Keeper Crops - How to store the summer harvest for the winter kitchen

A harvest of several types of onions. In general, red onions and yellow onions are good keepers; white onions are not as good.

During the winter months, when the ground is covered by a thick blanket of snow, there’s something particularly satisfying about still being able to eat food from your garden. There are many summer-grown crops including potatoes, onions, garlic, beets, carrots and winter squash, can be stored with relative ease to nourish you right through until the next growing season. Even a modest-size garden can yield a substantial crop of winter keepers.

To be successful storing these keeper crops at home, here are a couple factors to keep in mind:

• Some varieties store better than others, so be sure to seek out the ones that are known to be good keepers.
• Crops that are harvested at their prime – not before or after – store best. Time your plantings so they mature at the close of the season.
• Only first quality, unblemished produce is suitable for storage.
• Optimum temperature and humidity for storage varies by crop, so be sure that the crops you plan to store match the storage conditions you can provide.

Potatoes

Potato and Onion Storage Baskets
Potatoes in the Root Storage Bin

There are so many wonderful kinds and colors of potatoes to choose from: fingerlings, bakers, boilers, white, yellow, pink, red, and even blue. All are delicious eaten fresh from the garden, but if you want to store some potatoes for eating in the late fall and winter months, you’ll need to plant varieties that are well-suited to storage as well as to your growing area. Readily available potato varieties known to be excellent keepers include Katahdin, Kennebec, Yellow Finn and Yukon Gold.
Potatoes can be grown in a standard garden row, in a raised bed or in a container such as a Potato Grow Bag. The more foliage your plants have, the more good-sized tubers you'll harvest, so it's important to keep your plants as healthy as possible.

In late summer when the potato foliage has died back, your potatoes can be dug and “cured” for storage. Curing toughens up a potato’s skin and extends its storage life. Cure the tubers by laying them out on newspaper in a well-ventilated place that’s cool (50 to 60 degrees F.) and dark (so they don’t turn green). After about two weeks, the skins will have toughened up. Rub off any large clumps of dirt (potatoes should never be washed before storage) and cull any damaged tubers, which should be eaten, not stored. Treat the tubers very gently so as not to bruise or cut them. Nestle your spuds into ventilated bins, bushel baskets, a Root Storage Bin or a cardboard box with perforated sides.
Completely cover the boxes or baskets with newspaper or cardboard to eliminate any light. Even a little light will cause potatoes to turn green and be rendered inedible. The ideal storage temperature for potatoes is 35 to 40 degrees, though they will usually keep for several months at 45 to 50 degrees.

Onions

Onions should be cured before they are stored.

Wet summers are bad for picnics but great for onions. The more moisture onions get, the larger they grow. Onions also benefit from lots of sun, and will sulk if they’re crowded by neighboring plants or weeds.

Consider starting your onions from seed or young plants, rather than purchasing the little “onion sets” you can buy in the spring. Onions grown from sets rarely store as well as seed-grown onions. Growing from seed also allows you choose a variety that’s known for long storage. Strong-flavored, pungent onions store best (the same chemicals that make onions pungent make them good keepers). There are both red and yellow storage onions; those extra-large, milder onions should be eaten fresh as they don’t store well.

Onion seeds must be started indoors, several months before they’re planted into the garden. Broadcast the seeds so they are about 1/2″ apart and cover lightly with soil. Once the plants are up and the stems have straightened, trim the tops with scissors to a height of about 2″. Repeat every couple weeks (sort of like trimming a Chia pet) until it’s time for your onion plants to go into the garden. These haircuts force energy into the roots and also keep the plants from toppling over. Onions are heavy feeders, so be sure to amend the soil in the planting area with compost and a granular organic fertilizer. Set the seedlings (which may be less than 1/8″ in diameter at the base) about 6″ apart in each direction. Keep them well-watered and well-weeded, and make sure they don’t get shaded by neighboring plants.

In late summer, the leaves of onion plants flop over. This signals that it’s time for the plants to stop growing and start preparing for winter. Allow the plants to remain where they are until the necks begin to tighten and the foliage yellows. If the weather is dry and there’s no danger of frost, onions can be harvested and laid right on top of the soil to dry for a week or two. If the weather is wet or frost is possible, harvest your onions and move them immediately into a protected location where they will stay dry. The floor of the garage or a covered porch works well. Spread the onions out in a single layer and let them “cure” for two weeks. During this time the necks will wither and turn brown, and the papery skins will tighten around the bulbs. Once the necks have dried and there’s no more moisture in the stem or leaves, you can bring your onions indoors and store them in mesh bags or bushel baskets. Keep them cool (35 to 45 degrees F.) and away from light. Another technique for storing an abundance of onions: make caramelized onions. For details, read Making Caramelized Onions.

Garlic

A perfect bulb, just after harvest.

Home-grown garlic is a valuable crop. It's easy to grow all you need for year-round use, and the quality just can't be beat. There are lots of different types of garlic available now — read the seed catalogs carefully and choose one that's well-suited to your location. Cold-climate gardeners usually grow stiff-neck varieties, which are hardier. In warmer climates, the soft-neck garlic varieties (which can be braided) are more popular.

Garlic doesn't require much space. A 2 ft. x 12 ft. bed can yield enough garlic for a family, with plenty of extra heads to plant the next year's crop. Cold-climate gardeners plant their garlic in late fall for harvest the following summer. Warm-climate gardeners may find that a late-winter planting (February to March) is best. You can even grow garlic in a Garlic Grow Bag, which is 24" diameter x 8" high. Each bag hold 18 to 20 cloves.

For more information, read the article Planting and Harvesting Garlic, which includes slideshows that show you how.

Plant individual garlic cloves (the bigger the clove you plant, the bigger the head you'll harvest), setting them 4-5″ apart in all directions and just deep enough to cover the top of the clove. Water thoroughly. After the first hard frost, cover the entire bed with straw. Remove the mulch in early spring.

Garlic has the same growing requirements as onions. Keep the plants weeded and well-watered, and give them lots of sun. Calculating the correct harvest time is a little trickier. Dig the plants when the second set of leaves begins to yellow, which may occur as early as July. If you wait too long to harvest, the cloves will begin to separate as they dry, and the heads won't store as well.

Cure your garlic in a dry, dark place just like you would onions. Sort out and save the biggest heads for planting next fall. By planting only the biggest cloves, you'll gradually get bigger and bigger heads each year and will never need to buy garlic again.

The optimum long-term storage temperature for garlic is 35 to 40 degrees F. In warmer temperatures, garlic will begin to sprout. Dryness and complete darkness are essential.

Winter Squash

Squash can be grown in raised beds, but they should be allowed to ramble outside the boundaries of the bed. Another option is to train the vines on sturdy trellises.

Winter squash are fun to grow and easy to store. There are dozens of varieties, from the traditional acorn, Hubbard, butternut and buttercup, to spaghetti, delicata and golden nugget. Pie pumpkins, too! As with other storage crops, some squash varieties store well and some don’t, so choose accordingly.
Squash plants take up a lot of space, but they're not fussy about where they grow. You can usually plan on harvesting one or two good-sized squash from each plant. The usual recommendation is to put two to three plants (or seeds) in a little group, and space these “hills” about three-feet apart.
Don't plant your squash until the soil has warmed and all danger of frost has passed. Young squash plants appreciate protection from insects and harsh weather, and will thrive under garden fabric (row cover). Fertilize at planting time, then forget about the plants until the first light frost, when the leaves will die back and reveal your crop.

For long storage life, when harvesting winter squash it's important to leave some of the stem attached to the fruit. The best way to ensure this happens, is to use a stout knife or pruning shears to separate the stem from the vine. After harvesting, let your squash cure in a warm place (75 to 80 degrees F.) for 10 days or so. When ready for storage the outer skin should be very firm.

Store winter squash in a cool (to to 60 degree F) place that’s well ventilated. Humidity should be relatively low: 30-50%. Check your stored squash monthly to identify and use up any fruit that shows sign of decay.

Beets and Carrots

For winter storage, choose beet and carrot varieties known to be good keepers. Vegetables store best when they're harvested at — not past — maturity. This is especially true for beets and carrots. In most areas, this means that crops intended for winter storage are not sown until late June or July.
To maintain good eating quality, carrots and beets need to be kept at a constant temperature of between 32 and 40 degrees F, and at 90 to 95 percent humidity. There are three ways that home gardeners can provide these ideal storage conditions: in a refrigerator, in moist sand or right in the garden.

To store these crops in a refrigerator or in sand, start by harvesting the roots. Handle them gently to avoid bruising or nicking. Use scissors to cut off all but 1/2″ of the foliage. Rub the roots gently (do not wash them in water) to remove most soil. Don't cut off the root end because this will invite decay.
For refrigerator storage, lie similar-sized, same-variety vegetables in a single layer in gallon freezer bags. Remove as much air as possible before sealing each bag. Stack bags flat on a shelf or in a drawer in the refrigerator. Check monthly for decay and use those first. Beets will stay hard and sweet for five months or more; carrots should last almost as long. Should there be fine root hairs or a little decay, simply peel this off; the root itself will be fine. Carrots and beets can be shredded raw into salads, or can be parboiled, added to soups or stews, or roasted.

The Root Storage Bin

A second technique is to store these crops in moist sand. Prepare the roots as above. Moisten clean sand in a large container or wheelbarrow. Pack the vegetables into a tub, wooden box, 5-gallon bucket, plastic-lined cardboard box, or a Root Storage Bin. Start by placing several inches of moist sand on the bottom of the storage container. Lay vegetables on the sand in a single layer, not touching each other. Cover them completely with sand and continue layering until box or bin is full. Top with a layer of moist sand. Container will be heavy when full, so plan accordingly. Remove the stored vegetables as needed.

A third technique (for cool climates) is to store these crops right in the ground. Before hard frost, cover un-harvested carrots and beets with a 12-18″ layer of straw or leaves. (The shoulders of beets are susceptible to frost damage, so be sure to cover them before heavy frost). Lift back the mulch and harvest as needed. If spring comes before all the roots have been harvested, dig and use them up before the soil begins to warm.

How about storing those lesser-known root crops? Rutabagas store well in the refrigerator; prep and store as for beets and carrots. Parsnips may be stored in damp sand or can be left in the ground under mulch. Celeraic can be stored in either the refrigerator or in damp sand.

http://www.gardeners.com/how-to/storing-potatoes-onions-garlic-squash/5021.html

Despite California's drought, residents are promised access to several times more water than is actually available

(NaturalNews) There is a major water crisis currently sweeping California, and experts say outdated water allocation data is making the problem even worse. In many areas of the state, say experts, water control measures, many of which were established back in the 1920s and 1930s, have over-promised water that doesn't actually exist, and water regulators are scrambling to make things right as the Golden State limps through one of the worst droughts in recorded history.

According to the Los Angeles Register (LAR), the state has promised about five times more water to residents, businesses and public utilities than is actually available from its vast network of reservoirs, distribution canals and aquifers. This is because the State Water Resources Control Board does not actually know how much water is currently being used throughout the state, nor does it have accurate data on how much can legally and feasibly be distributed.

A new study on the subject explains that there is such a significant backlog in water allocation data that state water regulators and local water managers are stumped as to where water use needs to be further restricted, and where it might need to be loosened. Despite the fact that more than 60 percent of the state is currently suffering through "exceptional" drought conditions, the most severe level, some freshwater is still reaching the ocean, for instance, which means it is being wasted.

"If they don't know how much water is being used, they'll have to use a pretty blunt instrument," explained study author Ted Grantham to LAR.

Many areas of California aren't even using the amount of water promised under the law

Back in the early part of the 20th century when most of California's water allocation data was compiled, the state's population was a mere fraction of what it is today. A lot has changed since that time, including the Central Valley becoming a national hub of agriculture -- this region consumes a bulk of California's water supply, more than 40 percent according to recent data.

With conditions as they currently are, many of the streams and waterways that provide water throughout California are running dry. And this is occurring even as many areas draw less water than they are technically allowed to under the law, meaning that, if every area was exercising its full water rights, California's water crisis could snowball into a complete infrastructure collapse.

According to LAR, the most overused rivers are located primarily in Northern California, and mainly constitute those that flow from the Sierra Nevada mountains down into the Central Valley toward the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. In these areas, existing water rights exceed actual water availability by a factor of six or more, according to experts.

"If everyone was exercising their water rights and the full legal entitlement, we would have a lot more dry rivers than we do now," said Grantham. "There's a big discrepancy between how much water has been used and how much is promised."

Southern California has a similar problem on its hands, as water users have been promised more water than actually exists. Users drawing from the Santa Ana River, for instance, which serves as the main source of basin replenishment in Orange County, are currently entitled to 183 percent of the annual runoff from the river, or nearly twice what it actually provides in a given year.

"The first step is to get good numbers," said Grantham, who is calling on the State Water Resources Control Board to begin the laborious but necessary process of revising its usage numbers.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.losangelesregister.com

http://www.westerncity.com

http://www.chron.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com

http://science.naturalnews.com

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/046677_water_crisis_drought_California.html#ixzz3C0mpF3VF

Cooking Without Electricity

If the power goes out (grid down) and the electricity is off for a period of time, you will need an alternative method of cooking without electricity. Even your kitchen’s gas stove might require electricity to operate, so it’s best to consider multiple ways to cook and/or to boil water.
Here are a few ideas:


One obvious cooking alternative is by way of a wood fire, perhaps with a cooking grate placed over it supported by logs, stones, bricks, etc.

A ‘rocket stove’ is an efficient way of utilizing a controlled burn of a wood fire – a method which uses little firewood to create a quick hot fire. There are several popular varieties available.

A Dutch oven cooker either hanging over an outdoor fire or setting directly in a bed of hot coals (or hot coals on top of the Dutch oven’s cover) – perhaps in your fireplace if you have one. Good Dutch ovens are made of cast iron (they retain heat longer).

The issue with cooking over a fire is that it must be done outdoors. Weather may be an issue. This will probably not be an option for anyone living in the city or much of suburbia depending on your location.

Your barbeque grill is a likely option for cooking without electricity (until you run out of fuel), be it charcoal or propane gas. Always keep a full (large) tank, and preferably an extra tank (filled). If you use charcoal, when it goes on sale buy extra bags.

Again, weather and season may be an issue because you will have to cook outdoors. Preferably you’ll have a protected outdoor area for cooking which will make it a bit easier during bad weather. NEVER cook indoors with a bbq grill.

A solar oven can be very effective during the summer months, during days when there are few clouds – however this will be a limited use option. Nonetheless a solar oven is yet another alternative method of cooking if you are so inclined. Your geographical location, weather, season, and the efficiency of the solar oven will affect your overall success. I happen to have this solar oven and have used it with very good success.

‘Sterno’ heat (canned heat) like those which are used by caterers – may be used indoors and are effective for cooking. The canisters contain an alcohol-based ‘gel’ fuel – which does not spill and will burn for a few hours. You will need some sort of stand to hold your cooking pot over the canister.

There are all sorts of camping stoves which will enable cooking without electricity. Some of them are fueled from small butane canisters, many others use propane, and still others by liquid fuel (e.g. Coleman white gas).

Be wary of exhaust fumes, and unless your specific camp stove indicates that it is safe to cook indoors – assume that it is not.

One popular camp stove which has been around ‘forever’ is the Coleman camp stove. I have had two of their dual burner liquid fuel stoves during the past 20 years and have been very happy with them. They seem to be built to last.

Coleman 2-Burner Dual Fuel Stove
Coleman 2-Burner Propane Stove

I use the liquid fuel model because it seems a bit more rugged, it holds larger pots without issue, it will heat up very quickly, and I’ve simply been familiar with it for many years. I believe that liquid fuel is more practical when it comes to storage space versus the propane canisters because you will get far more cook time from a gallon can of white fuel versus an equivalent size can of propane fuel (for example).

‘White gas‘, is a special Coleman blend which is orderless, has rust inhibitor in it, and is available in one gallon cans at nearly every store that sells camping supplies.

Although the Coleman white gas fuel has a supposed shelf life, i’ve used it far beyond a supposed expiration, and have had zero problems (as in 10 years!).

According to Coleman documentation you can even use unleaded gasoline in their dual-fuel model stove as a substitute for their Coleman fuel white gas. I have not tried this, but it is good to know of an alternative fuel source.

A one gallon can of Coleman fuel will provide quite a lot of cooking time, and is well worth stocking

several, or more, in your survival preps if you have this type of stove.

I’ve even read comments reporting no problems or issues with the fuel even after 15 years, as long as the screw top is secured. Just remember to filter the Coleman fuel as it is poured into the tank, in case of sediment. Unleaded gasoline however will not store well for that long, and I recommend adding a fuel stabilizer additive such as PRI-G or STA-BIL if it will be stored beyond several months.

During emergency cooking without electricity, be aware of safety considerations – especially since this is not your normal way of cooking. Consider ventilation, the dangers of fuels, and the dangers of fire itself.

http://modernsurvivalblog.com/preps/cooking-without-electricity/#more-636

Senate Bill Warns Citizens To Prepare For EMP, Nuclear And Food Preparedness

State lawmakers are moving to make sure you know what to have on hand when electronic Armageddon strikes.

Legislation approved by the Senate Public Safety Committee would require the state Division of Emergency Management to come up with recommendations about what kinds of things Arizonans should buy now and store in the garage, basement or storage room just in case some enemy detonates a nuclear or other bomb that wipes out power and communications in the state — and possibly nationwide.



That recommendation also would spell out exactly how much food, water and medical supplies should be available to last for weeks or months. And the state agency would have to updated that list every five years.

SB 1476 is being pushed by Sen. David Farnsworth, R-Mesa, amid concerns about an electromagnetic pulse that can be caused by certain types of explosion.

According to a briefing prepared for legislators, a nuclear blast on or near the ground can damage electrical systems and communications for 70 miles or more from the site. But an explosion high in the air — 15 miles or more above the surface — could damage electrical grids nationwide for weeks, if not or longer.

That possibility concerns Farnsworth.

He said people have an understanding that disasters can happen. But he said folks are working under the assumption that the problem is local.

“Really, all we have to do is be prepared enough to hang on until outside help comes,’ he told colleagues. But this kind of disaster, Farnsworth said, could be nationwide.

“In essence, there’s no help coming,’ he said. “We need to be locally prepared for a long-term struggle.’

And Farnsworth said that means individual preparedness.

“As a society, we’ve become so dependent on the government and on our society the way it is,’ he explained. “Going to the grocery store, there’s always food there.’

Having the state prepare a list of what people should have in case of such an emergency, he said, would in essence be a wake-up call.

“Hopefully this will start the discussion and the awareness that we as a government cannot feed all these people,’ Farnsworth said. “As responsible citizens, we need to do our part to make our own private preparations.’

Lawmakers were given no indication of what it would cost the state agency to come up with that list of necessary supplies. But they were unanimous in their approval. In fact, some suggested the legislation does not go far enough.

Sen. Chester Crandell, R-Heber, said it isn’t simply a matter of individual survival.

“There’s a lot of different organizations we have in the state that actually work for the public safety,’ he said, including agencies like the Department of Public Safety or even utilities that need to provide power for everything down to the plant that purifies and pumps water. He said maybe state emergency officials need to be figuring out — and telling them — what they need to have on hand.
“If we’re looking at a nationwide, or at least a statewide catastrophic (situation), all the power goes out, trucks stop running, this whole thing, how are they going to then carry out their duties and responsibilities for public safety?’ Crandell asked.

Sen. Andrea Dalessandro, D-Green Valley, said she understands in a small way what can happen when unexpected disaster strikes, having lived in New Jersey.

“Sometimes we would have regional blackouts for several days,’ she said.
“It was absolutely debilitating,’ Dalessandro explained. “Gas pumps are electric. You can’t use credit cards.’

http://www.bioprepper.com/2014/08/30/senate-bill-warns-citizens-to-prepare-for-emp-nuclear-and-food-preparedness/

A Modern Famine? It’s Closer Than You Think

Wait… a famine? Yes. And the threat is much more real than you would have imagined. The idea of a worldwide famine in these modern times may at first seem far-fetched but the truth I’m about to share will change your mind of that forever. You don’t need to go farther than the pages of recent history for ABSOLUTE PROOF that a debilitating food shortage is not only likely, but may in fact be just around the corner.

Less than 200 years ago the devastation known as the Great Famine swept through Ireland when a calamity struck the nation’s potato crop. The food that was the basic staple of the Irish people turned into a black, stinking mess of rot as the potato blight spread, now known to be an airborne fungus… and left death in its wake. Over a million people died from starvation and disease while another two million were forced to emigrate from their homeland.



But WHY? WHY does the Great Famine matter to us RIGHT NOW? And WHAT does it have to do with the likelihood of a modern famine? The answer is surprisingly, shocking simple. When the potato blight hit Ireland in 1845 there was a reason why devastation was so complete. The majority of farmland was ONLY growing potatoes, but even more important to note, farmers were planting and harvesting ONLY one type of potato…

Let’s paint this clearly… A nation growing the same food… essentially genetically identical… with the same susceptibility… And disaster reared her head. And wiped out nearly 35% of Ireland’s population. A million deaths because the potatoes were almost completely from the same strain.

Let’s fast forward to today. Right now. Did you know that there are thousands of different plants and varieties available to feed the world’s hungry, but modern agriculture uses only a few? What do I mean by a few? According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, only 12 plant species provide 75% of our total food supply. Only 12! And of those plants, just 4 species provide 75% of the total calories consumed by man!

Grown to be the same disease resistant strains… essentially genetically identical… with the same susceptibility… Sound familiar?

With such a limited variety in such a limited number of crops, we are ABSOLUTELY looking at the same circumstances that led to the Great Potato Famine of Ireland. But this time, it won’t be one country.

With almost no food alternatives, all it takes is for just one disease, just one…. to wipe out the majority of the world’s food supply. And as diversity of crops narrows further, it is plain to see that the problem is spinning out of control…

…. But you can take it back.

And you can do it right now.

http://www.urbansurvivalnetwork.com/plan-prepare/food-storage/modern-famine-closer/

Survival Defense When Guns Are Not Allowed

In the time before a major crisis occurs, private ownership or use of firearms, bows and arrows, and crossbows may be illegal and banned. As the situation gets worse, the government will impose martial law and confiscate weapons no matter how well you may think they are hidden.
Here are a few weapons that may be overlooked and that can be used to protect your family and loved ones.

Edged Weapons

Edged weapons are the oldest implements used by man. Then, as now, you can make knives and other edged weapons from flint, obsidian, bronze, arsenic copper-bronze, tin-bronze, iron. Today, there are three kinds of steel that you may be interested in:

• Damascus steel – originated in India about the 5th century BC. The steel was heated to red hot, hammered, folded, and then quickly cooled in water. This process was repeated at least 500 times. This produced a better weapons grade steel.
• Carbon steel – will rust if exposed to air and moisture. The rust if heavy will flake off causing the steel to weaken and break.
• Stainless steel is an alloy with a minimum of 10% chromium by mass. Stainless steel does not rust or stain by water as ordinary steel does. When heated the chromium becomes chromium oxide that acts to form an air and water tight film that seals off the metal. This steel comes in many grades and finishes.

The following edged tools and weapons can be used as a substitute for firearms for protection. All of them can be dipped in poison so that even a single glancing blow can be a lethal one.

• 
• Farm Tools: Any of the metal farming or gardening tools can be used as weapons to protect yourself or the family. The spade, rake, pitchfork, pick, sickle, hand hoe, and garden claw all make excellent choices for either offensive or defensive weapons.
• Bayonets: Either spike or flat knife designs can be used as is or cut back to make push knives. You can also add a set of brass or other metal knuckles by welding it to the shortened bayonet.
• Daggers and Boot Knives: These double edged knives have a blade longer than 6 inches and are used to stick or slash. Most have a skull crusher at the back of the hilt.
• Small Knives: Usually the blades are shorter than 6 inches long and can be a folding or a non-folding version. These knives are good defensive or offensive weapons because they can be “palmed” and used without them being seen.
• Swords: There are two different edge designs for swords. The first is the single edge the other is the double edge. There are several lengths of swords. The first is the short sword which is 16 to 18 inches long, regular size sword which is 20 to 24 inches long, and the two handed sword that measures over four feet long. The short and the regular size swords can be used for protection and carried inconspicuously, but the long two handed sword is too large to be practical for anything other than staving off an attack on your home.
• Spears: Have a 4 to 6 foot shaft with a metal spear point at the top. These weapons are designed to be thrown or thrusted into a human target.
• Throwing Stars: Are metal shaped stars that have sharpened points that were designed to be thrown at a target and stick into it. In the hands of a trained individual they can kill or do great bodily harm.
• Axes or hatchets: Are used for chopping. Some axes have double or single edges. As a weapon it can be thrown and deliver a bloody crushing wound or blunt trauma if the back blunt end hits first.

Blunt Force Weapons

Blunt force weapons use weight instead of sharp edges to kill or do great bodily harm. Damage to the body is caused by crushing instead of cutting.

• Canes: originally used to steady and help a person in walking. A cane can be used as a nightstick type weapon and can deliver knockout or death blows to the head, break arms or legs, or cause deep blunt trauma wounds to the central body core. Historically the cane sword was a way to carry a sword concealed and at the ready if needed. This weapon is easy to carry in plain sight.
• Clubs: Usually made of heavy wood or metal scrap. These are crushing weapons that break bones or deliver deep trauma to inner organs.
• Bats: Wood or aluminum bats used to play baseball also make a good weapon. A bat can easily break bones or kill if they hit the right part of the body.
• Staffs or walking sticks: For thousands of years staffs were a defensive and sometimes offensive weapon for the poor or peasants. An individual who was good with a staff could disarm a person with a sword or a gun.
• Maces: Maces were a medieval blunt force weapon made of steel or other strong metals. It was designed to crush skulls and brake limbs with blunt force. Today it is still a good defensive weapon in times of major crisis.
• Chains: Chains made of steel or other heavy metals can be used as weapons in a defensive roll. They can be made to look like every day clothing accessories such as belts. They can deliver deadly crushing blows or break limbs.
• Slings (2 Cord Type): Is a very old weapon that goes back thousands of years. It is easy to hid or conceal. With a little bit of practice it is possible to hit or kill your target out to 200 feet or better with rocks or scrapes of metal. Slings can be either defensive or offensive weapons.
• Slingshots for stone, metal projectiles, or arrows: Slingshots are no longer a toy. They can be used to hunt small game by launching a ball bearing, rocks, and even arrows with deadly accuracy. This weapon can also be used defensively to protect your family in the absence of firearms.
• Hand to Hand Fighting techniques: There are many forms from boxing to martial arts. Choose the fighting technique that best meets your needs and start studying today. Do not wait until the last moment to start the training.

In a time when all private firearm ownership is banned or illegal, the above are a few alternatives for weapons that might be put into service to protect your family and loved ones. Almost anything can be used as a weapon regardless of the situation.

As with prisons and jails, you only need a creative mind and the will to have a weapon in order to get around any law or force used to try and take away your ability to defend yourself.

http://www.survivopedia.com/svp-survlgnsnotalwd/

Is it Crazy to Worry About the Golden Horde?

 

For years, I have listened to people in prepping circles talk about “The Golden Horde”. What is that you ask? Well, the golden horde is a concept that as far as I can tell was introduced by James Wesley Rawles. I like Mr. Rawles – have several of his books in my prepper library and I have been going to his website for years. Mr. Rawles is the writer of several prepper fiction novels (Patriots, Survivors), and probably the first survival book I ever read How to Survive the End of the World As We Know it . He is also the owner of the popular survivalblog.com website. Mr. Rawles’ golden horde concept roughly says that if we have a TEOTWAKI type of event, the major population centers will soon see a mass exodus of people out of the cities and into the surrounding countryside because the cities will be unlivable. The thinking will be to head to the countryside where there is more room, less violence, more food and a safer existence than in the cities.

 The historical Golden Horde was a Mongol tribe back in the 13^th century, but for the sake of Prepping and how the modern interpretation of this concept could apply to you, I will use Mr. Rawles’ own words in describing what he meant by this concept:

Here is a mental exercise: Put yourself in the mind set of Mr. Joe Sixpack, Suburbanite. (Visualize him in or near a big city near where you live.) He is unprepared. He has less than one week’s food on hand, he has a 12 gauge pump action shotgun that he hasn’t fired in years, and just half a tank of gas in his minivan and maybe a gallon or two in a can that he keeps on hand for his lawn mower. Then TEOTWAWKI hits. The power grid is down, his job is history, the toilet doesn’t flush, and water no longer magically comes cascading from the tap. There are riots beginning in his city. The local service stations have run out of gas. The banks have closed. Now he is suddenly desperate. Where will he go? What will he do?
Odds are, Joe will think: “I’ve gotta go find a vacation cabin somewhere, up in the mountains, where some rich dude only goes a few weeks out of each year.” So vacation destinations like Lake Tahoe, Lake Arrowhead, and Squaw Valley, California; Prescott and Sedona, Arizona; Hot Springs, Arkansas; Vail and Steamboat Springs, Colorado; and the other various rural ski, spa, Great Lakes, and coastal resort areas will get swarmed. Or, he will think: “I’ve got to go to where they grow food.” So places like the Imperial Valley, the Willamette Valley, and the Red River Valley will similarly get overrun. There will be so many desperate Joe Sixpacks arriving all at once that these areas will degenerate into free-fire zones. It will be an intensely ugly situation and will not be safe for anyone. In some places the locals may be so vastly outnumbered that they won’t survive. But some of the Joe Sixpacks will survive, and then the more ruthless among them will begin to fight amongst themselves for the few remaining resources. They will form ad hoc gangs of perhaps 6 to 30 people.

Now, with that context I will try to give my perspective on this question because I have heard a few of my fellow bloggers, some with no more expertise in this topic than Mr. Rawles or anyone else for that matter, give their opinion that is it foolish to think that the cities will disgorge themselves of people in a TEOTWAWKI event. They argue that people will sit and wait and never leave major metropolitan areas for all number of reasons. They say it could be they are too used to being catered to and will just sit waiting for handouts to come from the government. Others say that the roads will be blocked so there is no way to leave. Not wanting to be left out on the fun, I’ll give my own unlearned opinion below.

What is the Event we are talking about here?

As with all things in life, the situation you are actually faced with will determine the available choices you have or more appropriately, what choices you are forced to make. To say this entire concept is without merit is foolish I think and it shows a lack of imagination to say that this could never happen. I can easily see situations that would force people to leave their homes or cities and if you only have one potential disaster in mind you aren’t seeing the big picture. Everything depends on the disaster as I have said before so while one event might not cause any disruption at all, another could change the world. People are fleeing all the time so this isn’t some bizarre concept that lives solely in the realm of prepper fantasy.



In Mr. Rawles’ mental exercise he was using a power outage. What caused this power outage? We don’t know but it has been long enough that for Joe, “his job is history, the toilet doesn’t flush, and water no longer magically comes cascading from the tap.” We have to assume the power has been out for a long time or the outage was extremely severe and the Just In Time inventory has been depleted. Utilities are out so a major city would get ugly fast. Have you ever seen a sanitation strike in New York? He goes on to say “there are riots beginning in his city. The local service stations have run out of gas. The banks have closed.”. Now, imagine this Joe Sixpack is living in a major city when this happens like New York or Los Angeles.

Do you really think there won’t be people leaving if these things were happening? Do you honestly believe in a city of over 8 million people that nobody is going to leave that type of disaster? Even if we are only talking about 10% of the entire population that decides based upon the information they have (maybe we were attacked by terrorists with an EMP) that they need to get out of the city no matter what, you are still talking about 800,000 people. That’s only 10% of one city!

Let’s go ahead and continue with the theory that this is New York. We have to assume from Mr. Rawles’ mental exercise that since he said that this is TEOTWAWKI, that the same thing has happened across the country. This isn’t a small power outage caused by a storm that brings the power back in a few days. Now take the 10% from all the towns around New York and New Jersey and add those together. Can you begin to see how an event like this could trigger a “horde” of people moving into the countryside to escape the riots and lawlessness?

Where you live matters

In real estate, you know the phrase… Location, location, location. Where you live matters just as much as the event that causes the crisis or the crisis itself. If you live in the backwoods of Tennessee, you probably don’t have to worry about hundreds of thousands of people making their way out of the city, but what if Memphis and Knoxville were looking for a place to go?
Back in 2013, the Business Insider showed a map of the most populated counties in the United States. They used the census data to determine that over 50% of the population of our country lives in just 146 of the over 3000 nationwide counties. Do you live near one of these?

Half Of The United States Lives In These Counties

It is my belief that with the right disaster, the Golden Horde concept is very likely. I can easily see having to worry about people fleeing major cities if you live near some big metropolis. Now if you are out in the middle of East Jesus, then you probably don’t have to worry about it as much, if at all. However, that doesn’t mean it is crazy for anyone to worry about the golden horde. It might be crazier to think you know everything and everyone else is wrong. It is wise to research it though and find out for yourself if maybe there is something you need to plan for. Where do you live? Is there a big blue spot near your home?

http://www.theprepperjournal.com/2014/08/28/crazy-worry-golden-horde/ 

FEDS warning Imminent Terror Attack near U.S. Border or inside United States

According to high-level federal law enforcement officials, Islamic terrorist groups operating in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez are in the process of planning major attacks on the United States.

The news broke this morning, as Judicial Watch released a bulletin warning that Islamic Terrorists were planning to attack the United States with car bombs or other vehicle born improvised explosive device. High-level federal law enforcement and intelligence officials confirmed to Judicial Watch that a federal bulletin for an imminent attack was issued this week.

United Kingdom Raises Terror Alert Level

Earlier this morning the UK also raised their alert to ‘Severe’ and Prime Minister David Cameron told reporters that an attack was “highly likely.”

In a public statement, Home Secretary Theresa May said that the “increase in the threat level is related to developments in Syria and Iraq where terrorist groups are planning attacks against the West”.
“Some of these plots are likely to involve foreign fighters who have travelled there from the UK and Europe to take part in those conflicts”, she added.

Islamic Terrorist Groups Confirmed to be Operating in Mexico

According to Judicial Watch Sources, the militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) is confirmed to now be operating in Juarez, Mexico. They say Intelligence officials have picked up radio chatter indicating that the groups are going to “carry out an attack on the border.”
Earlier this week, a new English-language Al Qaeda magazine – yes these sickos actually have a magazine ­– released a how-to article for making car bombs that suggested targeting cities in the United States including casinos in Las Vegas, oil tankers and military colleges. The article went on to encourage lone-wolf terrorists, and implied that an attack on the United States was imminent.

Terror Threat on Chicago & U.S. Cities

Late last week, U.S. officials confirmed that they were investigating threats on Chicago and the White House, where ISIS terrorists posed in front of a building in Chicago and in front of the White House holding messages confirming their presence inside the United States.
The numerous reports that have been released this week indicate a very real threat that seem to indicated some sort of attack may be coming in the lead up to the 13^th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

http://offgridsurvival.com/feds-warning-imminent-terror-attack/

Laptop reportedly seized from ISIS hideout hints at bio weapons attack

A laptop reportedly recovered from an Islamic State jihadist contained a hidden trove of secret plans, including weaponizing the bubonic plague, and lessons on disguise, bomb-making and stealing cars.
A man identified by ForeignPolicy.com as Abu Ali, a commander of a moderate Syrian rebel group in northern Syria, told the publication the black laptop was seized earlier this year in a raid on an ISIS hideout in the Syrian province of Idlib, close to the border with Turkey, and belonged to a Tunisian jihadist.

 

"We found the laptop and the power cord in a room," Ali told ForeignPolicy.com. "I took it with me."
Initially, it appeared the computer had been scrubbed, but on closer inspection, thousands of secret files were discovered on the hard drive, which was not password protected, Ali said.

"The advantage of biological weapons is that they do not cost a lot of money, while the human casualties can be huge."- Document found hidden on ISIS fighter's laptop

ForeignPolicy.com was permitted to copy of thousands of files, which were in French, English, and Arabic. The information included videos of Usama bin Laden, ideological justifications for jihad and tutorials on how to carry out the Islamic State's deadly campaigns.

But most chilling were files that indicated the computer's owner, identified as a Tunisian national named Muhammed S. who joined ISIS in Syria after studying chemistry and physics at two universities in Tunisia, was teaching himself how to manufacture biological weapons, in preparation for a potential attack that could have been catastrophic on a global scale. A 19-page document in Arabic included instructions on how to develop biological weapons and how to weaponize the bubonic plague from infected animals.

"The advantage of biological weapons is that they do not cost a lot of money, while the human casualties can be huge," the document states.

The document includes instructions for testing the weaponized plague before using it to attack.
"When the microbe is injected in small mice, the symptoms of the disease should start to appear within 24 hours," the document says.

While some Islamic scholars have said the use of weapons of mass destruction is prohibited, the material on the seized computer included a fatwa, or Islamic ruling, permitting it.

"If Muslims cannot defeat the kafir [unbelievers] in a different way, it is permissible to use weapons of mass destruction," states the fatwa by Saudi jihadi cleric Nasir al-Fahd, who is currently imprisoned in Saudi Arabia. "Even if it kills all of them and wipes them and their descendants off the face of the Earth."

Foreign Policy verified that the computer's owner had indeed attended a Tunisian university and studied chemistry and physics there until some time in 2011.

Thousands of Tunisians have gone to Syria to join Islamic State, according to an estimate from Tunisia's government.

Foreign Policy noted that the information on the laptop does not indicate that Islamic State possess biological weapons. But it does show they are seeking them.

"The real difficulty in all of these weapons ... [is] to actually have a workable distribution system that will kill a lot of people," Magnus Ranstorp, research director of the Center for Asymmetric Threat Studies at the Swedish National Defence College, told the publication. "But to produce quite scary weapons is certainly within [the Islamic State's] capabilities."

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/08/29/laptop-reportedly-seized-from-isis-hideout-hints-at-biological-weapons/

70 Common Things That Go Wrong During a Disaster

As recent as four years ago, when someone mentioned disaster preparedness, the nature and scope of the disaster was typically something caused Mother Nature. Sure, some consideration was given to man-made disasters and terrorism, but for the most part, it was a freak of nature that worried us the most.

These days, we worry about a whole lot more. EMPs, solar flares, bio-terrorism, pandemics, nuclear war and more dominate the what-if landscape. Add to that the possibility of a global famine or economic collapse and heck, we could spend all day and all night caught up in fear of the unknown.



What this all boils down are three things that every Prepper knows:

1. Anything can happen at any time.

2. Being prepared means being ready for the most likely disruptive event we can fathom given our unique location, circumstances and person beliefs.

3. Regardless of how ready and how prepared we are, there is a strong likelihood that something will go wrong and things will not have the expected outcome.

All this brings me to the topic of today’s article: “70 Common Things That Go Wrong During a Disaster”. I came across this list awhile back and while it is not my original work, I felt that it was a list worth sharing. You will find that some of the go-wrong things are common knowledge, but there are others that are surprising and to be honest, a bit disconcerting.

Most of the 70 items are negative and many go against what we commonly believe will occur as first responders and rescuers come on the scene. So what is a prepper to do?

Read through the list, remind yourself that trained emergency personnel are human, and that even with the best of training, mistakes will be made.

70 Common Things That Can and Will Go Wrong During a Disaster

1. In an earthquake, there may be violent ground shaking; it will seem to last much longer than it actually does.
2. Fires will occur, caused by electrical shorts, natural gas, fireplaces, stoves, etc.
3. Fires in collapsed buildings will be very difficult to control.
4. The extent of the disaster will be difficult to assess, though this will be necessary to assure proper commitment of resources.
5. Emergency equipment and field units will commit without being dispatched. There will be an air of urgency and more requests for aid than units available to send.
6. Communications will be inadequate; holes will appear in the system and air traffic will be incredibly heavy.
7. Trained personnel will become supervisors because they will be too valuable to perform hands-on tasks.
8. Responding mutual aid units will become lost; they will require maps and guides.
9. Water will be contaminated and unsafe for drinking. Tankers will be needed for fire fighting and for carrying drinking water.
10. Citizens will volunteer but their commitment will usually be short-term.
11. There may be a multitude of hazardous materials incidents.
12. Aircraft will flood the area; law enforcement, fire, media, civilian, commercial and military aircraft will be a major concern.
13. The Command Post and/or EOC will be overrun with non-essential personnel; media, geologists, architects, engineers, representatives from other jurisdictions, etc.
14. Staging will be essential; the flow of personnel, equipment and supplies will be overwhelming.
15. Although it is an EOC function, the Field Command Post will become the temporary seat of government.
16. Electric power will be interrupted or will fail completely.
17. It will be difficult to shut off the gas; valves that are seldom, if ever, used will be difficult to find, and may not work when they are found.
18. Phone service will be erratic or non-existent. Pay phones will be the most reliable.
19. The media will have the best communications available; be prepared to share or impound their resources.
20. Fuel will not be available because there will be no electricity to run the pumps.
21. There will be an epidemic of flat tires; police, fire, and emergency medical vehicles will sustain a multitude of flat tires that will require repair in the field.
22. Fires will need to be investigated; mutual aid should include arson investigators.
23. The primary police department concern will be law enforcement; there will not be sufficient time or manpower to provide miscellaneous services.
24. It will be dark; there will not be enough generators or lights available.
25. Portable toilets will be in demand; there will be no place to go, and if a place is found there will be six photographers there to cover the event.
26. The perimeter will be difficult to control; citizens and media alike will offer good reasons why they should be allowed to enter the restricted area.
27. Search dogs will be needed early in the operation.
28. Documentation will be very important; there will be a multitude of requests for information later.
29. Riveted steel (oil and water storage) tanks may fail.
30. Streets will be impassable in some areas; it will be necessary to clear streets of rubble in order to conduct emergency operations.
31. The same buildings will be searched more than once unless they are clearly marked.
32. In earthquakes, there will be after shocks; they will hamper emergency operations, create new fears among the citizenry and may cause more destruction than the original shock.
33. Many injured people will have to find their own way to medical treatment facilities.
34. Volunteer and reserve personnel may be slow to respond; they will put their own families’ safety first.
35. On-duty public safety personnel will be concerned about their own families, and some may leave their posts to check on them.
36. Law enforcement and the media will clash; all media representatives should be referred to the Public Information Officer.
37. Very few citizens will utilize evacuation/mass care centers; they will prefer to stay with friends and relatives, or to camp out in their own yards.
38. Structural engineers will be needed to evaluate standing buildings for use as evacuation centers, command posts, information centers, first aid stations.
39. The identification of workers and volunteers will be a problem; it will be difficult to determine who is working where and on what.
40. There will be rumors; people will be listening to their radios and must be given accurate information.

41. There will not be enough handie-talkies; batteries will soon go dead.
42. Many fire hydrants will be inaccessible (covered or destroyed by rubble) or inoperable.
43. Generators will run out of fuel; jerry cans of fuel must be obtained early to maintain generator powered lighting and communications.
44. Critical facilities will have to be self-sufficient; gas, lights, water and sewage may be out for days.
45. Emergency responders will require rest and must be relieved. Local personnel may be of value as guides for mutual aid responders, or as supervisors for volunteer crews.
46. Equipment will be lost, damaged or stolen, and may never be accounted for.
47. Someone will get the bill; record-keeping and accounting procedures will be important.
48. Traditional non-emergency personnel will want to go home at 5 o’clock; all public employees must be made to realize that they are a part of the emergency response team.
49. People will die and there is nothing that can be done about it. Non-public safety personnel will not understand why everyone cannot be saved. Priorities must be set to save the most lives possible.
50. Dead bodies should not be an initial concern. Rescuing the living should be the first priority.
51. If phones are working, the number of requests for service will be overwhelming. People will have to fend for themselves; it will be difficult for dispatchers to ignore these pleas for help.
52. Some field units will disappear; you will not be able to reach them and will not know where they are or what they are doing.
53. Security will have to be posted at hospitals, clinics, and first-aid stations to control hysterical citizens demanding immediate attention.
54. Representatives from public agencies throughout the United States and many foreign countries will want to come and observe the operations or offer assistance. They will be a significant problem.
55. Department heads (EOC) staff may not have a working knowledge of their assigned areas of responsibility, and will play it by ear.
56. Some citizens and media representatives will question your decisions because they will not recognize that the safety of field responders is paramount.
57. There are no critically injured in a disaster; only those who are dead or alive.
58. Handicapped and disabled persons will probably die unless personal family and friends can care for them and maintain their life-support systems.
59. Management will not be familiar with field response procedures, and may attempt to change standard operating procedures.
60. Emergency responders (public safety and medical alike) will not be adequately trained to respond efficiently.
61. There will be initial chaos; supplies, materials and equipment needed will not be readily available.
62. There will be a general lack of necessary information; coordinators will want to wait for damage/casualty assessment information to establish priorities.
63. Emergency equipment will not be able to reach some locations because of traffic jams. Tow trucks will be at a premium. Parked or abandoned vehicles will block streets, and emergency responders will be the worst offenders.
64. Even though there will not be enough people to initially deal with emergencies, many available personnel will never be identified and never used. After the initial shock, there will be too many volunteers.
65. General information will be offered in response to specific questions because field units cannot verify the requested information.
66. Individual public safety officers will be asked to do the work of squads or companies; they will have to recruit volunteers on the spot to provide assistance to their efforts.
67. The message flow to, from, and within the EOC and Field Command Post will break down and become inefficient and unmanageable.
68. There will be an over critical desire to verify all incoming information. If it is received from a field unit, it should be considered as verified.
69. Some EOC and Command Post personnel will become overloaded; some will not be able to cope with the volume of activity and information they have to deal with, and some will not be able to cope with the noise and distractions.
70. Things will get better some time after they have become considerably worse.
Note: Credit for list is a July 6, 2006 article by Lt. Dan Blackston, Chula Vista Police Department

The Final Word

As hip as it may sound to talk about zombies, the end of the world and a doomsday apocalypse, the reality is that a disaster is anything but cool and hip. As we look back in modern history, we will find countless instances where a disaster, whether man-made or an acr of nature, has wreaked unexpected havoc, destruction and panic. The recovery process is long, and the level of organization and dedication required to successfully mobilize resources is huge.

As you read through this list of 70 things that can go wrong following a disaster, realize that while many of these things may not happen each and every time there is an emergency, many of them will indeed occur. And it is true. Things will get better – eventually – but they may also get a lot worse than you can imagine before the road to recovery begins.

As a layman citizen, think about your own needs now and how they might be impacted in an emergency. Recognize and acknowledge up front that if things can go wrong, they will. Go back and re-visit your most basic prepping skills and supplies by reviewing 12 Months of Prepping – The First Year. And of course, continue to stow away extra food, water and especially tools that will help get you through if a disaster occurs in your community. Couple these with some basic survival skills and a bit of faith and you will have done your best to prepare.

Yes, it is a cliché, but I will say it once again. Be prepared, not scared.

http://www.backdoorsurvival.com/70-common-things-that-occur-during-a-disaster/

4 Ways How To Tell If A Dented Can Of Food Is Safe To Eat

If a can of food is dented, it may be unsafe to eat it’s food contents and should be discarded – but not all dented food cans are ‘bad’ – some of them may be perfectly safe.
Here’s how to tell the difference if a dented can of food is safe to eat or not…


Knowing how to tell the difference between a safe or otherwise unsafe dented can of food may reduce unnecessary waste and can even save you money by purchasing these (dented) cans which may be on sale for a fraction of the price.
There are four simple ways or guidelines to determine whether a can of food is safe to eat or whether the can should be discarded.

Push On The Top And Bottom Of The Can

If the top or bottom of the can moves or makes a popping sound, the can’s seal has probably been broken and air has made its way inside. Popped cans should be thrown out.
If the can does not make a noise or move when pressing on the top and bottom, it is probably safe to eat (the seal is still good).

Bulging And Bloated Can

If the can of food is bulging and bloated (unlike an ordinary dent), it is not safe. Cans will bulge and bloat when bacteria begins to produce gasses which push the can outward.

Rusted Can

Rust will weaken the integrity of the can and may allow air and bacteria to enter, particularly if the rust does not simply brush off.

Does The Can ‘Spray’ Out When You Open It?

When you open the can – when you puncture the lid with a can opener, it should not spray or explode (as in being under pressure). If it does spray, do not eat the food because it may be contaminated with bacteria. Safe dented cans will open the same as non dented cans.

————————-
Notes:
Particularly avoid buying cans that are dented on the top or bottom, or near or at the seams. This is where the can is weakest – where the main seams of the can are located.
If the can is dented along the side it will probably be safe to eat the food inside, given the checks listed above.
When a can has become dented… the dent, crease, or dimple has weakened the can at that spot – especially a sharp dent. Further metal stress over time may cause the can to leak, so for this reason it is advisable to consume the food from your dented cans first – given the checks above.
Foods that have abnormal odors should not be eaten.
Having said all that, when in doubt, throw it out.

Information gathered from sources including grocery store owners and USDA inspectors.

http://modernsurvivalblog.com/survival-kitchen/4-ways-how-to-tell-if-a-dented-can-is-safe/#more-30136 

Terrorism Update: FBI Targets Preppers and Preparedness Supplies In Latest Bulletin

If you’ve been preparing for emergencies, disasters, or economic collapse there’s a strong likelihood that you’ve been added to a watch list somewhere.

Hard to believe?



The latest Communities Against Terrorism guidelines distributed by the FBI to military surplus stores in the state of Colorado outline specific activities that owners and retail associates should look for when trying to spot terrorist related activity. Much of the suspicious activity listed describes the behavior and shopping list of any modern day prepper:

What should I consider suspicious?
People or groups who:

• Provide identification that is inconsistent or suspect or demand identity “privacy”
• Insist on paying with cash or uses credit card(s) in different names
• Make suspicious comments regarding anti-US, radical theology, vague or cryptic warnings that suggests or appear to endorse the use of violence in support of a cause
• Demonstrate interest in uses that do not seem consistent with the intended use of the item being purchased
• Possess little knowledge of intended purchase items
• Make bulk purchases of items to include:
  -Weatherproofed ammunition or match containers
  -Meals Ready to Eat
  -Night Vision Devices; night flashlights; gas masks
  -High capacity magazines
  -Bi-pods or tri-pods for rifles

View the entire Federal Bureau of Investigation Memo [PDF]

The brief bulk purchases list described above is something you might find in the wish-list or supply closet of any serious prepper. If you are stocking up on ammo, buying extra magazines, a bi-pod and night vision then you are suspicious and potentially a domestic terrorist; nevermind that you may be planning a personal defense strategy for your property in the event of a widespread disaster and have no intention of using these items for any other purpose. Even if you are stockpiling the most basic of all preparedness lists, like MRE’s or other long-term food storage items, the FBI now considers you suspicious.

Via Oathkeepers:
The handout also instructs surplus store owners to consider as “suspicious” anyone who “demands identity ‘privacy’” or anyone who expresses “extreme religious statements” and those who “make suspicious comments regarding anti-US, [or] radical theology.”
The “Communities Against Terrorism” flyer closes by stating:

Preventing terrorism is a community effort. By learning what to look for, you can make a positive contribution in the fight against terrorism. The partnership between the community and law enforcement is essential to the success of anti-terrorism efforts.
Some of the activities, taken individually, could be innocent and must be examined by law enforcement professionals in a larger context to determine whether there is a basis to investigate. The activities outlined on this handout are by no means all-inclusive but have been compiled from a review of terrorist events over several years.

The handout encourages surplus store owners and employees to provide information on “suspicious” customers by calling the Denver Joint Terrorism Task Force or the Colorado Information Analysis Center. This handout is very nearly identical to one issued by the FBI to gun stores from Connecticut to Utah(PDF)
This new handout expands the absurdity by now also targeting customers of military surplus stores, and by specifically targeting the purchasing of very common, and very popular, preparedness items such as Meals Ready to Eat (MRE’s) as “potential indicators of terrorist activities.”

Those of us who have lost confidence in our government’s ability to manage a crisis, and have taken it upon ourselves to store reserve food supplies, water, self defense armaments, secondary monetary exchange units, or other SHTF Planning gear have now become “persons of interest” and domestic terrorism suspects.

References: Steve Quayle, Oathkeepers

When SHTF, How Long can you Survive Without Food?

We know that human beings can survive for many weeks without food, so technically food is not vital in a survival situation. Food deprivation is similar to dehydration in the effects it has on the body long before it finally causes death, such as irritability, weakness, low morale, disorientation, loss of mental clarity and/or judgment. Other notable physical effects include inability to control fluctuations in body temperature and a weakened immune system.

Water of course is the most essential element we need for survival but food is still high up on the list of critical needs. Going without food for even a short time, even as long as a week, while not long enough to produce starvation, can have many undesirable effects, both physically and mentally. Commonly noted conditions resulting from a lack of food is weakness (both weakness, experienced as a lack of strength and weakness of the immune system), irritability, general lowered morale, disorientation and inability to make good judgment calls, and an inability to control one’s own body temperature so as to increase the persons chances of hypothermia, heat exhaustion or heat stroke. Therefore, it is clear that the only way to achieve success as a survivor is to face all the adverse conditions that you may be forced to contend with on a full stomach.

The Will to Live and Hunger

It is generally accepted that the will to live plays a significant role in survival, regardless of the availability of food. A person’s will to survive can get him through an extended period of food deprivation while another individual who has given up will succumb to starvation much more quickly.

Your general health at the outset

If you’ve been safeguarding your health by sticking to a nutritious diet, you’ll be able to count on those nutrients you’ve consumed to carry you through the initial phase of the survival crisis and you will be able to last longer without food than someone whose diet has not been nutritionally adequate prior to the survival situation.

What your muscle mass provides

When you are starving, your body breaks down your muscle mass to provide both nutrients and calories. However, lean muscle burns calories even when the body is resting.

Your body fat and calories

In a survival situation, a little extra body fat is desirable, because when there isn’t any food, your body fat will step in as a substitute. There are 3600 calories in a pound of human body fat, and depending on the rate the body burns those calories, it will provide energy for about a day and a half.

Metabolism

It varies with each individual. As food deprivation continues, your metabolism will slow down; however, if you’re a person who already had a slow metabolism at the outset, you will be in a more favorable position than others because you will be burning less calories right from the start, and thus will be able to live longer.

The work done under food deprivation

The more work you have to do, the more calories and nutrients your body will burn. So, when under food deprivation, efficiency of motion becomes essential, since the less activity you have to perform, the better your chance of living longer.

Temperature

This plays an important role in the determination of how long you can live under food deprivation, since in both uncomfortably cold and uncomfortably hot environments, the body burns more calories than it typically does. If the temperature is heading to extremes of cold, the body spends the calories trying to keep you warm. If it’s heading to extremes of heat, the body will be releasing valuable electrolytes in the sweat it produces in its effort to keep you cool. You are more prone to heat exhaustion and heat stroke during food deprivation, but since water is always the primary factor in any survival situation, it is even more crucial when enduring food deprivation, because adequate hydration in the absence of food will keep you going longer than if you were facing a simultaneous lack of food and water.

http://www.urbansurvivalnetwork.com/featured/when-shtf-how-long-can-you-survive-without-food/#more-67

GOV. JERRY BROWN ANNOUNCES COLLAPSE OF CALIFORNIA AND ULTIMATELY THE U.S.

 

Flood of illegal immigrants prepare nation for takeover by global elite.

On Tuesday California Gov. Jerry Brown met with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto in Sacramento.

A day prior to the meeting in the California capitol, Brown announced the collapse of the United States and the elimination of its national borders when he declared California to be wide-open to illegal immigration.

“You’re all welcome in California today,” Brown said in Los Angeles on Monday.

Nieto characterized the influx of illegal immigrants as justice for “those who contribute so much to the development of the American society.”

In reality, the influx spells the destruction of American society. Brown’s welcoming of a flood of new illegal immigrants and Nieto’s insistence crossing the border represents social justice will ultimately deal a fatal blow to not only the state, but the nation as a whole.

The growth of illegal and legal immigrants – between 1970 and 2008 the share of California’s population comprised of immigrants tripled from 9 percent to 27 percent – has turned California into a failed state.

It will soon do the same for the country as a whole.

California: A Socialist Dystopia

In February, Democrats signaled yet another assail on the economic viability of the state when they proposed legislation that allows illegal immigrants to qualify for healthcare coverage under Medicare.
California is on record as the largest welfare state in the country. The state has one-eighth of the nation’s population and one-third of all welfare recipients.

In 2011 Judicial Watch cited U.S. Census Bureau data to show that families headed up by illegal immigrants are more likely to use welfare programs.

“Even before the recession, immigrant households with children used welfare programs at consistently higher rates than natives,” the organization explained. “Basically, the majority of households across the country benefitting from publicly-funded welfare programs are headed by immigrants, both legal and illegal.”

In Los Angeles County alone during 2013, $650 million was spent on welfare benefits for illegal immigrants, according to Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich of the Department of Public Social Services.

In addition to unbridled welfare benefits, illegal immigrants are provided with in-state tuition breaks. Nearly a decade ago, this scheme, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, would cost besieged taxpayers around $289 million a year.

California Paradigm

Democrats understand the capital harvested from wide open borders and liberal welfare and healthcare policies – both translate into a political monopoly. Overwhelming numbers of Hispanics vote Democrat. “Hispanics of all ages in the U.S. today are more than twice as likely to identify with or lean to the Democratic Party rather than the Republican Party,” Gallup reported in 2013.

“The immigration proposal pending in Congress would transform the nation’s political landscape for a generation or more — pumping as many as 11 million new Hispanic voters into the electorate a decade from now in ways that, if current trends hold, would produce an electoral bonanza for Democrats and cripple Republican prospects in many states they now win easily,” Politico reported last April.

This political monopoly will, however, come at a tremendous cost. According to one study, the cost to U.S. taxpayers of legalizing the current flood of illegal immigrants would be approximately 6.3 trillion dollars over the next 50 years.

Destruction of American Culture

In addition to destroying the economic base of the nation and ultimately impoverishing Americans, unbridled illegal and unrestrained legal immigration will accomplish a primary goal held by the global elite – the destruction of American culture and its heritage grounded in the principles of liberty, private property and individual sovereignty.

“Besides the successful culture of independence, Obama hates the white nature of America,” writes L. Todd Wood. “He is attempting to manage the ethnicity of America and quicken the demise of the white majority. He is attempting to crowd out the American culture of self-reliance and the rule of law with the culture of gang violence of Central America dependent on the federal government. This is a racist strategy that only Hitler could be proud of.”

It is also a strategy the global elite are proud of. If the culture of liberty and the drive for economic prosperity can be successfully destroyed and Americans reduced to third world serfs, the plan for one world government and domination can be realized.

http://www.thedailysheeple.com/gov-jerry-brown-announces-collapse-of-california-and-ultimately-the-u-s_082014

Simulation: New Madrid Quake Would Kill 100,000 Instantly; Displace 7 Million

If you live in and around Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi you might want to consider the following – then again, if you’re reading this web site you probably already have:

 

In May, the federal government simulated an earthquake so massive, it killed 100,000 Midwesterners instantly, and forced more than 7 million people out of their homes. At the time, National Level Exercise 11 went largely unnoticed; the scenario seemed too far-fetched — states like Illinois and Missouri are in the middle of a tectonic plate, not at the edge of one. A major quake happens there once every several generations.
…
National Level Exercise 11, or NLE 11, was, in essence, a replay of a disaster that happened 200 years earlier. On Dec. 16, 1811, a magnitude 7.7 earthquake hit the New Madrid fault line, which lies on the border region of Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi. It’s by far the largest earthquake ever to strike the United States east of the Rockies. Up to 129,000 square kilometers [50,000 square miles] were hit with “raised or sunken lands, fissures, sinks, sand blows, and large landslides,” according to the U.S. Geological Service. “Huge waves on the Mississippi River overwhelmed many boats and washed others high onto the shore. High banks caved and collapsed into the river; sand bars and points of islands gave way; whole islands disappeared.” People as far away as New York City were awakened by the shaking. 

More quakes, of a similar size, followed. But the loss of life was minimal: Not too many people lived in the area at the time. Today, there are more than 15 million people living in the quake zone. If a similar quake hit, “7.2 million people could be displaced, with 2 million seeking temporary shelter” in the first three days, FEMA Associate Adminsitrator William Carwile told a Congressional panel in 2010. “Direct economic losses for the eight states could total nearly $300 billion, while indirect losses at least twice that amount.”
Source: Wired Danger Room

Though there is debate over whether or not a New Madrid earthquake is due, the prudent thing to do would be for every individual and family to prepare. The Federal government will be capable of a very limited response, especially in a region-wide disaster on the scale of a 7.7 quake. This means that if it, or even a lower magnitude quake were to take place, individuals would be on their own, and it would be a long time before help arrived:

“Electric power would go out, not for days, but for weeks and months in the four state region,” he said. “Municipal water systems, they all run on electricity, don’t they? Well, people are gonna get thirsty. You need water for firefighting, don’t you? Second, all gasoline pumps run on electric power. Same with diesel fuel. So in terms of road mobility, of getting the relief forces in, and evacuating people out — no gasoline? The cascading failures go on and on.”

In such an event, there would likely be significant strain on the rest of the nation as well. It has also been postulated that a large enough quake in the region could potentially cause flooding for hundreds of miles, literally expanding the width of the Mississippi River and potentially submerging areas of Texas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

In addition to the well known natural potential for a major earthquake in this area, oil drilling utilizing hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has been active on a mass scale, theoretically increasing the likelihood of a major earthquake:

Canadian Geologist Jack Century crusades against induced seismicity from irresponsible drilling. In a 2009 speech before the Peace River Environmental Society, he provided a brief explanation of how fracking induces earthquakes, completely refuting industry denial that fracking causes quakes. Fracking induces not only micro- and mini-seismic actions that can compromise the integrity of well casings, but also large earthquakes registering on the order of 5 to 7 on the Richter Scale, resulting in human deaths.
Source: Activist Post

While quakes may be a normal occurrence in Arkansas and the surrounding region, recent earthquake data is alarming and may be the reason why the government has been performing simulations and drills:

When comparing Arkansas’ earthquake history with its drilling history, a causative correlation becomes obvious.
The entire 19th century saw 15 recorded earthquakes and none in the first decade of the new century. A total of 694 quakes rocked Arkansas in the 20th century. That number was surpassed in 2009-2010, with the bulk (483) occurring the last three months of 2010.
Source: Activist Post

It’s clear that the potential for a major event in this area is more likely now than at any time in the last 100 years.

FEMA and local emergency management personnel should be focusing their preparedness efforts directly on the individuals in these regions, advising those who live within the seismic zones that in an emergency, no one will be coming to assist, or response will be limited. Currently, the overwhelming focus of their efforts is direct response from government personnel.

Rather than “See Something, Say Something” DHS ads at local grocery stores and retail outlets, perhaps a better strategy would be to promote individual preparedness concepts such as asking people if they have a 30 day preparedness plan, and then going on to describe essential strategies in the event of a an earthquake emergency that include information such as:

• Water and Food
• Medical Supplies
• Disaster Tools
• Emergency Evacuations Plans
• What to do when an earthquake strikes if you’re outside, in your home, or in your car
• And, dealing with critical rescue response if a friend or family member has been trapped under debris

We urge those of our readers in these areas to learn more about personal earthquake response, as well as to coordinate efforts with friends and family outside of the seismic regions in the event you have to evacuate. This includes preparing yourself and family for making the evacuation journey on foot, bikes, or four wheel vehicles, as well as multiple pick-up locations where your contacts can meet you along your evacuation route and when (i.e. — within 3 days of quake we should be here, etc.).

http://www.bioprepper.com/2014/08/27/simulation-new-madrid-quake-would-kill-100000-instantly-displace-7-million/