WITH 12 years’ experience in the United States Marines and special forces,  Klint Janulis knows a thing or two about surviving in the wild.

And the 34-year-old put his skills to good use to train the participants of new Channel 5 series 10,000 BC, which sees volunteers live like Stone Age people.

Oxford Mail:

Klint Janulis stars in TV show 10,000 BC

Mr Janulis joined the participants in the Bulgarian wilderness at different points from October to December last year and helped them learn how to hunt, keep warm and stay healthy.

The first episode of the series was broadcast last night on Channel 5.

Our top stories

The Botley Road resident is studying for a PhD in Stone Age archaeology at St Cross College and runs Oxford University’s Paleotechnology Society.

He said: “I heard the advert for the programme when they were looking for volunteers and I thought it could be interesting to see how modern human beings adapt.

“I collected data on how they would follow game and gather food.

“Primarily I was teaching them how to trap animals and fish because that is where my research lies.

“I call them survival skills but they would have been basic skills that Stone Age people had.”

The show features 20 people including a sales rep who believes she has a direct line to God, a former male model and a housewife in an arranged marriage.

The show’s producers gave them  basic equipment such as waterproof containers and Stone Age replica clothing and left them to fend for themselves in Bulgaria.

Mr Janulis, who grew up in Kansas and moved to Oxford about 18 months ago, said almost everything in the show was authentic for the time period.

He said: “The participants had boots because in the real Stone Age people had feet that had adapted.

“We had to give them boots so the whole thing did not fall apart because they had bleeding feet.

“They were given some ceramics because they did not have enough skills to make watertight containers.”

Iraq veteran Mr Janulis said: “It was a fairly wild ecosystem. The most insidious hazard was probably the weather. It is hard when it is cold to bring in more calories than they were burning.

“It was a tremendous fun.”

10,000 BC will be shown on Channel 5 at 10pm on Mondays and Tuesdays.


  • Do you want alerts delivered straight to your phone via our WhatsApp service? Text NEWS or SPORT or NEWS AND SPORT, depending on which services you want, and your full name to 07767 417704. Save our number into your phone’s contacts as Oxford Mail WhatsApp and ensure you have WhatsApp installed.