Sleeping Gear JMHO

Description

http://www.thepathfinderstore.com

Dave Canterbury, David Canterbury, The Pathfinder School,Bush Craft ,Survival skills, Historical Lore, Primitive Skills, Archery, Hunting, Trapping, Fishing, Navigation, Knives, Axes, Fire, Water, Shelter, Search and Rescue

Tags: Bushcraft,Survival,David Canterbury,Dave Canterbury,Pathfinder,The Pathfinder School,Archery,Hunting,Fishing,Camping,Primitive Skills,Fire,Water,Shelter,Navigation,First Aid,Search and Rescue,Signaling,Prepper,Preparedness,Self Reliance,Survivability,The 10 C's,Knives,Axes,Saws,Bow Drill,Ferrocerium Rod,Ferro Rod,Tarp,Hammock,Canteen,Cooking,Longhunter,Trapping

Video Transcription

morning folks Dave camera at the path under school continuing on with our basic series talking about sleeping and we talked about shelter and we talked about fire we talked about disinfection of your ground source water and things of that nature in this series and what I want to talk about now is sleeping and getting a good night's sleep we've talked about different configurations we've talked about you know hammock sleeping we've talked about sleeping on the ground we've talked about a raised bed we've talked about pads and browse bags and things to keep us from having to battle too much with conduction we've talked about controlling convection we've talked about utilizing the radiant heat from the fire to keep us warm at night understanding that if we really want to stay warm and we don't have the best sleeping system we're going to have to have a large fire a very large fire the difference between a cook fire and a survival fire is about 10 fold so we need to understand that one of the things that I've heard lately in discussions on different programs and on different discussion boards and things like that is it kind of drives me crazy when you're talking about something and someone says while you're talking about a survival situation are you talking about bushcraft well the funny thing about that is is that bushcraft can turn into survival and people don't seem to get that through their head they want to either go out and practice bushcraft that they want to go out and practice survival and they don't realize that the two are intertwined because one can become the other very easily if I go out on a canoe trip for a day with my wife and my child or my wife and my granddaughter and 4 o'clock in the afternoon we're still 5 klicks away from our pickup point in the canoe spills over and it's November or October in the state of Ohio where it's going to get down to 40 degrees water temperatures already dropped down around 65 to 70 hypothermia is right around the corner at that point now it's become it's not a weekend pleasure camping trip anymore or a daily canoe trip now it's a survival scenario so it doesn't matter what else we were planning to do whether it was bushcraft canoeing fishing hunting whatever the outdoor experience we planned for that day it just became a survival scenario

and planning for that all the time is what's important and that goes along with your sleep system as well and you can practice with different types of sleeping equipment but you have to have confidence in knowing that whatever you do you're going to be able to sustain yourself in an emergency so let's talk first about wool blankets and I'm going to put a disclaimer on this discussion about wool blankets very quickly by telling you that there's no wool blanket on the planet that's going to be as warm as a sleeping bag it's just not going to happen so you've got a plan for that and that goes back to your shelter setup option your fire option what you plan to do to keep yourself warm understanding that you're not going to crawl into that wool blanket roll up on the ground and go to sleep without a fire in a very cold weather environment now there are some sleeping bags that will keep you warm in very very chilly weather so the first one we'll talk about is we'll talk about this one is called a Baker bundle and the reason I'm using this Baker bundle for an example is it's a very typical Dutch style trade blanket that would have been carried along the frontier most of the other ones would have been a bone or ivory white color I do have one coming as a sample from the same company that makes the current will blanketly care on our website that is 96 by 96 or queen-size I get a lot of questions about what size that will blanket is and how big it is compared to military blankets it's twice as big as far as width almost and longer it is a queen size wool blanket it's made out of solid merino wool we'll talk about that in a minute too because that keeps it from inching this blanket is made from virgin wool it's a very expensive handmade wool blanket it's very very worn

within reason if you've got your clothes on or you're dressed correctly and it's 30 degrees outside you've got a decent you know fire in front of a decent shelter it's going to keep you warm if it's below freezing outside you don't have that good fire and you don't have a decent shelter

you're not going to roll up in this thing and go to sleep on the ground and be warm it's just not going to happen you need to understand that and plan for that but this wool blanket is a very very good wool blanket probably one of the best you can get pretty much Hudson Bay weight again 96 86 but very expensive so if you're just out practicing bushcraft or practicing fronts to your living skills and you want to understand what it's like to sleep with a wool blanket what our forefathers went through to sleep with wool blankets in different situations this is the wool blanket that I would recommend for very cold weather now let's talk about the wool blanket that we saw on our website currently that website or the wool blanket we sell currently is a 96 by 96 merino wool blanket that is handmade in the USA or I'm sorry that is machine made in the USA it's made from an operating woolen mill right here in the US that takes the sheep on one end and comes out blankets on the other end basically if you want to look at it you know in the broad spectrum of things this blanket is very warm it's 96 by 96 for moderate temperatures I would recommend this blanket if you're trying to go with a wool blanket option it is kind of a fawn color it's made out of merino wool to avoid the itch problem that you have with wool it's not as thick as a Hudson Bay weight blanket it's about half as thick but it's every bit as thick as a military wool blanket as far as a US will blanket goes and if you combine this with a sleeping bag which we'll talk about here in a little while then you really got something we're going to talk about combining wool blankets or sleeping bags here in a few minutes but this blanket was meant for a milder temperature wool blanket this is not a winter weight wool blanket you need something more like the one that I talked about a minute ago the Baker bundle or a Hudson Bay wait what I call a Hudson Bay weight wool blanket that's 96 by 96 and the secret to wool blankets that most people don't understand is you don't just fold them in half crawling them and lay down go to sleep you've got to lay that blanket in a diamond fashion lay down in the middle of that diamond and layer that thing up and roll into it so that you're cocooned under 2 or 3 layers of wool trapping heat in between and that's the key element to holding that body heat in is to trap layers of heat so that's what you do with a wool blanket now let's talk real quick get off the wool blanket kick for a minute understanding that is something that we're doing to understand how our forefathers lived in the wilderness the other big of manage the wool is that it can be used as a garment as well as something to sleep in the multi functionality of the wool blanket is the key element to what I believe makes it such a vital piece of kit it can be used for outerwear it can be used for a shelter it can be used to sleep with all the other things that you cannot do with just a sleeping bag alone so let's talk sleeping bags from them if I'm going to use a sleeping bag and I only have three that are my main use sleeping bags and these three sleeping bags will get me through just about any weather condition especially when combined with a wool blanket sometimes I combine it with a bivy sometimes I don't but we're not really talking about biffy's in this video we're talking about just sleeping bags and wool blankets sleep systems the military sleeping bags are the ones that I would go with they're going to be the tried and trued bulletproof if you want to call it that systems that have been tried and true over time so the first sleeping bag that I'm going to show you is from a company called eco tat now I'm not always going to be able to tell you where to get this stuff a lot of people say where can I get that where can I get that but I can't always tell you if I know where to get it I will tell you in the video this this particular one was picked up at an army surplus store for like $20 and it's a $400 sleeping bag then I'm not even sure they make anymore but it was a sleeping bag that was designed for Recon Marines from what I've researched on it it's by a company called ecoute at the bottom of it is open with drawstrings so you can sleep in it with your boots it also has an opening in the bag itself in the center here that's velcro shut so that it could be worn for a poncho liner so it's a very versatile bag but at the same time the temperature rating of this bag is only about 40 degrees ish so once it gets cold this bag alone is not going to cut it for you again it's opening at the bottom so you can sleep in it in your boots which I wouldn't recommend unless you're you know on the run so that makes it less of a good choice than a normal sleeping bag because it's open at the bottom but it makes it more versatile in it can be used for an outer garment as well you're not going to get around the fire with this thing it's made out of nylon and it's going to melt without a doubt the one thing I like about this sleeping bag compared to some of the other military bags is that it has a center seam zip system on it in other words the zipper is in the center of the sleeping bag it's not off to one side so that makes it very easy to open if you're inside the bag and you're not going to be laying on top of that zipper in the middle of the night if you have to be if you have to get out of the bag it does have a nice hood on it with a drawstring for a mummy type hood that you can drawstring down around you again makes it good for outerwear as well because you can put that hood on open the bag all the way completely up the bottom has no seam in it so you can wrap that thing around you but again you're not going to do that around a fire very easily so that sleeping bag is very good um I always keep my sleeping bags when they're traveling with me if they're not with me I like to keep them out of a bag just fluffed up in the closet or something so that they can breathe dry out and things like that and they don't get the insulation doesn't get all crushed up and mucked up in them but I almost always keep my sleeping bags when I'm traveling in some type of a waterproof bag

hey that keeps it dry B it just gives me another container but a waterproof bag is a very good system for that now this bag actually is down-filled and it compresses very very small you can put this whole bag into a 10 liter dry bag very very easily push it all the way down and still have room in the top for some type of an improvised bivy especially or some type of a bivy system especially a summer bivvy where you've got something that's made out of bug net and lightweight sill line you can put that right on the top of this thing and then all you really need your sleeping pad you've got a complete sleep system in a pretty small package so the sleeping bags that i've got are going to be in waterproof bags for that reason i don't keep them that way all the time but i do keep them that way when i'm traveling

now the second sleeping bag that i would recommend or that i would say is a good sleeping bag if that's the route you used to go is I've got a gore-tex bivy on top of it here's the know pay attention to that in this video is the black arctic bag from the MMS Sleep System now I do not carry the green bag the patrol bag the reason I don't carry the patrol bag is because a if I need an extra layer inside here I can always use the e-coat I'd be I would rather put a wool blanket inside here like this merino wool one that doesn't take up much more space in my pack it's a little heavier but it doesn't take up much more space than the Eco tab does and then I have the versatility of this outerwear that I can put around the fire that's going to hold insulation and even if it gets damp or wet and I can combine that inside this sleeping bag to give me that added warmth but just this black bag by itself goes down pretty low okay the main problem I have with this bag is it's very warm it's very durable I've had this one for a long time it's got the same mummy hood and everything else in it and when combined with a wool blanket like I said it's just absolutely toasty in frigid frigid cold weather I've slept in this thing without a wool blanket with just the gore-tex bivvy at minus 9 degrees ish in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and was toasty warm just laying on a rubber sleeping mat directly on the ground with no cover over my head whatsoever the problem with this bag is the zip is really not in the center of the bag it's off to one side where the snaps are so you can snap this into the rest of the components that go with it

so you might roll over and be laying on this zipper in the middle of the night if you had to get out of it quickly for some reason it makes it a little bit less convenient to get out of especially if you're laying on the zipper that's something where this zipper is right in the center of the bag and that can be a problem for you especially in countries where you have large predators and things like that but all in all you know this sleeping bag is probably one of the warmest sleeping bags I've ever slept and BarNone without a doubt so I would definitely recommend this and they're getting cheaper and cheaper all the time now they used to be pretty expensive but they're getting pretty cheap now so I would definitely recommend this bag to anybody who's looking for a good quality sleeping bag it does take up some room is pretty big but you can stuff this down in the bottom of your backpack without the waterproof bag especially if you've got a backpack that's pretty decent waterproof and just pack your gear on top of it or you can shove it in a waterproof bag like this thirty liter and this thirty liter will hold not only a sleeping bag but it will also hold the Bibby and then you can put this down in your bag as well and you'll be good to go you can push this thing down to where it's barely even taking up half of this bag or just a little over half it's right to here right now and then I can put whatever I need to on top of that like the gore-tex bivy or whatever else and I pretty much got a self-contained kit because I could probably get a tarp in there too if I really wanted to okay again if you combine something like this with the mid weight wool blanket like the one that we saw on our website then you have the versatility of having a sleeping bag that will go down to a way low temperature plus you've got that will blanket that you can use for outerwear besides just using it for sleeping okay there's one more bag that I want to talk to you guys about real quick and this bag came from a gun show it has a really really large toe box in it it's a little bit heavier it's quilted it's a little heavier duty I think then the black arctic bag isn't in the sleep system and to me it's every bit as warm I've put I've been in this thing with a wool blanket before and it's just really really warm and comfortable it's got really wide shoulders in it as well as having a big toe box it's got really wide shoulders in it as well and I like that it says 1972 on it it says polyester other than that it doesn't have much writing on it I'll see if I can read this for you guys ought to put my spectacles on and do that and getting old here the wording on it is looks to be German if I had to guess but it says 1972 on it it says eju ege is the manufacturer like I said I picked this thing up at a gun show at a really really reasonable price I mean 20 bucks or less or I wouldn't bought it and it just fills a lot of the gaps that I think are missing with the mms system like I said it's a center zip it's got really wide shoulders in it and it's got a really big toe box in it for trapping out heat in there and I think that those things are really important it's nice quilted heavy-duty nylon like I said you put a wool blanket in this thing and you really got something going on it's got snaps along with the zipper as well if you want to snap it up I wouldn't do that myself personally but if you want to snap it up just to hold it a little bit more warmth you could do that so I wanted to show you this bag because it's kind of an oddball bag that I've never seen before and I have used it quite a bit I learned it a lot to students and stuff and winter classes some of my instructors if they don't have a bag to keep them warm because I believe in it you know I'm not going to give something to a student or my instructors and say hey use this if I don't think that it's going to definitely keep them warm and that's what I keep this around for mainly but I do use it myself sometimes as well I just prefer the big fire in the wool blanket for the traditionalism of it alright guys well I'm Dave Canterbury pathfinder school one I appreciate join me for another video in our basics series today you know when it comes to sleeping systems and the way you sleep you have to do what's comfortable for you you have to experiment you have to try different things and find out what works best for you because will keeps me warm or my comfort level may be completely different than your comfort level so you've got to figure that out remember that there's never going to be a wool blanket that's as warm as a good sleeping bag but they'll never be a sleeping bag

that's as versatile as a wool blanket so there's a tit-for-tat there that you have to understand and if you can combine the two you're that much better off I thank you for your views and thank you for your support I thank you for everything you do for me for my family for my school my sponsors affiliates and friends now to back to another video soon as I can thanks guys

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