Category: Contest

Living with WVO, by P.G.

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It has been said that necessity is the mother of invention. Needing fuel for their war machine lead Germany to invent and perfect the diesel engine. It was designed to run efficiently on vegetable oil, and they do to this day. Circumstances forced me to make a move from my East Texas home to the deep Southwest. It was a slow, long process of gradually moving my stuff and my wife to a new homestead. I commuted from Nevada to East Texas for almost three years, at least monthly. Growing up farming, ranching, and trucking, I had a lifetime of …


Smoke Grenades – Any Utility?, by T. in Virginia

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I’ve participated in a few discussions recently about the utility, if any, of smoke grenades and similar devices to an average person, or even a reasonably trained and equipped prepper, in a SHTF situation. There are certainly some valid points to both sides of the arguments. So, this short article is intended to share a few thoughts to help SurvivalBlog readers make up their own minds. Smoke grenade use generally falls into two areas— signaling or obscuration. Large scale smoke, such as from vehicle-mounted or stationary military-style generators, can also have other applications that are beyond the intended scope of …


Knowledge For Outside The Norm, by Phoenix WEA

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If you’re like me and you spend a great deal of time reading articles and books or viewing videos about survival and prepping, this article will resonate with you. Getting out there with boots on the ground, learning the basics, is very important. However, what I would like to offer you today are some out-of-the-box suggestions to keep in mind while you train. It’s knowledge for outside the norm. Water To start, if your scenario requires you to walk several miles to get home, you will need water. Well, most people don’t think about the water that’s in the pipes …


Prepping and Practical Minimalism- Making Them Coexist- Part 2, by FLSnappyTurtle

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In part 1, I stated the I believed prepping and practical minimalism can coexist. It seems a bit of an oxymoron to have both the words “prepping” and “minimalism” in the same phrase, but I believe it makes sense. We are renters, and recently I stepped back for a moment to take a good look at our way of living and our stuff. We had too much of it. Facing another cross-country move, I started taking inventory of everything we own and made some tough decisions about what to do away with. I’ve developed a new attitude of what I …


Prepping and Practical Minimalism- Making Them Coexist- Part 1, by FLSnappyTurtle

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My family has been prepping at a slower-than-desired rate for the past eight years. Like many survivalists, we add to our gear, food, and water supply as money and time permit. We are renters and tote our items from place to place when a move is required. Practical Minimalism Recently, I stepped back for a moment to take a good look at our way of living and our stuff. We had too much of it. Facing another cross-country move, I started taking inventory of everything we own and made some tough decisions about what to do away with. I’ve developed …


Dietary Change To Fit A Post Collapse World- Part 2, By J.L. Augusta

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In part 1 of this article, we took a look at the carb-based diet logistics in a post collapse world and outlined some of the health and practical concerns. Additionally, I introduced the Keto diet. The Keto diet focuses on consuming 75-80% or more of your calorie needs from fat sources, 15-20% of you caloric needs from protein, and 5% of your caloric needs from carbohydrates. The human body uses two types of consumable (food) energy. Sugars/carbohydrates turn into glucose and fats, which turn into ketones. Since most individuals have never really been on a Ketogenic diet (except when they …


Dietary Change To Fit A Post Collapse World- Part 1, By JLA

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In most first-world nations, the diet most individuals partake in consists of a high carbohydrate, moderate to low protein, and low fat regimen. This diet type is inefficient for a post-collapse world. Tribal groups who have had to live in a more limited and primitive manner had a diet that consisted of a high fat, moderate protein, and low carbohydrate regimen, also known today as a Ketogenic diet or Paleo diet. This article will go into the negative aspects of continuing a high carbohydrate diet and the positive aspects of transitioning into a high fat diet before the collapse occurs. …


Making A Living As A Reseller- Part 4, by BIF

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For those of you wanting to make the move towards self-sufficiency in a career, or for those who are just looking for extra income, I am writing about buying and selling as a source of income. I think with a little practice, anyone can learn to make money by reselling things. This is the final part of the article series where I have gone over my experience with various resources and techniques for reselling. Let’s continue with a few more steps in my sample. Another Tag Sale It’s another tag sale. This time it was a bank foreclosure on a …


Making A Living As A Reseller- Part 3, by BIF

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For those of you wanting to make the move towards self-sufficiency in a career, or for those who are just looking for extra income, I am writing about buying and selling as a source of income. I think with a little practice, anyone can learn to make money by reselling things. So far, I’ve provided some background information and given some insight into pawn shops as well as ways to acquire inventory with no money or very little. Stihl Concrete Saw and Wheeled Carriage (continued) Let’s continue to look at an example of one ways I made money reselling through …


Making A Living As A Reseller- Part 2, by BIF

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For those of you wanting to make the move towards self-sufficiency in a career, or for those who are just looking for extra income, I am writing about buying and selling as a source of income. I think with a little practice, anyone can learn to make money by reselling things. So far, I’ve provided some background on reselling from a theory perspective and information on my experience reselling, too. Now let’s get started with details. Let’s compare your efforts buying and selling to that traditional institution, the pawn shop. The Pawn Shop Over the years, I have spent a …


Making a Living as a Reseller- Part 1, by BIF

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JWR is a proponent, with good reason, of living at your retreat and living your preps. He has also pointed out from time to time that it can be a challenge to obtain a job in the American Redoubt. They are available, but sometimes a job require special skills or a willingness to take a step down in your salary or career path. One thing he suggests is finding a way to make a living that is compatible with your lifestyle and available at your retreat location, whether it is in the American Redoubt or not. Buying and Selling As …


Common Sense Preparation, by D.A.

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Over the years, I have become frustrated with my tribe’s lack of preparation progress. We need common sense preparation. After much reading on the subject, I realized there was no way our budget would support hard-core disaster prepping. This caused me to review our current state of readiness for the most likely threats we would face. The result of this review was that we were not making the best use of the resources we already had in place. In fact, until this review, we were unaware of resources already in place for which no money was spent to acquire. The …


Practice Makes Perfect- Part 2, by BON

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As I stated in part 1, real world practice beats newly acquired knowledge every time. To be truly prepared for a survival situation, one needs to have practiced practical knowledge of the various skills that are required. In part 1, we covered setting up a test, various sources for power, and sanitation. Let’s move forward to one of the most critical resources we have– water. Water, One of the Most Critical Needs One of the most critical needs is going to be water. Are you storing water? Do you have enough? Use the grid down weekend to determine how much …


Practice Makes Perfect- Part 1, by BON

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We live in a time when information on virtually any subject can be found with little effort. Prior to the Internet, in order to pick up a new skill or gain new knowledge on a subject, one had to learn by trial and error or find an expert to pass along information. With the plethora of blogs, websites, forums, and videos found online, “expert” level knowledge can be found without ever leaving the comforts of home. Knowledge Put Into Practice While knowledge is always a good thing, the only way to truly understand any subject is to get hands on …


Survival Fitness and Health- Part 4, by JBH

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This article is about physical fitness, because I believe it is most important for those who want to survive some of the potentially devastating and even not so devastating situations that one can encounter today. I’m not an athlete but have been involved in fitness training for decades and done quite a bit of research as well. As an introduction to the concept of fitness, I identified its components– muscular strength, cardiovascular fitness, flexibility, and body composition. I also have gone over the first and most of the second of the four principles/variables applicable to all fitness activities: specificity, intensity, …