Month: August 2011

Letter Re: Inexpensive Building and Gardening Techniques

I am writing this article to give suggestions and my experience of finding, buying and building my retreat so people can see that you don’t have to spend tons of money for one.  First off, let me tell you that it took over a year to find my retreat property, actively looking almost every weekend.  It included looking at more properties than I can count, and making an offer on 11 of them, before I got the price and property that I wanted.  It is a long and tedious process, but my family and I really enjoyed it.  We used …


Letter Re: Storing Calcium Hypochlorite

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James, Calcium Hypochlorite could be worth it’s weight in gold some day [, for drinking water treatment]. I’m very familiar with it because I’ve been a certified Aquatics Facility Operator for ten plus years and it’s a staple item for swimming pools. I’ve had Calcium Hypochlorite sitting around in it’s original shipping container (plastic) for several years, and have observed that the container will eventually turn brittle and break. Not a good situation, especially around some automotive fluids. I now store Calcium Hypochlorite in Ground Glass Stoppered Bottles that are inside of padded 6 gallon buckets. There is no metal to worry …


Letter Re: AR-7 Type .22 LR Survival Rifles

Jim, Regarding the Henry [AR-7 pattern] survival rifle, I feel it is important that readers be made aware of the front sight – in case anybody is considering ordering one before actually handling one. The front sight blade is a piece of plastic which is easily bent slightly with side pressure, and can easily be moved side to side with thumb pressure. I almost purchased the Henry survival rifle to carry in a backpack, in case a disturbance required me to walk a significant distance home. But without reliably accurate sights a firearm is worthless, and I have no confidence …


Economics and Investing:

Glenn Beck puts the Federal debt cap deal in prepper terms. SurvivalBlog’s G.G. sent several links: ‘The Bear Market Is Starting’: Marc Faber Europe on Brink of ‘Major Financial Collapse’: Guggenheim CIO Bank run! Greece in panic as it faces change of Homeric proportions Items from The Economatrix: Stocks Now Down For The Year As Economic Concerns Grow Hoarding Of Physical Gold, Voracious Global Demand To Produce Undeliverable Gold Futures, Parabolic Move To $2700-$3000/Oz. Global Manufacturing Collapses To Worst Levels Since Mid-2009, Markets “Shrug It Off” Bachmann:  Debt Limit Deal Means “We Embrace Being Greece”


Odds ‘n Sods:

John R. sent this: The Hobbits Win    o o o The new Red Dirt Cooking blog (penned by “Okie Ranch Wife”– a sobriquet familiar to SurvivalBlog readers) has some great insights and some very useful recipes. She plans to cover home canning and long term food storage, as well.    o o o Somehow, I missed this great piece when it was posted on July 6th in the Alt-Market blog: The Essential Rules Of Liberty. (Thanks to C.R.W. for sending the link.)    o o o My wife Avalanche Lily and several SurvivalBlog readers all alerted me to some …


Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation." – Dr. Adrian Pierce Rogers


Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 36 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and B.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $300 value.) C.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $275 value), D.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo, and E.) …


Wood Cookstoves: The Alternate Source For Your Everyday Life, by Sarah C.

Wood heat: Is it really the best source, and why? This seems to be a popular question. I’m sure you have heard about the many benefits of an alternative energy source, but how much do you really know about wood heat? Maybe you remember that you grandmother used to cook on a wood cookstove back in the day, but you probably assume that wood cooking is old fashioned and outdated — think again!  How much do you spend a year to heat your home? Not to mention the additional cost of cooking your food, and heating your water. We just …


Jim’s Product Review: 4,000+ Nights in a Wiggy’s Sleeping Bag

It has been nearly six years since I first posted my endorsement of Wiggy’s brand sleeping Bags, so the majority of SurvivalBlog readers have never read it. (As background: SurvivalBlog had only 9,377 unique visitors in August, 2005, but 287,665 last month.) So for the benefit of my newer readers, here is a re-post of that August, 2005 review: I don’t write many product reviews, but I am uniquely qualified to write this one: In November of 1994 I rolled my 1968 Bronco on black ice on a winding stretch of Highway 12 paralleling the Clearwater River in Idaho. In …


Letter Re: Prayer For Rain in Southern U.S.

Hi Jim and Family, If you have the time, will you please pray for rain in the South?  My extended family and I live in the Austin area.  The drought in the South, especially in Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and parts of Louisiana is especially bad.  The temperature hovers around 100 degrees F every day.  Obviously, when your family has lived here all their/our lives, we cannot move to another state.  We have to stay here because of our jobs and each other.  If you don’t mind, please implore all of our dear readers of the SurvivalBlog, to please ask …


Letter Re: AR-7 Type .22 LR Survival Rifles

The debate on firearms manufacturers and caliber are endless, so each person must in the final assessment decide what works for them and theirs, having over 50 years of shooting, gunsmithing experience, and having taught firearms safety, I would like to offer a insight on a wonderful .22 rimfire rifle that is available from Henry Arms Company.  It is called the U.S. Survival Rifle .22. (A very appropriate name, for current conditions in this world).   I first owned a variant of this little rifle back in the 1980s when it was called the AR-7 and enjoyed the unique shooting and storage …


Economics and Investing:

Ol’ Remus talks economic collapse: We have arrived. He may be right. The debt-limit compromise in congress was a travesty. Tuesday’s drop in the Dow and the jump in gold signal that market senses some big changes in the near future. If the Federal credit rating slips below AAA, interest rates will rise, and there will be a nasty cascade of concommitant events. Buckle up! F.G. flagged this: Metal Detectors Hit the Jackpot J.J.G. sent a link to piece by Ann Barnhardt: We The Stupid. Real estate debacle: More than two years worth of shadow inventory overhang. That Which Is …


Odds ‘n Sods:

J.D.D. sent this piece about concealed carry in Michigan: 10 years after concealed weapons law, unclear why many in state were gun-shy. (The good news is that we’re winning: I found an animated GIF at Wikipedia that shows the advance of the right to carry laws since 1986. And guess what? There hasn’t been “blood in the streets” and “wild west shootouts.” Crime rates have actually been falling. Granted, this is partly because of our aging demographics. But I believe that some of the decrease in crime can be attributed to scared spitless criminals.)    o o o K.A.F. sent …



Note from JWR:

Today we present the first entry for Round 36 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and B.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $300 value.) C.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $275 value), D.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo, and …