Water and urine

[agelaus]

I have a couple questions regarding urine and water.

1. They say that you know that you got enough water in your system when your urine is clear. I assume this is because it means that you have taken in more water than your system needs, so your body is expelling it as waste. My question is does this mean that in a survival situation where you need to conserve water should you avoid this point since this means you are wasting water?

2. A gross option that has been going through my mind, but I have to ask. Is it OK to recycle your waste by boiling/purifying your urine? This would make it so you could utilize the water your body expels as waste along with other minerals and vitamins.

[Fletch]

I'm gonna just go ahead and assume you were asleep or sick in highschool chemistry the day they explained distillation


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillation

http://www.wisegeek.com/how-does-distil ... -water.htm

Enjoy!

[Doctorr Fabulous]

I have a couple questions regarding urine and water.

1. They say that you know that you got enough water in your system when your urine is clear. I assume this is because it means that you have taken in more water than your system needs, so your body is expelling it as waste. My question is does this mean that in a survival situation where you need to conserve water should you avoid this point since this means you are wasting water?

2. A gross option that has been going through my mind, but I have to ask. Is it OK to recycle your waste by boiling/purifying your urine? This would make it so you could utilize the water your body expels as waste along with other minerals and vitamins.

Point one is incorrect. Urine color depends on the waste content. You are not a kangaroo rat, and therefore your body requires about 1 liter of water per hour to function at peak in a oom temperature environment. less if you are sedentary, more if you are moving or the temperature is higher or lower. Too much water can result in hyponatremia, wherein your body shuts down because your vital minerals (namely sodium) have been flushed out. The more common issue is a heat or cold related illness.

Urine color can be indicative of hydration, but what you are ingesting and expelling will change the color. Most of all, your kidneys, among other things, need to have a bare minimum amount of water through them to function. In other words, use your water. It's easier to carry/find more (normally) than it is to die of renal failure, or be incapacitated by something like a kidney stone or heat stroke.

[cdreid]

Too many people are buying into the "ubertough survivalman!" mythology.

Dont go drinking your pee unless youve distilled it and know what youre doing. IE the water may be the LAST thing that distills out. You may in fact be distilling amonia (urea is turned to amonia when it exits the body) which will be very very unpleasant to drink. Your body is expelling the liquid for a reason. It doesnt want it back. I can see doing it in a Desert but im betting you dont live in a desert.

[DarkAxel]

The urine color guideline is sorta useful in that it can give you a general idea about your hydration levels, but be forewarned, some things you eat or drink can mess with it badly. For example, even if you are moderately dehydrated, caffeine and alcohol will make your piss clear because water is being flushed out of your body faster than it should, which is dangerous. I would go so far as to say that anyone in a survival situation should avoid alcohol and caffeine totally.

As to the other point, <insert Bear Grylls meme pic here>

[duodecima]

You are not a kangaroo rat, and therefore your body requires about 1 liter of water per hour to function at peak in a oom temperature environment. less if you are sedentary, more if you are moving or the temperature is higher or lower.

A whole lot less than 1L/hr if you are sedentary and not in heat - 3L/day is very adequate then.

Otherwise, yep. Urine's rarely going to be your easiest water source.

[MichaelM]

In general, you shouldn't drink urine. Among other things, it contains a lot of ions. Your body needs more water to process these than there is in most urine, so you actually dehydrate yourself by drinking it.

If you're stuck in a situation where you don't have another source of water and you have urine, build a solar still. These use solar radiation to evaporate and subsequently condense and collect water. This leaves the majority of the stuff you don't want to drink behind. You can also use this method to gather water from mud, plants, and really anything with water in it.

Just don't expect a solar still to act like a water fountain. They act slowly and only actually collect a bit of water at a time. They're better than nothing, but nowhere near as good as your faucet.

[tookieblueeyes]

A healthy person's urine is about 95 percent water and sterile, so in the short term it's safe to drink and does replenish lost water. But the other 5 percent of urine comprises a diverse collection of waste products, including nitrogen, potassium, and calcium—and too much of these can cause problems. When you drink your own pee, all the stuff that your kidneys had attempted to excrete comes right back into your stomach, and much of it ends up back in your kidneys. After several days of this, your urine will become highly concentrated with dangerous waste products, and drinking it can cause symptoms similar to those brought on by total kidney failure. At that point, you're doomed either way—from dehydration on the one hand or renal meltdown on the other. (Even if one could filter out most of the unwanted products in urine, the cycle would not be sustainable for long. In addition to what he or she pees out, the average human excretes about half a quart of water a day through sweating and exhaling.)

[ferball]

I thought your own urine was useless to drink after five minutes because any useful "water" evaporates off in that time. The urine stream does steam when pissing in a snow bank, so if you wait for it to cool you lost any hydration value if you are not going to distill it.

[raptor]

Why is everyone so preoccupied with drinking urine.

Seriously you should be more concerned with understanding how to purify the available water, ensuring you have enough water stock piled or if you don't... you should be stockpiling. Water is the cheapest preparation portion of your stockpile if you use tap water.

Time spent on rain barrels, water barrels and sand filters are far more likely to benefit you then figuring out when you should drink your own urine. When you are at that point it should mean that many series of failures have resulting prior to that point.


Urine color can be a predictor of dehydration. However, if you are dehydrated it is likely that there is no urine being produced. using urine for dehydration alarms is not good. If you are in a hotclimate should drink water continuously to prevent dehydration even if it means you empty your canteen in the process. You are better off with the water in you than in the canteen...within reason obviously.

[Doctorr Fabulous]

Piggy backing on the urine color: mineral content of food or water will change the color as well. MREs usually result in yellow or orange urine,as does water with a high sulphur content (like Florida) and iron makes it reddish orange or brown (Georgia clay is red because of iron) and lastly, tannic acid (murky water) will also "brown" the urine. Filtration may or may not get all the minerals out.

[tookieblueeyes]

Why is everyone so preoccupied with drinking urine.

I think perhaps agelaus is just curious about the "drinking your own urine" issue not as a long term solution to warding off dehydration, I think perhaps the question is posed about urine in an emergency survival sense of a situation where the problem is there is no where else to procure drinking water except from yourself.

I highly doubt anyones idea is to survive long term is to drink their own urine on a regular basis. Maybe. I hope not anyway.

In any case... I think that is is a viable question/concern because shit happens and the possibility that drinking your own urine as a last resort is ever-presant. Knowing what you are doing and what the pro's and con's are to consuming your own waste can help in a really bad situation.

Knowledge is power, regardless of what you know or think you know