Year: 2008

Odds ‘n Sods:

A bit of “I told you so” for my friend Fred, who claimed that he had “missed the boat” when gold got up past $550 per ounce. I have been begging him to diversify into some silver and gold, ever since gold was around $345 per ounce. Yesterday, (Thursday, Jan. 10, 2008), spot gold spiked briefly to $895 per ounce and spot silver shot up to $16.21 per ounce. There will surely be a lot a volatility–including some scary dips–but the long term trend is almost certainly up for all of the precious metals. Buy on the dips, folks.    …




Grandpappy’s Pemmican Recipe – A Native American Indian Survival Food

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Pemmican is a Native American Indian survival food that has a very long shelf life and it requires no refrigeration. It is similar to a Granola Bar except it contains no artificial preservatives. It is a compact energy source that contains protein, fiber, fat, carbohydrates, natural fruit sugars, vitamins, and minerals. It also tastes great because it is a simple combination of meat jerky and your favorite dried fruit. To make pemmican you only need three basic ingredients: 1. lean meat, 2. animal fat, and 3. fruit or berries. Pemmican has several very important and desirable characteristics: 1. It uses …


Letter Re: Home Canning Your Garden Produce and Meat

Howdy! I appreciate the SurvivalBlog site and loved your novel “Patriots”. Keep up the good work! Let’s assume TSHTF in a long term way. Let’s further assume you have made reasonable preparations for food, both stored food, and open pollinated seeds for future gardens. How do you store all this future food? Freezing will be iffy since the electricity may become unreliable. It only takes a few days to ruin a freezer full of meat and veggies. Drying can be effective for some, but not all foods. It’s a very time consuming to prepare the food, and it has to …


Odds ‘n Sods:

“The Other Jim R.” sent us this: Goldman Sachs sees recession in 2008. Since this recession was triggered by a global credit collapse rather than just a typical market cycle swing, the recession could be deep and long. (There is even the outside chance of it worsening into a full blown depression.) The nascent recession will also doubtless make the post-Housing Bubble period much longer and deeper. Be ready.    o o o Thanks to WW for spotting this article: Shortwave infrared: Next-generation night vision    o o o Steve in Pennsylvania flagged this BBC story: South Asia Hit With …


Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“I have had a taste of it myself, and it’s mighty bitter. A debt is a debt, whether it’s margins or mortgages; and debts are all the same, no matter how you try to camouflage ’em. You never get much out of ’em except trouble. On the farm or in Wall Street, if you use the other fellow’s money, it costs you a lot more than it’s worth.” – Sue Sanders Our Common Herd, 1940


Letter Re: Sources for Free Survival and Preparedness Information on the Internet

James: K.L. in Alaska has presented a lot of interesting sources for information. I’ve noticed that you tend to link Wikipedia a lot when discussing various topics, I thought I would point out that there is a DVD with [a snapshot of] all of the English Wikipedia articles. It is a good general reference that can be viewed and searched offline when the Internet is not available. There also exists a Wikipedia free DVD download site, but it’s only a small part of the depth that the whole database has to offer. Great job on the blog! – Bman in …


Two Letters Re: Seed Catalogs and Heirloom Seeds

Sir; I saw your post on The Memsahib’s collection of seed catalogs coming so soon. The reason for this is a simple one: to get your plants to a respectable size, and in the ground after the threat of frost has gone, they must be sent to the customers as early as possible to allow proper selection by the customer, mail processing time, order fulfillment, return processing, and in the case of some seeds, proper germination time before setting out into the garden. I know these things, because I have started a few gardens from seed before. This all plays …


Letter Re Advice on Valmet .308 Rifles and Magazines

Dear Jim: I need your advice. Years ago, when it appeared likely that some type of an ‘assault weapon’ ban would be enacted, I began to look for a semi-automatic rifle which would be suitable for hunting, but which would also possess the absolute reliability and durability of a military weapon. I wanted something which wouldn’t look too ‘threatening’ to people who were not comfortable around military-style firearms, and something a bit more powerful, with greater penetrating ability and longer range than typical .223 based weapons. I settled on a little-known rifle, the .308 Hunter made by Valmet Company of …


Odds ‘n Sods:

From The Baltimore Sun: Higher food prices start to pinch consumers    o o o LHW suggested this British newspaper article on Plunge Protection.    o o o I just heard about a great site featuring do-it yourself field and survival gear–and much more: Funditor.com    o o o Hawaiian K. recommended this chart showing the long term “adjusted for inflation” price of gold.



Note from JWR:

The high bid in the current SurvivalBlog Benefit Auction is now at $340. The auction is for a scarce original 1980s-vintage Heckler und Koch 19mm Emergency Flare Launcher (EFL) aka “Notsignalgerät“ from my personal collection. It comes with three magazines and 28 scarce original German 19mm flares–10 red, 10 white, and 8 green. Together, this package is worth approximately $400. It is not classified as a “firearm” under Federal law. (Consult your state and local laws before bidding.) Sorry, no overseas bids will be accepted for this auction. This auction ends on January 15th. Please e-mail us your bids, in …


Understanding Labor, Wealth, and Real Money

Our generation in the First World is presently living in a time of unprecedented wealth, luxury, and leisure. Technology has allowed huge advances in transportation, health care, and commerce. But much of the “wealth” that has been created is transitory. Real Wealth In essence, the only real wealth in the world is extractive. Extractive wealth come from mining, oil drilling, timber cutting, farming, ranching, or fishing. Manufacturing, while important, is essentially re-arranging what was originally extracted. And all other “wealth creation” in the so-called service economy is even more abstract–it is merely shuffling around bits of paper or electronic digits …


Letter Re: Prepared Individuals and the OODA Loop

Jim- You are probably familiar with Bill Whittle’s web site. Whittle’s writings are always arresting. His latest essay has relevance for all of us SurvivalBlog readers who are going through OODA loops [“Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act”] unwittingly and therefore inefficiently. His essay observes that although OOD is far more important than Action, success after all depends on Action–done with speed. So this subject is timely for those of us watching events unfolding. Many are pretty good at Observing and Orienting. Fewer are Deciding (which is a concrete term–not ephemeral “planning”). Your site is very good at presenting the issues …