Good post.

I went through a similar thing in a Kansas City ice storm a few years ago. The power was out for nine days. As a result of that, I bought a small diesel generator. That way I can share fuel with my PU either at home or in the boonies.

I think a good approach to the survival problem is to initially think in terms of lasting a week or so. Once that is managed, then it is mostly a case of just adding more stuff for a longer haul. In most emergencies, there will be a little warning time. The big exception is finding oneself in the middle of a riot -- that can happen in a hurry. Obviously, earthquakes come without warning.

I'm not as close as I would like to be. I could pull it off for 2 months tops.

The trouble with most ordinary people is that they usually 'scoff' at the survivalist mentality, until the SHTF. I've tried for years to pound this philosophy into my relatives collective psyche's to no avail. Money would be my problem as it always been in short supply, and if it turns into 'worthless script', then it serves only for lighting fires. I am pretty well heeled enough to deal with goblins, or interloping government types. Stocking-up on freeze-dried food is always a good idea, as is having an adequate medical kit at the ready. There really is no such thing as being 'too prepared'.

sadly, i have neither food, water, or cash to get me by very long. but, i have about 1400 rounds of ammo for my various weapons. lol about 50 of those rounds feed my ar,, but i can get by with my ak. and i feel, if things get to that point, i can walk to one of 5 publix's (giant grocery store) that are less then a 1/2 mile from my home. and from there, acquire what i need. also its come to my attention that im the ONLY member of my neighborhood with a firearm or ability to use it. my services in pertection could also be traded for what i needed. i by no means plan to lot and steal, but in some situations, taking food from a store is necessary. and if my fellow neightbors need me, and my protection, then im happy to offer it, as long as i dont starve!

Growing up with hurricanes in the south and now ice and snow storms in the north, we live naturally with the possibility of going awhile without restocking. I don't have 6 months though. That seems a bit much.

We keep at least a 6 month food supply in the form of canned goods,dryed food,MREs, water,etc.(all stay rotated out). We also live on a large fresh water stream full of fish with plenty of game around. I have a generator/fuel supply that I work with that could be used for power if needed. I also keep plenty of chopped wood for the fireplace. I usually keep 3000+ rounds of ammo on hand anyway(.223,12ga,.45,.22) so thats taken care of. Will I ever need to utilize any of it, probably not but if I do I know that my family and I will not go hungry or cold and THAT is priority for me. Most of my friends/family think I'm a crazy for keeping so many supplies on hand but I PROMISE you if the SHTF I know whos door they'll be knocking on! Better have food and supplies in hand if they do!

I guess I have been lucky most of my life in the fact that I at least wasn't born or choose to live in a stupid place where natural disasters are more likely to happen. However, noone is totally safe, no matter where you live. It just so happens that I have just gotten power back after being out of power for 11 days due to an ice storm, which took out most everyone's power, and blocked most roads with fallen trees and limbs.

I was never in any real danger, although some people did die in the area, from fires, and other accidents during this outage. It took us over a day just to cut our way to the highway with chainsaws. I had been through a power outage in winter before, but it was much shorter, but even then I learned that having some alternative source of heat and light was a must.

Fortunately, I was heating with wood anyway so we didnot get cold, and we were able to cook on top of the wood stove. I had a lot of large candles stored and I had stored up plenty of lamp oil, for my lanterns. I caugh some water in whatever containers we had, fearing we would run out of water, and we did loose water pressure, but never completely run out of water, due to being down hill from the main line, so I had a ready store of rural water in their lines that no one else could take.

I did eventually loose my food that I had in the fridge and deep freeze. I didn't have a generator, and many people purchased generators during this outage. I almost bought one on a couple of occasions, but frankly I wasn't hurting that bad, and the food I had in the fridge and deepfreeze had been picked over already, so I didn't want to invest a bunch in fuel to keep it anyway. I can kill a couple of deer to replace it if I really need too.

At the local walmarts, and other stores, lamp oil was bought out, and could not be had, I was glad I had plenty. Batteries were also bought out. I did eventually purchase a new Colman propane cook stove, which was nice to have, and I did finally purchase a couple of Coleman battery powered lanterns that used 8 each D batteries, after seeing how good a light they made, with the smoke and fumes caused by the the coal oil lanterns, and they made a better light for reading by in the evenings.

Fortunately I had quite a few batteries, and flashlights, so I got by pretty good. The main thing I missed was nice hot shower or bath. It's hard to heat enough water on the wood stove, or campstove for a bath, except for sponge baths. We just got the power back tonight, so the first thing I did was take a hot shower.

This is the longest I have ever been without power, due to an outage. I will be better prepared next time. And I think I will get a generator, but I am going to do a little research first to make a good choice. And I am tempted to get a propane hot water heater, mine if course is electric.

I had enough ammo and guns to fight off a small army but I never fired a shot, I would not want to be without my guns, but it seems like the most of the time, short of an all out government colapse, one will need a can opener a lot more often then an AR-15.

And last but not least, gasoline was in short supply, because the gas stations were out of power also, and couldn't pump the gas. The only thing that I could get to the highway with was my old Ford 4WD and only one gas tank worked on it, so I was a little nervious about finding fuel when I left home, so I got some gas cans and bought extra when I could find it. Even gas cans were hard to find, not every store had them.

One thing I knew, but was driven home to me, during this outage, was the fact that waiting until you need something at the store, is a bad idea, during a disaster, because everthing will be bought out, very quickly. And if it wasn't for good supply lines and restocking, things could have gotten ugly, or at least a lot of people in this area would have had it a lot harder then they did.

I work at a large company (30.000+) so Im in meeting all the time. In 2 different cases this week I talked to guys who had a gun or guns but no more food than the normal sheep has in his house. In both cases I wound up having long talks with both guys about short term (canned), intermediate (some freeze dried etc), and long term (bucket) food storage. The guy I talked to on Monday called me Wednesday and said he had talked to his wife the night before and she's on board. They have 2 kids under the age of 3. I told him to approach it from that angle that they need to have food for the little ones. Now she's all for it. Im having much fun now converting people to the idea that they need to be prepared.

AR15...check.
Boots...check.
Toilet paper...check.



Yep I'm good.

There is so much wrong with this post it is unreal. You do not have squat, and have not prepared, so you feel justified in looting and stealing whatever you need and are willing to use deadly force to get it.

I hope you know some trauma care.

I have ammo, a few thousand rounds ok maybe five thousand if i counted all of it. I have tubs full of basic foodstuffs, rice flour rolled oats brown sugar, turbinado sugar, dried beans. I also have canned goods and two freezers full of food, that will be the first to be eaten. I have around 80 mre meals and access to water, spring sourced. I have woods all around so wood heat is at my fingertips and i have two wood stoves and several generators. I also have my own Owned 1000 gallon propane tank and heaters and a 40 gallon water heater(propane) I live ij the middle of thousands of acres of woods so wildlife is abundant. I have several medics kits and a surgical kit with sutures. I have water purification filters and night vision, I do need more food and more batteries and some of my candles melted together so they are little but fire starter now, I do have quite a few trioxane fire starters and sever canteens and packs for moving deeper into the wilderness is needed, i have several tent options. I also have cordage in several sizes and many different knives for all purposes. I am equipped with at least two tactical vests and several back pack options. I have been at this since pre Y2K. some of my ammo and stores are from that time and the canned food is still edible and tasty. I do need some canned butter and canned cheese. I also have may sleeping bags in several temp ratings. I like military supplies as they are made to do the job.

when buying food to have for long term survival, look at protein and calories as well as nutrients when choosing what food to stock up on, I dont like peas but they have great nutrient levels.

This is something me,my dad and brother have been working on here lately. At the moment my dad has a place with natural water supply,as of now we have 6 month food supply for us and a few more there now. Xtra tank of propane, a years worth of diesel for the tractor, plenty of ammo and reloading supplies(if there is such a thing), and surplus fishing supplies(there is a lake that we have access to that is well stocked). We have a library of books on survival, ex. Encyclopedia of country living, and others.
Me and my brother do not live there but we both keep a months worth of food each where we live(I am going to try and step that up to three months), and reserve fuel cans to get back to my dads if need be.
The three of us are going to a weekend long defensive carbine class in march also.
It seems though that for everything we add we find two more we need.

My wife was actually the one who converted me into being a prepared person. I'd always been mindful of the gun side of being prepared, but had never given much thought to the rest of it. For the past year or so, we've been getting our act together, though. We live on six acres, and have started farming a good portion of it. We have a few small garden plots, and are working out an orchard area. The rest of the usable land will go to raising livestock(chickens, hogs, and goats).


My personal projects for SHTF scenarios are 1) building a good perimeter fence. 2) stockpiling enough ammo to last a year, including hunting and the occasional target practice. My wife is leading the efforts in the area of food stockpiling and preservation. I just carry and stow the bucket and cases wherever she wants them...

I think the only areas that we really are lacking in are enough money and enough ammo. I've used a good bit of it recently target shooting, and with the prices going up and no one on the internet having anything in stock(as far as I've been able to find), it's getting harder to replace it in bulk.

I think that all in all, we'll do better than most.

No I believe what he's saying is that he's the only person on his block with a gun. So he'll provide protection for the neighbors, in exchange they can feed him...you know, I scrtch your back you scratch mine, although I highly doubt they're any more prepared.

My dumb cousins are now asking me for ammo.
They either want to buy some of my stash or let them have a few boxes.

My mind says hell no...but my heart will say ok.
Heart will win.

I have plenty.


Mean while in other news.
My vegetable garden is doing very well.

How you been CUZ?

[quote name='Ilikelegs' date='March 30th 2009 12:49 PM' post='684774']
My dumb cousins are now asking me for ammo.
They either want to buy some of my stash or let them have a few boxes.

My mind says hell no...but my heart will say ok.
Heart will win.

I have plenty.


Well, if you don't have enough "dumb cousins" and would like one more.........

long while since no post. on edit------I guess I didn't realize there were 2 pages. oops
I'm not ready, but I'm getting there. I've got my rifle and my pistol, all within the last 2 months and 600+ rounds of pistol ammo, working on the .223. I've got some basic survival items in my SHTF backpack, like first aid, compass, BICs/matches,clothing etc.
As far as food and water I'd be screwed, but it's in the works. My problem is my occupation requires travel and lots of it. In one place for 6-8 months or more. I was renting(never have owned) and now my family travels with me, wife works with me and I have 2 boys, 2 yrs and 1 yr.
So yeah, I'm unprepared and ashamed of it.
But I don't know where in the hell I'd store food/water.
My mother did just buy some land and I've encouraged her to garden/farm.
I guess if it happened real soon, being in construction, I'd at least have fairly easy access to fresh bottled water(lots) a generator and lots of battery operated tools???
I've been looking to buy a place for the past year, but now with the way the economy is I don't know what to do. I wish I had cash to pay for a home on at least a small piece of land. Then I could work on my gardening skills/hoarding food/water etc. and build an underground bunker, lol.
Problem is, time I may not have.

This post has been edited by NETMReaper: April 11th 2009 2:57 AM

I am not very prepared at all just yet. Mainly water is an issue. In my current living situation, stockpiling food is not very much of an option, but there is enough food running around in my back woods to last me indefinitely if worse comes to worse and we have a huge garden space that can be (and has been) used to grow more food than we could ever eat, though this year it doesn't look like we will plant much. I have a few thousand rounds of .22lr for small game and a few hundred rounds for my m91/30 for bigger stuff. I still have a major shortage of .223 though. Of course, I also have a few hundred candles, a few oil lamps and a little oil, and plenty of lighters and matches stockpiled. It has been many years since I practiced my wilderness survival skills, but I think I could still do it if needed. I was quite adept in my teen years. Being an Eagle Scout, I got quite a bit of training.

Where less drastic situations are concerned, I just got started on my money saving plan about a month or two ago so I only have about a weeks take home pay saved up, but I am being very diligent about putting that 10% of my pay each week into the interest bearing account where I refuse to touch it. Even getting started at 32 years old, if the fecal matter doesn't hit the whirling blades by then, at retirement age, I should have well over a million dollars saved up in my nest egg due to compounding interest.

All in all, I should be fine. Mankind lived for thousands of years without modern conveniences and since I know the basics of doing so and have plenty of wilderness around me to do it with, I will make it too.

Rev. R. Farrier

This post has been edited by Rev. Redmond Farrier: April 11th 2009 3:35 AM