woke up on my bed of fir boughs surrounded by other sleeping bodies. There are seven of us lying in a circle inside the round white tent. The only part of the tent floor not covered with prone bodies is the area next to the door and the small rectangular woodstove. [...]

Allagash falls after several days of heavy rains. A shirtless figure stands alone, shaking his fists. Shot during the fall, 2004 fall semester course on day 9 of an 11-day trip with a disposable film camera. Great shot, great trip, great guy.

These are not good times to put out a book on edible wild plants. Unless you’re Samuel Thayer. When I reviewed Thayer’s first book, The Foragers Harvest, I wrote that it is as good or better than anything available on the topic. It has since become the go-to book for students at the Jack Mountain [...]

Paddling into the mist on Long Lake, part of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway in northern Maine. Shot on a cool September morning under a clear blue sky.

This is one of my favorite photos, taken during the fall, 2003 Wilderness Bushcraft Semester. It’s the St. Croix River, which is the border between Maine and New Brunswick. In the photo are two women poling solo in 18 foot canoes. It was a beautiful fall morning; cold and crisp, with warmer water generating the [...]

Safety and having several backup plans are key when planning a trip. We designed a form a number of years ago that students fill out as part of our guide training curriculum for each excursion. You can get a .pdf of it here. The procedure is simple: Fill out three copies. Keep one with you, [...]

Do babies understand numbers, or are they a blank slate?  Is it a given that they will grow to understand numbers like we do, or do they need to be taught?  Is how we experience numbers different from how stone age people understood them? These questions and more are examined in this Radiolab podcast from [...]

We do a lot of sourdough baking in the reflector oven when on remote trips.  It’s a great piece of low-tech, high-skill equipment that is worthless in the hands of someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing, but priceless in the hands of someone who does.  The best way to become proficient with it is [...]

We’ve had some great discussions about how the brain works in the learning process as part of our ongoing online course on becoming an instructor.  One aspect that we’ve only touched on briefly is the role of exercise in the learning process.  To simplify a complex subject into a soundbite, exercise is good for your [...]

Nutshimit is a word and concept from the Innu.  Previously known by the name given to them by the French, Montagnais, they inhabit a huge, sparsely populated region of Quebec and Labrador. For many Innu, life in the village is marked by idleness and a sense of loss and alienation, in strong contrast to being [...]

The question of how our bushcraft courses are applicable in the modern world comes up from time to time both in email and through discussions, so I wanted to formally address it today. When examined from a sufficient distance so as to blur the specific skills, our courses teach four things: problem solving, leadership, self-reliance [...]

I’ve been thinking for several years about putting together an expedition-style course for young men where we’d spend three or four weeks in the north woods canoeing and living outdoors.  It would be a similar, although less rigorous, curriculum that we use in our college semester programs, with a focus on academic subjects such as [...]

There are many features that make our yearlong bushcraft immersion program unique, and to read about them you should check out the yearlong page as the purpose of this post is to list a few of the perks that go along with taking the yearlong, but aren’t a part of it. Yearlong program graduates have [...]

I love to explore new places.  I’ve covered a lot of northern Maine in my canoe over the last decade, and I’ve still only scratched the surface.  Sometimes I find those special spots where no one goes, the fishing is good and there’s a beautiful place to camp.  Other times I’m hauling over beaver dams [...]

Thanks to a friendly piece of software this blog is now formatted with a mobile theme for viewing with the iPhone/iPod Touch, Google Android, Palm Pre and other touch-based smartphones.

Early spring is the season of travel on remote northern rivers. Swelled with snowmelt, a canoe is able to travel where the water is too low during the summer. This is one of my favorite spots in Maine, seldom visited, far from any logging road and a long way from town or a paved road. [...]

Something we emphasize on our courses is to know yourself and how you deal with different stresses that come into play on extended trips or even when you’re just working around camp. One of the most important deals with hydration; how much water YOU need and what happens when you don’t get enough. This is [...]

When I was a kid I knew the company I wanted to work for. I knew what my job would be and the things I’d do. But I couldn’t get hired by that company because it didn’t exist. I had to build it. Here’s a timeline of some of the highlights of that journey. 1995. [...]

I haven’t been blogging much lately, as I’ve been a busy dad as well as working on a lot of the behind the scenes aspects of our 2010 season. But I have been adding content to our various outposts on the web, and this post will tell you where they are. 1. We’ve got a [...]

With the rise of the web and people being constantly connected, I’m concerned about the future of really experiencing things. These days I see so many people constantly tweeting, shooting video, and documenting their experiences, especially outdoor experiences, that I wonder if there’s any authentic experience taking place or if the whole thing exists just [...]

The dates for the fall and spring terms of our 2010-2011 yearlong immersion program have been set. The yearlong program includes the fall, winter and spring terms. Fall Term: Wilderness Bushcraft Semester 8/22/10-10/23/10 – Immediately following the fall term is our practical exam, which lasts several days. Winter Term: Winter Bushcraft Intensive 1/9/11 – 1/22/11 [...]

TV survival shows are about hardships and risk. With background music to set the mood, the feeling of jeopardy hangs heavily over the host as s/he negotiates within an inch of his/her life. The danger makes it sexy. In the real world, bushcraft is much more about heritage and tradition rather than risk. The old [...]

We’re adding a tuition financing and payment plan for our long term programs. All the details aren’t set yet, but will be in a few weeks. It’s part of our plan to make our programs available to anyone who has a strong interest in bushcraft and living a simple, outdoor life.

Last summer I found an old magazine a friend had left at my place. It was the summer, 2004 issue of Outdoor Canada magazine, and on the last page was a short article titled “Homage” by Gary Ball. In it he gives his list of the perfect qualities a guide should posess. I think he [...]

Books on outdoor adventure can be read in the warm, dry, comfortable surroundings of the home. They entertain, but when finished they seldom change the reader. Actual outdoor experience and wilderness travel is characterized by bad weather, bugs, difficulty and exhaustion. Their impacts are felt throughout life, changing the person. Without the difficulty, there can [...]

Northern Maine’s St. John River is the premier wilderness trip in the US east of the Mississippi. This year we’re running it May 10-17. The natives called it Wallastook, or “Beautiful River”. It’s the largest river in Atlantic Canada, but starts from a series of small ponds deep in the woods of northern Maine, this [...]

Thinking about taking a semester off from college and spending it in the wilderness? If so, compare the different approaches of our program versus the large, corporate wilderness education companies. If you’re looking for modern, high-tech outdoor education with programs on backpacking and mountaineering, then check them out. But if you’re interested in building a [...]

We’ve changed the curriculum of our guide training course for 2010, and renamed it the Riverman Course It’s the first week of our 4-week Canoe Expedition Semester, and takes place in early May when the rivers are swollen and the bugs are still sleeping. This weeklong course prepares you for working as a professional guide [...]

I’m headed back to Canoecopia in March for a presentation on wilderness survival for paddlers titled “How To Avoid Becoming One With Nature Through The Composting Process.” As such I wanted to be clear about what you won’t hear in my survival presentations: 1. Long, drawn out discussion of equipment; kit is secondary, knowledge is [...]

I read an article from the Dallas Morning News on December 6th titled “Global Impositioning Systems; Is GPS technology actually harming our sense of direction?” by Alex Hutchinson. While I’ve often heard of people having no sense of direction, and have met a few that can get lost driving to the grocery store, I didn’t [...]

The forum on the Jack Mounatin Bushcraft Network (our online social network) has been increasingly active lately. Someone recently posted a question about natural alternatives to insulin: What happens if you are Insulin dependent and end up in a survival situation without Insulin. Is there anything you can do? Are there any natural forms of [...]

Is it better to know a little about hundreds of outdoor skills, or to know a lot about a few core skills? This is a heated debate, and the answer often depends on how you live your life. For the urban set, where bushcraft is a trivial pursuit, breadth wins you more kudos at skills [...]

We do quite a bit of knifemaking (crooked knives, mostly) in our longer courses. In trying to keep things as simple as possible, we use the campfire or woodstove to anneal the blades, and an open fire to temper them as well. We’ve got a coal forge with a hand crank blower, but we’re always [...]

As part of the online course we’re running titled “Becoming A Bushcraft Instructor”, we’re currently reading the book “Hare Brain, Tortoise Mind” by Guy Claxton. We’ve been enjoying many thoughtful discussions on teaching and learning and how they apply to bushcraft and the outdoors. This gem of a passage is from near the end of [...]

I was discussing bushcraft on Saturday and trying to explain it to someone whose life experience has been all in urban areas. In discussing life at our field school, I explained that it was just like life anywhere else, except without the infrastructure. I thought about this for a while after the conversation ended, and [...]

Our first online course, titled “Becoming A Bushcraft Instructor,”, has been a great experience thus far. We’ve had some thoughtful discussions about our first book, Hare Brain Tortoise Mind, which examines how the brain processes information. I’ve been learning a lot from the discussion. As a sample, below is a post from Russ Venditto on [...]

Simple food, simple shelter, simple transportation, simple tools, simple gear. A simple, rich, rewarding life.

We’re offering an early registration discount for 2010. If you register and pay in full for a 2010 course or trip by January 15th you can take 10% off the tuition. This includes our long term programs. It could save you a cool $1050 off our yearlong program; enough for a new canoe, a wall [...]

We’re adding an internship component to the yearlong program. As you know, the program begins with the fall semester course, continues with the winter intensive and finishes with the spring expedition. We’re adding a summer internship where students learn the business end of bushcraft, how we run weeklong courses, etc. They’ll get experience teaching, organizing, [...]

What would the ultimate Maine canoe, bushcraft, fishing and outdoor living program look like? We’ve thought about this for ten years and the 2010 4-week canoe expedition program comes pretty close. It begins with our Riverman course, a week of solid instruction in canoeing, guide training and practical camping and outdoor living. Daily lessons with [...]

There’s an idea about competing that winning is everything. It isn’t. I like to compete because it pushes me. Physically, it teaches me how much more is in the tank when the needle is hovering on “E”. As a business owner, it keeps me thinking about how to do it better and to create something [...]

When most people think of the northeast corner of North America, they think of the huge urban area stretching from Washington DC to Boston. They think there’s no wild country left, and that the west is the place to be. The map they think of looks like this: View Larger Map But look a bit [...]

I’ve never looked the part. Most people never do. We’re TBH (trained by hollywood) that people who do certain things should look a certain way. After all, that’s how they look in the movies. But it’s a big lie. My high school soccer coach was adamant about people not using their appearance to stand out. [...]

I just finished Tony Nester’s new book The Modern Hunter-Gatherer; A Practical Guide To Living Off The Land. If you don’t like reading book reviews, here’s the abbreviated version; It’s great, get a copy, read it twice. As the title suggests, it’s a primer for those looking to supplement their diet with wild fish, game [...]

Our educational system has become increasingly abstract over the last hundred years.  Instead of instruction in sensory development and hands-on skills, we focus almost exclusively on the intellectual and the abstract.  Much of this is the result of the influence of Jean Piaget and his stage theory of cognitive development from the 1920’s.  He viewed [...]

This is a selection from my upcoming book “Bush Cookery: Outdoor Cooking Secrets From A Professional Guide”. You should never leave food, even small bits of it, around your camp.  To do so is to bring animals into camp, and ultimately habituate them to human food.  There’s an old saying that a fed bear is [...]

Our yearlong immersion program is a combination of field school and home school; hands-on hard skills and more traditional academic work focusing on ideas and scholarship. We’ve decided to open the home school portion up to anyone who is interested for free.  It scales well, requires only an internet connection and a library card (and [...]

“There are nowadays professors of philosophy, but not philosophers.  Yet it is admirable to profess because it was once admirable to live.”  Thoreau from chapter on Economy in Walden. There are nowadays many instructors of bushcraft and wilderness living skills, but few who spend much time in the bush.  Yet it is admirable to profess [...]

As discussed on online courses page, we’re ready to start our new online course series. The online courses represent the academic component of our yearlong course. We’re sharing it with anyone who wants to participate. It’s not a replacement for hands-on training in hard skills. It’s a complement for such training, resulting in a deeper [...]

I picked up a book at the library the other day called The New Toughness Training For Sports; Mental, Emotional, and Physical Conditioning.  I’ve enjoyed reading it, and think that it applies to survival and outdoor living. Mental and emotional toughness are crucial in survival, but also in bushcraft, camping and probably every other arena [...]

I’ve been reading Eric Brende’s book Better Off: Flipping The Switch On Technology.  The book chronicles he and his wife living off the grid and with limited technology for 18 months.  With all the current talk about sustainability and the search for new technologies that will make it possible, it makes the point that the [...]

Another new course for 2010, the Bushman course is an intensive exploration of primitive bushcraft skills. The word primitive is derived from the latin root primus, which means first or original. We’ll focus on original skills, those that don’t require specialized kit or other gear. Nature is our gear store. Knowledge makes it accessible. This [...]

My son and I set aside time every week to get outside and explore the natural world.  We’ve been looking at plants, tracks, rocks, and other things that he can see, smell and touch.  Then we go to the Austin Science And Nature Center, where he can get points for the things he discovers.  The [...]

I just got the fall, 2009 Maine Wilderness Guides Organization newsletter.  It has the previously mentioned write-up on Jack Mountain, and also included this great little story. One morning a husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap. Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the [...]

172 years ago today (October 22nd, 1837), Henry David Thoreau started keeping a daily journal.  It was a pretty simple act, but he stuck with it and the result is that people around the world continue to talk about his writing and ideas.  Start something today.  Who knows how far it will go?

I’ve recently been reading about axes with very short handles, and it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.  Historically, the difference between an axe and a hatchet has been one hand. An axe is a tool traditionally used with two hands. A hatchet is used with one. While the various companies will [...]

We’re introducing several new week-long courses in 2010, the first of which is the Woodsman course. It’s a comprehensive introduction to bushcraft and wilderness survival in the northern forest, and will serve as the basic course for our week-long programs. Topics will include: * Wilderness Survival 101 * Introduction To Bushcraft * Fire Making: The [...]

Starting next year we’ll be partnering with Blackwater Outfitters to offer lodging options for our programs. Owner Dick Cullins is a friend and first-rate hunting guide, and his cabins are comfortably furnished with hot showers and soft beds. They’re located just down the road in Masardis. For those interested in attending a course but don’t [...]

For poor instructors, it’s all about the instructor. For marginal instructors, it’s all about the material. For good instructors, it’s all about the student.

We’re officially changing the name of our flagship course. The Earth Skills Semester Program is now The Wilderness Bushcraft Semester. The content of the course will remain the same. The reason for the name change is to make it more descriptive of what is taught and to eliminate any ambiguity caused by the term earth [...]

I’ve had the good fortune to be featured in a bunch of media outlets over the years, and while it’s always nice to see your name in print, when your peers write about you it means that much more. This month I’m the featured guide in the Maine Wilderness Guides Organization newsletter. Since it’s not [...]

Knowledge comes from using information, not access to it. It’s an important distinction to be made in the era of the web and the unlimited amount of information available. Just because someone copies a bit of how-to information onto an online forum doesn’t mean they know something. I’m not trying to be elitist, but there [...]

There are many outdoor education programs available these days, but there are huge differences in content, educational philosophy, and curriculum between them. When we explain what we do to people with no concept of bushcraft, they often remark, “so it’s just like (insert name of national outdoor company here)”. We reply, “No. In fact the [...]

Here’s a photo of my two favorite axe heads.  The top one is one that I managed to find a few years ago; an original Emerson and Stevens, made in Oakland, Maine.  This is the axe head that Geoff Burke sent to Sweden when Gransfors Bruks needed a template of a good American felling axe.  [...]

I’ve been an avid reader of Vilhjalmur Stefansson over the years, and I have a habit of writing down passages that really speak to me.  Having grown up with the common stereotypes associated with stone age people, I’ve always been especially interested in first hand accounts of explorers who made the first western contact with [...]

I heard from a friend last night who took one of our courses a few years ago.  He’s starting a bushcraft school in Canada and wanted to know if he could use our liability release and acknowledgement of risk forms.  I told him yes, as it’s my policy to let anyone who wants to use [...]

I enjoy reading about aspects of history that are little known – especially with regard to exploration.  Fittingly, I recently started reading a book I got at the library by Gavin Menzies called 1421: The Year The Chinese Discovered America.  In it the author discusses the Chinese treasure fleets and how they explored the globe [...]

The new stainless steel water bottles are all the rage these days, and while fashionable trends aren’t something I tend to engage in, there are real benefits to them over their plastic predcessors.  The most important benefit is that you can boil water right in them, eliminating the need for carrying a separate pot when [...]

Wanted: A mentor who can help me create a way to provide scholarships for low-income youth. Goal: To set up a scholarship fund, foundation, or non-profit wing of Jack Mountain in order to provide remote canoe trips and bushcraft courses for low income rural middle and high school boys. Need: Help figuring out the process [...]

Drawing on the philosophies of bushcraft we’ve developed over a decade of field courses, the traditions of Maine Guides that go back generations, the Cree concept of miyupimaatisiium (translated as “being alive well”) and the Scandinavian idea of friluftsliv (translated as “open air life”), the following seven elements comprise the components of our programs. 1. [...]

Eating acorns is a hot topic these days as I’ve gotten several questions about it.  If you haven’t read it, check out this page for a great essay written by my friend Dan Fisher.  He explains how he does it, and i chime it at the end with a short blurb. To answer some recently-posed [...]

If you’re a regular reader or visitor to our site, you may have noticed the small “site by Aroocom” text at the bottom of each page.  No, we haven’t outsourced our site to a Siberian media conglomerate.  Since I’m on an 8-month sabbatical from teaching extended bushcraft courses, I’ve decided to offer my web consulting [...]

There’s a difference between outdoor leadership and management.  Management is when you ensure people carry out predetermined tasks leading to a defined outcome.  Managers aren’t looking for innovation.  They’re there to ensure things get done according to a preexisting plan.  When we’re cooking a group dinner over a campfire in a remote location, we often [...]

We’ve been fielding a lot of questions about our yearlong program lately.  Several people over the weekend wanted to know if students live on-site for the entire year.  The answer is no, they don’t.  The program is organized around three intensives: the fall semester, the winter program, and the spring expedition.  For graduates, there is [...]

We’ve updated the information on our Yearlong Bushcraft Immersion Program for 2010.  Changes include the addition of a 2-week winter survival and travel course and that the course will begin with the fall semester instead of the spring.  Although our costs will go up with adding the winter course, we’re keeping the tuition the same. [...]

I hear from people regularly who are interested in making a move to the country and want to know how much land they need.  This question has also been the impetus for many discussions around the fire.  There is no right answer, as everything depends on the land and what you want to do with [...]

During a recent course we spent some time trout fishing.  When we were paddling across a remote lake I offered some of my lures to be trolled.  As I handed one of my treasured lures to a course participant, I told him the history of the lure, that I had bought it in 1981, that [...]

People stealing other’s content (text, photos, etc.) is common on the web, although that doesn’t make it alright or any less disrespectful.  Some large companies send threatening letters from lawyers to add a consequence for this act.  Our policy is to identify the site, say that it’s both uncool and illegal, and give them an [...]

I first read this story in the mid 1990’s.  It reminds me of a line from Edmund Ware Smith’s “The One-Eyed Poacher And The Maine Woods”, where he writes that the woodsmen in his stories “have their own idea of wealth, and it’s got nothing to do with money.” “A Micmac Looks At The Ways [...]

I’ve updated our blog with some new software, one result of which is that you can once again leave comments.  I’ve had them turned off for a few years, and updating the software and reactivating them is finally off the to-do list.

I spent Saturday canoeing the San Marcos river with my son and a friend.  The section we paddled was a narrow, gentle river  that wound its way past high sandstone banks, through cattle farms, and past some big houses.  There were enormous cypress trees, herons, red-tailed hawks and a bunch of turtles who were enjoying [...]

Our new online registration process is fully operational after a day of tinkering with it.  Instead of our old system where people had to print, fill out and mail a form, we’ve automated the process with an online form.  So the process will be faster, smoother and easier.  If it all seems like too much [...]

I’ve been rereading Calvin Rutstrum’s book The Wilderness Life and am enjoying it as much as the first time.  I think his insights on wilderness living are keen, and his years of experience are evident in his writings unlike some other popular writers.  (I really dislike Nessmuk, and will write about why at some point.) [...]

It takes a long time to achieve competence approaching mastery with bushcraft and primitive living skills.  There are so many different things to learn, and real learning can’t be rushed. Consider this: Tomas Johannson, a director of the Institute for Prehistoric Technology in Sweden, has calculated that would require twelve years of schooling today to [...]

A commodity is a product that is the same no matter where you get it.  A bag of flour is a commodity, because it is the same whether you get it from your local store, through a fancy cooking store, or order it over the web.  Those who sell commodities compete on price because the [...]

During each field school program, we always take a few hours to visit the Ashland Logging Museum.  It’s a great place to learn more about the woods life lived by loggers before the chainsaw and the logging road.  There are replica cabins, a Lombard log hauler, a king’s pine, and numerous other items of interest.  [...]

Where did the widespread idea about surviving in the bush “with only a knife” come from?  I can tell you that it didn’t come from people experienced with living in forested regions.  If I could have only one tool for a trip of a 1-100 days, it would be an axe, not a knife. But [...]

This year we won’t be running a fall semester course for the first time in six years, as I decided a month ago that it was time for a sabbatical.  My apologies to all of you who applied only to have the course postponed for a year, but it was time for me to take [...]

I’m incommunicado no longer, and once again can join the conversation. Jack Mountain has a new phone number, and this one’s a keeper.  207-518-8804. We’re also changing our email to:   jmbushcraft@gmail.com The email change will be gradual, and we’ll still be using our old address for a year or two more. There’s a pile [...]

It’s been a fantastic summer and we had a lot of fun running a wide variety of programs. Yes northern Maine has had a lot of rain. But it led to people perfecting their wet-weather fire skills, and allowed me to run a bunch of whitewater that can usually only be run in early May. [...]

I got an email from my friend Stephen Marshall today about the launching of his new site, Backwoods Adventures (backwoodadventures.com) in Nova Scotia.  Stephen and I worked together a few summers ago and he’s doing great things with first nations people in the Maritimes.  I’m hopeing to get over there one of these days so [...]

This morning I’m wondering where the idea about surviving in the bush “with only a knife” came from?  If I could have only one tool for a trip of a 1-100 days, it would be a full-sized axe, not a knife.  The reason is that an axe makes a better knife than a knife makes [...]

Most survival advice available in the press is dubious at best, written by professional writers and not seasoned instructors with field experience.  Thankfully Outside Magazine decided to hire Tony Nester of Ancient Pathways to answer their  reader’s questions on their Survival Guru blog. Tony’s got two decades of experience teaching in the field, has written [...]

I came across this graphic on Keith Johnson’s Permaculture And Regenerative Design News blog.  Keith used it to support the idea that the production systems that sustain major urban areas lie far the urban boundary.  The term we use for this is displaced impact, and we’ve written about how it applies to minimum impact camping.  [...]

It’s looking like I’ll be trading our white, 15 passenger van, aka the white tube of misery, in for another vehicle later this month. The name was coined by Jeff Butler on our now-infamous roadtrip to Canoecopia a few years ago.  We were driving through Chicago on our way back from Madison, Wisconsin and were [...]

The cord I’ve been using for a decade is finally available online. I got tired of paying the high prices for paracord in the 1990’s and switched to using commercial fishing twine. It’s tough and much cheaper than paracord. The place where I get it recently added an online store. To check out the cord, [...]

The book of poetry titled Pine Tree Ballads was published in 1902 and has some great pieces about the north woods of Maine.  The Knight Of The Spike-Sole Boots by Holman Day tells the story of a sport who tried to run the Hulling Machine on the East Branch of the Penobscot River.  I’ve run [...]

Our new podcast is coming together, and the first episode is live on the web.  There is a bit of work left to do getting everything set up and integrated. Note: In December, 2013 we moved our podcast to it’s current place on our own site.

This morning after dropping my son off at preschool I was walking down the stairs to the house and I heard a bunch of crows making a ruckus.  After looking towards the lake for a few moments, I spotted a shape in one of the white pines, about 20 feet from our deck.  It was [...]

I wrote up a document on helping people prepare for their field school course recently, and put it online with a link from our Registration page.  You can read it at: http://www.jackmtn.com/PDF/JMB_field_school_preparation.pdf The text is below. ———————————————————- ———————————————————- 1.    Food, meals and cooking 2.    Drinking Water 3.    Electricity 4.    Gear And Gear Lists 5.    Sleeping [...]

I’m back from the field school after a great spring semester.  The weather is perfect, the perennial edibles are coming up in force, and we’ve got an edible plants of early summer workshop tomorrow.  More to come, including thoughts about the spring semester, are coming soon.

We’re taking a resupply break at the field school today and made the trek to Presque Isle.  We just finished week 4 (of 6) of the spring semester with a trip on Mooseleuk Stream and the Aroostook River.  We did some fly fishing on the stream and I caught a beautiful 11″ wild brook trout.  [...]

There has been a lot of interest in simplifying and preparedness recently as a result of the economic circumstances many are facing.  Knowing how to take care of your family, even if the modern conveniences stop working for a while, is something at least one person in each household should know.  The good news is [...]

Things have been busy with a new baby and getting ready for the spring semester.  I’ve been working on a white ash bow, and today I cut the handle and thinned the stave using a draw knife and spoke shave. There’s a strip of open water along the lake shore a few feet wide, and [...]

I’ve been trading emails with Taj Forer for a few months, and last weekend we finally got together.  Taj is a photographer and one of the founders of Daylight Magazine.  We discussed a project he’s working on documenting traditional wilderness skills and made plans for him to join us for some of the spring bushcraft [...]

I was recently interviewed by Iain Haywood at ooh.com.  You can read the piece here.  In addition to some nice photos of Ernie Davis and David Bosum, I’m quoted on educational philosophy: “At its best, teaching should be invisible; a person who learns from a mediocre instructor will realize how talented their instructor is. The [...]

We get a lot of requests for work-study options for our programs, so we’re introducing one for summer, 2009. Duties include organic gardening, landscaping, cutting firewood and building an intimate relationship with the land. You’ll live in your own tent or a shelter you build. You’ll maintain an off-the-grid solar pv system, our composting system, [...]

On April 1st I’m giving a talk at the Goodwin Library in Farmington, NH, on preparedness, sustainability and using low-tech techniques to recession-proof your home and family. I’ll be discussing how to live gracefully without modern conveniences such as septic, running water, or electricity in the New England during all seasons.  Topics will range from [...]

Part 2 (of 2) of our Philosophy Of Bushcraft Video. Jack Mountain Bushcraft Journal – Episode 20. For a higher resolution version that combines parts 1 and 2, check it out at blip.tv.

Philosophy Of Bushcraft – Part 1. Jack Mountain Bushcraft Journal Episode 19. For a higher resolution version that combines part 1 and 2, go to our blip.tv channel.

Yesterday I received a dvd copy of a television show shot a year ago called I’ll Try Anything Once and featuring Touré and myself, with a guest appearance by Don Merchant.  I spent several days teaching Touré the skills of winter survival, culminating his 24-hour solo in the winter woods.  I hadn’t seen any footage [...]

I’ve been a fan of Bill Mason’s films and books for several decades.  He was a proponent of wood canvas canoes, canvas tents, and traditional skills of the bush.  I picked out a great quotation from his film Waterwalker the other night: You see things differently when you travel the way the native peoples did. [...]

Our semester course originally grew out of the desire to move past a skills-only paradigm to include the experience of living a simple outdoor life.  After ten years and 12 semester courses, I think we’ve been successful at introducing a new idea of outdoor education to the world that isn’t limited to just hard or [...]

If you haven’t seen it yet, check out the National Film Board Of Canada’s site.  They’ve put their archives online for free, so we’re able to watch a bunch of great films right on the web. To put this in perspective, about 15 years ago I heard about the film Cree Hunters Of Mistassini.  I [...]

I had the opportunity to do some reading and enjoy some spirited discussions on our recent trip to northern Quebec. One of the topics that kept coming up was the lack of decent terminology in english for the simple, outdoor lifestyle based on skill, simple tools and a relationship with the land and it’s resources. [...]

Over the weekend I learned that the article about our 2005 canoe trip on the Big Black River that Tom Haines wrote appeared in the book The Best Travel Writing 2006; True Stories From Around The World.  It originally ran in the travel section of The Boston Globe on June 12, 2005. You can get [...]

Our recent trip to northern Quebec was fantastic.  We had amazing weather, good company, great food, and more than enough laughter for our 8-days in the bush.  I had the good fortune to have Ben McNutt, Lisa Fenton, Matt Upson and Steven Hanton from Woodsmoke, a bushcraft and wilderness survival school in the UK, on [...]

My friend and fellow bushcraft instructor David Cronenwett has a great new blog called A View From Aerie Mountain: Natural History, Bushcraft, Outdoor Survival, Grizzly Bears, Human Ecology, Montana And More.  David is an experienced instructor of outdoor living and has some keen insights into both outdoor life and people. His post titled Personas Among [...]

In the morning I’m heading north with a small group to Oujé-Bougoumou, Quebec, for 8 days of snowshoeing and winter living with my friend David Bosum.  I’m bringing a group with me to experience the Cree way of life and hospitality. I’ve taken several trips with David over the past decade, and all have been [...]

In addition to being the base for our programs, our Bushcraft And Sustainability Field School is also where we experiment with different technologies in order to achieve a simple, comfortable, rural life.  It’s a demonstration site, but not in the sense that we create alternative ways of doing things and then revert back to the [...]

Arctic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson wrote that “adventure is a sign of incompetence.”  But if it isn’t for adventure, why do people do the things they do?  I’m with Stefansson on adventure.  It implies that you’re not prepared for what you face, which, in the case of living a life outdoors, should never be the case.  [...]

Friluftsliv (pronounced: free-looft-sleev) literally means “free-air-life”, and is translated by Roger and Sarah Isberg for their book as “simple life.”  Originally written in Swedish,  it was published and reprinted three times there before being expanded and translated to English. Here’s an explanation of the term by Roger from the introduction; It defines the philosophy and [...]

If you’re interested in keeping up with all the updates we put on the web, check out our FriendFeed page at: friendfeed.com/jmbushcraft It lists all the updates we make on the web, including this blog, photos, videos, Facebook updates, etc.  I’m going to put it on our site soon, but for the time being check [...]

In the February issue of Men’s Fitness we’re featured in an article titled “Surviving The Elements” (“When Tragedy Strikes” in the print edition) by Jesse Huffman.  We offer some survival advice to hikers and snowshoers. Read the article here.

We’re wrapping up week 1 of the Earth Skills Winter Program, and I’m getting all the gear assembled for our snowshoe trip next week.  We’ve had the coldest temperatures of the year so far, but it’s been a fun week anyway and we’ve covered a lot of ground.  Today I’m busy prepping and packing what [...]

The number of primitive skills and survival schools has swelled in the last few years, and while all schools are not created equal there are many opportunities to learn wilderness skills these days.  It’s important to be clear about what we do because it’s different than what’s available elsewhere.  Yes, we teach skills.  We’re among [...]

I got an email from Tim MacWelch of the Earth Connection School of Wilderness Survival And Ancient Skills in Virginia today.  They’re running a weekend primitive skills gathering this month, January 16-18.  From his email: Wolf Moon Camp – Primitive Skills Gathering – January 16-18 Earth Connection School of Wilderness Survival and Ancient Skills is [...]

We’re introducing a new format for the fall, 2009 Earth Skills Semester Program.  We’re breaking the course up into two blocks of four weeks each, with a week off in the middle.  And instead of working five days a week, we’ll be working six days a week.  With the practical exam at the end of [...]

We went out on a family tracking walk yesterday.  The snow was perfect and there were all sorts of tracks for my son to investigate.  It’s fun being outside with him and seeing the landscape through his eyes.  One of the neat things we can learn from children is the idea of vu-ja-de.  It’s the [...]

There’s a lot of information about bushcraft on the web, but much of it is focused around equipment and celebrities, not knowledge and experience.  If you’re just getting started, here are seven things to keep in mind. 1.  It’s not about the gear.  We did alright for 99% of human history without all the latest [...]

My friend David Cronenwett is the co-owner of the Wilderness Arts Institute in Montana, an experienced bushcraft instructor and a professional naturalist.  He sent me this essay he wrote about a winter survival exercise that became a wilderness survival episode last winter in Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness.  It’s a good read and there are lessons [...]

In preparing for our programs I always tell people to bring enough sleeping bag.  If you know you can get 8 or ten hours of warm, comfortable sleep at night most situations are tolerable.  My good friend and semester course alumnus, Sean Fagan, recently sent me a note about his experience with us in northern [...]

Our 2009 calendar is complete and you can view it here.  I’m putting it all on Google Calendar, and have it embedded at the bottom of the page.  We’ve got a bunch of new programs, including a week of making pack baskets, bows and canoe paddles along with staying in a nearby resort.  We’ve also [...]

I just finished reading Tom Jamrog’s blog post reviewing the Snow Walkers Rendezvous in November.  He’s got several videos in the post, including the tour of the tents and part one of Allan Brown’s torching of a canvas tent.  It’s definitely worth the read.  If it’s difficult for you to get to Vermont in November, [...]

I’ve got the updated details on the 2009 yearlong (7 months to be specific) immersion program online. The price has come way down and there is a discount for bringing your own canoe.  We’re accepting applications until April 1st and will only take ten people.  Full details are available at jackmtn.com/esyear.html.

We put up a blog for the participants of our semester programs last spring, and a big part of a spring logbook was recently posted. So if you want to find out more of what goes on in our programs, you can check it out at The Bushcraft Experience.

Below is the 21-point curriculum for our spring, 2009 Bushcraft Canoe Expedition Semester. Wilderness Survival – Basic, intermediate and advanced survival. Fire – Fire making with and without modern tools. Shelter Construction – Building for survival, short-term and long-term stays. Water – Acquisition And Purification. Navigation – Barehand (using no modern tools), map and compass. [...]

We’re redesigning our spring semester for 2009. The new format will be a 6-week program with most of the time spent traveling through the bush of northern Maine. There are 5 phases to the program, each of which can be taken as an individual course. Phase 1: Weeklong bushcraft and guide training immersion course. Phase [...]

We use steel axes and knives on a daily basis in our programs, and I’ve been asked several times how this meshes with the primitive skills movement.  My answer has two parts.  First, I believe that in order to progress to the skill level where a tool such as an axe or knife is no [...]

The major updates to our site are done, and everything seems to be working.  If you come across a problem, please let us know.

Many of our web pages are out of date.  Our menus are out of date.  Our calendar is in need of an upgrade.  All of this is coming in the next two weeks.  I’ve been working with new menu software and am almost ready to go live.  So if you’ve been frustrated by our website [...]

December 16-20 is the annual Maine Wilderness Guides Organization winter guide training course, and I’ll be working with Kevin Slater of Mahoosuc Guide Service again this year to put it on. It’s a great opportunity for those who are new to winter living and guiding to get some experience in the bush and learn about [...]

We’re got two new programs for ESSP alumni coming in 2009. The first is a practicum, where people gather at our Bushcraft And Sustainability Field School for a week (or two) to get back in touch with the bush life. It’s an opportunity to spend some unstructured time working on subjects of interest, prepare for [...]

I love to research and travel on the old canoe routes that were the highways before the vast northern forests of Maine had a single logging road.  A few years ago I picked up a copy of a book called “The Indian Canoe Routes Of Maine” by David S. Cook, which described many of these [...]

We’re adding a new member to our team – The University Of Maine at Presque Isle.  We’ll be actively collaborating with UMPI beginning in 2009 and are excited about the opportunities this presents.  It’s a great opportunity for college students seeking to include buscraft as part of their studies.  More at the UMPI Recreation and [...]

I had a great time at the Snow Walkers’ Rendezvous in Vermont, both meeting up with old friends and making some new ones. My workshop on using an axe and lighting wet-weather fires was well attended, and the food was outstanding as it always is at the Hulbert Outdoor Center. I also attended an informative [...]

A question I get asked on a regular basis, and one I wish would just go away, is what I think about the TV survival shows.  Usually, the person asking likes one show and doesn’t like another, and is willing to support their hero to no end.  Having spent the last few years with no [...]

Tomorrow I’m headed to Fairlee, Vermont for the Snow Walkers’ Rendezvous at the Hulbert Outdoor Center.  The focus of the event is on traditional winter travel skills of the north.  I’ll be running workshops on axemanship and fire building, but as is the case with all rendezvous or gathering-type events where I run workshops, I’d [...]

Jack Mountain was featured in an article titled Extreme Survival Schools by Scott Bowen that hit the web on October 15. From the article; “The instructors at Jack Mountain Bushcraft can teach you everything from how to live happily in the woods with nothing but a knife, to proper snow-shoeing techniques, to the art of [...]

We wrapped up our 12 semester program over the weekend, and I’m back in NH for a short while.  It was the first semester run entirely at our 41-acre Bushcraft And Sustainability Field School in Masardis, Maine, and the new location added immensely to the experience.  The beautiful, clear waters of the Aroostook River, the [...]

This photo is looking upstream on the Aroostook river.  Our Bushcraft & Sustainability Field School is on the right.  I loved this photo because of the light on the basket and canoe.

When the tail end of hurricane Kyle swung through Aroostook County and dumped several inches of rain it brought all the rivers up to their spring flood stage in two days.  We took advantage of this and went exploring on some of the nearby rivers. With each passing week I learn more about the area [...]

This month (October) Jack Mountain is featured in an article titled “Could You Handle An Emergency?” by Michelle Crouch.  The article deals with how to handle a variety of emergencies.  Our short blurb focuses on what to do if attacked by a black bear when hiking.  For those who want the short answer, it’s to [...]

Friend and Maine Guide Shawn McNutt has been posting his journal and photos of a fall, 2006 canoe guide training course we ran on the Allagash on his blog Guide Spot.  It’s great to read his perspectives on the trip, and his photos really bring out the natural beauty of the waterway. You can read [...]

We’re putting together a busy schedule of short courses for this fall, winter and spring, and we’ve got a great new venue where they’ll be offered; the Ossipee Mountain Grange.  As part of our ongoing partnership with sustainability organization GALA, they’ll be hosting our workshop series in their new building.  The first scheduled workshop is [...]

Week 5 of the 10-week Earth Skills Semester Program is finished.  It’s been a great semester, and our new ground ere in Aroostook County has been flat-out amazing.  Last week I saw a lynx sneaking around camp, and I’ve been enjoying all the other wildlife we’ve seen.  In addition to the bald eagles, osprey, kestrels, [...]

We spent the week on a remote, northern Maine lake learning the arts of canoe paddling and poling.  Cooking every meal over the open fire, watching the bald eagles fly over the lake and land in the white pines, listening to the songs of the loons who would sit in the water off the point [...]

Week one of the fall semester is completed, and next week we’ll be in the bush camping on some remote lakes.  It will be an introduction to the traditional skills of canoeing and the grace of living in the bush. This past week we identified and used numerous wild food plants, as well as a [...]

In the morning I’m off to begin the 10-week fall Earth Skills Semester Program. It looks like there will be no internet access at our place after all, so I’ll be away from the blog and email for a while. If you want to get in touch with me, the best way is by phone [...]

I spent the last two weeks in Masardis with a friend putting up our new cabin.  The day before we started working on it I found a few large moose tracks under what became the center of the building, so I’ve been referring to it as the Moose Track Lodge.  It’s the next stage in [...]

From an interview with Wade Davis in the April, 2008 issue of Discover magazine. True or not, it’s a great story. During the 1950s the Canadian government forced the Inuit into settlements. A family from Arctic Bay told me this fantastic story of their grandfather who refused to go. The family, fearful for his life, [...]

We’re organizing a yearly trip for alumni of our bushcraft semester courses.  Our goal is to create avenues for continuing education and group learning.  The 2009 trip is still in the planning stages, but will likely take place on the Penobscot and Allagash rivers and be 2-3 weeks long. More of a practicum than a [...]

I was at the library in town tonight and found out that there was an article in the local paper about a recent edible and medicinal plant walk I ran. It’s in the July 17th edition of the Granite State News in the Home and Garden section. Titled “Finding edible plants and medicines in your [...]

Knowing we’d be far from the power lines this past semester, and knowing I’d want something to use as a generator to charge camera/camcorder/cell phone batteries, I bought a Freeplay Weza before the start of the course. I’ve had great luck with one of their other products, a hand-cranked LED lantern, and the way the [...]

One of the challenges of an extended stay in the bush during the warm (no snow or ice) seasons is planning meals that don’t require refrigeration. Of course, there is always the option of storing food in a cooler with store-bought ice, but this is a hassle as well as being expensive. There is also [...]