Is Recession Preparing a New Breed of Survivalist? [Survival Today

Yahoo ran an interesting article this morning indicating a rise in the number of survivalist communities cropping up around the country. I have been wondering myself how much of the recent energy crisis is causing people to do things like stockpile food and water, grow their own vegetables, etc. Could it be that there are many people out there stockpiling and their increased buying has caused food prices to increase? It’s an interesting theory, but I believe increased food prices have more to do with rising fuel prices as cost-to-market costs have increased and grocers are simply passing those increases along to the consumer. A recent stroll through the camping section of Wal-Mart did give me pause - what kinds of things are prudent to have on hand in the event of a worldwide shortage of food and/or fuel? Survivalist in Training

I’ve been interested in survival stories since I was a kid, which is funny considering I grew up in a city. Maybe that’s why the idea of living off the land appealed to me. My grandfather and I frequently took camping trips along the Blue Ridge Parkway and around the Smoky Mountains. Looking back, some of the best times we had were when we stayed at campgrounds without electricity hookups, because it forced us to use what we had to get by. My grandfather was well-prepared with a camp stove and lanterns (which ran off propane), and when the sun went to bed we usually did along with it. We played cards for entertainment, and in the absence of televisions, games, etc. we shared many great conversations. Survivalist in the Neighborhood

U.N. Power Grab?

U.N.'s 'Climate Change' Plan Would Likely Shift Trillions to Form a New World Economy

March 27, 2009
By George Russell
Fox News Exclusive

A United Nations document on "climate change" that will be distributed to a major environmental conclave next week envisions a huge reordering of the world economy, likely involving trillions of dollars in wealth transfer, millions of job losses and gains, new taxes, industrial relocations, new tariffs and subsidies, and complicated payments for greenhouse gas abatement schemes and carbon taxes — all under the supervision of the world body.

Those and other results are blandly discussed in a discretely worded United Nations "information note" on potential consequences of the measures that industrialized countries will likely have to take to implement the Copenhagen Accord, the successor to the Kyoto Treaty, after it is negotiated and signed by December 2009. The Obama administration has said it supports the treaty process if, in the words of a U.S. State Department spokesman, it can come up with an "effective framework" for dealing with global warming.

The 16-page note, obtained by FOX News, will be distributed to participants at a mammoth negotiating session that starts on March 29 in Bonn, Germany, the first of three sessions intended to hammer out the actual commitments involved in the new deal.

In the stultifying language that is normal for important U.N. conclaves, the negotiators are known as the "Ad Hoc Working Group On Further Commitments For Annex I Parties Under the Kyoto Protocol." Yet the consequences of their negotiations, if enacted, would be nothing short of world-changing.

Getting that deal done has become the United Nations' highest priority, and the Bonn meeting is seen as a critical step along the path to what the U.N. calls an "ambitious and effective international response to climate change," which is intended to culminate at the later gathering in Copenhagen.

Just how ambitious the U.N.'s goals are can be seen, but only dimly, in the note obtained by FOX News, which offers in sparse detail both positive and negative consequences of the tools that industrial nations will most likely use to enforce the greenhouse gas reduction targets.

The paper makes no effort to calculate the magnitude of the costs and disruption involved, but despite the discreet presentation, makes clear that they will reverberate across the entire global economic system.

Click here for the information note.

Among the tools that are considered are the cap-and-trade system for controlling carbon emissions that has been espoused by the Obama administration; "carbon taxes" on imported fuels and energy-intensive goods and industries, including airline transportation; and lower subsidies for those same goods, as well as new or higher subsidies for goods that are considered "environmentally sound."

Other tools are referred to only vaguely, including "energy policy reform," which the report indicates could affect "large-scale transportation infrastructure such as roads, rail and airports." When it comes to the results of such reform, the note says only that it could have "positive consequences for alternative transportation providers and producers of alternative fuels."

In the same bland manner, the note informs negotiators without going into details that cap-and-trade schemes "may induce some industrial relocation" to "less regulated host countries." Cap-and-trade functions by creating decreasing numbers of pollution-emission permits to be traded by industrial users, and thus pay more for each unit of carbon-based pollution, a market-driven system that aims to drive manufacturers toward less polluting technologies.

The note adds only that industrial relocation "would involve negative consequences for the implementing country, which loses employment and investment." But at the same time it "would involve indeterminate consequences for the countries that would host the relocated industries."

There are also entirely new kinds of tariffs and trade protectionist barriers such as those termed in the note as "border carbon adjustment"— which, the note says, can impose "a levy on imported goods equal to that which would have been imposed had they been produced domestically" under more strict environmental regimes.

Another form of "adjustment" would require exporters to "buy [carbon] offsets at the border equal to that which the producer would have been forced to purchase had the good been produced domestically."

The impact of both schemes, the note says, "would be functionally equivalent to an increased tariff: decreased market share for covered foreign producers." (There is no definition in the report of who, exactly, is "foreign.") The note adds that "If they were implemented fairly, such schemes would leave trade and investment patterns unchanged." Nothing is said about the consequences if such fairness was not achieved.

Indeed, only rarely does the "information note" attempt to inform readers in dollar terms of the impact of "spillover effects" from the potential policy changes it discusses. In a brief mention of consumer subsidies for fossil fuels, the note remarks that such subsidies in advanced economies exceed $60 billion a year, while they exceed $90 billion a year in developing economies."

But calculations of the impact of tariffs, offsets, or other subsidies is rare. In a reference to the impact of declining oil exports, the report says that Saudi Arabia has determined the loss to its economy at between $100 billion and $200 billion by 2030, but said nothing about other oil exporters.

One reason for the lack of detail, the note indicates, is that impact would vary widely depending on the nature and scope of the policies adopted (and, although the note does not mention it, on the severity of the greenhouse reduction targets).

But even when it does hazard a guess at specific impacts, the report seems curiously hazy. A "climate change levy on aviation" for example, is described as having undetermined "negative impacts on exporters of goods that rely on air transport, such as cut flowers and premium perishable produce," as well as "tourism services." But no mention is made in the note of the impact on the aerospace industry, an industry that had revenues in 2008 of $208 billion in the U.S. alone, or the losses the levy would impose on airlines for ordinary passenger transportation. (Global commercial airline revenues in 2008 were about $530 billion, and were already forecast to drop to an estimated $467 billion this year.)

In other cases, as when discussing the "increased costs of traditional exports" under a new environmental regime, the report confines itself to terse description. Changes in standards and labeling for exported goods, for example, "may demand costly changes to the production process." If subsidies and tariffs affect exports, the note says, the "economic and social consequences of dampening their viability may, for some countries and sectors, be significant."

Much depends, of course, on the extent to which harsher or more lenient greenhouse gas reduction targets demand more or less drastic policies for their achievement.

And, precisely because the Bonn meeting is a stage for negotiating those targets, the note is silent. Instead it suggests that more bureaucratic work is needed "to deepen the understanding of the full nature and scale of such impacts."

But outside the Bonn process, other experts have been much more blunt about the draconian nature of the measures they deem necessary to make "effective" greenhouse gas reductions.

In an influential but highly controversial paper called "Key Elements of a Global Deal on Climate Change," British economist Nicholas Lord Stern, formerly a high British Treasury official, has declared that industrial economies would need to cut their per capita carbon dioxide emissions by "at least 80% by 2050," while the biggest economies, like the U.S.'s, would have to make cuts of 90 percent.

Stern also calls for "immediate and binding" reduction targets for developed nations of 20 percent to 40 percent by 2020.

To meet Stern's 2050 goals, he says, among other things, "most of the world's electricity production will need to have been decarbonized."

Click here for Stern's paper.

By way of comparison, according to the U.S. Department Of Energy, roughly 72 percent of U.S. electrical power generation in 2007 was derived from burning fossil fuels, with just 6 percent coming from hydro-power and less than 3 percent from non-nuclear renewable and "other" sources. And even then, those "other" non-fossil sources included wood and biomass — which, when burned, are major emitters of carbon.

Click here to see the Department of Energy report.
George Russell is executive editor of FOX News.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510937,00.html

http://www.millennium-ark.net/NEWS/09_World/090327.climate.change-UN.grab.html

The containers, properly called inter-modal steel building units (ISBUs) are familiar to almost everyone. Even inland they are seen riding on flatbed railroad cars or hauled on a dolly behind tractors on interstate highways and are featured in the stock film footage on the news channels, illustrating every story about port security. ISBUs are manufactured of heavy-gauge Corten steel and are water-proof, fire resistant, impervious to bugs and built to hold cargo securely on the pitching deck of a ship. You can almost imagine an architect staring at an impressive tower of containers when the light-bulb flashed on. Wow, a low cost, resource efficient, readily available, and incredibly ugly source of housing.

But architects are working on many plans and building techniques to make shipping container housing attractive and functional. They do not have to be square and flat-roofed - some are finished off with trussed roofs and interior and exterior finishes make them look very much like conventional housing.

ISBUs are supposedly manufactured in two sizes - 20' x 8' x 8' and 40' x 8' x 8' and one container can form the basis for a small, low cost home - perhaps emergency temporary housing following an earthquake or hurricane - or multiple containers can be used as building blocks to create larger and more permanent structures. For example, four 40 foot units placed side by side with the side walls of the inner two containers removed provides an open space 40' x 32' - 1,280 sq. ft of living area. The containers are manufactured to be stacked as much as nine high without compromising their structural integrity so second or third stories are no problem.

Architects are acting like kids in configuring these huge Lego's into bold designs and blueprints for college dorms, artist loft space, shopping areas, and now a wide variety of housing. They line them up, pile them up, cantilever them, and add on decks, canopies, and achieve a final result that can appear ultra modern, traditional, or whimsical.

Container housing is not an American innovation. Containers have been used in Europe, New Zealand, and many third-world countries and they are far ahead of us in the number of completed projects and in innovative technology. Still, building companies and architects are jumping in and it is expected that prices for completed homes will be coming down to a level which will make ISBU homes appealing to American consumers.

This could be a do-it-yourself project, and there are plans available in books and on the Internet, but Bob Villa's website and his television program recently featured a project building a container house by Tampa Armature Works (TAW), a Florida company which has been developing approaches to adapting containers for use as housing units. TAW custom fits the containers at their plant - generally removing all but the outer side panels, leaving the vertical steel support beams for structural integrity and cutting openings for windows and doors in the remaining walls. The company uses a spray-on ceramic coating on both sides of the remaining walls. This spray has an R value of R-19 and bonds nicely to the steel surface. The insulate can be covered with drywall on the inside and a number of finishes such as stucco on the exterior.

At the site - which must be accessible for heavy trucking and a crane - the owner or local builder assembles a concrete block foundation with an appropriately sized stem-wall foundation reinforced with steel rebar. The cells are then filled with concrete and half-inch thick steel plates with a J-hook are embedded into the concrete at the corners. The J-hook connects the ISBU to the rebar and ties it all the way down to the footing. Additional block and concrete work is done to support the sides of the other containers. The ISBU are lifted onto the foundation by crane, hooked down and then welded to the steel embedded in the foundation and at the corners. According to Villa's website, these containers are so strong - each is designed to carry over 26 tons of cargo - that they only must be fastened at the corners but attaching them to the rebar and welding them in place "ensures they will be immovable."

The multiple containers are welded together at top and bottom and roof, where specified, trusses are put on with steel straps that are welded to the steel roof of the container. Interior finish work is done with metal studding and drywall and when finished, the container looks like a real house.

So what are the advantages?

The containers are exceptionally strong and may be a solution to construction in hurricane prone areas and they nearly eliminate the use of trees to build a home. They are energy efficient and since they are built to factory specifications guesswork and fitting is eliminated. This reduces construction time for building crews and wasted materials. While container construction does not necessarily produce cost savings at present, as more and more homes are built with this technology, there will be significant savings.

Of course, one of the big advantages is in eliminating what promises to be a progressive environmental impact on areas around container depots and the recycling rather than land filling of resources.

So how do you find a shipping container and how much do they cost? Well, believe it or not, on eBay. We found quite a number of them and they were available nationwide. A 40' container was for sale in Salt Lake City for $2,800 and another in Houston for $3,900. 20 footers ranged from $1,100 in Long Beach to $2,500 in Florida. We even found places advertising containers that were outside the dimensions specified above. We located containers for sale that were 10, 30, 45, and 48 feet long and as much at 9.5 feet high. Perhaps the construction of these put them outside of the ISBU definition but they were of steel construction and their availability would open more design possibilities. Shipping the containers of course adds to the cost, but if you are interested, perhaps you can arrange to deliver a load of winter wheat from Salt Lake or motor oil from Houston to your new doorstep and cover part of the cost.

>>>So I found a recipe for canning butter - and cheese.<<<

Great!

Currently there are no ‘Official’ USDA approved home canning guidelines for either of these.

From what I can gather from some sources I feel are pretty reliable, the secret to butter canning is to melt it at a high enough temperature to drive out any remaining water (as this is what will cause it to go rancid) and be careful not to scorch it. Then it is poured into the jars. All the ones I have read about say that it is more solid (less spreadable) than store bought butter (water would account for that) The ‘spreadable’ butters are made by adding oil to the butter and whipping it. Problem here is that in processing and in sitting, they tend to separate unless they are kept chilled. I do plan to try this too (have about 10 pounds frozen).

I have done the cheese. (no approved recipes for this either) For the cheddar, I cut it into chunks, packed the jars and put them in the oven on a cookie sheet. As they melted down, I added more till the headspace was about 1/2 inch and then processed in hotwater bath. (It is acid enough to do that). I don’t believe the Colby cheese will keep as well as the cheddar does. (at least it applies to fresh, so am assuming it would apply to canned)

I have been buying #10 cans of concentrated cheese sauce from WalMart (about $6)and repack it in half pints. I get about 13-14 jars from each can. Put the lids on and hotwater bath process them. Doing this eliminates the waste that we would have before we could use a whole can. A half pint with an equal amount of milk makes a nice cheese sauce for macaroni or over broccoli or cauliflower even asparagus.

These are ones that I cannot sanction (because the official experts don’t recommend it), but I feel confident enough in it that I do it.

ANGIOSTRONGYLUS MENINGITIS - TAIWAN
***********************************
A ProMED-mail post
http://www.promedmail.org
ProMED-mail is a program of the
International Society for Infectious Diseases
http://www.isid.org

Date: Fri 27 Mar 2009
Source: Taipei Times [edited]
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2009/03/27/2003439499

Angiostrongylus in Thai workers after consuming raw snails

Earlier this month (March 2009), 4 out of 5 Thai workers who ate raw
snails became infected with a potentially deadly parasite
[_Angiostrongylus_], the Department of Health (DOH) said on Wednesday
[25 Mar 2009]. Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director Chou
Jih-Haw said that 3 of the workers were in stable condition, while one
had left Taiwan and the other had not shown any symptoms of illness.

Three of the workers were reported to have been infected with the
parasitic nematode Angiostrongylus cantonensis — an elongated
cylindrical worm — early this month and developed symptoms of
eosinophilic meningitis, including headaches, fever and vomiting, Chou
said. The DOH discovered that the trio and some of their friends had
caught apple snails (_Pomacea canaliculata_) in fish ponds in southern
Taiwan and eaten them raw with sauce.

Snails are usually the primary host of the worm, also known as the rat
lungworm — a parasite endemic to Southeast Asia and the Pacific
region. Humans become infected by ingesting the parasite’s larvae,
which are then carried in the blood to the central nervous system.
This can result in eosinophilic meningitis, which is characterized in
the early stages by severe and acute headaches, fever, nausea and
vomiting, and stiffness of the neck, and can result in death or
permanent brain damage.

Chou said that it was once believed that eating giant African snails
could cure certain illnesses and that there were frequent reports in
Taiwan of infections of this type of roundworm.

A 70-year-old man in Kaohsiung was treated for the same conditions in
2007 after eating raw frogs in an effort to cure back pain. Another
case in 2005 saw Hualien’s Tzu-Chi Buddhist General Hospital treat a
48-year-old man who had become infected with the parasite after eating
raw snails. In 1998, 8 Thai workers came down with eosinophilic
meningitis as result of eating raw snails and in 1999, Kaohsiung
Veterans General Hospital reported that 9 Thai laborers had been
infected with rat lungworms.

In light of the recent case, the DOH said it would contact Thai
authorities to step up health education to avoid a recurrence of the
problem.

—
Communicated by:
ProMED-mail Rapporteur Susan Baekeland

[_Angiostrongylus cantonensis_ is transmitted to humans eating raw
fresh water snails and lettuce contaminated with infected slugs. Human
infection with _Angiostrongylus cantonensis_ is common in Thailand and
is seen especially in the northeastern region, where it is associated
with the habit of eating koi-hoi, which contains raw snail meat
(Eamsobhana P et al. Thai Koi-Hoi Snail Dish and Angiostrongyliasis
Due to Angiostrongylus cantonensis: Effects of Food Flavoring and
Alcoholic Drink on the Third-Stage Larvae in Infected Snail Meat.
Foodborne Pathog. Dis. 2009 Mar 9).

Ocular Angiostrongylus has also been described from Thailand (Sinawat
S et al. Ocular angiostrongyliasis: clinical study of 3 cases. Eye
2008;22:1446-8).

See Life Cycle at:
http://www.dpd.cdc.gov/dpdx/HTML/angiostrongyliasis.htm - Mod.EP

Images of _Angiostrongylus_ at:
http://www.petdoctors.co.uk/upload/image/thumb_300_70_angiostrongylus_200x_dup27p.jpg
http://ecurriculum.mv.ac.th/health/m.5/lesson5/liver5/angiostrongylus_adult.gif
Apple snail _Pomacea canaliculata_:
http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/006/Y5098E/y5098e0m.jpg
- Mod.JW]

[see also:
Angiostrongylus meningitis - USA (02): (HI) 20090326.1167
2008

Angiostrongylus meningitis - Viet Nam 20081113.3576
2006

Angiostrongylus meningitis - China (04) 20061001.2811
Angiostrongylus meningitis - China (03) 20060826.2423
Angiostrongylus meningitis - China (02) 20060822.2362
Angiostrongylus meningitis - China: RFI 20060821.2354]
.....................ep/ejp/jw

Wow, I hadn’t realized how long it’s been since I sent a newsletter.

I’ve primarily added to the “Frugal Quilting Fun” section.

Chris Dahl from Quilting Weekly wrote the article “The New Word in Scrap quilting is ‘Selvages’”. Go to http://www.womenfolk.com/frugal_quilting/selvage_quilts.htm to learn about these unique quilts that use your fabric selvages. (I see she is renovating her website so I will put up-to-date links in the article when it’s done.)

It also occurred to me I need to have more about the fun part of “Frugal Quilting Fun”. Who could be better to write about that than Pat Sloan who brings fun to everything she does. So often we make so many quilt commitments that quilting becomes a chore. Pat reminds us that “Quilting is About the Fun!” http://www.womenfolk.com/frugal_quilting/quilting_fun.htm

I got to thinking about how cheerful fabric was during the Great Depression and took a look at how fabrics today bring the same joy to us. Check out http://www.womenfolk.com/frugal_quilting/fabric_fun.htm

In addition I want to announce a writing contest that Kimberly Wulfert is offering. No you don’t have to write a book, just a short story of 750-1000 words. I am so pleased that the money raised will go to the Quilter’s Hall of Fame. Read all about it at http://womenonquilts.blogspot.com/2009/03/call-for-fictional-stories-as.html

I also have posted information about a very special program that is preserving our past by gathering the stories of quilters. Learn more at “Save Our Stories - Interviews With Quilters” at http://www.womenfolk.com/quilt_notes/save_our_stories.htm

I’ll be back with more in a month or so.

Judy Anne

America’s Quilting History
http://womenfolk.com/historyofquilts

Patches From the Past
http://historyofquilts.comYahoo! Groups Links

To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/quilthistory/

ISBUs are supposedly manufactured in two sizes - 20’ x 8’ x 8’ and 40’ x 8’ x 8’ and one container can form the basis for a small, low cost home - perhaps emergency temporary housing following an earthquake or hurricane - or multiple containers can be used as building blocks to create larger and more permanent structures.<<<<

The size of a travel trailer.

If one asked on Free Cycle, for the insides of travel trailers, you would soon have all the sinks, paneling, etc to make your cabin in a container.

I think there all kinds of uses, shops, craft/art studio and of course all the farm uses.

A couple joined, with a solar green house on the south and the units half buried in a hill side, would be about perfect year round temperatures.

The price of housing had to force us into finding cheaper shelter.

Another useful thought, and I did talk to a contractor about this, was to have him build 2 double garage shells, joined and he said he could substitute the doors for the kitchen and bathroom plumbing stubs and you could finish the interior.

Then he could have done it for $10,000., today it would be double, but you would have a 24’ x 40’ building, with electric and ready for your plumbing.

One cabin on a lake that I sold for the owners, 45 years ago, was all knotty pine interior, not small at all, but they did not have it divided into rooms, it was a bathroom and the great room.

When guests came and they needed bedrooms, there were Knotty Pine closets and storage units, about 6’ tall, 4’ wide and 18’ deep, on rollers.

These were pulled from the wall areas, and placed around the beds for walls and pushed back, when the company left.

Even the kitchen cabinets were the same units and I have wanted them in the kitchen every since, hate those tiny kitchen cabinets.

Survival Gardening: Growing Food During A Second Great Depression, by H.I.C.

By God’s grace I was born and raised on a small family farm. During the 1960s and 1970s we were trying to pay off a 340 acre corn and soybean farm in northwestern Iowa and we were flat stinking broke. So we raised nearly all of the food to support our family. This required a large garden (80ft x 120 ft), an even larger truck patch (48 ft x 1,200 ft), a small fruit orchard (12 trees), livestock (caves, sheep, hogs, and 300 laying hens).

With some of the best and most productive farm land in the entire world, with better than 30 inches of precipitation, 165 frost free days, real farm tractors, planters, and cultivation equipment it took us 20 ac to feed six people. That breaks down to a 1/2 acre garden, 1 acre truck [farming] patch, 8 acre pasture, and 10 acres for hay ground and animal feed.

My point for you non-farmers out there, is that you are not going to feed yourself with a Mantis tiller and 1,000 square feet of sandy dirt that requires you to pump endless ground water irrigation just to keep your crops alive. If you committed enough to surviving that you purchase over 20 firearms and 20,000 rounds of ammo (a good start) I am suggesting that you need to consider a similar commitment to growing food.

I do not discount the importance of purchasing and storing up bulk staples, dried grain, canned goods, and freeze dried entrees, I have them as well. But I am telling you straight out that if the economy tanks anything like the 1930s, and I think it will last longer, you are going to run out of grub mighty early.

Now everyone has different skills, resources, and family commitments, but let’s consider some of the basic requirements for growing food:

Yearly precipitation
Up to a point, more is better. You typically need 12 inches to grow grass, 20 inches to grow trees, and 30 inches to grow corn. If you want to raise a really big garden without irrigation you need about 8 inches per month through out the primary growing season (May-June-July-Aug). Except for a few areas defined as microclimates I recommend that you consider living east of the dry line (100th meridian, i.e. Wichita, Kansas). Rainfall beyond 12 inches per month or 48 inches total will only make it harder to control the weeds and bugs. A maximum of 48 inches leaves out Louisiana, Florida, and the Coastal areas of the deep south A good source of local area climate data is City-Data.com.

Frost free growing season.
See these maps at the NOAA web site. Anything less than 120 days severely limits what you can grow. Remember that the folks scratching a living from the Dakotas, Eastern Montana, and most of the Rocky Mountain States are not multi crop farmers, they are either ranchers or specialist who grow crops like hard winter wheat. Any climate with between 165 to 240 days is about perfect. This translates into south of the Dakotas and North of Dallas, Texas. This is enough of a growing season for row crops and all vegetables and allow a little wiggle room for getting every thing planted on time. In the south you will be able to plant every thing directly in the garden, on the northern edge you will be starting many of your plants in a greenhouse. That said, starting plants in a green house gives them an important jump start on weeds and bugs. You should plan on one.

Microclimates
While I suggest that you should consider living in the mid-southern region of the short grass prairie, there are a number of smaller areas that provide the basic conditions for productive farming. I suggest some fine areas such and La Grande Oregon, Rathdrum, Idaho, Montrose, Colorado, where the local rainfall and warmer winters make favorable microclimates. The easiest method of evaluating an area in the arid west is to look for big commercial fruit orchards. If it grows both apples and peaches the temperature extremes will be acceptable and if you can grow fruit without pumping ground water they must get enough rain. The reason that I concentrate so heavily on living in an area with rainfall is that I anticipate that no matter what the trigger event (WMD terror strike, economic crisis, destructive natural event) we will not have enough electrical power or fuels to pump large volumes of ground water for a really long time.

Soil productivity
Black, gray, brown, and even red soil is fine as long it is loam. This means that it has organic particles (composted twigs, leaves, wood, bark, and stems) to help hold the moisture and feed the worms, bugs, and microbes that make soil really productive. Sand and gravel are fine structure but if you don’t have the worms, bugs, and microbes to aerate the soil and fix atmospheric nitrogen for the plants roots you will have to do this mechanically and ultimately you will have to add nitrogen fertilizer. [JWR Adds: It is wise to have the soil tested before making an offer on a retreat property. Soil testing is usually available at colleges and universities that have agriculture programs. You can also contact your local NRCS office or USDA Extension Office, and they can. provide information on soil testing labs in your region.

Equipment
My whole family might be able to plant and cultivate 1/2 acre without equipment. But I don’t plan to find out. For my own use I bought a 25 hp diesel tractor and basic tillage, planting, and cultivating attachments. I also bought an old Ford 8N plus 4 attachments for under $2,000. A small tractor should only burn 20 gallons per year tending a small garden and truck patch. Gas and diesel may still be available during a deep depression, it may even be cheaper, but I have 500 gal of stabilized diesel in a farm tank.

Seeds, Fertilizer, Weed & Pest Control, and Livestock
Most folks have heard about Heirloom seeds. Plant varieties that will reseed themselves true year after year. But just as important, livestock will allow you continued farming success without access to petroleum based fertilizer, weed, and pest control. I use a wheel hoe in the garden and a tractor mounted cultivator in the truck patch to kill weeds, but I would rather use sheep, goats, and poultry to eat the seedling trees and weeds when I can. Livestock manure is the ultimate fertilizer and Poultry, particularly ducks, geese, and guinea hens will help control the bugs and deliver the fertilizer at the same time. Personally, I can not imagine trying to control weeds and bugs without my livestock.

Fences, Shelters, Ponds, and Trees
These are some common land improvements that are best built and planted before the crunch. [With most common soils] an agricultural pond will not efficiently seal and hold water for 2-3 years, fruit trees take 3-5 years to bear fruit heavily, and my Pecan grove will likely take 10 years if the deer and bugs will just leave it alone for a while. Building these improvements is really not difficult unless you try to do it yourself without power tools. I suggest that you build them now so you can borrow or rent tractors with PTO augers, bulldozers, backhoes, cement mixers as needed.

Academic Classes and the Extension Service
Many community colleges and land grant university extension services offer free information and classes to teach you to raise gardens, fruit, and livestock, and how to store your produce using a home canner. I took a great class titled “backyard food raising”. The skills needed to raise and store food are a lot like the skill to shoot a gun or reload ammunition. You can’t just read about it, you learn by doing.

Practice
Growing a garden is not like riding a bike. It is different for each area and the weeds and bugs are scheming right now to eat you out of house and home. I suggest that you start now and learn each new plant, animal, and pest while you can still buy food at the grocery store. While you can grow a lot the first year, my experience is that it will take 3 years practice before you are confident and fully successful
.
Some Useful References:
Homesteading, Gene Logsdon, 1973 Rodale Press
Basic Country Skills, Storey, 1999, Storey Publishing
Emergency Preparedness and Survival-Section 3, Jackie Clay, 2003, Backwoods Home Magazine
Organic Orcharding, Gene Logsdon, 1981, Rodale Press
Introduction to Horticulture, Shry, Reiley, 2007, Thompson Delmar Learning
Backyard Fruits and Berries, Miranda Smith, 1994 Quarto Publishing
Animal Science, Ensminger, 1991, Interstate Publishers Inc.

http://www.survivalblog.com/food_storage_cooking/

Update to Survival Gardening: Growing Food During a Second Great Depression, by H.I.C.

While re-reading my recent post concerning survival gardening, I realized that I have completely forgotten to point out some important info.
While living through a crisis you are going to need to eat more calories than normal [to provide adequate nutrition with the extra exertion, stress, and physical labor], perhaps twice as much. I am planning on 4,000 calories per day.

Fresh fruit and vegetables are important as a source of vitamins, however most green veggies do not contain enough calories to keep you going. During a crisis you are going to need several sources of protein, oils, and starch.

I believe the best way of storing red meat is to raise livestock. Naturally you want them to reproduce and raise enough young for you to enjoy fresh meat for the duration of the crisis. Rabbits, Chickens, and Goats are particularly easy to raise. Having fish in your agricultural pond is perfect.

Two acres planted to Wheat, Corn, Dry Beans, Potatoes, and Winter Squash will produce more food than a typical family can eat in a year. We used to plan our sweet corn, pinto beans, and potatoes in field rows and use the tractor to cultivate them.

An acre of winter wheat planted in good soil should yield 50 bushels (2,000 lbs) of easily storable grain. A second acre of open pollinated field corn should yield 80 bushels (4,000 lbs), but requires more fertilizer and more effort devoted to weed suppression. A full acre of pinto beans would be way too much, 35 bushels (1,400 lbs).

A native pecan averages 50 - 80 lbs of nuts which store for a year or more. Each acre of pecan trees would contain 15 large trees or 30 smaller trees and provides a rich source of calories, oils, and protein. Since you are hoping to avoid too much attention you might plant your fruit trees and a variety of hardwood nut trees scattered across your pasture or mixed in with your wood lot. Less attention and [given their wide spacing,] fewer insect pests. [JWR Adds: Some of us that live in high elevation or northern climates where most pecan trees are unlikely to survive (even the Hardy Pecan). But there are other nut trees such as as Carpathian Walnuts that do well in all but the most severe climate zones.]

I hope this helps explain my emphasis on trees, small livestock, row crops, and field crops. - H.I.C.

http://www.survivalblog.com/food_storage_cooking/

Bloom Where You’re Planted, by Gertrude

I write this to encourage everyone to begin preparing right now, whatever your financial situation and physical location in life. We are one of the many families that don’t live in a sparsely populated western state and don’t have a retreat that is fully stocked, off-grid and off-the beaten path. But we are very aware of the precarious situation that our country is in and we are trying as best we can to be prepared. Doing a little bit consistently every day will add up very quickly and you will be better prepared every day as you go along. Doing this will also do wonders for your mental outlook.

To give a little background: our household consists of my mother and myself, along with four cats, three dogs and a flock of chickens. My mother is 79 years old and I’m a retired 57-year old woman. My sister and brother-in-law live about a half-mile away and our niece and her husband live next door. Both of my parents grew up on farms and we always had a big garden and plenty of fruit trees when I was a child. We live in a semi-rural area about three miles from a small town. There are no interstate highways nearby.

The people here in our community are pretty self-reliant. People still hunt, fish, and grow and preserve their own vegetables and fruits (although not as much as in the past). We have about five acres of land with a small fruit orchard and garden area. We don’t have any mortgages or car payments to worry about, but we also don’t have the financial resources to retreat to another location. Are we fully prepared? Of course not. I don’t think anyone is ever fully prepared, but we are much better prepared than we were last year and we were better prepared last year than we were the year before that. This is because of consistently doing something every day to prepare.

As I sit here typing this, our supper is cooking on the wood stove while my mother is in the living room quilting and our alarm systems—our three dogs—are outside keeping an eye on things. The coffee pot is ready to go on the stove for supper later. The chickens are happily occupied in their area. Our pantry is stocked with wheat, rice, beans, store-canned goods as well as home-canned vegetables, fruits, and meats and various other food and non-food items. We have another separate storage area for paper products, medical supplies, batteries, cleaning supplies, etc.

We didn’t have the wood stove, chickens or bigger-than-average pantry storage a few years ago. Back then I would have said we were above-average in “preparation mentality” but my eyes were opened when I began doing research on the subject of preparedness. It began when I wanted to be prepared to survive a possible flu pandemic. I quickly learned of other things, such as the possibility of EMP strikes, electric grid going down in general, Peak Oil problems, you name it. My first reaction was one of panic, but that subsided as my mother and I began “putting feet on our prayers.” We started small, buying more food each week when grocery shopping. Then we decided to go “whole hog.”

The first thing we did was buy a wood stove. We now have three heating systems: [a heating] oil furnace, gas logs operated on propane and the wood stove. We use the wood stove most of the time in the winter now. Although it’s not a [broad-top] cook stove, we do very well cooking meals on it. We perk the coffee for supper most nights even if we don’t cook the main meal on it. We have lots of wood on our land, but aren’t physically able to cut the wood ourselves so we buy it locally, and my brother-in-law has supplied us with wood (my sister and he have a wood stove too). We have three able-bodied men in the family (brother-in-law, nephew-in-law and nephew) who can and will cut wood if need be.

The next thing we did was install a manual well pump. We’re on well water but we needed a way to get the water if the grid goes down. I began researching manual well pumps and my brother-in-law installed one for us. Last summer, we worked on what has probably been the biggest project of them all: building a chicken house and fenced-in chicken yard. Our chickens are what I suppose you’d call semi-free range. They have a 24x24 foot yard to roam in. My mother was the chief architect. She designed the chicken house herself. We first had to clear the land, then we prepared the foundation for the house. After that came the actual building of the chicken house.

Although we have a pick-up truck, my nephew was using it at the time, so I would go to the local Big Box building center and buy as much wood as I could fit into the car and bring it back. We’re proof that you can pretty much do what you set your mind to do if you’re determined enough. We worked steadily every day except Sundays at building the chicken house and got it done. Then we had to clear the land for the chicken yard, and after doing that we began digging the holes for the fence posts. The only thing we had any outside help with was installing the poultry wire for the fence. We needed my niece and her husband to help us get that pulled tight enough. We finished the entire operation by putting netting over the entire chicken yard to keep out hawks. We now have a great flock of chickens. As I write this, we have about eight dozen eggs in the refrigerator. We share [the eggs] with my sister and husband, my niece and her husband and my nephew and his wife. The dogs also get a scrambled egg dinner about once a week. We haven’t bartered any eggs yet, but we know that’s a possibility down the road if economic conditions warrant it.

Somewhere in the midst of all this preparation, we bought a Country Living grain mill (the manual kind). Mother has done most of the grinding so far. She’s baked whole-wheat rolls and loaves of bread with the wheat we bought and ground ourselves – yummy!

Our garden suffered last summer, because we were so busy getting the chicken flock project set up. Our goal for this summer is to have as big a garden as we can manage. We do have a stock of garden seed laid back. We’ve already stocked up on lots of canning jar lids. We already had a good supply of canning jars and rings but I plan on stocking up on those, as well.

One of the big things we need to do next is prepare in the area of self-defense. We have a rifle and recently bought a S&W 9mm handgun. We also have my late father’s 38 Special revolver. We have magazines and ammo and plan on stocking more ammo. My brother-in-law (a former Marine) is going to train me on the handguns and rifle. If there is one thing I regret in life it is that I didn’t take advantage of the fact that my late father, who was a police officer, wanted to train me in the use of firearms, but I was a wimp. I’ve always believed in the right to bear arms, but was actually a little afraid of using guns, mainly because I’m so nearsighted. But I’ve gotten over that now. After one very short session with my brother-in-law going over firearm basics with me, I’m excited about getting proficient in their use because I can actually understand how the darn things work now!

I believe we’re doing pretty good at blooming where we’re planted. We can garden, sew, quilt, cook (don’t laugh – a lot of people don’t know how to do that!), crochet, can and preserve food, and we’ve don pretty well at carpentry. In addition to my retirement pension, I also have a second stream of income doing manuscript typing at home.

To summarize, I encourage anyone who feels paralyzed by current events to get up and get going. Start small: buy a few extra groceries each time you shop; stock up on non-perishables; prepare a first aid kit; and take a first aid course. Pay attention to what’s going on around you. And, most importantly of all, never stop learning. Before you know it, you’ll be a lot more prepared than you ever knew you could be. - Gertrude

http://www.survivalblog.com/food_storage_cooking/

Emotional Stressors During Societal Collapse by Campcritter

As determined men and women of yesteryear made their way west to make for a better life, pioneer women often kept journals of their life on the great prairies or sent letters home to their sisters back East. In those letters they described the silence as the most unwelcome guest. These brave women wrote about being left for weeks on end alone, lost in an endless sea of grass with only the wind for company while the men hunted or went for supplies. In some cases the quiet was so severe that it became unbearable and the women developed mental problems. One young mother in 1853 wrote, “Silence is an evil creature, it stalks you by day, watching, waiting, ever vigilant. By the dark of the moon it strangles your thoughts and slips away with your sanity.”

Imagine now, that we are about six weeks into a societal collapse. You are sure you have prepared yourself fairly well. You’ve made all the plans and stocked all that needs to be stocked and you feel pretty confident that you and yours can weather whatever comes, right? After all, you have given lots of time and energy to making sure that you have everything that you need. You have provided for your physical well being, but have you taken the time to consider what happens to the family’s emotional stability when life as we know it suddenly takes a turn south?

In all the preparedness information out there, there seems to be an expectation that ones emotional response to real world stressors are somehow less important than the physical. Or maybe people are not wanting to deal with that which is yet unknown and frankly, just too scary for most of us to comprehend. What happens to the emotional intellect when forced to shoot another human being for the first time or watch helplessly while a loved one dies of an illness or a massive wound. How about dealing with feral pigs, dogs and any other typically domesticated animals? Can you let your children out of your sight to play in the yard or do you live with constant fear they may become a meal for a once beloved family pet or the zoo animal that hasn’t eaten in a week? These are real life situations that need to be discussed along with beans, bullets and band aids. Even Tom Brown, “The Tracker“, writes of feral dogs of his youth while living in New Jersey.

Now that the stores are not being stocked you have used up all that was in the cupboard and freezer and have broken into your stored rice and beans. Everyone in your household has been about four weeks without McDonald’s, potato chips, Spaghetti-Os, wine, beer and cigarettes. The family complains of being gassy and bloated and by now the cravings are so bad that even the neighbors lawn ornament is beginning to look good. Tempers are just one spark away from ignition within the family unit. Depression sets in as Sissy hysterically cries, “I’m never ever going to use a flush toilet ever again!” It becomes apparent that holding this unit together is going to be a real challenge. Isn’t it is amazing how a change in diet can trash the family dynamics?

My field of study for the past 25 years has been in Holistic Nutritional Sciences. This field is centered around the whole body and everything that goes into it, air, water, plants, the soil plants are grown in and the health of animals that are used for food. Current research indicates there are definite changes in body chemistry when one gets off the processed and junk food hamster wheel. As chemicals, heavy metals and other toxic particles leave the body there is what has been described as a healing crisis and it can be all too real for the ones that suffer through it. Think for a moment, you have suddenly been forced to do without coffee or cigarettes, a real nightmare for some. What will you feel like in a few days? Your children have been forced to do without their favorite French fries or soft drinks. What will be their mood in a week or so? If you have ever been witness to a loved ones kicking of the habit you will appreciate that it is not always a pleasant happening. These are a few of the more obvious, lets take a look at some lesser known problems with our modern situation.

Currently there are about 3,000 substances added to food that are on the FDA’s generally regarded as safe (GRAS) list but the GRAS can not guarantee that an additive is 100% safe for every human because not every human has the same biochemistry. Food colors seem to be most problematic for young children in that they can be toxic to the nervous system, kidneys or liver. And don’t get me started on genetically modified foodstuffs, it makes me screaming mad. I can’t say anything good about altering the perfection of the natural world. The fact that this brand new life form was not studied long term and released into the unsuspecting publics food supply makes me nuts. Were humans really meant to eat a corn plant with say, a petunia’s DNA? Of course, that’s a much simplified version but I believe there are some things that we just weren’t meant to ingest. Genetically modified ingredients in infant formula being number one on my list to scream about. My list to scream about on the subject of GMOs just scratches the surface here ,but that rant is for another day. ( hint: get as many open pollinated seeds as you can ASAP. That means yesterday. If you don’t have a garden get open pollinated vegetable seeds anyway, they will make great barter in the near future. Most seeds are viable between 2 and 5 years.)

An application of malefic hydrazide is routinely sprayed on potatoes and onions to keep them from sprouting but did you know that this potentially toxic chemical is sprayed on tobacco products in the U.S., and some chemicals such as propylene glycol, glycerin, or sorbitol are not always listed on a label. Aspartame as in Nutrasweet and Equal has been shown to be a precursor to Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. What happens to the body when it doesn’t get it’s daily dose of acrylamide (a carcinogenic chemical created when potatoes and corn chips are baked or fried at high temperatures) or when the body is deprived of high fructose corn syrup from soft drinks? For some people they can have the same painful withdrawal symptoms as from coffee, cigarettes or drugs. I have seen people become depressed, angry, foggy in the head, sluggish and almost manic when taken off processed foods. Raw foods do an excellent job of cleaning out lots of toxins that accumulate in our fat. (See Power Foods by Stephanie Beling, M.D. and Rawsome by Brigitte Mars)

More and more young people are becoming diabetic, something very rare at the turn of the century. My neighbors eight year old child has to be monitored for high cholesterol, it’s just shocking! Students are under much more stress these days than ever before which can result in emotional eating and behavioral problems. More cravings with less food available could be overwhelming to children who aren‘t understanding why they can‘t have a second helping. Even my own grandchildren are such fussy eaters, what happens when they no longer have access to their junk foods and are forced to eat “real food”? And by the way, their idea of what real food ( pull it out of the freezer and pop it into the microwave) is and my knowledge of whole real food doesn’t line up. Where as there lies the problem. When at Grams house you need to adapt or go without. (wink, wink, I have been know to bend just a little, sometimes.) Also, eating a constant diet of freeze dried storable foods and garden produce can have an undesirable set of problems all it’s own. Much more water needs to be taken in or the system seems to get painfully backed up.

What about those pioneer women? They didn’t have GMOs or cell phones. They certainly didn’t need a good detox diet but many did keep journals to help insure some sanity. Writing stuff down is almost like talking to a friend. If our world does the “Patriots” thing, we all will be pioneers in our own right. Picture a world of teens without their cell phones, blackberries, computers, music or anything else that makes them tick. The withdrawal symptoms from the “NEED” to communicate alone surely should scare even the hardiest amongst us. Taking care of the emotional person is very personal and challenging. Learn what you can about the food you have been eating and the world around your retreat and take charge now. The mental health you save may be your own!

A note to Grandparents: You are hereby requested to help keep our history alive. Talk to your Grandchildren about your history, our country’s history and how we got to this point in the world. Write it down if needed. Teach them all the skills that they will need in their future. Plant the seed early, grandchildren seen to respond to grandparents easily. Their world will be inherently different than the one we lived in. Teaching them how to garden, fix a roof, sew a shirt, harvest and save seeds, cook a stew, etc., everything that you know. What you don’t already know how it do, learn it together. They are going to need all the advantages that we can give them.

http://www.survivalblog.com/food_storage_cooking/

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