Have seen some pretty handy apps that some of the local loggers use on an iPad. I shudder at the cost of them, but, man, what a great resource, if you need or want it, and can afford!
a gps and or compass
- Thread starter rar
- Start date
Have seen some pretty handy apps that some of the local loggers use on an iPad. I shudder at the cost of them, but, man, what a great resource, if you need or want it, and can afford!
orienteering skills are often overlooked
Knowing how to use a map and compass is essential knowledge every back country user should have.
GPS...... the phone idea is a good one if you have a reliable method of charging the device like a roll out solar panel
Handheld GPs units are a better option as the batteries can be swapped in seconds or use rechargeables and that handy roll out solar panel.
I'm actually in the market for a new GPS unit, though i have been proficient with a map and compass since I was a teenager
My brother picked up a Garmin Montanna 700i for use on his harley, his atv and as a handheld. i think I will probably pick one up as well.
Getting lost in woods is one thing...... and a map and compass are great but it's too hard to navigate to my hot ice fishin spots after a blanket of snow covers the lakes...... need a gps for that haha!
Knowing how to use a map and compass is essential knowledge every back country user should have.
GPS...... the phone idea is a good one if you have a reliable method of charging the device like a roll out solar panel
Handheld GPs units are a better option as the batteries can be swapped in seconds or use rechargeables and that handy roll out solar panel.
I'm actually in the market for a new GPS unit, though i have been proficient with a map and compass since I was a teenager
My brother picked up a Garmin Montanna 700i for use on his harley, his atv and as a handheld. i think I will probably pick one up as well.
Getting lost in woods is one thing...... and a map and compass are great but it's too hard to navigate to my hot ice fishin spots after a blanket of snow covers the lakes...... need a gps for that haha!
- Location
- The Conservative part of Ontario
I agree with most of what you're saying, but only to a point. Navigation with a compass over longer distances will require what you said in this post. However, when the next road is only a few miles away, things get pretty basic.
My compass training included field trials where we were supposed to come out of heavy cover within ten yards of the objective after traveling 3 miles, while measuring trees, & crossing a swimming deep creek. Most of us failed. But I was within 40 yards, and that's close enough for most hunting applications, when all you want it to get out of the bush.
For a lot of guys, just learning the direction they need to walk to safely reach a roadway, and checking the compass direction they use to walk in is enough. Declination not required for short distances. using this method.
However, when the map comes out, and you want to go from A to B on the map, over a fair distance, you best Know the CURRENT declination for your area, or you could be way off.
As you pointed out, it can be challenging finding a landmark on the ground. However you can maintain a reasonably straight line using the tallest tree you can see that's along your line of travel. Just don't wander through the bush staring at the compass! Can't see very far ahead? Use the furthest tree/rock/hilltop you can see on your line, and walk to it even if it's only a few yards ahead. It introduces more chance of error when you use close distance, but sometimes you have no choice.
Me, I carry a GPS, but use a compass pretty much all the time. It's faster when doing short distances and that's what I do now. Nothing more than 3-5 miles.
Study the map, LEARN your hunting area. Don't be that guy that carries a compass because it will save his life, but has no idea what direction to walk when he needs it. One night at the old hunt camp I surveyed the guys. Only one other guy knew the directions needed to get out from each of our hunting areas. Did they then learn? Nope! City guys, fully dependent on the couple of guys that did the walking to get them out if they got in trouble.
I suspect for a lot of GPS owners the same is true. Probably don't even have waypoints marked to guide them out, or how to project one to a spot they want to go.
before going in the bush, plot your trip on the map and take notes. Then follow the notes.
Once there, if you have to roam around, mark the direction, count the double-steps and take notes.
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
That’s gave me a warm chuckle. It unfortunately doesn’t work that way where in the mountains here where you live Legion. That’ll keep you pointed the right way on a trail or cut across between roads, but we sure don’t have much of that in the coast mountains anywhere you’d want to go explore and hunt. And if you tried to count whatever a double step is you’d be at the thousands moving through BC’s cold jungle in the mountains, hopping log to log on the mountain slope Jenga piles. Seems like a lot of notes, I envision fiendishly pointing at a map that’s a tangle of notes with a crazed look in the rain as the dark comes. Sounds like fun.
Or, get a good GPS app and still carry your compass. In 25 years of navigating by GPS in volumes not that many do, it hasn’t failed me yet. And you can still have your paper and compass plan B ready to feel content.
At the very least, having a compass on you will allow you to somewhat reverse your direction and head back in the general vicinity of where you came from. It's not unheard of to get turned around in the bush and be completely confused at to which general direction is out. So to me, the compass still has its value, even just as a backup to modern technology.
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
The biggest merit of GPS, especially when combined with an excellent topo map and satellite overlay you can alternate between, is when you’re travelling you can select the safest and most efficient route. And without any guess work determine where you actually are reliably rather than a best informed guess.
More efficient means safer, less tired, and you spend more time hunting than trying to get to and from your drops and pickup points. You also get far, far more accurate progress measurement, ie. distance covered per hour and if certain objectives are safe or feasible before nightfall etc. I could argue this til blue in the face, but those who’ve lived it will never tell you gps isn’t a good idea. They’ll only argue about which form of gps is best.
There’s a reason the military uses gps as primary navigation too.
More efficient means safer, less tired, and you spend more time hunting than trying to get to and from your drops and pickup points. You also get far, far more accurate progress measurement, ie. distance covered per hour and if certain objectives are safe or feasible before nightfall etc. I could argue this til blue in the face, but those who’ve lived it will never tell you gps isn’t a good idea. They’ll only argue about which form of gps is best.
There’s a reason the military uses gps as primary navigation too.
- Location
- Blaster land, Okanagan BC
All the older fallers I work with came up in the days of a compass, map and hip chain for survey and block layout, they all say how glad they are that tablets, gps based apps, etc took over the industry. Not bad to have the skill set to use a map and compass but the gps and all it’s overlays and high res imaging is where it’s at, all the heli work I’ve done recently was all done by iPad or Garmin with regards to navigation, well that is when they weren’t flying or navigating by line of sight or guided by someone sitting shotgun.
what can I say, it has been done like so for ages
I certainly had to learn this exact way of traveling in the military 30 or so years ago
Nowadays the GPS does it all in a more precise way but it is the same thing: keep track of direction and distance
(a double step is 2 steps, one learns to count +1 every time the left foot touches the ground. Then you multiply that with the double step length and adjust for terrain ruggedness)
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
And I’m not even sure we make “steps” in coastal BC. What’s a hop from one log to another, with a slip and fall every twentieth into devil’s club count as? Guiding & hunting on the west coast.
Only on CGN is GPS good enough to land a plane full of people in #### visibility but not to find your truck.
Only on CGN is GPS good enough to land a plane full of people in #### visibility but not to find your truck.
lol
join the USMC if you really want to learn to use the map & compass
they still use both even though they have GPSes
And I’m not even sure we make “steps” in coastal BC. What’s a hop from one log to another, with a slip and fall every twentieth into devil’s club count as? Guiding & hunting on the west coast.
Only on CGN is GPS good enough to land a plane full of people in #### visibility but not to find your truck.
Just tools. Use them well, or badly.
I like my GPS, but carry a compass anyways, and know how to use it to my advantage when I must. I still have my first GPS, and IIRC, it got about 4-5 hours of use on a set of 4 AA batteries. It also lost satellites, if there were two branches worth of tree cover, or a heavy cloud cover, so got used to redundant methods. Never failed to find m truck or quad, while following the heading that my pig of a GPS gave me, set on the Compass!
- Location
- The Conservative part of Ontario
GPS, pretty accurate, gives your location down to two feet on mine.
However, the maps on it, were surveyed in the 1950's and updated periodically by air.
Their accuracy isn't so great.
SO, what does that mean?
It means I know of one spot, where the GPS locates me 100yards in, on the wrong side of a road I'm standing 50 yards the other side of.
Having a GPS, or a compass either for that matter, is not the end all be all of finding and knowing your location.
Land forms can be a huge aid. Knowing for example that ridges in my old hunting area run predominately NNE to SSW can really make life simple. Having in your head, details from your map as to where water bodies are in relation to other things, is a big time saver over a long walk too.
One of the very best little time savers for a quick check when dogging off small areas is a ball compass. Tiny little compass that is pinned to your jacket. Not great for long distance navigation, but for typical 2hr walks pushing deer, they're great. A quick glance tells you you're still roughly on track.
One such deer push, you went SW for a while, then SE for a while, using landmarks gained by experience, for when you turn, or just rough time walking in that direction. The blocks we used to "dog off" were bounded by roads/ trails, or water, and it was pretty rare for someone to make a mistake and wander off into no mans land, but it did happen. Even to me. All you need to do is zig a little too far, and the return zag puts you on the wrong side of a swamp. It's not at all funny when it's late in the day, and you hit water that's not supposed to be there. For me, I sat down for a minute to figure out what I did. (Pre-GPS days) got my Sylva Ranger out, took a bearing, and walked out to the road. Stars were out when I made it back around to the guys I half jogged about 13K. They were hollering etc. Wondering where the F I was.
However, the maps on it, were surveyed in the 1950's and updated periodically by air.
Their accuracy isn't so great.
SO, what does that mean?
It means I know of one spot, where the GPS locates me 100yards in, on the wrong side of a road I'm standing 50 yards the other side of.
Having a GPS, or a compass either for that matter, is not the end all be all of finding and knowing your location.
Land forms can be a huge aid. Knowing for example that ridges in my old hunting area run predominately NNE to SSW can really make life simple. Having in your head, details from your map as to where water bodies are in relation to other things, is a big time saver over a long walk too.
One of the very best little time savers for a quick check when dogging off small areas is a ball compass. Tiny little compass that is pinned to your jacket. Not great for long distance navigation, but for typical 2hr walks pushing deer, they're great. A quick glance tells you you're still roughly on track.
One such deer push, you went SW for a while, then SE for a while, using landmarks gained by experience, for when you turn, or just rough time walking in that direction. The blocks we used to "dog off" were bounded by roads/ trails, or water, and it was pretty rare for someone to make a mistake and wander off into no mans land, but it did happen. Even to me. All you need to do is zig a little too far, and the return zag puts you on the wrong side of a swamp. It's not at all funny when it's late in the day, and you hit water that's not supposed to be there. For me, I sat down for a minute to figure out what I did. (Pre-GPS days) got my Sylva Ranger out, took a bearing, and walked out to the road. Stars were out when I made it back around to the guys I half jogged about 13K. They were hollering etc. Wondering where the F I was.
