Participating in Nature
Get in touch with your wild side! Primitive living is a way of learning about nature by participating in it. Instead of merely camping in the wilderness or passing through it, you can become part of the process. You learn about nature by using it to meet your needs for shelter, fire, water, and food. You set aside the trappings of modern culture and step directly into nature with little or nothing, to experience nature on its own terms.
Participating in Nature: Wilderness Survival and Primitive Living Skills provides a direct, hands-on experience of the world around you. With this book you have the opportunity to discover the thrill of staying warm and comfortable without even a blanket! Learn how to design and build shelters that are uniquely appropriate to the available resources, weather conditions, and your goals while you are there.
Experience the magic of starting a fire by "rubbing two sticks together" using the bowdrill or handdrill, and learn to make your own flint & steel fire kit for convenient fire-starting in any weather.
Learn about Giardia and develop confidence drinking out of backcountry streams. Learn practical water purification strategies to use when conditions require it. Learn how to catch a fish by hand and cook it without a pan!
Discover innovative "primitive gourmet" cooking methods, such as making ashcakes, sourdough, and wild strawberry ashcake pies. Learn how to cook bread in a stone oven, gather and process wild clay to make your own pots, and cook a stir fry on a slab of bark.
Learn about edible wild plants and wild food economics, including starchy roots, wild fruits, harvesting and winnowing seeds, pine nuts where you wouldn't expect them, plus tapping maples, box elders, and birches for syrup.
Experience the thrill of quietly stalking up on an animal, or developing trust-stalking skills to allow it to accept your presence. Make your own "quickie bow," arrows, and bone arrowheads. Learn how to process sinews and hide glue, butcher a roadkill deer, tan its hide, and make your own clothing.
Make rugged, all-terrain sandals out of old tires and transform a wool blanket into an instant coat. Create warm felted mittens from raw wool. Learn how to pack your gear as a bedroll or make a primitive packframe.
Participating in Nature includes dozens of innovative skills and an incredible 350 pictures and illustrations plus a thoughtful philosophy. Tom does extensive experiential research. He places an emphasis on publishing new information that is not found in any other source.
The cost of this book is $35.00. That price includes shipping to anywhere in the United States. The book is shipped via the U.S. Postal Service.
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Botany in a Day
Our culture teaches us that we are separate from nature. We spend most of our lives in houses surrounded by manicured lawns, living in towns or cities where recrecational activies are based on human-centered sports. Nature is something we go to a park to see, or we watch a show about it on TV.
Those of us in the field of environmental education try to preach a different message, telling people that "all life is interconnected" and that "we really are part of nature". But in the next breath we tell them to stay on the trails and to practice "no-trace" camping. We tell them to look at nature and photograph it, but not to touch it. We tell them our modern way of life is destroying nature, and that we need to stop mucking up the planet. In other words, we tell them we are part of nature--the bad part!
Here at HOPS Press, LLC we advocate a positive interactive relationship with the natural world. We want people to get involved in nature, to be a part of the process on many levels:
Through Participating in Nature: Thomas J. Elpel's Field Guide to Primitive Living Skills and the Art of Nothing Wilderness Survival Video Series, you can experience an intimate connection with nature as you rediscover the skills our ancestors used to survive for tens of thousands of years. Instead of merely camping in the wilderness or passing through it, you will become part of the process as you learn about nature by using it to meet your needs for shelter, fire, water and food. Learn to set aside the trappings of modern culture and step directly into nature with little or nothing, to experience nature on its own terms.
With Tom's book Botany in a Day: The Patterns Method of Plant Identification, you can connect with the wonderful diversity of plants and flowers all around you in a way that you may have never imagined. Instead of seeing the green world as little more than pretty wallpaper, you will learn to know the individual plants, wildflowers and weeds as if they have been your life-long friends. Our book Shanleya's Quest: A Botany Adventure for Kids Ages 9-99 utilizes the same patterns method of identifying plants as Botany in a Day, but in a metaphorical story form where children of all ages can join young Shanleya on her journey to learn the plant traditions of her people.
In Living Homes: Integrated Design & Construction you will learn how to make your home part of nature, as well as how to make nature part of your home. Learn the secrets to building low-cost, high-efficiency homes with stone masonry, log-building and strawbale construction methods. With this book and Tom's Slipform Stone Masonry DVD/VHS Video you will be able to build your quality, earth-friendly Dream home on a budget, even while the "experts" say it isn't cost effective.
Finally, in Direct Pointing to Real Wealth: Thomas J. Elpel's Field Guide to Money, you will learn to see the economy as an ecosystem where money is a token that represents calories of energy. Learn the basic rules of this economic ecosystem and you will be empowered to use your resources to more effectively achieve your desired quality of life, while making the world a better place to be. You will be able help convert an economy that harms planetary biodiversity into an economy that helps restore it.
The cost of this book is $35.00. That price includes shipping to anywhere in the United States. The book is shipped via the U.S. Postal Service.
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Full Size USMC KA-BAR (Serrated Edge)
The Ka-Bar USMC fighting knife is a lengendary blade that was first designed to serve US troops during World War II. Now, more than 50 years later it still offers the same high-quality design you can depend on. It boasts a 1095 carbon steel blade that is epoxy powder coated and a stacked leather handle. Includes a leather USMC sheath. Blade length 7"; Overall length 11-7/8". Made in the USA.
The cost of this knife is $82.00. The price includes shipping to anywhere in the United States. The knife is shipped UPS Ground.
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(The following video is part 1 of a 5 part series on a test
conducted on the USMC Ka Bar Combat Knife. The
video shows how truly reliable the knife is.
Be sure to order yours today!)
Short Black KA-BAR (Serrated Edge)
This knife boasts a 1095 carbon steel blade that is epoxy powder coated with a non-slip handle. Includes a black leather sheath. Blade length 5-1/4"; Overall length 9-1/4". Made in the USA.
The cost of this knife is $68.00. The price includes shipping to anywhere in the United States. The knife is shipped UPS Ground.
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