Mountain men and longhunters both practiced no trace camping. It could mean their life if their camp was discovered an hour or so after departure.

Sparks

Still can if the Park Ranger/DIFW catch up too you in some areas.I was practicing leave no trace long before it was Politicaly Correct.Ever walk into one of your old haunts just too find it all cluttered up with burn pits/rock piles and no bushes left,sickening.

On the subject of ovens, they are present in AFC records, but are exceedingly rare suggesting they were for use only at posts. There are 3 listed in 1832 at Ft. Union and 4 'cast ovens' in 1851. There are a few wood stoves as well including one in 1832 and 4 in 1851. Its highly unlikely that any of these saw much trail use or made it to Rendezvous.

Pilot bread, Navy bread, ships biscuit, and barrels of flour are all commonly noted in trade records from AFC, Ft. Hall, the various incarnations of RMF, and Bent and St. Vrain. Ashley's agreement to supply Smith, Jackson, and Sublette contained a fixed cost of $1 per pound for flour, and even hard cases like Kit Carson bought flour from Ft. Hall in 1835.

On the subject of no trace camping, I would imagine that some of this occurred while they moved in small trapping parties. From what I've read though, they often had an evening camp where they rested, grazed their stock, and cooked dinner, but they regularly left those fires burning and moved off several miles to cold camp when they perceived some risk of enemy attack. When they were moving as a lager party of 10-50 men with up to 150 animals, it would have been folly to even try to hide your camp or trail. Period literature contains several references of prairie and forest fires started from unextinguished campfires as well as intentionally set fires.

Sean

quote:

Originally posted by Rifleman1776:
Near the end of the book of his adventures, in 1837 or '38, Joe Meek recalls an incident regarding bread. He sees some missionary wives cooking bisquits with a reflector oven (by itself, that is interesting). He convinces an indian to trade them for a bisquit and bring him one. He gets it and savors the taste of bread for the FIRST TIME IN NINE YEARS. So, can we say reflector ovens are 'authentic' at rendezvous but bread isn't?

I guess if your "persona" is a missionary's wife you can make all the biscuits you want.
I suspect that unless they brought along some wheat seed they quit eating bread too when the flour ran out.

Dan

Guess my attempt at humor directed tward what I always heard called low impact camping was a bit feeble, No offence was meant tward any scout leaders.

J, No offence taken. I love a good, hot cup of joe in the morning. Best Regards. Rockerhound

No offence here either. You gave me a good chuckle as a matter of fact. I was poking fun at the absolutist faction of "No Trace" camping. It's important for kids to learn how to build fires and make shelters. It's also important to teach kids when not to.

I spent a good deal of time and effort showing the kids how to cook on stoves and how to make their own so they're not dependent on expensive manufactured things quite so much. A 3 cent wax fueled buddy burner will vulcanize an egg just as well as a $50 gasoline camp stove. More quietly, too.

Three Hawks

Heres a good one for Yall(though might should be a seperate thread. anyone ever make a camp cooker with a piece of sawed log and a candle? You use a ship auger and bore a hole in the end of the log,then cut a x down through it with the hole for the center of the x all this needs to be about 6" deep,put the 1" candle down the hole light it and set your kettle on it. This will boil cffie,fry meat,ect

quote:

Mountain men and longhunters both practiced no trace camping

I'm gonna have to disagree here. There's a difference with folks who defaulted into what we today may call "leave no trace" when camping. By default, I mean a moccasin leaves not tread marks, and was made from natural materials..., as today the idea of LNT includes leaving as little disturbed by one's passing, including wearing trails in the woods with vibram soles, the use of mocs was necessary, not practiced.

The longhunters were a very specific group, in a small geographic region, existing for about a mere decade, so perhaps that's the confusion. A longhunter is also a frontiersman, but not all of the frontiersmen were longhunters.

Longhunters would often leave 2-3 skinned carcasses in the woods each day, and their goal was a minimum of one per day. They built half faced shelters and remained in them many months. Lots of fuel was used by the average longhunter camp, and lots of shoed horse who foraged in the woods, as they didn't take feed with them. So those factors alone would eliminate them from LNT criteria. There are many times when longhunters had their camps raided, and they had to flee.

Mountain men too, faced the same problems of the longhunters, although the carcasses they left behind were smaller, they had to harvest, process, dry, and store their pelts. They needed pack horses and shelters, so they too did not practice LNT.

Both would worry about detection by NA's, and would do what they could, but the chores and methods needed for them to accomplish the reason they went into the woods, would eliminate them from LNT.

Scouts on the frontier, when facing hostiles, (often called in popular literature frontiersmen) would practice doing as little as possible to attract attention. Cold camps, white-oak bark buried fires and a blanket in cold weather, are a couple of the tactics they used in warfare.


Here's an LNT tip, for all you trekkers..., and anybody who works with youth groups trying to practice LNT..., HALF BRICKS. This doesn't work so well solo if you are traveling as light as possible, but if a four or more person party each carries a half-brick inside two, small cotton canvas drawstring bags..., you can have a campfire without worries.

LNT maintains that burning of the ground with a campfire sterilizes it, may kill roots beneath the surface, and often hardens it. So if each person places their half-brick on the ground to form a square, and you build a small fire on top of that square, the bricks shield the ground to a great degree. (Works even better with 6 people). Sure the brick get hot, but it's much better, and much cooler than a fire on the actual ground.

When cooking is done, in cold weather, you put the half-brick inside one bag, then the brick & bag go inside the second bag, and that's placed at your feet to keep 'em warm at night. In warm weather let the fire burn out, but you can keep the coffee warm for a while longer sitting on the bricks. The pair of canvas bags keeps the bricks from burning your feet, and when the brick is cool, the bags keep the soot from messing up the other gear in the pack or roll. Just be sure to use the same bag as the interior bag at all times.

When you are ready to leave camp, breaking up the ground with a knife, and sprinkling about half a film canister of fertilizer encourages the foliage to return.

LD