Here’s lieu’s take on the matter.
There’s a “Down By The Salley Gardens” joke in there somewhere, but it’s not coming out.
There are 2 books currently available at Amazon titled How to shit in the woods. They contain some very useful information. As far as nbr 1 goes, I live on a boat and to me there’s nothing better than hanging it over the rail. I seem to remember a movie called Rocket Gibralter where Burt Lancaster says peeing in the ocean makes you feel like a man.
I can whip it out and pee, no problem. As for pooping, I have only encountered one situation in my life where it was necessary, and by that I mean, it was only a question of where, not whether.
I was mountain biking with some friends when the feeling came upon me suddenly, and we were miles from civilization. I biked up ahead a ways, hopped off the bike, ran behind a tree, whipped off my shorts and underwear, and unloaded. It was, well, explosive. I think if I had ridden for another 50 feet, I wouldn’t have made it. Anyway, I cleaned up as well as I could using my underwear, dropped it atop the pile as sort of a warning not to tread there, and biked away.
I’m not proud of leaving my underwear sitting there, but I had nothing to carry it back in. It was completely destroyed.
We’re going camping and hiking at the end of the summer, so I may again get the opportunity to see if under normal circumstances I would have any reservations about it, but hopefully there won’t be a need for it.
I’m a geocacher. Although I plan as best as I can and hit the john before I hit the door, sometimes Mother Nature just doesn’t go along with the game plan. That’s why I have several travel packs of Kleenex in my caching bag. And I am totally amazed how the flies can be on the shit in three seconds flat.
But I will admit that I take perverse delight in peeing as high up on a tree as I can. I just know some dog is going to come by and think, “DAMN!” when he gets a whiff. 
Well, being female, I have the issue mentioned above by other female posters–namely, making sure not to get any on me when peeing. I have had to #2 in the woods once, and off the side of a boat once. In the boat, I had no choice in the matter–I was going to go whether I wanted to or not. ::shudder:: In the woods, I had the luxury of my husband to stand guard, and a convenient tree-trunk to use as a toilet seat. Fortunately, we always carry TP.
Let me know if it works for you.
Remember, you will feel uncomfortably oxygen-deprived before the sphincter says “to hell with it, I’m opening up”. But not dangerously so.
ETA: Oh, and you will remain continent of bowel contents with this approach. That sphincter opens much later in the process, and only if you continue breath-holding waaaay past the point of bladder-emptying.
Thanks for replies: Muldoon, I hadn’t seen lieu’s canoe thread— wonderful!
And Qadgop, that’s a nice bit of advice. What’s the physical mechanism there?
To gals whizzing in the woods worried about splashback; if you dig a small hole, sans the leaf litter layer, there is much less splash. It soaks on in to the dirt, and, you’re helping to fertilize the plants there. I always cover it back up, not sure if that’s an instinctive impulse or social manners.
I’ve done quite a bit of backpacking and always had a terribly unpleasant time relieving myself anywhere but a bathroom where I am alone. Public bathrooms are unpleasant, and I can’t for the life of me understand how guys can use urinals without, y’know, walls surrounding them. In the woods, the privacy issue is compounded by actually finding a suitable place - right slope, no prickly/irritating plants, but still enough dense vegetation between you and the trail. Plus then there’s the wiping situation, which is always a pain (either you’re gross and incredibly irresponsible and bury the tissue, or you’re unbelievably gross and pack it out…ick). And then you may not be able to properly wash your hands, so you just have to settle for dousing them in Purell, which is really pretty much the worst part.
I don’t need an instruction manual to do it, but really, if I’m out hiking or backpacking, it waits until the last possible moment.
I rather like shitting in the woods. It took practice, but I have no problem at all. On the other hand, my home toilet is an outhouse without a door. I may be an outlier.
A lot of times when I’m backpacking, it seems like I’m rushing to get somewhere, or to set up camp, or get ready to go, but shitting gives you a chance to get out by yourself in nature and spend some time experiencing the wilderness. Of course, changing a tampon in a snowstorm is more of a wilderness experience than I usually need, but that’s how it goes. I don’t mind packing out my toilet paper. I’ve never done anything different, so I just have a “poo bag” set up with small ziplocs of fresh toilet paper and purell, and other bags for used paper.
I recently bought a Freshette, which is still kind of weird to use, but it’s so nice to not take off your pants in the cold.
A good friend of mine is a very outdoorsy kind of guy. I’ve known him since we were in the boy scouts thirty years ago. Since then he’s been a LRRP (Long Range Recon Patrol) in Viet Nam, and a Forest Ranger and an Army Reservist. Now he’s a farmer/rancher. He tells me he can only go camping for three days if his wife goes along because she can only hold # 2 that long.
I find that doggie poop bags work really well for this (they even have non-petroleum-based, compostable/biodegradable ones!), especially if you use a drysack (like the SealLine kayaking bags) as an outer trash bag. The black doggie bag hides the sight and smell nicely and the outer bag is there to catch any breaks (hasn’t been an issue yet) and is easily cleaned and re-used.
the back door is 5 feet away. The bathroom is up a flight of stairs. You do the math. 
I don’t have a problem taking a shit outside either, but the logistical difficulties of squatting with pants pulled makes me prefer a regular toilet, or a toilet seat on a frame outside. If I were naked it’d be a lot easier though.
You wouldn’t be referring to this gem, would you?
My educated WAG is that as oxygen saturation drops, the body decides it’s not worth the metabolic effort of keeping that particular sphincter closed, especially since one level of the nervous system is trying to open it up anyway.
Interesting. If it were to happen to an animal, caught and being strangled by another animal, we might call it a survival strategy: foul yourself, make yourself smell like a dead thing, and the predator might decide you wouldn’t be so yummy after all.
A very timely story came out today. The Sherpa who holds the record for most climbs of Everest is going for the summit again - but a major part of his rationale for the climb is environmental:
*"Yet the expedition that he hopes will take him to the top of Everest for the 19th time – his nearest rival, Chhewang Nima, has reached the summit a mere 15 occasions – is inspired by a different concern; the increasing environmental threats to a mountain the sherpas consider sacred. Litter and rubbish discarded by the dozens of commercial expeditions that attempt to climb the mountain every year, have turned parts of Everest into a high-altitude dump. Left-over climbing equipment, litter, and human excrement that fails to decay have transformed this once-pristine Himalayan landscape.
He said that he and his team members would be carrying hundreds of bags that can be used to carry excrement and other rubbish and transport it down the mountain so it can be disposed of properly."*
And you people can’t even hike your leavings back for proper disposal? Shame.
I can’t even let it go easy indoors!
Let a guy stand next to me at a urinal and I’ll be there for an hour!
I may even *pretend * to piss and just hold it till I get home!
Because of the meds I have to take, I find it easier to sit down and piss. (And yes, I know they make fun of me on SNL, but it just “comes” quicker that way.)
But the questions was “outdoors” wasn’t it?
Yeah, when I’m cycling I can go easier, if I have to pee - but not if I have to scheisse.
Just something about my dick and my balls dangling and me squatting… I don’t know, man. Maybe it’s a Freudian thing… Something is gonna chomp on me, I just know it!..
Q
Voluntary breath-holding doesn’t reach the level of strangulation. Nowhere close.
And I always felt that the post-hoc theory of defecation at near-death being a ‘survival strategy’ was really rather flawed; All sphincters let go at the time of death. Tensed muscles relax when a creature dies. That’s just physiology. What’s the survival advantage for your gall bladder tending to dump its contents into the small bowel at death?
Apparently, I misunderstood the question.
Again.
Sorry.
I tought y’all were talking about being able to evacuate your bowels and kidneys comfortably in the woods.
TMI seems to follow me around.
Or maybe I just cut to the chase?
Q