Category: Contest

Hiding and Tracking – Part 4, by J.M.D.

(Continued from Part 3. This concludes the article.) Tracking As I alluded to earlier, becoming an expert tracker requires a lifetime of practice and experience, but there are a number of things that you can do to begin developing and improving your ability to track people: Improved Endurance – The further away your target gets, the harder it will become to track them, and if they’re in better shape than you they’ll be able to quickly increase the gap between you. You need to be able to move long distances at a reasonable pace if you want to be able …


Hiding and Tracking – Part 3, by J.M.D.

(Continued from Part 2.) Weather The weather can have a significant impact on both the trackers as well as the trackees. A clear sunny day can make it easier to follow someone visually and detect signs of their passage, while rain, snow, fog or mist can reduce visibility and require trackers to close the distance or move slower to locate sign. At the same time, snow on the ground will leave obvious footprints and is one of the easiest conditions in which to track someone, unless it’s snowing hard enough or blowing snow that fills in or covers tracks. Rain …


Hiding and Tracking – Part 2, by J.M.D.

(Continued from Part 1.) A somewhat more obscure but still possible method of tracking is by following an electronic signal. If you’re using any type of transmitting device such as a radio or cell phone, a tracker could potentially locate you by detecting that signal. There have been a number of good articles on SurvivalBlog.com on radio frequency direction finding and locating, so I’m not going to go into detail here. Someone could also plant a dedicated tracking device on you or your vehicle and use that to track your location, but the tracker would obviously need the right equipment …


Hiding and Tracking – Part 1, by J.M.D.

I enjoy learning new things and picking up new skills, and the many activities I engage in such as shooting, paintball, backpacking and, of course, prepping give me ample motivation and opportunity to do so. A year or so ago while on a backpacking trip with some friends I met a guy who was a pretty decent tracker, and after he kindly spent some time on that hike showing me some of the basics I decided that tracking (and evading trackers) were some skills that might be useful in a TEOTWAWKI scenario. Since then I’ve taken training classes, read books, …


The Modern Breadcrumb Trail, by BowtiedPartisan

Introduction Modern life in a First World country is fantastic. Access to everything you need. What’s even more beneficial, is having a computer in your pocket. That’s right, your smartphone, it’s a computer and a radio transceiver. It can communicate with almost anyone in the world via radio waves and the Internet. All it needs to do is reach a cell phone tower. Let’s focus on a few aspects of this though, what the cell phone was originally created for, and what it has replaced. It plays a part in understanding your reliance on this device. Cellphones were primarily created …


Aggression and Awareness, by SwampFox

Have you ever noticed how some people in life have a “kick me” sign on their back, like they are repeatedly targeted by others? Have you ever heard somebody react to news of a violent crime with disbelief, saying “I never thought it could happen here?” Why does it seem that some are incapable of defending themselves when attacked, begging not to be harmed? There are two kinds of people in the world – those who are aggressive and those who are not. Many of us have been taught from a young age to be kind and polite in words …


Lessons Learned From a Winter Storm – Part 2, by Michael X.

(Continued from Part 1. This concludes the article.) Generators: TWO is NONE In all this time my second biggest concern, after the generator, was our outside hot tub. When the power is out it becomes a liability. 250 fifty gallons of hot (warm but cooling) water, waiting to freeze and wreck the tub…. The hot tub water temp was down to 74 degrees after one night. My choices were to get the generator going, or drain the tub. Part of the equation for this decision was the availability of the hot tub’s water for toilet flushing. I had only hours …


Lessons Learned From a Winter Storm – Part 1, by Michael X.

I have often bugged my wife to let us try a “long weekend without power”. I wanted to test my preps, byt so far she has not taken me up on my offer. However, recently Fate stepped in and gave me what I wanted. I am writing this to document my experience and my analysis of what I need to do to further my readiness. I have been interested in Prepping for many years. My early introduction to prepping was on this website, and by reading the Patriots novel series by James Wesley, Rawles. Many, many books followed that rounded …


Assessing and Prioritizing Risks, by Francis Marion

One of the most common questions asked by new preppers is “What should I prepare for?”. The easy…and wrong…answer is “everything”. After all, as Frederick the Great said, “He who defends everything, defends nothing”. If one attempts to prepare for everything that can happen…from coastal erosion to Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) to winter weather…one could quickly become overwhelmed. This is why the first steps in preparing should be to assess and prioritize risk. For background purposes, I spent more than 25 years as a commissioned officer in the United States Army Reserve, including multiple deployments. When planning military training and operations, …


Are You Self-Reliant, Self-Sufficent, or Self-Sustaining?, by Mrs. Alaska

One of our goals each year is to decrease our dependency on others by increasing our skills and resources. In the city, it was convenient to pay for services and products. Living remotely, we learn to do many things ourselves or do without. I evaluate aspects of our life on a continuum from dependent to independent: Dependent on others Self-reliant Self-sufficient Self-sustaining Given recent news reports of coronavirus and the economy, tornadoes, wildfires, and power outages, perhaps readers are applying this sort of rubric to their situations, too.


Thoughts on a General Purpose AR-15 Rifle – Part 2, by Steve A.

(Continued from Part 1.  This concludes the article.) The mid-length and rifle length gas systems are known for operating the action more smoothly when compared to the carbine length system. The mid length gas system increases for the carbine length barrel. The longer gas tube gives a longer bolt carrier dwell time in the rifle, which lets all the moving pieces work a little more slowly and less violently but still quickly and energetically enough to let the bolt carrier move back fully and allow the bolt to strip the next round off of the magazine reliably. The entire recoil …


Thoughts on a General Purpose AR-15 Rifle – Part 1, by Steve A.

You are a safe and responsible firearms owner. After much research on the web and discussion with friends and family, you have made the decision to purchase or build up a general service AR15 style 5.56/.223 caliber rifle and accept the responsibility of doing so. You have a reasonable budget in mind. Now what? You can certainly go buy a complete factory rifle and do very well with it. However, particularly if you plan to use the rifle for a lot of different uses you may well wish to order it bult to your specifications or build it yourself. By …


IT Careers and Rural Living, by M.J.

I’m writing this as an expansion of JWR’s article posted on December 8, 2022. As he noted, many office jobs can now be done from home. This article is about how I got started in my career in Infomation Technology (IT). While bumpy at times, IT has really paid off for me financially. I hope that my article will inspire some readers to follow a similar path, which may allow them to escape the dysfunctional cities. For those who are already living in rural America, read on to find out about another way to earn income. I got started in …


Upgrade Your Bug Out Bag’s Batteries, by Kevin Berg

I recently finished reading another set of doom and gloom novels. I like these stories as they give me ideas of what to do or options to consider if the need arises. After I put the book down, I thought about the equipment that was used and if it was relevant to my needs. I pulled out my go bag and dumped out the contents. What a revelation to see some of my mistakes. There were three major areas of potential catastrophe. The first was that I had the wrong clothing for the season at hand. The second issue was …


A Young Man’s Preps – Part 3, by St. Leibowitz

(Continued from Part 2. This concludes the article.) Assembling Your Kits You should have or be in the process of getting some kind of long-range weapon and one or two blades for various tasks. These are going to be integrated into your preparedness primarily as hunting and survival tools, though defensive use is of course on your mind. I like to think of my supplies in terms of “kits.” In my teens, my Crosman 1377 air gun, slingshot, and some snare wire were my “small game kit,” which lived in an old Polish gas mask bag. In the same bag …