How to Get Water While Camping

It's always best to pack your own bottled drinking water when you go camping. If bottled water isn't available, there are things you can do to improve the quality of natural water sources, if public treated and tested water isn't obtainable. You can only live for 3 days without water, so think ahead and be prepared on your next camping trip.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

1. Collect rainwater or morning dew, if you know you're going to have a water shortage. This is the best source of safe drinking water when camping out. Normally, the first 30 minutes of a good shower removes the pollen and smog from the air, making the rainwater safe to drink. Catching the runoff from your tent or tarp roof is the best way to catch the water and then filter it through cloth if necessary. Collection of morning dew is more time consuming, but you can run a thin cloth over the plants to collect the moisture and then ring it out into a cup.
2. Melt snow or ice, if it's available. Collect it, place it in a covered container and hold it inside your clothing, but not next to your skin, to melt it. If you hold it inside your mouth to melt, it'll evaporate too quickly and won't quench your thirst.
3. Follow the wildlife. Chances are they know where the water is. Beehives are always located near water, so pay attention to where they go after they leave the flowers or listen for frogs, geese or ducks. Animal paths always lead to a water source of some kind.
4. Consider ground water as a last resort. The purest form of ground water is at the head of a spring, where it emerges from the ground. Once it travels downstream, it collects all of the contaminants from the wildlife in the area. It's better to get water that's been flowing over rocks than water in a stagnant pool. A dry stream or spring may have water close to the surface if it has recently dried up, and a little digging may produce a source of water.
5. Filter ground water to remove as many impurities as possible. If the water is cloudy, allow it to sit until the sediment settles on the bottom. This may take up to 24 hours. Then you can carefully scoop the water from the top and filter it through coffee filters or even a piece of clothing before you attempt to purify it.
6. Purify your water if possible, especially if it's ground water or you suspect contamination. Boiling for 2 minutes kills most pathogens, but this isn't always possible in an emergency. If you plan to store the water for more than 24 hours, chemical purification is necessary. Two drops of chlorine bleach per quart of water kills bacteria and virus, but not protozoa. The bleach must sit in the water for at least 1 hour, and then be checked for a faint bleach odor. If the odor isn't present, repeat the process. If the odor is still not present after another hour, then the water is too contaminated and unsafe to use.

Tips & Warnings

• Surface (ground) water is contaminated and full of organisms that can cause illness. It's never safe to drink any type of surface water without some kind of purification.
• In order to prevent illness, safe water is necessary for drinking, cooking, brushing your teeth, washing your face and hands, and washing cooking and eating utensils.