Is it possible to 'moisture trap' from trees while thru-hiking?
I'm toying with the idea of collecting water from tree leaf transpiration, while hiking:
Obviously, vegetation with larger leaf surface area (and certain types) would be better than others.
But is it useless to try and collect water from trees during the night? Do trees not transpire as near as much during the night as the day - or maybe not at all?
Obviously if you are thru-hiking, daytime tree water collecting is simply not possible (as a principal water source at least), it could only possibly be done at night time.
So how practical might this idea be? Perhaps it is more practical in certain climates but not others?
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/q/6526. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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Tree's generate water as part of the respiration process (not to be confused with photosynthesis which is different). This happens at night and day.
This is relatively static day or night. Photosynthesis alters dependant on sunlight, respiration (being the process of producing energy) does not. Respiration will alter dependant on the time of year, i.e. in winter a tree may be dormant with no leaves, etc. and respiration almost stops.
You're not going to be able to generate anywhere near enough water using this method, regardless of the time of day. This is a useful survival method but that's it. do not rely on it as a source of water.
The trap you show above is likely to produce a few ml of water per day regardless of climate. You're likely going to need several litres of water per day.
I couldn't find any exact figures on the amount of water you're going to get but this wikipedia article describes a condensation trap much larger than the one you describe that yields very low volumes of water:
Condensation traps are not in themselves a sustainable source of water; they are sources for extending or supplementing existing water sources or supplies, and should not be relied on to provide a person's daily requirement for water, since a trap measuring 16" in diameter by 12" deep will only yield around 100 to 150 ml per day.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/6527. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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