Outdoor Shane 
Alaska lives up to its name as the Last Frontier, and despite having lived there for years and visiting old friends again many times after, sometimes I have a hard time describing it to someone who hasn’t been there. I strongly recommend it for anyone who is going for a visit, and for many people …
Paracord has an interesting history, and is an example of something that started out with one use but because of its versatility continued to thrive in others. Since parachute cord, aka paracord, was developed in the military in total there are six officially recognized sizes of paracord: 95 cord, 275 cord, 325 cord, 425 cord, …
There’s a lot of wisdom to be found from the old hands who have spent decades hitting the local fishing holes, wandering through the woods, and surviving off the land. If someone who walked into the Alaska woods with nothing but a backpack walked out 30 years later talking about his cabin 20 miles into …
The black widow spider has certainly gained a reputation for being both elegant and deadly. To the point they are one of the few feared spiders in North America, and have caught imagination as they are found on every continent except Antarctica. These beautiful but “deadly” spiders have been the inspiration for multiple works of …
Seeing expiration dates on things like a gallon of milk or package of hamburger makes sense but why would bear spray or other outdoor gear have an expiration date? Most important, for something like bear spray does it still work after that expiration date? Considering that this is used to defend against a potentially life-threatening …
The joke that was already decades old by the time I hit my early camping years in the late 1980s/early 1990s was when it doubt, use “Scout Water” to get that fire going. Scout Water was, of course, gasoline, and yeah, that’s one way to start a bon fire. But is it really a safe …
Starting a fire with gasoline…it’s a life choice we don’t recommend. Obvious safety concerns aside, is it actually legal, though? This is a question that is generally fairly easy to answer but there are some important considerations to get the answer you want. Generally it is not illegal to start a fire with gasoline, assuming …
We already looked at whether or not you can safely use expired bear spray, but that’s not the only safety question that focuses around bear spray and its use. Since this aerosol is used to chase off even the biggest of bears, could it actually kill a person? While very painful, bear spray cannot kill …
If you live in North America there aren’t too many spiders that worry you. The United States isn’t Australia, which means even the “most dangerous” spiders in North America won’t make a blip on the radar as the more exotic spiders in areas like the Land Down Under. The brown recluse spider has a reputation …
Having spent many many months of my life camping when temperatures decided to slam into the mid to high 90’s, camping in hot weather is no stranger to me. Add in daily hikes in Austin Texas for two years where the mercury could climb into the triple digits pretty easily (and early) in summer and …
