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Wilderness Lean-To Shelter: First Try

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Being a fan of the Dual Survival television show – my interests in primitive survival have been peaked recently. I decided to try to build my own lean-to shelter.

Lean to shelters are one of the most basic form of expedient wilderness shelters that can be easily made with very few tools. I have seen these on TV, in the movies and read about them in books. I decided to take a stroll into the woods and see how difficult it would be to construct this primitive shelter.

Below: I came across a downed tree and thought that it would work well to “lean” branch’s against.

Below: After surveying the area and gathering many branches – I laid them against the fallen tree. I then criss-crossed many other branch’s of various sizes across the first branches. 

Above: Pine tree’s and pine branches were laid across and all over the shelter to form more of a solid existence. I then threw a bunch of leaves on it to provide a little more of a barrier. My hope is that with enough material between the shelter top and the sleeping area – that the inhabitant would have a little better insulation from the rain, cold and extreme heat.

Above: Inside of the shelter.

Above: The only tools used was this inexpensive ax.

Total time spent on this shelter was maybe 1 hour. Not bad. If I was really needing to use this for protection – at least triple that time would have been spent constructing. What would I have done different? A little longer and I would have enclosed it on two sides. I also would have made certain that it was built in an area that would have been out of the way of running water should it rain.

Overall it turned out pretty good and building it is just another bit of info to tuck away in my little brain.

For more info on wilderness shelters…..click here.

Rourke

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