Month: October 2008

Note from JWR:

Round 19 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. is still underway.The contest prizes include: First Prize: The writer of the best contributed article will be awarded two transferable Front Sight  “Gray” Four Day Training Course Certificates. This is an up to $4,000 value! Second Prize: A three day course certificate from OnPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. Third Prize: A copy of my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course, from Arbogast Publishing Round 19 ends on November 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that articles that …


Letter Re: Warning on Insect Pests Getting Into Storage Food

Dear Jim, I thought that due to the recent influx of newbies on your site, I would send this warning to not do as I did. Last year, I lost a lot of my stored food as I left it in the original packets in which it was shipped. I ended up with a major infestation of cupboard beetles, losing food and having to steam clean my cupboards. The bad news is thee bugs reproduce unbelievably quickly. The good news is the die just as quickly, and won’t harm you if you eat them, but they sure are unsightly. It’s …


Letter Re: The Least Expensive Way to Stock Up on Storage Food?

Sir, In regards to TJD, “Somewhere in Kansas” lamenting that he is in the middle of nowhere and can’t easily stock up on food, I must say I find his worries a bit hard to understand. In the Bible, Joseph stored up seven years of harvests to prepare for seven years of famine. Those stores were made up of grain crops. That is how Egypt made it through a great famine and gained great wealth by selling their grain at high rates to nations that did not prepare. Being from North Dakota, I know that the title for greatest wheat …


Letter Re: Market Observations From The Trader Blog

Mr. Rawles – Thank you for your recent mention of my site, TheTraderBlog.com. I am a former Lehman Brothers employee, I worked in New York City on the FX trading desk, but left in 2002, so I am glad to have missed all the recent excitement. I publish my blog in an effort to help me reason through my personal trading strategies, and also like to share my opinion about the markets and related events in general. I have not yet figured out how to make any money off of the site, so for now it is just a great …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Reader Mark A. wrote us to mention that he had found this web site that houses “more information then in one spot then I have seen anywhere else. The site is maintained to provide Third World countries information on farming and sustainability. All their information is free to download. Note, however that their ZIP files are very, very large. There are 4,000 titles, totaling 13 gigabytes.”    o o o In a recent e-mail, The Chartist Gnome mentioned two things about the precious metals market that confirm my observations: 1.) The COMEX spot prices now have no correlation with “real …



Letter Re: The Least Expensive Way to Stock Up on Storage Food?

Mr Editor, I’m a newcomer to your site. Last week, I followed a link from a news story that mentioned SurvivalBlog, and instantly found my favorite blog. I’ve been burning the midnight oil for the last few nights, going back through your archives. What amazing stuff! Thank you for sharing so much wisdom on preparedness and for so unselfishly putting out there free for the taking. (Oh, yeah, I should also say that you can count me in on a [voluntary] 10 Cent Challenge [subscription].Three bucks a month is a total bargain, in relation to what I’ve already gotten out …


Letter Re: Prisons and Other Institutions Amidst a Societal Collapse?

James: I live in a rural area in Wyoming. My husband, our children and I are lucky to have been raised in the area. We have access to thousands of family owned acreage to hunt, fish and garden on. Because we live in a rural area (at lease ninety miles in any direction from any large community) we are among the few that still have skills handed down to us that will allow us to be self sufficient. I have only recently found your blog and have enjoyed all of what I have read here. I agree wholeheartedly that our …


Letter Re: Anti-Hoarding Law of World War I as a Precedent for Future Laws?

Hello, Thanks for all the helpful information in SurvivalBlog. Regarding the reader who wrote in about the prospect of food hoarding laws; there have indeed been times where private U.S. citizens were forced to give up “unreasonable” stores of provisions, thus setting a possible precedent. For example: In 1918, Herbert Hoover (who would later be a US president), then working as head of the Food Administration, saw to it that a retired Navy doctor and his wife were charged for having about a year’s worth of foodstuffs in their home. (The law stated that more than thirty day supply was …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Larry in Cincinnati spotted a link over at the excellent Urban Survival blog to a classic book in the public domain: Handy Farm Devices & How To Make Them. (BTW, there are lots of other free references available at the Journey to Forever site.)    o o o Adrian mentioned an article over at The Trader Blog with some observation on Iceland’s economic turmoil and potential for hyperinflation: What Happens After A Country Implodes? Also, don’t miss this very recent piece by the same blog author: “We are approaching the apogee of the Treasury bubble”    o o o Ready …



Note from JWR:

Michael Panzner, the editor of the widely-read Financial Armageddon blog (and the the author of the book of the same name) recently quoted SurvivalBlog in this piece: Worse This Time. Take a look through Panzner’s archives. You’ll see that he has his head on straight.


Three Letters Re: Family Food Security for a Recession or Depression

Sir, I have been checking a few other sites this morning that I frequent, and while at the Viking Preparedness Forum, I was checking the food and water storage board and came across these canned food shelves. It is a good set of shelves, making the best use of space, and allowing them automatic stock rotation. We live in a house with a monolithic slab foundation, and the footprint, does not give us a great deal of room to work with, but I think that we can do something similar ourselves. I liked the way that they were set against …


Two Letters Re: Mr. Romeo’s Retreat Owner Profile

Dear Mr. Rawles, I read Mr. Romeo’s retreat plans, and I would like to add a couple of things to his preparations list. The one glaring omission I see in his list is a lack of HF communications gear. VHF radios are line of sight communications, which is great if you’re planning on staying within range of the coast. If he plans on heading out to deeper waters though, HF gear becomes a lifeline to Pacific maritime nets, weather information, and other useful resources. Even if he doesn’t plan on transmitting, an HF receiver would allow him to listen to …


Odds ‘n Sods:

KAF bookmarked this one for us: FuturePundit: Face Masks And Hand Sanitizers Slash Flu Risks    o o o From our Economic Editor comes another big batch of news and commentary: Gun Sales Thriving In Uncertain Times — Europe On Brink Of Currency Meltdown — Iceland: IMF Cash Not Enough — Current Volatility Hints At Next Crash — Financial Crisis: Latin America Hit Hard — Customer Panic And Bank Run In Kuwait — Dow Up Almost 900 Points, But No Sighs Of Relief — Iceland Raises Interest Rates To 18% — White House To Banks: Start Lending Now, Stop Hoarding …