So I just finished watching NATGEO's "American Blackout". So not prepared....

In our neck of the woods we are blessed with a lot of ponds, so a decent gravity water purifier should see to your water needs.

Food is definitely a good thing, I have been picking up a few extra cans of soups, veggies every payday and sticking then aside. As they age rotate them into your everyday food needs until the SHTF.

Other items to grab onto,

Ammo. pretty much anything. Certainly focus on what you have guns for, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't grab what you can even if you don't have something that shoots it. It would be an awesome barter item. 22 lr is hard to find these days, and will be like money when SHTF.

Propane tanks. those little ones that power lanterns and grills will be sweet to have. If you have extra, another barter item. A few 30 pounders would be sweet as well.

Booze. will dull the misery of S hitting the fan, and be an excellent barter item.

55 gallon drums. useful for wood burners, water collection, waste disposal, water storage. etc. they are cheap now. and will be like gold later.

cigarettes, good barter item.

The list could go on, others may have some other key items to list at the top. These are a few that come to my mind right away that are easy to fit into a tight budget that would go a long way to helping out in pretty much any disaster scenario.

Take care

The absolute best survival plan is to live by the ocean and be prepared to take to the sea if everything goes south.

Its is a relatively easy thing to learn to sail, fish, and build a cheap solar desalinization piece of equipment for water.

Probably about the safest place you can ever get if things do get that bad. Its doubtful anyone is going to use a fuel powered craft to head a thousand miles out into open water so the only people you may rarely run across are other sailors.

Head back in a few years when things have quieted down.

reply to post by caterpillage


And me and my gang figure out you have supplies and we want them. Oh wait, you have some guns.....hmmm....guess we will just hide over there and burn down your house and all inside it then take whatever we can find.

Do you see the problem with your scenario?

reply to post by superman2012


Thank you for the advice.

I live right in the middle of farm country.

I would also like to add that we have a little 20 by 20 garden that did really well. We are going to can next year.

reply to post by liejunkie01


I also will be canning next year and pickling. Also toying with the idea of a root cellar in the backyard. I have no idea how to can but am lucky to live in a small community where many people know how and are willing to share their knowledge. Old people rock and have lots of information.
Apparently root vegetable will keep quite awhile in damp sand in the basement. I haven't tried that yet. Anyone here tried it?

reply to post by Spookybelle


I like my plan better. I believe I would have a much better chance keeping in a tight knit community. You and your marauders going to try to take a town of 600+?
There are easier targets for you. You are more then welcome to join us and contribute to the community though.

Spookybelle
reply to post by caterpillage

 

And me and my gang figure out you have supplies and we want them. Oh wait, you have some guns.....hmmm....guess we will just hide over there and burn down your house and all inside it then take whatever we can find.

Do you see the problem with your scenario?

To be blunt and realistic for the topic? That is why I've networked with my neighbors and in no random pattern for who is closest in some things. If my house gets hit, the people doing it will find themselves facing me..who they expected to overtake (and probably could), but then will also find threats from multiple NEW directions they hadn't expected to see anything from.

Ditto on my own part, should one of them come under looting or some other threat in a disaster. Mutual support and in a logical way. All important things to do in advance and then largely forget about in talking through with others, IMO.

Don't get sucked into this prepping crap. This is the biggest scam going around these days. Someone want to disagree? I'll just tell you you've been fooled by the businesses making a #### load of money off of the fools getting scared into buying supplies for their "prepping" needs. Go ahead and waste money on supplies which will never serve you any good. You'll probably just use them eventually in your day to day life after you wasted 20 years worrying about a disaster and their shelf life is nearing the end.

Once again we have the TV scaring people. In 1938 it happened with Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds". No, of course there wasn't the same scam going on then as there is now, but the point is time and time again the media will scare the public into believing something is true just because they told you it is. I understand "prepping" is preparing for an event which cannot be proven to be true or false as of current day, but give me a break...can you really not see the scam behind this?

Either waste your money or don't.

reply to post by SeriousIndividual

I would be willing to bet you have life/house/car/travel/medical/some other insurance.

What's wrong with having food insurance? Or the knowledge to take care of ourselves?

Are you that scared of us? We'll help you too.

Spookybelle
reply to post by caterpillage

 

And me and my gang figure out you have supplies and we want them. Oh wait, you have some guns.....hmmm....guess we will just hide over there and burn down your house and all inside it then take whatever we can find.

Do you see the problem with your scenario?

We weren't discussing defensive tactics in this case, just really things you should have. In your scenario, yes much more would be needed. And in my case, you would likely prevail, but you would suffer heavy losses.

reply to post by SeriousIndividual


Can I ask you what you spend your money on?

In your opinion it is a waste to buy food and gear.

My opinion it is a waste to buy everything else.

So really do you just sit on your money and wait for inflation to make it worthless?

reply to post by GNOarmy


1. several good full tang field knife - K-bar, parang, sawback, ect....
2. Multiple water filtration methods- ceramic, gravity, lights, tablets
3. regional wilderness survival guide
4. Practice- minimalist camping, bugout drills, survival outings
5.Never stop learning about self-reliance learn to do everything the old way or with out modern tech.

These are the most important things in my opinion.


To those who think prepping is a waste of money it is insurance against any kind of disaster; lose of income, injury, food shortage, crop failure, ect... it is only a waste if you are not cycling your supplies and allowing them to expire. Once the back stock is there is does not take any extra funds. Now people can go overboard but that is their choice.

SeriousIndividual
Don't get sucked into this prepping crap. This is the biggest scam going around these days. Someone want to disagree? I'll just tell you you've been fooled by the businesses making a #### load of money off of the fools getting scared into buying supplies for their "prepping" needs. Go ahead and waste money on supplies which will never serve you any good. You'll probably just use them eventually in your day to day life after you wasted 20 years worrying about a disaster and their shelf life is nearing the end.

Once again we have the TV scaring people. In 1938 it happened with Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds". No, of course there wasn't the same scam going on then as there is now, but the point is time and time again the media will scare the public into believing something is true just because they told you it is. I understand "prepping" is preparing for an event which cannot be proven to be true or false as of current day, but give me a break...can you really not see the scam behind this?

Either waste your money or don't.

Exactly. This is why "prepping" should always be done with a mind for daily living. You don't build yourself into a bunker, you acquire things you need now, maybe in double, with a mind for the future. If you later have to throw away items that have become too old, your doing it wrong. But... when something goes down, you're all like, "yay me!"

reply to post by SeriousIndividual


These scenarios aren't beyond the realm of possibilities. History has proven that there are times that people should have been prepared to some extent. You have Katrina, the blizzard of 77,78, major droughts and countless other disasters and scenarios. Millions of people throughout history have perished unnecessarily. It is scenarios like these and not TV that has prompted me to want to be prepared. I don't think I want to go overboard, but just want the basics to survive. So my question to you is, do you deny that being prepared would have saved lives?

reply to post by caterpillage


I don't think he will be back.

I just went to his profile.

It seems he likes to hit and run on threads.

I would be surprised if he did come back.

reply to post by ParanoidAmerican


I would say the most important skill is being able to know when a certain area is going to have a problem and getting out of there before it goes to hell.

Yep, that looks like a hurricane coming so we should perhaps start thinking about leaving. Or, it looks like this city is going to erupt in civil violence so maybe we should take a trip.

If the entire nation goes down at once there really is little hope of survival anyways and since that has never happened in our history its unlikely it ever will.

reply to post by GNOarmy

Don't bother. There are people that will jump into a thread to poo poo it just to try to get more stars by going off topic.
Do what feels right to you. Gain the knowledge that you need to do what it is, you want to do. No one can take your knowledge away. I do agree with other posters though, practice to make sure not only do you know the theory, but can achieve your goal as well.

liejunkie01
reply to post by caterpillage

 

I don't think he will be back.

I just went to his profile.

It seems he likes to hit and run on threads.

I would be surprised if he did come back.

I hope he comes back, he could be fun.

reply to post by Spookybelle

Leaving is an option for some scenarios, but is not a viable option always. Do you drag the family through the chaos in the streets or hunker down till it is a bit safer, these are decisions that are made on the spot and among those it involves more than anything else.

Yes while it is true we have never had that happen here....it has happened over and over in the past and even recently, look how hard it was to keep Greece under control.....now imagine that here...all empires fall it is just a matter of how and when...

reply to post by superman2012

During the show, Marie Osmond was a spokesperson for some survivalist food company. Should I listen to her? I mean, she did survive an entire decade of the 70's.