Category: Survival Mindset

Letter Re: Becoming the Bank in TEOTWAWKI

Hugh, I am writing concerning the post on “Becoming the Bank in TEOTWAWKI” by J.M. I have followed Survivalblog for the past five years and have worked hard to build a large supply of beans, bullets, and bandages, along with a supply of silver, gold, and cash. The posts over the past five years have been very informative, along with the advice from JWR & HJL. We have read that we need to have enough to be able to share as a testament of our Christian walk, and I hope to be able to do exactly that. We have read …


Family Disaster Planning, by N.J. – Part 1

“Poor Prior Planning Produces Pitifully Poor Performance”, or a similar version known as the “Six P’s”, is the mantra of this document. Plan ahead and you can survive most disasters. Disasters come in all shapes and sizes. In trying to put together a plan, it is best to have a plan that would “basically” fit any disaster by addressing the complications brought on by a disaster. These complications include loss of power, hampered communication, compromised safe location (temporary or permanent housing), limited resources (food, water, and clothing), financial hardship (separated for obvious reasons), lack of security, lack of transportation, reduced …


Letter Re: Getting A Real Education

HJL, No disputes on the article from me. It points out that the “college education” and the attendant debt only assures more debt and dubious occupation opportunities. I made the error of having a career. When the economy went down the tubes and I was out of work, I did the degree thing. I was left with debt. Essentially no job opportunities were there. The economy was still failing. Because I had experience and an education, I was told I was “overqualified”. Say what? Reentry in the job market was at minimum wage, in a job normally filled by a …


Livestock Breeding Strategies For When SHTF – Part 2, by S.W.

The goat is called the poor man’s cow. They are inexpensive, easy to handle, and eat a wide variety of vegetation. They are basically browsers, meaning they eat leaves and stems from shrubs and trees. They are the most efficient animal to convert browse to lean meat. When commercial feeds become unavailable, they would be the most likely survivors. They are also easily trained as pack and cart animals, able to pack 20 to 40% of their weight and pull five times that. They can negotiate more difficult terrain than any other pack animal and continue with only the water …


Letter Re: Moving Females in SHTF Scenario

Dear HJL, I’m a female and had some thoughts regarding C.B.’s letter on moving females. On one level, I was a little surprised that we needed special handling but agree that there are predators who do look for the most vulnerable victims out there, whether it’s TEOTWAWKI or not. I think my concern is that if someone is attempting disguise and the expectation is conveyed to them that they will be more vulnerable, it may pump up the fear level in them and that fear will show. I don’t think it is all that easy to truly disguise a female …


Seven Years of Preparation, by CHG (Chicken Hating Grandma)

We work best when we have a deadline, so our preparation began in October 2008 with hopes of reaching our goal in seven years. Our son, who is a university professor, became convinced that we had seven years to “prepare”; we were not sure of exactly what we were to prepare for though. (We thought perhaps he had changed his name to Joseph, since the Biblical Joseph had seven years to prepare before the seven years of famine.) We decided to join him, because it couldn’t hurt to be ready for any calamity. Our half-hearted efforts took on urgency after …


Letter Re: A Simpleton’s Guide to Preps

Hugh, Another letter in regards to A Simpleton’s Guide to Preps‘ overrated item #8 – NBC Equipment. BH appears to have forgotten the C in NBC. If you live near railroad tracks, chances are that a good deal of chemicals transit that line. A train derailment may be all that is between you and wishing that you had gotten some NBC gear for your family. In addition to a train line not too far off, there is a local fertilizer plant that could be an ammonia hazard. Not all NBC hazards mean that WWIII has broken out.


Letter Re: A Simpleton’s Guide To Preps: The Best And The Overrated

HJL, I enjoyed reading A Simpleton’s Guide To Preps: The Best And The Overrated, by B.H. He (she?) gave some excellent arguments against gold, generators, batteries – in one type of situation, but life is never that simple. The thing about crisis is we don’t get to choose what it looks like. It might be the lawless TEOTWAWKI they are describing. It might equally be a totalitarian jackbooted police state with severe deflation. It might be global thermonuclear war, or it might just be a national economic malaise, such as what Fernando FerFAL Aguirre went through in Argentina, 2001. In …


Moving Females in SHTF Scenario, by C.B.

The topic I want to discuss might seem pretty obvious to some of you and not so obvious to others. This article is going to discuss the transporting and safety of tactically untrained female members of your group. I’ve been a prepper for a number of years now, and I really haven’t ever seen anything on bugging out to a retreat or anywhere for that matter with untrained females in a SHTF scenario. First, let me give you some background on myself; it might help to establish some credibility with some of you. I have served in the U.S. military, …


A Simpleton’s Guide To Preps: The Best And The Overrated, by B.H.

The Best: Become a faithful, obedient Christian. Why? Because we’re thinking long-term. Prepping doesn’t exempt death; it just postpones it (maybe). If you believe in prepping for the few decades you have on this earth, doesn’t it make sense to prep for the eternity that follows? Develop a long-term attitude in all your preparations. Why? At various gun-shows and events I attend, I occasionally see a small patch for sale that reads, “Embrace the Suck.” How true this could be. Simply giving-up during bad times will most likely kill more folks than anything, including smoking unfiltered cigarettes or running with …


Letter Re: The Little Things, by Claymor

Hello Hugh, In the recent post entitled “The Little Things“, writer Claymor mentions the importance of water and of providing for a means of treating non-potable water. I certainly agree with this, however he goes on to assert “If you’re lucky you’ll die from dehydration before giardia takes claim.” This may not be the case. Every reputable survival school in the country teaches the same thing– if faced with the choice between drinking questionable water and suffering the effects of serious dehydration, you should (almost) always err on the side of drinking the water. The reasons for this are several: …


Letter: Mastitis

HJL, Mastitis nearly killed me. In a more primitive country, I could have been another maternal death statistic. Mastitis is just one path of infection and death for new mothers. Mastitis cannot be downplayed. Nor can the value of breast feeding “support” be over estimated. While my response to the excellent and informative article by Dr. Goscienski is intensely personal and private, perhaps in the future it may save a baby or mother’s life. I come from a comfortable family, in the socio-economic sense. It would not be correct to just say we are advocates of breast feeding. Simply, everyone …


Survival and Prepping in a Homeowner’s Association, by M.B. – Part 1

As federal, state, local, and county governments reel under the weight of reduced tax revenues, declining productivity, and impossible “unfunded liabilities” (pensions, entitlements and health–welfare services), many communities are only able to continue to operate and maintain their facilities and infrastructure due in whole or in part to self-governed Homeowner Associations (HOAs). “The fastest growing form of housing in the United States today is Common-interest developments (CIDs), a category that includes planned-unit developments of single-family homes, condominiums, and cooperative apartments. Since 1964, homeowner associations have become increasingly common in the USA. The Community Associations Institute trade association estimated that HOAs …


Guest Article: Evil Exists, by L.A.

When I was young, it was a whisper you heard in the school hallways or some television news story that you overheard your parents talking about. As children, we still played outside, rode our bicycles or skateboards all over town, and only came home right as the streetlights were coming on. There wasn’t really anything to be afraid of. Whatever evil there was back then, it at least stayed hidden in the shadows most of the time. Not anymore. Today’s world is something completely different. Evil is rampant and is increasingly seeking notoriety. More and more children are going missing, …


Guest Article: Tornado Survival Tips, by Matthew Stein, P.E.

Darden describes a family of five who lived on a farm outside of Higdon, Ala., a small community in the northern part of the state. They had no storm shelter, but they did live in a home that he says was well built. On Saturday, Darden and a partner visited the family. “The mother and three daughters were there at the time,” he recalls. Looking at the wall-free ground floor—all that remained of the home—”I introduced myself and said: Thank God y’all were not home. “Her response? “Oh, we were here.” With no storm shelter and nothing but a slab …