Primitive skills: Using shadows to find North/south

This is a fairly well known trick for emergency situations. By Marking the point of a shadow of the course of several minutes/hours you can determine west/east by drawing a line between the two points. It's a good tool to know when the sun is out and you don't have a compass. As long as you know that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west you can find your way.

[BCkayakcamper]

A great bit of knowledge to have for sure!
Well done!

[TheoutdooradventureNet]

Essentially you mark the tip of the shadow and then do it again at the new tip of the shadow after 15 minutes or so. Then you connect the tips by drawing a line between them.That line is perpendicular to north.

The other shadow could just be from the bush nearby. I'll try to do another video of this in the summer.

[esxx]

the first part was easy to understand but when you came back afetr 15 minutes that bit was really confusing..

[falcon]

That Line? between the two? Markers?
Confused draw a line between the stick and the first point?
So thats 90 deg. away from the second point?
Really good info but I'm confused or stupid. Why does it look like there is a shadow running both ways from the stick in the second part?

[aleksandarkuznetsov]

The line between the two shadows points west, right?

[Bro-bi_Wan_Kenobi]

Now where did you learn this? Land nav course using anything but a compass?