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Creek Stewart is a Senior Instructor at the Willow Haven Outdoor School for Survival, Preparedness & Bushcraft<\/a> and the author of the just released book, <\/em>The Unofficial Hunger Games Wilderness Survival Guide<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n I\u2019d like to start this article with how I start many of my teaching programs and seminars \u2013 with The 3 Survival Rules of 3<\/i>. In extreme circumstances, humans can survive:<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t invent these rules. Mother Nature did. This mantra has been around for many years. I\u2019m a big fan of simple, easy to remember survival phrases like this. Sudden survival scenarios can feel overwhelming. The mind tends to go a bit crazy with panic and fear. Even simple tasks become complex. The emotions that come with being lost, stranded, or in danger can become paralyzing, overwhelming, and just flat-out scary. Easy to remember phrases like The 3 Survival Rules of 3<\/i> can help survivors regain balance and calm by helping to establish critical survival priorities. Often, it\u2019s the simple things that matter the most in a survival scenario \u2013 like getting your priorities mixed up and pursuing food before shelter or water.<\/p>\n With that said, if a survival ordeal lasts long enough, you will eventually need to put fuel (calories) on the human furnace. Gathering wild edibles is one of my favorite things to do. I absolutely love making a salad from fresh wild greens in the spring, foraging for berries in the summer, and digging starchy wild tubers in the fall. I\u2019ve had many years of practice and consider myself a fairly adequate wild plant forager. I even teach a seminar for restaurateurs who want to incorporate wild foraged plants into their uniquely local menus. Even with all of this practice and skill, I can state with 100% certainty that I could not live long-term on wild gathered plants alone \u2013 especially in certain environments (desert) and seasons (winter). It is not possible for even the most experienced forager or survivalist. At some point, a long-term survivor will need the calories that only meat can provide.<\/p>\n Survival hunting is a delicate balance of risk versus reward. One must always try to calculate whether the energy expense of making hunting tools and the act of hunting will result in an ultimate calorie loss or gain. Making hunting tools requires energy. Hunting requires energy. Field dressing and cooking requires energy. The goal is to choose a hunting process that trades the best chances of calorie reward for the least amount of calorie risk.<\/p>\n I have a friend who sells items at fairs, festivals, and flea-markets. He always says to me, \u201cCreek, the money is in the smalls<\/i><\/b>.\u201d He tells how it\u2019s nice to sell a $50 or $100 item every now and then but if he depended on those products to make a living he\u2019d be bankrupt. He tells me that he makes his living on the $1 and $2 items.<\/p>\n This is the best analogy I can think of when it comes to survival hunting. You will make your living on the smalls. Don\u2019t try to hunt the big ticket animals like elk, deer, boar, or bison. These animals require too much effort. You run the risk of caloric bankruptcy if you focus on these big ticket animals alone. Your chances of bagging one with primitive weapons is slim to none anyway, regardless of what you see on TV. Primitive peoples hunted animals like these in hunting parties of up to thirty adult men and it sometimes took many days. Even then they often came back empty handed. In a sudden and unexpected survival scenario with limited resources, your best hunting chances are with the smalls<\/i><\/b>. These include wild game such as frogs, fish, rodents, snakes, birds, and maybe (if you are really lucky) rabbit, squirrel, groundhog, muskrat, and possum.<\/p>\n One of the best primitive-made multi-use small game hunting tools is what\u2019s known as a split tip gig. Split tip gigs are still used in remote parts of the world to put food on the table every day. They are easy to make with limited tools and very effective at up-close and short-range distances. Below I walk you through how to make one.<\/p>\n You want to start with a green sapling (small tree) that\u2019s about 1-1.5 inches in diameter and 6-8 feet long. Dead, dry wood won\u2019t work. You must cut down a fresh green sapling. Bamboo makes an exceptional split tip gig, but most of us don\u2019t have access to it. I like to use willow. Willow is very common in places where you\u2019ll get the most use out of a gig like this \u2013 near water. You can use virtually any species of tree as long as it\u2019s nice and straight.<\/p>\n Next, you\u2019ll want to trim away all of the branches and chop off the top where it starts to taper to smaller than 1 inch in diameter.<\/p>\n The business end of the gig is made from the bottom of the sapling (the fatter end). You\u2019ll start by holding your knife or sharp rock directly across the bottom of the sapling. It must be as perfectly aligned in the center as you can get. Drive your knife down the sapling about 10 inches or so using a stout stick or rock. I prefer a stick so as to not damage my knife. It\u2019s important to split the gig shaft directly in half. This is known as batoning.<\/p>\n Now, rotate the sapling 90 degrees and baton again. This will split the base of your gig into four equal quarters about 10 inches deep.<\/p>\n From the branches you trimmed off in the previous steps, cut two pieces of branch that are about the diameter of a pencil and two inches long.<\/p>\n One at a time, push these down into the splits you just made.<\/p>\n This spreads the tines of your split tip gig. You can now see the gig starting to take shape. Your gig tines should have about a 4-6 inch diameter spread. The benefit of a gig like this versus just one sharp tip is that it increases surface area; improving your chances of a successful strike. The tines also form wedges that help to trap and pin potential prey.<\/p>\n Now it\u2019s time to sharpen your tine tips to a sharp point. You will have to work your knife inside and out of the gig tines. Willow is a very soft wood and is easy to carve. Other species such as walnut or maple are harder and will take more effort.<\/p>\n In spring and summer, the bark from willow (and many other species including mulberry and basswood) can be peeled and used as crude cordage to lash the end of your gig so that it doesn\u2019t split out with continued use.<\/p>\n If you only plan on using the gig a few times, lashings aren\u2019t necessary. However, lashing the base of the splits makes the gig more durable and prevents it from splitting out. In the photo series below I detail a quick and effective lashing that works perfect with traditional cordage or primitive plant and bark fibers. I\u2019m using paracord so that it\u2019s easy to see how the lashing works.<\/p>\n Loop one end of your cordage as shown.<\/p><\/div>\n Wrap the long end around the gig and over the short end.<\/p><\/div>\n Keep wraps tight.<\/p><\/div>\n Continue wrapping.<\/p><\/div>\n Feed the end through the loop you made in the beginning.<\/p><\/div>\n Firmly pull the bottom tail and the loop with the loose end of your cordage.<\/p><\/div>\n Pull the loop just under the first couple of wraps and trim the two ends.<\/p><\/div>\n\n
How to Make a Primitive Split Tip Small Game Gig<\/b><\/h3>\n
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<\/p>\nLashing Your Gig <\/b><\/h3>\n
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<\/i><\/b><\/p>\nTips for Hunting with a Gig<\/b><\/h3>\n
![\"Man](\"https:\/\/content.artofmanliness.com\/uploads\/2013\/05\/creek-gigging-river-2.jpg\")
<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n![\"Unofficial](\"https:\/\/content.artofmanliness.com\/uploads\/\/2013\/05\/unofficial-hunger-games-cover-with-gig.jpg\")