Preparedness

[Steve M.]

I'm considering purchasing this -http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002UJX9UW/ for electricity. It's noiseless and portable. I'm also considering (evil) plastic collapsible 5-gallon water containers. I have a mountain of camping gear with enough, just inside the 4 back-packs packs, of everything to cover my whole family for a week. In each I have food, water, fire equipment starting stuff, misc. plastic shelter, twine, knives and some propane portable stoves as well as misc. hygiene stuff. It's mostly for grab and go conditions. I also have a couple of computer battery backups that should be good for providing some temporary electrical needs. I wonder if the item (linked above) would work at recharging the battery backups as well. It seems to have the needed cables etc.. I'd hate to daisy chain too much to the solar panels and ruin the whole setup.

Nearby (though several miles) is the oldest organic farms in the USA. I'm going to see about duck fat maybe over the weekend. There is no place that I know of that actually has it. The one thing about it is my wife is nearly 100% vegetarian (eats "organic" birds/fish) but she says she'll eat any meat if it is organic. I just hope I can afford a stock of the things she will eat. Of course hungry people will eat whatever is before them.

I'm also interested in RyanX (I believe)'s idea about finding what you can eat by foraging in a forest (berries, roots etc..).

I've been considering setting up a store of food in the country, outside of the city here, but maybe the best thing to do would be stick it out at home. If I were to leave to the country, the idea fear being that everyone would get wacked out and go after other peoples things, I'd still leave quite a bit of necessities here. Here, we're pretty close to about 6 months of stored goods, if we have electricity, 2-3 months easily without.

..much to consider.

 

[ScottD]

Being a former Eagle Scout and avid hiker I have quite the horde of camping/hiking gear as well in case I need to hit the dusty...or perhaps icy trail. As far as water storage I am looking at the Shelf Reliance 55 Gallon barrels (_http://www.shelfreliance.com/55-gallon-water-supply-kit.html). I also have a small stream in the backyard that could be conditioned for usable water if needed. For quick travel I have CamelBak water storage and handheld filtration systems.

That laptop charger looks decent. I've been thinking about something similar so that I could slap the solar array on a window and let it charge when I can.

There's definitely a lot to consider and to not get sucked into the survivalist mentality but one of a well prepared individual ready to weather whatever may come.

 

[Divide by Zero]

From a Sarajevo War Survivor:
Experiencing horrible things that can happen in a war - death of parents and
friends, hunger and malnutrition, endless freezing cold, fear, sniper attacks.

<snip>
4. If you had to go without one utility, lose electricity - it's the easiest to
do without (unless you're in a very nice climate with no need for heat.)
<snip>

Problem is that most oil or gas burners require electricity to run. In the last big outages in my area people scrambled for generators to feed their fridges and furnaces!

 

[LQB]

From a Sarajevo War Survivor:
Experiencing horrible things that can happen in a war - death of parents and
friends, hunger and malnutrition, endless freezing cold, fear, sniper attacks.

<snip>
4. If you had to go without one utility, lose electricity - it's the easiest to
do without (unless you're in a very nice climate with no need for heat.)
<snip>

Problem is that most oil or gas burners require electricity to run. In the last big outages in my area people scrambled for generators to feed their fridges and furnaces!

That is a prob, I agree. For cooking, a propane tank and a fish-cooker high BTU burner will do nicely. You can also get reasonably priced propane heaters that do not require elec - and will run off the same tank. You will need to store the tank outside but drill a hole and install a short gas line. This will not heat the whole house but at least one room. If you have the funds, there are small solar systems that will deliver about 1 KWhr per day assuming the sun is out. This will work for an appliance that does not draw a lot of power to stay on. Just some things to think about if you want to plan on the elec going out.

 

[Nawd]

From a Sarajevo War Survivor:
Experiencing horrible things that can happen in a war - death of parents and
friends, hunger and malnutrition, endless freezing cold, fear, sniper attacks.

<snip>
4. If you had to go without one utility, lose electricity - it's the easiest to
do without (unless you're in a very nice climate with no need for heat.)
<snip>

Problem is that most oil or gas burners require electricity to run. In the last big outages in my area people scrambled for generators to feed their fridges and furnaces!

I'm actually considering purchasing a Sun Oven (solar powered!) It's not cheap, but it seems to be one of those things that might be good to have around.

_http://www.campingsurvival.com/sunovsocoov.html

Of course this is assuming the sun will shine 2-3 times a week. Also, in it's discription it mentions you can dehydrate stuff, which makes it (in my mind at least) even more valuable. One could even use it in the winter as long as the sun is shining.

 

[rrraven]

--http://www.ehow.com/how_5480450_make-solar-cookers.html

a solar cooker made with alu foil...no fuel required only sunshine

 

[3DStudent]

Problem is that most oil or gas burners require electricity to run. In the last big outages in my area people scrambled for generators to feed their fridges and furnaces!

Can't you just put a match on the burner if the electricity goes out? I'm wondering what I'll do for my cooking needs, because we have an electric stove. Propane would only work until it runs out. So maybe the solar oven or backyard campfires will work.

 

[cubbex]

Things are gonna get harder, don't they????

But this kinda confuses me, it is because its going to be a war, or because of the weather?

 

[3DStudent]

Things are gonna get harder, don't they????

But this kinda confuses me, it is because its going to be a war, or because of the weather?

I think of immediate concern is the economy collapsing. And we know of the ice age that is coming. I don't know about any more wars, but who knows with the PTB in control. Other than the war we fight daily within ourselves, that is.

 

[cubbex]

Things are gonna get harder, don't they????

But this kinda confuses me, it is because its going to be a war, or because of the weather?

I think of immediate concern is the economy collapsing. And we know of the ice age that is coming. I don't know about any more wars, but who knows with the PTB in control. Other than the war we fight daily within ourselves, that is.

Ok, I asked for a war because of Laura's post, but I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

Here on Chihuahua things get a little hard with some cold, I just imagine what it would happen in this next ice age.

 

[Mrs. Peel]

Ok, I asked for a war because of Laura's post, but I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

It's obvious you don't live in the US of A.

 

[cubbex]

Ok, I asked for a war because of Laura's post, but I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

It's obvious you don't live in the US of A.

Yeah, I think that if everyone in one group say yes and some few say no, those few have to do what the mayority say.

And you are right, I am no from US from America.

 

[Hildegarda]

I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

Historically, that's what ALWAYS happens. It's not a matter of belief.

 

[Mrs.Tigersoap]

I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

Historically, that's what ALWAYS happens. It's not a matter of belief.

Absolutely. As Laura said in this very thread:

I talked to an old farmer down the road one day and he told me that during WW II, the government sent troops around to take the food from all the farms to feed the army. They took everything. Then they issued food coupons that were for barely enough to keep a person alive.

So I might have understood wrong, but I think she was talking about a man down the road in France, where she lives. I don't see why the pyschopathic agenda would be confined to the USA.

**********

I have looked around for a pressure canner and have discovered that they are almost inexistant here! I'm currently reading a very interesting Canadian blog (in French, unfortunately:_http://conserves.blogspot.com/) about canning, and the author was saying that he does not know why but that apparently, pressure canners are virtually impossible to find in Europe.

I noticed that very often, people here (and on forums, Internet shops, etc.) mix up pressure cooker and pressure canner. And also, they don't seem to know that you need more than boiling the cans if you are dealing with low acid food like meat (or they don't know about botulism?). So apparently in Canada, you easily find what they call an autoclave (a pressure canner), whereas here you must call that a pressure sterilizer, etc. and even so, they are usually huge things sold to the industry, etc.
So now, I've looked and found Presto pressure canners on ebay.com, but the cheapest ones cost 80$ with 70 $ shipping costs. Not cheap..

May I ask where our European members have bought theirs?

 

[Nević Nenad]

Things are gonna get harder, don't they????

But this kinda confuses me, it is because its going to be a war, or because of the weather?

I think of immediate concern is the economy collapsing. And we know of the ice age that is coming. I don't know about any more wars, but who knows with the PTB in control. Other than the war we fight daily within ourselves, that is.

Ok, I asked for a war because of Laura's post, but I do not believe someone is going to take people's food, do not believe the people is going to let the police or whatever group to do that.

Here on Chihuahua things get a little hard with some cold, I just imagine what it would happen in this next ice age.

Oh, they would do that without any second thought. Especially if it is government (army) that is taking away food for some "greater" cause (feeding the army).

It is in a part different, is it "just" economic collapse, and you are trying not to be hungry (like it was in Serbia during 90s) or is it also war, where on top of that you have people who are trying to kill you or to take you in their army to kill other people (like it was in Bosnia during 90s). Anyway looks that the best thing for stockpiling is your knowledge, because everything else would wear out sooner or later, but your own knowledge wont.