Hunter/gatherer survival

[don heath]

Tried to post this yesterday but it disapeared. - Just over the border is a small bushman 'comm8nity centre my father built. A small clinic, two room school and piped water. Many old bushmen live perminantly there subsisting on corn handouts and some wild vegitables and they look after the kids who stay behind for school while the parents continue their normal nomadic life.
 
In the last week I have been called in to 'rescue ' two bushmen families who have been trying to reach the centre and failed. It has been a very hard year, and there is nothing green in the bush and most of the game has moved north or west. Wednesdays family has 4 kids and three women who were too weak from starvation to stand when I got to them (one of the men came to find me). Two of the women were pregnant and one was ill, and the kids were simply too malnourished. They hadn't had a semi decent meal in over three weeks.
 
The other family had run into a lion. One man killed and the other two injured. Their families were too weak from a lack of food to drag the stretchers any further and the kids were in a shocking state when I got there (a young woman walked 50m in 24hrs carry a baby to get me!).
 
These people are toucher than I will ever be, but a hunter gather lifestyle, even in one of the richest game fields in the world, isn't a walk in the park. I want a field with a crop in for reliable food and a decent 4x4 and rifle for hunting thanks!

[Victor3]

 I'm sure those folks were happy to see you, Don. Glad you were there for them.
 
 I've heard so many stories from a friend of mine (He founded an org that drills wells in Malawi) about what many people there have to go through just to get a drink of water.
 
 I hear you on that 4x4 and a rifle. I was once stuck in sand, miles from help with neither. Won't happen again if I can help it. 
 

[pastorp]

Don,

Most Americans can't even imagine the conditions those people live in. Gives new meaning to the word survival. Truth is If I was unable to go to the pharmacy every month for my meds I would probably die. And they probably have never even taken a asprin tablet. 

I once walked 50miles through the mountains, but I had rations & a mule to pack them for me. I thought I had a great adventure, but compared to these folks it was a walk in the park. 

Regards,

[Empty Quiver]

Sounds like a microcosym of the human experience, Don. The entire race came to the conclusion that farming was the key to prosperity. Hunting and the meat became the "gravy" for those meals of potato's that were so dependable.


You have first hand experience with a lifestyle so romanticized here in the states. I like many here like to think I would survive in the bush. I know better, I am not quiting my day job.

[jlwilliams]

  Thank you for putting what I thought was a rough day in perspective. 
 
  I just bit into a burger that had a bit of bone in it.  Split my tooth like a piece of fire wood.  (split from top to bottom, down below the gum line, both pieces still in the hole) I was bitching and moaning about how hard it was to get a dentist on a Saturday so I can get this pulled or capped or whatever he's going to do.  I thought it was a bad day.  On the other hand, I have plenty of food, I'm getting medical attention for the tooth.  Some pain.  Big deal.
 
  The tooth does hurt, but it doesn't seem so bad.  It's not like I'm being eaten by a lion.

[kaveman]

Don thanks for sharing those stories they had a very sobering affect on me when I read themm later that night I discussed them with my children as we sat down to dinner, I told them to never take it for granted where your next meal comes from and that millions of people are far worse off than we , Question for Don why cant more game meat be donated to locals to help with shortages this was a question asked by my 10 year old, again thanks for making me think
                                                   Kaveman

[don heath]

One of the biggest obsticles faced by nomadic hunter/gatherer people is they cannot store food from times of plenty. In july here it is a simple thing to harvest a couple of Eland, a bunch of impala and as many disco donkey's (Zebra) as you want....but in a bad season the game moves...
 
At this time of the year the hunting is hard. We have been out for eland every day since my last post. Have seen them several times a day but no oportunity for a shot. No impala and no Zebra. For lion bait I have had to buy donkeys from the tribal area to the north. If a man with a bushman tracker, a full water bottle and a rifle cannot get meat, what chance does a bushman with a 20 yard bow and who is thirsty before he starts the hunt?
 
I don't ever need to buy meat- but I have storage facilities and when the hunting is easy, I fill the freezers, in the cold weather I make biltong, but to do that you need vinegar (from aples- I have trees and could make my own if necessary), salt, and pepper (have bushes). Those three ingredients are essential-vinegar and salt stop meat going rotten and pepper keeps the flys off. Corriander helps the flavour and is easy to grow...but you need someplace to grow basic crops and someplace to store the biltong, and if you are going to do that you might as well plant corn and veggies. 

[don heath]

Another depressing thought for all the 'go it alone' types.
 
Why do women outnumber men by at least 2:1 in any hunter/gatherer society, depite the high mortality of females in chilld birth? Becuase young men frequently don't make it.
 
I would estimate that c40% of male bushmen between the ages of 12 and 25 don't come home. After age 25 male survival rates shoot up. If a bushman makes it to 25 he'll probably make 70.
 
Males go off in small groups of brothers/cousins hunting, collecting medicainal herbs, etc and frequently fail to return. The women stay close to the group and very few die of disease or snake bite. Child bearing kills a fair number but nothing like the attrition on males. Also the bushmen hardly ever go off alone- they will go as a small group- almost always relatives- and if one gets injured his companions will do everything to get him home- ie a broken leg or sprained ankle which would kill a man alone is unlikely to be fatal to a man with support.
 
I am not 100% sure what kills the young men, but I see the family groups and know the statistics from the community centre. Also it appears that seldom does one out of the group die- one is sick or injured and the others bring him home. it is usually all get home or none do. 

[Couger]

Don,  Do you have any statistics on Bushmen or all people who get hurt and die?  Or make it home?  Or to medical help? etc.
 
I'm also interested in how many die from snake bite (and type of snake), lion or preditor mauling?  Elephant attack?  Buffalo attack?  Just plain attrition to the elements?  Or even parasites?  THANKS!

[mannyrock]

 
  Just some food for thought.
 
  I have never been to Africa, but I can tell you that here in America, the number one killer by far of African-American males under the age of 25 is being murdered by other African-American males under the age of 25.  The homocide rate for these folks in this age group is absolutely astounding. 
 
Mannyrock
 
 

[don heath]

Couger...no- In a normal year food is abundant and bushmen (and their wives) spend less than 2hrs a day gathering food- a party off on walk about wouldn't die of hunger.
 
Murder? Never heard of a single incident in the san communities The Blacks hate them and used to kill them whenever possible but 'modern law' has reduced this although a few undoubtably get shot for 'poaching' in a national park.
 
Snake bite? Again I think the incidence is low- a few kids but not otherwise. Lion? they evoke fear in the bushman camps like nothing else except a rabid hyaena- which is why the most treasured possession is a decent revolver
 
Taking a guess I would think it is disease- mainly malaria or measels- in their own community they are not exposed to measeles and when they go 'on tour' they become infected and die or malaria- in a family group with the support of elerly relatives who know the herbs and what sustains a very sick man...they make it, A small group, all go down , all die.

[coss]

I recently returned from a vacation, during which I took a tour of some cliff dwellings in New Mexico.  The guide was a NPS ranger who had been a college professor whose specialty was primitive peoples.  It was one of the more informative 90 minutes I've spent in years.
 
The take home lessons:  the cliff dwellers were not an exact parallel to nomads because they had established houses and farmland.  They lived on corn, beans, squash, and whatever meat they could hunt with bows.  They had the ability to store food for 3 years.  Despite these advantages, analysis of graves indicate that their life expectancy was about 35 years.  A common cause of death was tooth decay--if a person could not chew well, their dietary choices were so limited they could not survive when their sole food source failed.  To a hunter, an injury could be a death sentence for that person and his family, unless he could trade with a farming clan (which it appeared they did).
 
The standard of living of these cliff dwellers was better than European serfs who lived in the same era (about 1000 years ago).
 
The stark reality is that if most of us had to live that lifestyle, we would not live very long.  Even the people who were good at it did not live very long.