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Avoid Campfires

Use a modern, lightweight backpacking stove. (If you use a gas-cartridge stove, be sure to pack your used cartridges out.) Campfires waste a precious resource: wood that would otherwise shelter animals and, upon falling and decaying, return vital nutrients to the soil. Campfires also run the risk of starting forest fires.

Exercise special care when using an ultra-lightweight alcohol stove, as its flames tend to be uncontrollable when the pot is off the burning stove. Be sure the area is cleared for at least a cubic yard of flammable materials above, around, and below the stove.

If your stove fails and you must cook over a campfire in order to survive, here are some guidelines: If possible, camp in an established site with an existing fireplace you can use. If you must build a fireplace, build with efficiency and restoration in mind: two to four medium-sized rocks set parallel along the sides of a narrow, shallow trench in a sandy place. Set the pot on the rocks and over the fire, which you can feed with small sticks and twigs (use only dead and downed wood). Never leave the fire unattended. Before you leave, thoroughly extinguish the fire and pour water over the ashes, and then restore the site by scattering the rocks and filling the trench.