Category: Contest

Bird Flu: What I’m Doing About It, by Sara Sue

The Current Situation The White House suggested, via the Press Secretary, that over 100 million chickens have died, or been destroyed, over bird flu.  I noticed that the price of eggs has gone up exponentially, so I polled my group of friends in an online homesteading forum, asking what they are seeing.  I also asked family members who live across the country.  The highest price I heard of from a family member in California was $10 per dozen for grocery store eggs.  Locally where I live, free-range chicken eggs are about $5-to-$6 per dozen. Eggs have been a standard for …


Fuels for Cooking, Warmth and Comfort – Part 4, by Lodge Pole

(Continued from Part 3. This concludes the article.) Cooking with Wood and Propane We do not regularly use our house wood stove for cooking. We can, but since we installed the wood stove, it has not been needed. Recently, I was given an old, homemade wood stove from an old-timer’s cabin. The stove is very well made. I have it outside of the shipping container and use it to cook on. It is an extremely large stove inside and out. It stays outside and will likely never be indoors again. Whoever built it, put several feet of ¾ inch steel …


Fuels for Cooking, Warmth and Comfort – Part 3, by Lodge Pole

(Continued from Part 2.) When the 2024/2025 woodstove season started, I had roughly seven cords of stacked, seasoned wood in the shipping container. We use about two cords of wood each winter. My goal is to always have at least two years of firewood on hand. To me, three years is an insurance policy. If I am unable to gather firewood one summer, I do not need to worry. I will simply gather more the following summer. I also store everything I need to gather, cut, carry, and split wood to prep it for storage. Our log splitter, chainsaws, axes, …


Fuels for Cooking, Warmth and Comfort – Part 2, by Lodge Pole

(Continued from Part 1.) Tools for Cutting Wood at Home Wheelbarrow or manure cart- I use these to haul wood and cutting equipment. Occasionally, someone will offer me free firewood they cut some time previously. Sometimes, if it is seasoned and not split, the wood can be heavy. In these circumstances, I will use a furniture dolly, but I try to never cut and/or haul anything that large/heavy. Hunting/Boy’s Axe – I prefer using a two-pound “boy’s axe” because it is extremely light, and easily maneuverable. This is strictly used for delimbing. Splitting maul – I use these not only …


Fuels for Cooking, Warmth and Comfort – Part 1, by Lodge Pole

Before buying our home, we rented it. The first winter living there, I had forgotten to call and get a propane fill-up. When I checked the tank level, it showed 1%. I called the propane company, explained that I needed a fill-up, and was told they could not service me for another week or more. The only exception was if I agreed to be placed “on route”, which meant they would fill my tank when they were in our area, every two weeks. We needed propane to stay warm since our only heat was an HVAC system, so I agreed …


Prepared For Financial TEOTWAWKI? – Part 4, by St. Funogas

(Continued from Part 3. This concludes the article.) Can Our Fiscally Irresponsible Congress be Reined In? While it’s certainly mathematically possible to balance the budget, it’s not humanly possible. An eighth-grade math class in Peru or Portugal, having no preconceived illusions about US spending, and no prejudices about what to cut, could balance the budget. Musk said he could strip $2 trillion from the budget. So could I, but Congress won’t pass most of the DOGE recommendations. It’s also not humanly possible to balance the budget because not only do fiscally irresponsible voters keep sending the wrong people to Congress, …


Prepared For Financial TEOTWAWKI? – Part 3, by St. Funogas

(Continued from Part 2.) The current war in Ukraine is a prime example of how the system works for large corporations without providing a single benefit for We the People. After the Soviet Union collapsed in late 1991, Russia asked to join NATO. Even though having Russia as a NATO partner would have been the best possible arrangement for the citizens of the US, European Union, and Russia, the US, needing enemies in order to keep justifying obscene defense budgets, dictated “no”. In 2014, the US orchestrated the overthrow of Ukraine’s freely-elected government to install an anti-Russian president, then contrary …


Prepared For Financial TEOTWAWKI? – Part 2, by St. Funogas

(Continued from Part 1.) Interest on the National Debt There are three categories in the US budget. Mandatory spending is mandated by law to be paid. Discretionary spending can be adjusted for each department, or the funding can be eliminated at any time. Interest payments are in their own category but for all intents and purposes are in the mandatory category. The 2025 budget has the interest payment estimated at $969 billion, just a hair under one trillion. If I can tweak that up to $995 billion based on historical budget misses it will make the math easier as this …


Prepared For Financial TEOTWAWKI? – Part 1, by St. Funogas

Sometimes the truth is ugly and nobody wants to hear it. Ignoring the truth is what got us into the current budget deficit mess and the insurmountable national debt we now face as a nation. Hope is a remarkable thing. Hope that our actions will pay off keeps us working toward the goal and it generally pays off. False hope, on the other hand, causes us to work toward solving a problem which is impossible to resolve. Because we fail to recognize it can’t be fixed, we keep working and hoping and can’t understand why our exertions aren’t achieving the …


Supplies for Staying Clean WTSHTF – Part 2, by SaraSue

(Continued from Part 1. This concludes the article.) Bars of Soap and Healing Ointment I stockpile bars of soap because there are so many uses for a good bar of soap.  I use several different kinds of soap bars, but the nice thing about them is they are compact and you can stuff them into numerous places for safekeeping.  You can grate them to make a liquid detergent for washing just about anything, yourself included.  Bars of soap are probably the cheapest, and most easily storable form of soap you can buy.  There are many, many, recipes online for making …


Supplies for Staying Clean WTSHTF – Part 1, by SaraSue

I have often thought about the things I stockpile that have come in very handy in day-to-day living. Many of these are considered quite traditional or old-fashioned.  These are things I never previously kept or used in any quantity, but now do.  I thought that I would share, so you can add it to your preps if you haven’t already.  In a WTSHTF scenario, keeping things, and yourself, clean becomes imperative.  In disasters, most people die from disease and illness after the disaster.  If you could easily and quickly attend to cleanliness, illness will be less of an issue.  I’ve …


Join Or Die: What Can You Contribute?, by Michael X.

Okay, it’s here: The Stuff has Hit The Fan (SHTF). You are either ready or you are not. Time is limited. Even if you are the most ready of anyone, you probably still can’t do it all, in isolation from others. In getting to where we are at this moment, many of us think we have done a very good, even great, job of prepping. Prepared people read and watch the news critically, identify what they think the most likely problem is that will occur, and prepare for it (plus many related issues). They use information sources like SurvivalBlog to …


Writing Contest Prize Winners Announced for Round 116

We’ve announced the winners of Round 116 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The top three prize winners will each receive some great prize packages. — But before we announce those winners, we’d like to introduce the most recent writing contest prize sponsor, starting this month with Round 117: 3Vgear.com.  Take a look at their website for details on their top-quality outdoor and preparedness gear. This Utah-based company makes backpacks and bags, rifle cases, MOLLE pouches, pack covers, hydration systems, and more. For their prize, they will be generously providing an ultimate bug-out bag bundle that includes their 3-day Paratus …


Modernizing an Old Coleman Stove, by Lodge Pole

A few months ago, my father gave me some camping gear he bought in the 1970s when he and my oldest brother started camping.  He gave me a red Coleman lantern, and a large, green Coleman, dual burner stove.   I remember using both pieces on occasion when he took me camping as a young boy.  On the last camping trip we did together, when I was in college, neither the stove nor lantern would work.   It was a dark night, and our food was cold. Both pieces were put on the shelf for many years. I have rebuilt many stoves …


Circuit Breaker Panel Labeling, by Free Loader

Most people’s circuit breaker panels that I’ve seen (including my own) are poorly labeled regarding where each circuit breaker’s current actually goes. Many panel descriptions are either very vague about what circuits are on each breaker or they aren’t labeled at all. Usually, this happens because the person who installed the panel was in a hurry to finish the wiring and never returned to label them properly. When they did label them, it was often with something vague like “east half house” or “basement.” These descriptions aren’t very helpful when you’re trying to locate the specific breaker for a particular …