Sunday, September 23, 2018

Prepper Training Drills

During an emergency, it is easy to become indecisive. Unsure about what to do, people often freeze and do nothing.  Such delays can be life threatening in some cases.  But having rehearsed your plans makes executing them second nature.

http://www.primitiveskills.com/
It is good to have plans, but we must be able to execute them, and that requires practice. So what are some good training drills to practice?  Anything that you have formal written plans for should be practiced.  In addition to that, here are some suggested Training Drills:
  1.  Bug Out Time - there are Red Flag Warnings that it is bug out time, but will we recognize them and respond in a timely & sensible way?  
  2. SHTF Day One exercise - what do you do the first day you realize things are falling apart?
  3. Home Invasion - Often there is no warning, requiring that you respond quickly and respond. Group Security Drills Country Home Security Plan 
  4. Pandemic Quarantine procedures - don't just let people come and join your group. 
  5. Shooting Skills - Target Practice, especially for beginners.  A .22 Long Rifle or BB gun are the best for beginners and still fun for old timers. 
  6. Group Movement Exercises for your Security Team.  How do you safely move from point A to point B when the SHTF?
  7. Power Outage - practice being out of power for 1 day, 2 days, .... days.  Its ok to leave your refrigerator and freezer running, but turn the breaker off for everything else and practice surviving without electricity.
  8.  Fishing Skills are essential to Wilderness Survival and should be practices frequently.
    Survival Fishing
    3 Odd Techniques for Primitive Fishing
    How to catch your own live bait
    Noodling
  9. Camping - outdoor skills are essential.  Camp out with the family and practice living off the land with only what you can carry in your Survival Back Pack.
  10. First Aid practice is good.  Take Red Cross CPR classes or other such training. 
Beyond this, document and practice your own Prepper plans.

For additional information see the following links:
Blog Table of Contents

Top 10 Lists 

Sunday, September 16, 2018

Sewer disposal when the SHTF

Here is a TEST for you.  After this test, the importance of this topic will be obvious. 


Go 7 days without toilet paper or flushing your toilet.  How long before it is intolerable?

Or try to bring in water from a creek or swimming pool in a 5 gal pail for every toilet flush you do.

Now suppose that every time you go out for a pail of water, that your life is in danger from Looters.

Consider the rule:  when it is brown, flush it down; if it is yellow, let it mellow.

For many, it may be difficult to imagine how dark and violent the world can become.  City Survival could become dangerous, especially without a Neighborhood Watch Program.

But our focus here is on waste disposal, which is an often overlooked consideration.  Imagine what the neighborhood will be like when everyone starts dumping their poop in different places.  Is there a vacant lot, or empty space away from everyone and water sources for dumping waste? Perhaps a business dumpster, or even an abandoned business.

Burning some waste and burying the rest (got shovels?) in 8" deep catholes could be a solution, although the smoke from burning could draw undesirable attention to you, putting your life in danger especially if you don't have Security &/or Intruder Detection.  Even if you detect intruders, do your people have  Shooting Training, or even Gun Safety Training?


The US Department of Conservation offers the following:

Shallow holes for human waste

Dig a shallow hole for human waste; but not just any hole, anywhere. Choose an appropriate place to dig the hole.
How to do it:
  • Keep human waste well away from waterways. Dig shallow holes at least 50 m from water, tracks and campsites.
  • Select a site where other people are not likely to walk or camp, such as next to thick undergrowth or near fallen timber. If possible also dig your hole where it will receive plenty of sunlight. Heat from the sun helps decomposition.
  • Use a trowel to dig a hole 150 - 200 mm deep (about the length of the trowel blade) and 100 -150 mm wide. Deposit your solid human waste. Then back fill the hole with dirt and disguise it with leaf litter or other natural materials.
  • If camping in an area for more than one night, or if camping with a large group, agree on a single toilet place and dig a hole deep enough for the group for the length of your stay.

Toilet paper

  • If you have to use paper, use only plain, unbleached, non-perfumed types.
  • Use toilet paper sparingly.
  • Do not burn toilet paper, as this can result in wildfires. Bury paper in your shallow hole or carry it out with you in a plastic bag. 
  • Try using natural materials such as bark or leaf vegetation (non-prickly!) or snow instead. Natural ‘toilet paper’ is as sanitary as processed toilet paper and blends back easily into the environment.
While a topic of debate, using human waste, a.k.a. bio solids or night soil for fertilizer, has been done for centuries.  In the absence of commercial fertilizer (and pesticides), it may be necessary to use anything possible.  Human urine is sterile and contains Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium which are essential plant nutrients.

Your Neighborhood Watch Program could help organize a safe, sanitary latrine location a minimum of 200 feet away from water, trails, and campsites, in organic soil.  Your latrine should be about 12" deep and one foot long for each person that will be using it each day.  Then as the first one foot is used, the waste is covered and then the next foot is used.

By the middle of the 1800's cities, life in big cities was hazardous to your health.  The air was polluted, the streams were open sewers and the streets were covered in horse manure.  This led to disease and the death of many people.  We must manage waste to prevent this from reoccurring and a small amount of planning can help achieve this.

For additional information, see the following links:
Blog Table of Contents

Top 10 List of Prepper info
Top Rated Prepper Handbook Posts of all time
Top Rated Prepper Website

Thursday, September 13, 2018

Hurricane Bug Out Bag

If you only have 5 minutes, be sure to grab these 6 things: 
  1. Warm rain coat and layered clothing
  2. Heavy duty resealable water jug (full); preferably metal that can be used for boiling water in.
  3. Pocket Knife 
  4.  Bic Lighter - light candles or fire.
  5. Concentrated, dried packaged foods, peanut butter
  6. Bottle of bleach to purify water - 2 drops of bleach per liter of water.  Let it sit 30 minutes.
If you have time to pack a Bug Out Bag, here are some suggestions.
  1. Small tent
  2. Survival blanket
  3. Stainless steel bottle of water (2 liters)
  4. Granola bars or MRE's
  5. Fire tinder - cotton balls in petroleum jelly
  6. Fire starter - 2 methods
  7. Large fixed blade knife
  8. Duct tape
  9. High top water proof boots & extra socks.
Beyond this, look at the list of things that expert survivors take to live in the wild for long periods. 

For more information visit our related links below:

Saturday, September 8, 2018

MeMaw's Goulash

This is an economical dish that is easy to make in about 45 minutes; another good addition to our Pioneer Recipe series.

Ingredients:
1 - pound Hamburger
2 - 14.5 oz cans of Stewed tomatoes (or frozen)
1 - cup white rice
2 - cups elbow macaroni
12 - cups of water
Salt & Pepper

Steps:
  1.  Brown Hamburger and drain thoroughly
  2. Add Tomatoes and 12 cups of water, then bring to a rapid boil
  3. Add rice and macaroni & stir
  4. Cover and simmer on low fire for 20 minutes without opening the lid and do NOT stir
  5. Open, stir, salt & pepper to taste then cook uncovered for 5 - 10 more minutes
  6. Turn fire off, cover and let sit for 10 minutes


 This dish really goes good with MeMaw's famous corn bread or corn fritters.


Also see:
Complete Sustainable Living Plan
Acorn Flour Pancakes
Pemmican Recipe
Hardtack Recipe

Goulash
Texas Brisket
Corn Bread
Sour Dough Bread
Corn Fritters
Apple Cider Vinegar
More on making Vinegar
Backing Soda vs Yeast
Baking Soda uses

Best Foods to Store

For additional information see the following links:

Blog Table of Contents
Building your food stores the right way
Emergency Water Supply
Complete Sustainable Living Plan

See similar topics by clicking on the labels below

Immigration - MUST Watch


You MUST watch this Immigration Video.  If you have seen it before, watch it again, and share it with your friends.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPjzfGChGlE

Immigration History


Here is a summery of US immigration history and evidence that it is repeating it's self, along with an obvious solution.

Immigration High Level Perspective (why immigration hurts countries that we take immigrants from)
Illegal Immigration Cost 


For additional information see the following links: 
Blog Table of Contents;
Or click on a label below for similar topics.
 

Making Penicillin

Possibly save the life of your loved ones with home-made Antibiotics.
  1. Put some bread in a plastic bag or container
  2. Once it begins to form spores, break it up into small pieces
  3. Mist it lightly with water and reseal it.
  4. Remove it once the mold culture turns obviously green
As the mold begins to grow and develop it will take on white, blue and green stages. The green mold you see in the picture above illustrates this point. The green color is going to contain doses of penicillin. As you can see the green areas are where the mold has grown the largest, essentially where it has matured. Now that you have this green mold, you can actually begin to use it as treatment. There are a few ways to go about this.
Option A: Take the bread clumps, fill up a large cup full of them and add warm water (not boiling water). Mix together and consume. Repeat as necessary, essentially as daily doses of penicillin. It is important to note that while you are growing the mold, you are most likely growing other things. Not all of them helpful. And when you consume the bread will be getting both penicillin and that bad stuff. Yes, it will also taste terrible. Does the bad outweigh the good? In the scenario above, diarrhea or upset stomach are much less serious problems compared to a major infection. So it can be worth it. This remedy has been used for thousands of years in ancient cultures and has also been seen in many folk remedies around the United States for centuries.
Option B: Take your time and carefully separate nothing but the green mold from the bread. Clean the wound, take your ‘scrapings’  from the bread and topically apply them over the whole would. Dress lightly and repeat this process regularly.
An interesting fact I once learned studying Egyptology. Dating back to Imhotep, ancient doctors used to dress wounds with honey. Why is this? It is actually extremely hard for bacteria to grow on honey. If a wound is fresh and clean and infection free, you can apply honey to the area to preserve it from harmful bacteria. Believe it or not, medical grade honey bandages are still used in modern emergency rooms to this day. For home use simply cover the entire area in honey, and wrap the wound to both keep the honey in place and everything else away.
There are of course more advanced ways to make penicillin from bread and oranges that go beyond what I mentioned above. Perhaps if you have more time, more resources available at hand, you can indeed make potentially pharmaceutical grade penicillin using the same basic process I mentioned above. With the relatively low cost and the wide availability of penicillin in the healthcare marketplace today, this may not be practical. But find yourself in the middle of the zombie apocalypse, this information might just save your life. If you wish to know more advanced means of processing penicillin I recommend reading up on it further.

FULL DISCLOSURE:  I AM NOT A DOCTOR NOR PHARMACIST. 

To read the original article, click HERE

For additional information see the following links:
Blog Table of Contents

Top 10 List of Prepper info
Top Rated Prepper Handbook Posts of all time
Top Rated Prepper Website

 





Wednesday, August 29, 2018

.338 Lapua on the Cheap

Customers often ask us (CTD) what the best long-range rifles are. This is a loaded question since most calibers have a niche they fill or job they do particularly well. In the world of long-range precision, the .338 Lapua has overtaken most of the other calibers in popularity. Despite the lower kinetic energy when compared to the .50 BMG, the .338 currently holds three places in the top 10 longest confirmed sniper kills. It fills the role of an anti-personnel and anti-material round nicely. Civilians and military alike have embraced this cartridge as a young legend, and it is only growing in popularity. However, the .338 Lapua has one distinct disadvantage—it is outlandishly expensive.
For the average shooter who takes their .270 or .308 to the range on weekends, the .338 Lapua is like a Ferrari Enzo. Without devoting a lot of time and resources, the cost of owning and maintaining a rifle in that caliber is too great for the payoff. However, being the stubborn sort, I figured there had to be a way to shoot the .338 while not having it rip a Grand Canyon-sized dent in your wallet.

The Gun





Savage 110 in .338 Lapua
Savage 110 in .338 Lapua

We will start with the easy part. If you can find one in stock, Savage makes excellent quality bolt action .338 rifles for 1200 to 1500 bucks. I know that may seem like a fortune to pay for a bolt gun, but when you compare that price tag to some of the other custom .338 rifles on the market, you know you are getting a smoking deal. For example, Steyr’s SSG-08 rings in at around seven grand. With the Savage 110 or 111 Hunter, you get a detachable box magazine, muzzlebrake, AccuTrigger, Picatinny rail, and one darn accurate rifle.




.338 Lapua Hornady Custom Match BTHP
.338 Lapua Hornady Custom Match BTHP

The Glass

Everyone says not to skimp on the glass. I agree. Like many things, when it comes to scopes you get what you pay for. One consideration to maintain is the .338 Lapua has a fair amount of recoil, much more than your .308. However, with that muzzle brake, the recoil won’t be out of control, but stay away from the bargain basement scopes since they tend to not hold up. An SWFA SS 10×42 scope for around $300 will hold up to the recoil and give you an outstanding mil-dot reticle. For a little over $400, you could grab a Vortex Viper. It gives you a BDC reticle and a stellar reputation for an outstanding scope. Don’t forget to pick up some quality scope rings either. I like the quick detachable models in steel or aluminum. The steel rings tend to be stronger, and since this is already a heavy rifle, you won’t notice the extra weight steel rings bring to the party.

The Ammo

This is by far going to be the most expensive part of running this rifle. If you are not reloading your ammunition, you’re wrong. Start reloading and learn what your rifle likes to eat. If you purchase regular factory ammunition, a box of 20 rounds can cost well over $100. But if you can reload that brass, you’re going to save a lot of money.
Even though getting into the .338 Lapua game can get expensive, it isn’t out of reach if you are determined to get it done. There are plenty of lower cost options to give you a leg up. Who knows, you may start to outshoot the less expensive components of your setup and start investing in some seriously heavy-duty gear.

Are you a .338 fan? What’s your longest range shot? Share your answers in the comment section.

Check Out These Related Articles

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The mission of Cheaper Than Dirt!'s blog, "The Shooter's Log," is to provide information-not opinions-to our customers and the shooting community. We want you, our readers, to be able to make informed decisions. The information provided here does not represent the views of Cheaper Than Dirt!

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Tuesday, August 14, 2018

National Prepardness Month

QUESTION:  Why does our Government have a National Preparedness Month?
   ANSWER:  It makes good sense to be prepared. 

 

Preparing is simple.  There are a few basic things you need: 
  1.  Water - 3 gallons for each person in the household.
  2.  Food - have a weeks supply of the can goods and foods that you normally eat.
  3. Gun - it is important that you can protect your food, water and more importantly your family. 
Here is a Beginners list of things to have.  A garden and some livestock is also good to have.


For additional information see the following links:



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Tuesday, August 7, 2018

Fall Garden

Fall garden planting starts in August, and can yield some good healthy food for gardeners. If you have never gardened, now is a good time to start your first Practice GardenThe ability to Growing your own food from seed is a skill that can prove priceless.  


A few dollars worth of Survival Seeds could prove to be the best investment you have ever made.  Most households have a few yard tools, but if not, there are a few Budget Garden Preparations to consider buying.

Its not hard, just get started viewing some of our links here.  Start by reading our Practice Garden post; finish up by reading Budget Garden Preparations.

For additional information see the following links:

 
Also check out our Prepper Livestock series 


Or click on a label below for similar topics.