Missouri Man, Dog, Eat Berries And Plants To Stay Nourished While Lost In Interior

As the tweets above explain, another tale of survival in Alaska took place recently, when Holmer, 26 and from Missouri, and his dog Mike were lost for 3 1/2 days in snowy and foggy conditions in the Alaskan Interior. Here’s the Fairbanks News-Miner with a little more:

Holmer brought two days of food. He camped alone the second night, and continued hiking the third day, thinking he was on route and would soon reach Chena Hot Springs Resort. However, at some point he realized “things just didn’t look right.”

He spent the third and fourth day doing some “heavy hiking,” trying to find a familiar landmark. Most of the hiking he realized was in the wrong direction. He ate the last of his food — a tortilla and some peanut butter — on the morning of his fourth day. …

Holmer started supplementing his diet with bearberries and a rooty moss. He chose the rooty moss because it was plentiful and he had heard somewhere that roots are usually safe to consume. The roots were painful to chew, but he believed he gained some nutrition from them, especially on the cold night when he struggled to stay warm enough to sleep.

A helicopter finally spotted Holmer and Mike. Man and dog are both doing fine.