Petrov: A man who lived in the woods of Mendocino County (2022)
ukiahdailyjournal.comThere was a family in Siberia who went off-grid and lived in the Siberian forest for 42 years. They were discovered by the Soviet authorities in 1978.
I read about them elsewhere; one of the details I remembered is how at some point they started noticing fast-moving "stars" in the night sky and the father realized they must be man-made artificial objects (satellites).
The most interesting bit about this to me is, how fast the daughters developed their own language without intention.
They were Old Believers! I've heard of this story before but never picked up on that facet. There's still some living in settlements in Alaska.
This was a very nice and fascinating (although strange) read with my morning coffee. Thank you for sharing.
This immediately reminds me of a book I read a year ago about a man who walked off into the woods of Maine in 1986 and lived as a hermit for 27 years [1]
[1] “Stranger in the Woods” by Michael Finkel: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30687200
The craziest thing about this guy is he spent every Maine winter over those 27 years without lighting a single fire to keep him warm because he thought it would expose him. He would just stay awake all night and start walking around when he thought he was getting so cold it might be dangerous. That really to me is hell on earth. At least Petrov lived in California where it was mostly nice year-round.
I met a self-described “mountain man” in Montana once, and I asked how he stayed warm in the winter. He told me the key was to build an insulated nest, below ground, packed with snow, and then you light a single candle and close up the nest. That this was enough to stay warm even in the Montana winter.
It’s hard to know if what he was saying was true or not, but I think I believe it. He also saw my VW and immediately observed that it had been in an accident based on the way the doors hung. So, I feel like he knew some stuff.
That’s how snow caves are constructed. Tunnel in and up in a snowbank so that the floor of the cave is higher than the ceiling of the entry tunnel. The air in the cave will equalize to 32F once you enter thanks to body heat. As far as I can tell this works well in any temperate climate because the snowpack tends to be warm(er) at the bottom and warmer air rises.
At any rate it worked in all my snow caves, which was admittedly not a large sample but included places like Teton pass in Wyoming.
> The air in the cave will equalize to 32F once you enter thanks to body heat.
This is an interesting post! Can you explain the science behind why 32F/0C is important here? For example: If I build a snow cave in a place where it is -30C, -20C, -10C, 0C outside, will they all "equalize to 32F/0C"?
Snow is a very good insulator due to all the trapped air, and it’s fairly easy to make thick walls (the same as straw-and-mud block construction - not the highest R value per cm thickness, but if the walls can be 50 cm thick, it adds up). So yeah, a proper snow cave will converge on freezing point - body heat plus lighting will heat to that point, after which the snow melts.
You might survive 32F but you can’t possibly make it for very long if you have to be that cold night after night.
Actually 32F without wind is no big deal if you have a decent sleeping bag. Plus it gets warmer as you do more stuff inside (e.g., cooking). Igloos have the same design and can get pretty warm. [0] The real problem in my experience is that it's quite humid. Since you are insulating with snow it evaporates and raises the humidity up to the dew point.
I guess it varies from individual to individual. I can be out in 110F weather all day comfortably if I have enough water and a large hat but have very low tolerance for the cold.
Inside the sleeping bag, it will definitely be quite warm!
Even quite mediocre sleeping bags (by modern standards) are positively toasty at 32 degrees. It was common in my group for people to sleep in their underwear in the caves! Our sleeping bags were 0 degree rated, though.
Further: the major source of heat loss in a sleeping bag isn't to the air, it's to the ground. Which is why backpackers carry sleeping mats, either of expanded polystyrene or self-inflating air-mattresses. In both cases, the air is the insulating element.
In primitive conditions, pine boughs or fur skins would be used.
Other than that, wear a cap, and if it's truly cold, boil water, pour it into a Nalgene (or similar) bottle, and slip that into a sock. It'll keep you toasty (often too warm) all night.
> mediocre sleeping bags (by modern standards)
Sleeping bags have been very good for a long time
"modern standards" means cheaper than goose down
You have to poke holes in the ceiling, and make sure the they’re clear every day.
If you light a candle, the snow will melt and freeze into a film of ice.
The holes are important for ventilation in general, but it also allows vapor to escape.
When we built them we’d use ski poles to make the holes. You don’t want them to be too big or you risk the structural integrity of course. There was a ratio of hole count : people that we followed but I can’t remember that detail (:
I camped out like this once per year in my teens!
It was lots of fun. We’d hike into the snow pack set up a tent the first night, and spend the second day building snow caves and sledding. Then we’d build a bonfire that would melt down to the ground (or a boulder) by morning. Good times.
Caves take way less time to set up than an igloo and only requires a shovel for equipment. Although, it requires more maintenance for long-term shelter than an igloo. There’s good documentation on how to build one online.
But he did use gas bottles to heat up things and this can make all the difference. Still, not pleasant.
Oh - and you automatically stay awake, when it gets too cold. Only when you are really exhausted and sleep in the cold, you will never wake up (from various movies and books I was afraid of this trope when I was younger, but nope, as long as you have energy left, your body automatically wakes you up and starts moving to create heat). Not being able to sleep, because of cold, is one of the less awesome outdoor experiences. On the other hand, the more you enjoy the sun on the next day (if you are lucky and there is sun).
I learned this the hard way when I was homeless at 17-18 years old in the middle of Wyoming winters. I had at least had my old Grand Cherokee to sleep in the trunk space, but not enough money for gas to run the heater. I'd pile all my clothes on top of me, but there were always patches where the cold got through and I'd spend so many nights just shaking from the cold. Spent the Christmas of 2004 this way. You are also correct that when it would be sunny (but still cold) the next day, it was an awesome experience. Almost like a ray of hope, as cliche as that sounds. It's crazy what having sunlight can do to improve your mood. That's one reason I loved living in SF later on, there were so many sunny days and I also wasn't homeless lol.
Merry Christmas man, hope this one is better for you!
I was also homeless with a car for a while, but in a much warmer climate. It's no fun!
What evil you two tell of
So much wealth in the world, and an eighteen year old sleeping in the trunk of a car in a continental winter
"Poverty is a sin A sin of the rich"
Thanks, man. I appreciate that. Merry Christmas to you as well and Happy New Year!
I haven't read Finkel's book on Christopher Knight, but other pieces on Knight were discussed here, with distinct tones to the discussions.
Into the woods: how one man survived alone in the wilderness for 27 years - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13878801 - March 2017 (124 comments)
The Strange and Curious Tale of the Last True Hermit - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8205993 - August 2014 (86 comments)
This the guy that basically lived in a tent and stole from those in the nearby community for decades right? I agree it must have been difficult in the middle of the night when it was cold, but it's not like he was farming, hunting, or foraging in the forest.
There is also Daniel Suelo who left everything behind and moved into the caves in and around Antelope Canyon: https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/03/homeles...
I believe he's not Petrov but Petro after all (out of options listed in the article)
You are unlikely to have no first name and two last names, and Zailenko looks like a last name, so the other one is likely a first name, which would be Petro.
Of course there is always a chance that he is Petrov-Zailenko.
-enko is a common ending for Ukrainian last names and Petro is Ukrainian first name.
Thank you for pointing it out! Name is definitely Ukrainian, so no russian army, because in Second World War the was Red Army of USSR
No Russian Army because he was born around 1914. Otherwise, of course you would find a lot of people with -enko last name in Russian Army in WWI. Not only Russian Empire controlled most of present-day Ukraine but also parts of Poland.
He was captured by Nazis during Second World War
“And I was a kid, so I thought love could fix anything,” she said, recalling how she hugged him good-bye once, “and he just shook.”
I’m always blown away by how people like this managed to eat. I suppose you could live off bottle deposits if you only ate corn and beans. Even at five dollars a day he would’ve had to collect 50 bottles in the best case scenario.
Hunting and gathering is as old as human beings. It's more difficult in the XXI century but in a large-enough forest (and a natural park that is), you can still do it.
It saddens me to see a comment where finding some way to pay for food, would be the only way to eat.
Outside of local edible vegetation, there is smaller game. And as you say, this is how many used to survive.
But beyond that, you can plant beans and have a crop in weeks. Even with a lack of pesticides and fertilizer, being able to plant a plant here, a plant there, will result in food not being eaten completely by pests.
And the ground is far more fertile, when not monocropping.
And yes, seeds can be reused, it's how farming still works today for many farmers.
To speak to this, where I grew up, many people would go into the woods, and plant a single pot seed here, another there, always close to trees etc, so overflies by police helicopters wouldn't see a crop.
Being rural, some people owned 1000 acres, and plausible denialability exists. Even if some went missing, the scatter method yields results.
> Outside of local edible vegetation, there is smaller game. And as you say, this is how many used to survive.
And: compared to past centuries (or even pre-agricultural), a bit of help from modern society can save a lot of time. A lighter here, a $5 knife or cooking pot there, some discarded materials from a construction site, etc etc.
Doesn't make primitive life easy. But it's not hard to see why some people would prefer it over navigating the complexities (or stress!) of 'living in the fast lane' modern society.
do beans need to be in season, or are some varieties year-round?
Many beans can be dried and cooked months or years later.
I was responding to this:
you can plant beans and have a crop in weeks.
Hunting and gathering is fine if you have free rein of the land and live in a relatively productive area (for fruits and vegetables). From what I know of NorCal it does not naturally grow stuff you can pick and eat. Also hunting is relatively restricted around national parks and there is no mention of petrov doing it.
I live in NorCal and do some culinary foraging for fun. There's plenty, I mean people lived here before Europeans colonized. There's all kinds of native berries, blackberry, salmon berry, service berry, elderberry huckleberry. There are plenty of nuts, beaked hazelnuts, black walnut and the most plentiful are acorns.
And there's plenty of small game to hunt and trap. I don't see that Petrov did this, but I imagine if he was comfortable catching and eating a neighbors duck, he probably took a squirrel or two in his life. The natives would obviously fish, take all kinds of small game, even including rat.
Have you tried living off foraged foods for any length of time? Is it realistic to be able to get enough calories, proteins, and fats doing this on your own without extensive fishing and hunting? Sounds like it would need a lot of nuts, and there aren't that many fruiting trees there to begin with, are there?
I just read a hypothesis from an anthropologist suggesting that the reason California’s indigenous tribes did not practice agriculture like eastern tribes, was due to the abundance of food they could forage year around. Oaks providing a significant part of their diet (which are plentiful in Mendocino) but also other nuts, berries, and tubers found throughout California.
So relative to our modern diet, maybe your point holds, but the California Floristic Province has plenty of plants to sustain humans. IIRC, the indigenous population density was some of the highest in the world.
That's also my understanding. I do wonder if that's a bit of a misunderstanding about not practicing agriculture, though. They did practice forest management with intentional burns. I'm pretty interested in traditional English forest management, and reducing brush and decreasing canopy increased the amount of forest "products" available to people, from building materials (basketry, hut materials, etc) to increased yields from under story vegetation.
It's a bit of a digression, but it's a subject I find interesting and rarely pops up in hacker news. :)
I thought a lot of that is acorns (that need a lot of preparation) and fish, not so much random food growing around the redwoods you could just pick and eat?
(Lived in the area for a long time, but not an expert at all). Did the anthropologist provide any details? I'd love to read their work
Something would have limited their population though.
The Dawn of Everything has an interesting take on this - they didn't practice agriculture because they wanted to differentiate themselves from other cultures in the area.
I would love to hear what it is. There are truckloads of acorns but it’s all I can think of besides some berries.
> John Melvin said Zailenko was eventually taken to the hospital in Ukiah, and over several days, many different people visited and tried speaking to him in Russian and many other languages, but no one could identify what words exactly he was speaking.
I'm assuming it was Ukrainian? Although if someone tried to speak to him in Russian, they'd be able to understand that he was speaking Ukrainian and naturally understand a good majority of it.
Petrov/Petroff is a (a very common) surname/lastname in Russian, but never a firstname.
-ko is a suffix denoting a lastname of Ukrainian origin though those were spread around even in Russian Empire.
There are a lot of people with Zayilenko surname in Russia now and Zalenko and Zelenko is still one in Ukraine now.
Given the Wikipedia article on him there is a chance it's just a corruption and he was called Petro Zelenko
[0] Petrov "Petro" Zailenko, a.k.a. Pitro Zalenko
Most probably. Petro is the Ukrainian first name, while Petrov is the Russian last name. Zailenko is the Ukranian last name. So the only valid combination is Ukranian. (Do not ask me how I know this. I can’t explain. Just a trained neural network produces these results).
A doctor did this in Hawaii for a while https://www.sfgate.com/hawaii/article/The-tale-of-the-doctor...
Kauai, ok
One thing that initially annoyed me about Oahu was that there were people everywhere
Remote secluded beach? People.
Woods? People.
Forbidden, secret trail after ten “no trespassing we’ll shoot you” signs? People.
I lived there for 6 months and found more solitude when I wanted it, but also became more exhibitionist
Also an interesting story of a man who lives now for more than 20 years in a mountain cave in Serbia.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/23086418/tiny-cave-home-in-rem...
Great skies there at night.
A back to the lander true and true.