Alternative Foods in Famines, by ShepherdFarmerGeek

Several future scenarios include or produce famine on a very large scale. The goal of a famine feeding strategy is to get people from the beginning of the famine to the end alive and not permanently damaged. In extreme circumstances this may call for unusual measures…

Preparing for famine. We can be reasonably confident that any future crisis will include food scarcity. From EMP to pandemic, from war to drought, food is a critical resource. (The projected death rate from an EMP, including death from a variety of causes including famine, is 9 out of 10 Americans!) The sooner we can educate people about the dangers ahead the sooner every family can begin to prepare. Every little bit will help. And the sooner we start the better.
People need to know the facts in a non-inflammatory way and in a way they can relate to, “painting them a picture” so to speak of how it could affect them and their family. They need to know they cannot expect a government rescue, they need to take personal responsibility for their preparedness. And they need hope – to believe that their efforts can make a difference in the outcome.
Americans have been manipulated, lied to, cheated, and stampeded from issue to issue by unscrupulous people in government, education, the media, and even the church. We need a well thought-out strategy so that we don’t sound like crazies predicting the end of the world or selling something. That’s not going to happen without a lot of deliberation and work.

One of the reasons for getting a head start on famine preparedness is that the real experience of famine is horrible – it is surreal and disorienting and frightening. People need mental preparation, a sort of “mental inoculation” so that they are mentally, emotionally, and spiritually up for the challenge. Without this inner preparation many people will give in to paralysis and hopelessness and make an already dire situation worse.
Consider all the time and effort and materials that are going toward creating lovely politically-correct landscaping in 99% of American cities. Most of that landscaping could be replaced with food-producing plants, pasture grasses, fruit- or nut-producing trees, edible decorative plants, and even simply gardens. Fruit trees take several years to come to maturity – if people are going to plant them they are going to need to get going now..
As a group or a church becomes prepared their efforts will be multiplied by those in the community who catch the vision and understand the dangers. City policies for landscaping, even public landscaping, could be improved, and laws examined to allow emergency contractual changes to neighborhood covenants.
Gardeners need to be educated on how to grow insect resistant crops that don’t require pesticides, or that can be treated without commercial chemicals that will in all likelihood be unavailable. Cold-resistant and drought-resistant crops should be encouraged and seeds (for more than a single season’s planting!) and know-how distributed.

Stored foods. Clearly the best option in the face of famine is to buy food in advance! The challenges are (a) the cost of accumulating food over and above everyday consumption, (b) storing a large quantity of food, some of which will need special storage conditions, (c) making sure there is a nutritional balance, and (d) trying to guess how long a famine might last and how much might be needed. Because we can make some advance preparations now we even have the luxury of asking a nutritionist to help us develop a nutritionally sound plan, or of finding some individual or organization that has already done this basic meal planning. (A good resource is the LDS storage food calculator.)
In addition to a centralized storehouse, food storage should also be dispersed to individual homes as much as possible to make it harder to be all stolen or destroyed in one emergency or raid. Dispersed storage also means greater storage totals, and greater participation as people take personal responsibility. Bulk foods purchases could feed as many as 1,000 people for around $100 per day.

Raised foods. Raising basic, hardy crops such as beans, cabbage, beets / sugar beets, and potatoes can contribute significantly to the food available. It’s difficult to raise grain in a gardening situation, except for corn. Whether or not corn grows well will depend on what caused the famine in the first place – it typically needs a long, warm growing season which may not happen in some areas. Bean pollination can be improved (if insects are affected by cold or disease) by growing larger varieties and hand-pollinating. Sprouting grains in spring could provide an early “crop”. Unless massive amounts of vegetable seeds are made available to a community in advance, with gardening help, the first year’s crops are not going to come close to meeting the need.

Livestock. Livestock that can survive on foods that people do not eat (like grass) are an option (cows, sheep, rabbits, etc.), but livestock that requires grain input (chickens and turkeys) may not be an efficient use of the calories available. Care must be taken (if possible) not to eat livestock that may be needed for other essential purposes, such as oxen or horses for plowing or transportation. Growing children, the elderly, and the ill would benefit greatly from additional protein (eggs/meat) and fats.

Purchased/traded foods. In a famine some food typically continues to be available from traders or markets or even in stores, but at a significantly higher price. Saving up money to purchase food after a famine begins would be crazy, since far more food can be purchased for the same amount of money before it begins. But it’s possible that a delegation could be sent to other areas with a surplus to trade for food. A survival community theoretically could bring back additional food to sell to the public to cover the expenses of the trip.

Hunted/found foods. Hunting, fishing, trapping, and foraging are all good sources so long as there aren’t thousands of other people competing for the same resources. Once famine has thinned the population and concentrated people in the cities for government feeding programs, wild game and edible weeds/plants may rebound and be more available.

Gleaned foods. Combining a wheat field leaves significant amounts of grain still in the field where the combines miss the stalks – that grain can be collected. There may be fruit on fruit trees that was too difficult to reach or that was overlooked by pickers. All food harvesting processes should be investigated as possible gleaning candidates.

Discarded foods. An organized effort to collect food thrown out by restaurants and grocery stores could make a significant contribution to feeding people, and if nothing else scavenged foods may be fed to livestock to supplement their feed and indirectly contribute to feeding people. Fruit left in the field because of blemishes or damage, insect damage or rot, might yet have an edible portion. Even rotten, disgusting foods may provide highly-nutritious food for maggots (rather than feeding on feces), which can be safely consumed by humans.

Livestock feeds. Animal products like “All Stock” are made with bran, minerals, and molasses. It contains 12% protein (red wheat is typically 14%), 2% fat, 15% fiber, and vitamin A and D – it could be consumed by humans. “Cull peas,” a product of split pea manufacture, are peas that are too small to be processed for human use. A serving of pea soup has 8 grams of protein, 26 grams of carbs, 3 grams of fat, and 161 calories. Chicken scratch is just coarsely ground corn and wheat. It costs more than just plain whole corn and wheat, but if whole grain is not available the scratch is edible. The one thing to watch out for is that some foods unfit for human consumption are sometimes dumped in the livestock market – grains contaminated with mold, pesticides and other chemical contamination. Great care will need to be used to detect and avoid harmful feed (and it’s not good for the animals either!)

Insects. Millions of people around the world already know that the local insect population can be considered a potential food source. Maggots, or other large insects / bugs / worms such as earthworms and cicadas and grasshoppers are edible and nutritious when properly prepared. In ideal circumstances insects could even be raised, rather than having to be foraged for (found foods, below).  Insects could be fed foods that are unfit for human and livestock consumption and produce high quality protein in return.

Lake “seaweed”. Not all algae is edible (avoid globular and floating!), but the long stringy strand-types can be boiled (or pressure-cooked!) and consumed, containing starches and even fats. There may be water pollution issues, but in a worst-case scenario that would be a secondary concern. Blooms of algae (floating on surface or making the water turbid) can be highly toxic and make everything in the water, including fish, toxic. Saltwater kelp/dulse (sea lettuce) is edible.

Non-traditional foods.  Some things are edible (or could contribute nutrition to a meal) that are not commonly considered food. Some foods consumed by other cultures may have been rejected as too spicy, disgusting, or strong.  Even dogs, cats and horses in excess of what is needed for security and agriculture/hauling should be considered if times are desperate enough.  Bones discarded by butchers (turkey bones, chicken bones, etc.) contain valuable nutrients, as do organ meats including heart, lung, kidneys, liver, and intestines. They’re all edible, all safe and nutritious, and all consumed in many other non-Western cultures today. See e University database of foods known to be used by populations around the world in famine.  Just three crops – maize, wheat and rice – account for about 40% of the world’s consumption of calories and protein. 95% of the world’s food needs are provided for by just 30 species of plants. In stark contrast, at least 12,650 species names have been compiled as edible (Kunkel 1984)

Fillers. Historically, chaff and fine sawdust have been added to breads to make the flour go further and still be filling. It’s not nutritive, but it’s filling as a last resort. Steel-cut (pin-cut) oats can be added to chopped meats to extend the meats because the oats take on the flavor and are nutritious in themselves.           

A note about Vitamins. If every family would stockpile a year’s supply of a good multivitamin for each person it would be a huge help toward meeting their nutritional needs (particularly Vitamin D.) People escaping famine by pouring into Irish cities in the mid-1800’s died more frequently from disease caused by crowded conditions (and weakened immune systems) than directly by starvation. “In famines, most people do not die of hunger but of hunger-related fevers and diseases,” according to the excellent Multitext Project in Irish History.

Where do we start? “The minimum survivable calories varies between individuals, with 600 to 1,000 given as a standard range, according to the US Army Survival Handbook. The less active an individual is, the fewer calories he can eat and still survive.” There are a lot of variables to consider, and active, contributing persons would need more food than inactive and barely surviving ones. We don’t know how bad a famine will get or how long it will last, but we have to start somewhere:
The last time I checked, locally purchased wheat straight from the silo costs $200 a ton. That’s just 10¢ a pound. At 92 calories per ounce that works out to 1472 calories/pound, and around 14,000 calories per dollar (roughly 72¢ per person per day). Bulk, un-winnowed wheat could be the cheapest calories per dollar deal we can find, and could be the foundation for a desperate food planning strategy. If I did the math right about 1,000 people could be fed on $72 per day. It’s not impossible to save a lot of people.

“Pinto beans are much more nutritious but more expensive ($1,600 per ton at Costco), and corn, potatoes (dried or stored in cool/humid conditions), oats, sugar, oil (corn oil keeps and is inexpensive) – all can be bought in bulk. Using the figures from Paul B.’s SurvivalBlog article Staple Foods Storage By The Numberstarget nutrient categories per person per day are 112.5 grams of protein, 412.5 grams of carbohydrates, 100 grams of fat, and 40 grams of fiber. Much of that can be met with wheat, supplemented with other bulk foods as well as the alternative food sources mentioned above in this article.

Replant, Store, Raise, Hunt, Trap, Fish, Forage, Scavenge, Glean, Trade, and “eat outside of the box” – these are all famine survival strategies, but without a plan very little is going to get done. The effort in your community, your church, your club needs to begin NOW – today – and be led by the “vision bearer” – the person who “gets” that there is a storm coming and who has the leadership charisma to organize and motivate people. (This person might or might not be a person in the officially sanctioned ranks of an organization or church!)

Preparing for a famine, to prevent widespread death from hunger in our community, will be hard work that requires leadership and sacrifice and focus. We can probably save ourselves – those of us who have already been “prepping” for years – but the compassion of God calls us to save as many others as we can.
Find a way. Be Prepared. Trust God. We can do both.

A Personal Preparedness Success Story, by Ranger Mat

After being a reader of SurvivalBlog for some time now, I finally noticed the tag line, right under the title states: ‘The Daily Web Log for Prepared Individuals Living in Uncertain Times.’ While we all on here are preppers in one sense or another, the thing that we all have in common is that we look forward to being prepared for uncertain times. Things like financial meltdown, government tyranny, natural disaster, war, famine, all occupy our minds at one point or another during our preparation considerations.

I recently had a personal ‘uncertain time’ hit me and my family. I have been attending classes at the local university and my wonderful wife had been supporting us with her employment when we both hit a stage of burnout. Studying Recreation, I knew the importance of taking a break to recharge ourselves, so we attended a conference out of town that covered a topic that we both found interesting for a short vacation. We even managed to find some extra funding from my university to attend, so the trip was not overly costly for us.

What ended up being costly for us was the failure to account for the lost income that came from the time off. For the next few months, unexpected bills from medical expenses due to both of us falling ill over a few months, as well as from some other mistakes that we made began to rear their ugly heads to hunt us down. Other monetary items began to creep up on us as well, such as Christmas, needing to fix up the car for license renewal, and other things drained much of our bank accounts.

As I was not working, I personally went through a time of depression, feeling useless because I was unable to personally support my family. My wife had her own depression, fearing that our debts and unforeseen needs would drain us financially and we would need to move in with one of our families. Both of our families still have children living at home and are helping to support our other siblings who are having their own hard times. My parents are also caring for my aging grandmother, while in my wife’s family, my father in law had to retire after working for his company for 20 years. Originally we felt, when the money was good, that being independent was the best way we could finically assist our individual parents. Now we feared that we might need to move home and add more burden to our strapped families.

This is where our preparations came into play for us, and provided a great blessing in the way of the foresight of our actions earlier when times were better. We thankfully were able to begin using the food storage that we had set away of the few years that we have been married, and did not have to buy nearly as much food each trip during the couple of months that we were financially hurting. This is because our food storage was based on the ‘Eat what you store, Store what you eat,’ school of thought. Other things that proved useful to us was having bought good quality household items that didn’t need much maintenance (other than my aging car) and putting extra money away into a few savings accounts. With our savings, we were able to pay for many of our unforeseen expenses, like the needed car repairs.

Some things that we learned from this experience, other that the need for both food and money preparations, is the need for a greater variety of food in our stores. There are only so many ways that you can prepare pasta and spaghetti sauce. On warm days, a pot of soup is not the best idea. Having good quality clothing is as important as food stored away. For cold nights, good bedding helped save money on our gas bill by allowing us to turn down the thermostat. Facebook is a good tool for contacting family and friends during a job search. Knowing about free or other forms of cheap entertainment, even when you have money, can help you have things to do when you don’t have money. A night out with friends can cost as little as some spare time, an enjoyable video, and the ability to laugh. It is emotionally beneficial to have ways to relax and entertain yourself, especially in times of high stress. I can’t imagine what things would have been like if we had any sort of addiction that we had to pay for on top of everything else.

This experience also reminded me of the time when my father lost his job, and my family needed to rely on what we had stored and could grow. For a while, our diet was bread and butter, corn and potatoes from our garden, and some cheese. It wasn’t the best diet, and for a while after, fresh baked bread and a certain dry soup mix made me lose my appetite. As a teenager at the time, I was afraid of having friends over for fear of knowing how poor we were. It was a hard time but that experience led to some of the greatest blessings that my family had.

Now I feel that my wife and I are in store for some great blessings as well, or at least we hope. My wife recently found a new job, with better pay and better benefits, and I have found a job as well that is within walking distance of our home, which will save us some money as well. We are rebuilding our preps and savings now. My new job involves handling money at a register, and my boss allows me to exchange coins from my own pocket for pre-1965 coins that I dig out of the change compartments, so we are adding some silver to our stores as well. We are considering finding ways to add other foods to our storage that we didn’t have before and working on adding other preparations to our stores also. I am also working on other skills that I want to have, but never felt I had time for because of my schooling and other duties. We are also planning on learning gardening by working with our parents’ gardens when pleasant temperatures return in the Spring. I used much of my Christmas gift money for tools that I can use in a disaster, or just around the house. I have sent in for my CCW permit, and my wife is considering getting one of her own when we have the income to afford it. As we rebuild, another one of my goals is to increase my prepper network, and have a group to work with to mutually uplift and educate each other or to help each other if things truly get Schumeresque.

We are again on the road to building a better life for ourselves and our future children. We are thankful for the resources that have helped us in the short while we have been preparing for the unknown future. Our experience has helped us in other personal ways in planning our future better and discovering more goals for ourselves. We came closer together as a couple during our ordeal, and my wife is more enthusiastic about preparing, and her family wants to learn more about it was well. We also are working on being more social with others around us. Only our family and a couple of very close friends knew about the extent of our troubles. I don’t think that the leader of our local congregation even knew.

While thinking about being a hero in a disaster or other unusual situations can be fun or entertaining at times, or just knowing that you have a better ability to survive can be comforting, I believe that many of us will be much more likely to face a disaster of a personal nature, like a lost job or being short of income, especially in this economy. Things like having spent years of my life camping have taught me to get by with less than I am typically accustomed too, and I feel that if the SHTF I will be able to get by. Having lived in tornado and hurricane country and seeing the effects of such storms, I know that people are more likely to experience inconveniences that disasters cause, rather than fighting inside the Thunderdome. That is not to say that I don’t ever think about being the hero in times of extreme crisis or natural disaster, because I do. And I am also not saying that this is the solitary event to plan for, but I want to share that, while I have seen many natural disasters and sat at the feet of others who have experienced more than I have, the biggest need for my preparations came from the small and simple things that throw off the everyday stability and create for us ‘uncertain times.’

Letter Re: Alaska as a Retreat Locale

James,
I felt compelled to write this letter response to Thomas K’s post from January 18th. I found his second point to be racist at worst and ignorant at best. I must first point out that I am not a politically correct minded
person nor do I wish my letter to come across as Jessie Jackson-ish rhetoric. I am married to a Manila-born Chinese/Filipino who moved to the US when she was a year old and has spent about the last 20 out of
her 27 years as an American Citizen. I had a chance to visit the Philippines in 2010 with her and her family and based on my observations there I would say that most Filipino’s would have an advantage over most Americans in a disaster. The first reason I believe this is that they already know how to go without the things that we Americans take for granted, such as consistent running water, electricity, and automobile transportation.

Secondly, Filipino’s are some of the most resourceful people on earth. Anyone who has been to the Philippines will tell you about the most recognizable form of transportation in the country which is the Jeepney which is basically a bus that was constructed from US military Jeeps that were left behind after WW2. This is just one example of the ingenuity of the Filipino’s. My third and final point is that Asian cultures as a whole place a huge emphasis on family and they will band together and help each other out in a disaster situation. Look at how Japan responded to the earthquake/tsunami last year and the Korea Town response to the Los Angeles riots as an example. Now I understand that there are some Asian gangs and criminals and there might be a high percentage in Anchorage as Thomas K. suggested. But this does not give him the excuse to write off all of the Asians in Alaska as thugs that will take each other out. I would be happy to have Asians as my neighbors during a disaster and I have a feeling if Thomas K. would learn a bit more about this amazing people and culture he would feel the same. – Josh H. in the Pacific Northwest 

Letter Re: Cash Transaction Limits in Belgium

Hi,
Recently on the news here in Belgium they said there’s soon going to be a law effective that limits cash payments to 5,000 euro maximum, and in 2014 this limit would be decreased to only 3,000 euro. Officially it’s to limit ‘black money’. Haven’t heard much other things about it (no questions, protests, ..) so it’s interesting to follow up if that’s only our government being creative
(which I doubt) or that other European countries will also apply a similar law, maybe as a way to be able to devaluate the euro currency in a few years. – A. in Belgium

Letter Re: Keeping Chickens in a Backyard Flock

Mr. Rawles,
I very much enjoyed reading the article about Keeping Chicken in a Backyard Flock, by Nightshade. I have 58 hens and seven roosters and I enjoy every one of them. I did want to address one statement, however. It’s concerning the comment about the presence of a rooster and his ability to produce a hormone that turns bad cholesterol into good cholesterol. Perhaps the author of this author could verify that claim? I have contacted the nutrition experts at our state’s university research center on the matter, and they have informed me that there is no scientific evidence to support that claim. They said: “Dietary cholesterol, cholesterol that is found in the food itself, including meats and meat based products, are not measured by HDL and LDL and instead listed just as dietary cholesterol. Once a person has consumed the food, whether it contains dietary cholesterol, dietary fat or a combination, the person’s body makes cholesterol to handle/transport the fat and cholesterol. This transport includes HDL and LDL among others. The type and amount of each is unique to the individual and each person’s body handles the lipids (fats) differently. So, even if the egg were to have more HDL (which it wouldn’t) there is no guarantee that once it was ingested it would react the same way. Your body may choose to handle the cholesterol differently dependent on several factors.”

Personally, I believe that the nutrition of the egg and the hen that lays it is directly correlated with the diet she is given. Green grass and other green matter is very good to supplement the diet, and is said to reduce the cholesterol of the egg. The rooster should be more fertile on the same diet. I have had questions before now about whether the presence of a rooster would cause a hen to lay more, but I haven’t found any claims to suggest that. I suppose that if nothing else, the rooster crows very early in the morning, which wakes the hens up so they get off the roost and thus are exposed to more light, which is what makes them lay more. My purpose for having roosters is to produce fertile eggs for the sake of hatching new chicks and for them to to watch for hawks and owls when my flock is free ranging. It may be possible that the sperm has some nutritional benefit, I suppose, but I can’t find any proof of it. Sincerely, – A.R.

Economics and Investing:

AmEx (American Expat) spotted this at Arutz Sheva: ‘Dr. Doom’ Investor: Prepare for World III

G.B. mentioned this podcast: McAlvany Interview with John Williams of Shadow Statistics. Williams warns of hyperinflation, saying: “The Federal government will print money until it fails.”

Reader Dean G. recommended a great post from Tim Price, at Sovereign Man: The Final Countdown

 

Items from The Economatrix:

Greek Default Imminent

Iran Oil Ban Means Economic Suicide for Europe

Correction In Gold is Over and on Way to $4,500

Recovery at Risk as Americans Raid Savings

Odds ‘n Sods:

Solar blast heading our way.

   o o o

This medieval solution probably wouldn’t be used in western countries, for fear of lawsuits: Indonesian railway stringing concrete balls to deter roof riders. (Needless to say, the Indonesians are not famous for The Subtle Approach.)

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George S. found an interesting series of articles by a journalist in Washington, DC who wanted to buy a pistol: Emily Gets Her Gun. This is a lengthy chronicle of her travails, jumping through all the fiery hoops to get permission to buy a gun in the District of Criminals. And even after all of that, she can’t carry the gun, only keep it at home. I should mention that things are much different here in The Unnamed Western State. You just walk into a gun show, buy what you want from another private citizen, and take it home. (Or you can buy it at a Federally licensed gun shop, but who likes filling out paperwork?)

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Alan in Maryland wrote to mention that Marjorie Wildcraft has released a three-DVD course on “Grow Your Own Groceries” that is being offered for sale with a bonus book “How to Grow More Vegetables”.  Here is the link:

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Mike sent this: Tor Operations Security

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“O our God, wilt thou not judge them? for we have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do: but our eyes [are] upon thee.” – 2 Chronicles 20:12 (KJV)

Letter Re: The Year I Accidentally Grew Wheat

Hey There!
I really enjoyed reading “Year I Accidentally Grew Wheat”, by Gonzo In Virginia. It’s a familiar scenario to me, as I have learned many valuable and interesting lessons by accident as well. I wanted to comment on one of the things that was mentioned in this great post. At the end o, of the article, he mentions that he now has some knowledge of ways he can use his stored wheat. I have something to add, that I learned by accident myself. If you are using your stored grain for planting (which I did last year) you will discover that there are many, many different kinds of (in this case) hard white wheat. I had at least five different types of wheat in my milling stores. They all had different maturity dates, different mature heights, different head shapes, etc. So, if you are planning to grow wheat, it would be better to buy pure seed wheat and then ever after have pure seed for growing. – Gracie Wray

Note from JWR:

A reminder that Safecastle’s Freedom Awards Finalists are now posted on Safecastle’s blog site for public viewing and voting. One of the finalists is K.M., for his article “What is a Well-Stocked First Aid Kit?” (that appeared in SurvivalBlog.) Please post your vote for your favorite article or video before midnight on January 20th.

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Today we present another two entries for Round 39 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:

First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) 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 C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $275 value), and E.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo.

Second Prize: A.) A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol. It is a $439 value courtesy of Next Level Training. B.) A FloJak F-50 hand well pump (a $349 value), courtesy of FloJak.com. C.) A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $300, D.) A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials, and E.) two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value) and F.) A Tactical Trauma Bag #3 from JRH Enterprises (a $200 value).

Third Prize: A.) A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21. (This filter system is a $275 value.), B.) Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy. This is a $185 retail value, C.) A Commence Fire! emergency stove with three tinder refill kits. (A $160 value.), and D.) Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security.

Round 39 ends on January 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Self-Sufficient Farming in East Prussia in the 1930s and 1940s, by Mrs. Icebear

Please keep in mind that English is not my mother tongue, and that these recollections are from the perspective of a young girl, now in advanced years.

My mother-in-law grew up in what was then called East Prussia (Ostpreussen) – now Poland. She was born 1929 – got twice evacuated – the first time at the age of 14. The beautiful area is called “die Mazurische Seenplatte” and  “die Mazuren” and is today developed for tourism.

I´ve picked her brains to learn as much as I can, and here are some of the things she remembers of life on the farm back then:

Father, mother and 8 children lived abundantly – with spare produce to sell (and saving up money to buy more land) on 35 hectares (about 75 acres) of ground.  8 hectares was mixed forest, 27 hectares tilled land and meadow for grazing. A river ran near the farm, there the animals drank, the geese and the ducks swam (one child had to keep fox-watch), and net fishing for dinner was done. From the meadow and forest they got wood for building the houses, firewood, all kinds of berries, nuts and mushrooms, healing herbs like peppermint and chamomile, linden flowers and birch juice, rushes were collected from the river.
They all had a lot of work to do, schoolwork was done in between farm chores. In the evening there was singing and storytelling while spinning, knitting, shoemaking, horse tack making, basketry, small carpentry, sorting peas, shelling beans, feathering the ducks and geese  was done by petroleum light. The children had almost no toys, but my mother in law got her first and only doll. She put the poor doll close to the oven so it wouldn´t feel so cold – and the doll melted.
The animals on the farm were: geese and ducks for down bedding, meat and eggs, chicken for eggs (own use and market sale), some sheep (less than 10) to make own wool, 6-7 pigs for sale and own use, around 20 cows strictly for sale of milk/ butter/cheese (i.e. not for slaughtering), three cats as mouse police living in the barn, a guard dog and 3-4 horses for traveling and farm work like plowing. The father was the exclusive handler of the horses, and even so he once got severely kicked by the most nervous horse and had to be hospitalized because he (in a tense market situation) forgot to talk to the horses before he came up to them! While the father was hospitalized the mother got (organized by the state) an inexperienced 15 year old “white Russian” forced labourer to help out on the farm – she had to teach him everything in sign language. He stayed on since both sons of the family had to go to war. Later, when the Red Army invaded East Prussia this boy saved the whole family by testifying that he had always been treated correctly, he even cried and begged to be allowed to stay. Families got shot to the last member if they had treated the forced labourers badly.

A doctor and hospital was 20 kilometers away in a bigger town, so the trip there was a big project. The school principal owned the only car in the village (a Volkswagen Beetle). The 3 kilometer trips to school and church were generally done on foot – the horses were spared for farm work apart from on very special holidays.

After the first evacuation to another village an “ordinary man” got the job of being local priest, grave digger and dentist. Dentistry meant getting a tooth pulled out without any ado and pain killers. Infections were completely avoided by rinsing with alcohol and chewing plantain leaves.

The children walked the three kilometers to school in summer barefoot or in “jesuslatschen”, (toe sandals) – in winter in wooden clogs the father made. Later he advanced to making leather shoes for the children – he bought the leather but the thread for rough sewing they grew on the farm: Linen/ flax was grown for the fiber and as animal fodder. The linen fibers got soaked in tar and were used to make tack for the horses and thread for sewing shoes.

Some things that the family bought: Petroleum oil for the lamps, linen fabric for sewing bedclothes, underwear and kitchen towels (dresses and such were made by the village seamstress), salted herrings, salt, sugar, pepper, cinnamon, feather pens, ink, schoolbooks (handed down to all the children in turn), small blackboards with chalk for individual writing, from the 5th class real schoolbooks for writing in. They also bought nails and carpentry tools of course, sewing notions and even a sewing machine. (The sewing machine got hidden in the earth cellar in the forest when they had to evacuate – sadly the family never came back to reclaim it.)
The family built their own house with relatives to help, they grew/ raised/ collected all their own food except the aforementioned herrings,  for instance meat got cured by smoking with juniper.
They also made their own bedding (mattresses filled with straw, exchanged when necessary, counterpanes and pillows filled with down and feathers), spun their own wool, made all knitted clothes like socks, sweaters, mittens etc. The father made baskets of all sizes and shapes, also for animal feed (through shape), either from willow or split and watered tree roots, and he also made some of the simpler farming tools out of wood. Strangely enough none of this got sold, just the farm produce. (During the war years nobody wanted to get paid in money, so the family paid the seasonal farm workers in meat, butter, cheese and eggs.) They collected all their own seeds, made jam, pickles and “sauerkraut”. Peat and wood kept the “kachelofen” running, an enormous oven built into the house, including a built in water heater and a big bread baking oven that got used for eight sour dough loaves once a week (cakes were made afterwards since the oven was heated up.)

The horses got fed hay, clover and oats, the cows got hay, clover and thinly sliced turnips, and the aforementioned linen seed/flax mix if ill or having just calved.
The dishes were first rinsed with clear water so the pigs could drink the swills.
The crops were: Potatoes, red beets, turnips, beets, carrots, peas, beans (pinto beans), red cabbage (got stored with the complete root in sand in the cellar) white cabbage for sauerkraut, oats, wheat, rye, barley, cucumbers for pickles, and squash/ pumpkin plus garden herbs like chives and parsley.  Flax and clover was grown for the animals.
Rushes of different kinds were cut up and put on the clay floor in the ”old house” – it smelled good and was easy to brush out again since it made no sense to wash a clay floor. This practice was discontinued after the new house was built with wooden floors.
 
My mother in law´s mother got struck dead by lightning during the years as a refugee. The sun was shining again after a thunderstorm , but she was leading a goat and a sheep in iron chains, one in each hand… The father died of pneumonia because of having to do forced labour in winter, one son barely survived Stalingrad (he “just” lost one and a half legs to frostbite) but all the children managed somehow to escape to the west and start their lives anew there. 

The most sought-after barter goods in war time (after food) were: watches, cutlery (a fork could buy a piece of bread) and fur coats! Guns made zero sense in this situation, since that only would have gotten one killed faster.  Being devious, hiding and/or keeping calm in the face of danger was the way – or simply appealing to the human side of war-traumatized soldiers: My mother-in-law had many narrow escapes – once she got found cowering behind the dresses by a Russian soldier rifling through the clothes cupboard with a bayonet, and he spared her life because mother cried and begged for her; once she came running to her father with Russian soldiers on her heels, so father fast dug her into the strawstack he was just making. He stood calmly still on the stack over the spot where she hid – the soldiers pushed bayonets through the stack but she thanks God they missed her every time. Her father did like the other farmers, they used coal “make up” to accentuate their wrinkles and thereby appear older and useless for other things than farming. The soldiers wanted to “take him” (i.e. to Siberia), but he insisted he had to feed the cows otherwise they (the cows) would starve – and food was the number one priority also for the Red Army, so he was spared.

My personal conclusion: Know when to keep your guns in the cupboard, get distilling equipment for making your own alcohol! In case your antibiotics get too old/ used up or you have a resistant strain of some bug or the culprit is a fungus or virus – get books on herbs now, grow Echinacea, stock up on tea tree oil and baking soda (for your teeth)! Thyme, sage and honey will fix almost everything. Grow paprika/ red peppers (window sill) and rose hips for vitamin C. Plantain chewed to a pulp heals cuts, sores, and acne;  aspirin was originally synthesized from willow bark. If you have a chance, grow tons of nut trees, and maples for the syrup, and when your vitamin pills get used up remember that nettles, nuts and dandelions contain lots of important vitamins and minerals.

Dragging Your Family Into Preparedness, by W.M.

I am 52 years old – a working woman, a wife, mother, stepmother, grandmother, sister, aunt, cousin, niece, and daughter.  My parents had six children, I have six grown children, and you can start counting out from there.  We are a big family.  We are the typical outgrowth of middle class American suburbia. 

Some of us are financially better off, but all of us are accustomed to our luxuries, even if that means rich, freshly ground coffee in the morning or a delicious sip of good red wine in the evening.  Many of us lost substantial resources during the past few years of economic turmoil and others fared okay.  Still, we have our little luxuries.
We are geographically dispersed and independent, but emotionally close and communicative.  Not a day goes by that a handful of us are not communicating by text, cell phone, Facebook, or email.  A theme has emerged among most of us.  A few of us are more serious than the others are, and have engaged in lengthy phone conversations with one another.  We are all afraid.  It is as if we have all been on the same wavelength, but hesitant to discuss our fears lest we sound crazyas.

Now, we are talking.  Tentatively, but talking.  Each of us has begun to prepare in his or her own way.
One brother has stockpiled ammunition and weapons in his garage, bought an old used RV, has enough plywood in the garage to board up all the house windows, and reads every survival blog he can get his hands on.  One son-in-law has quietly, and carefully, acquired an array of weaponry and sufficient ammunition to get out of dodge with.  One sister and her husband purchased property somewhere in the suggested American Redoubt complete with habitation and a fresh water source.  One carefully watches every political move made by the current Administration and keeps an eye on world affairs.  He also has brushed up on his shooting skills.  One buries his head in the sand and pretends that nothing bad could ever happen in America.

I research and gather books on every topic.  I have an intellectual knowledgebase that is astounding.  I realized however that I had to stop reading and start doing.  I stopped the expensive salon visits.  What in the world am I doing spending money on fancy hair color, fabulously long nails, and perfect little toes, when the world is falling apart?  I save change and sort the older coins into old food cans.  I am stocking my pantry.  I stopped buying expensive cleaning products and learned to wash dishes, laundry, and just about everything else with simple ingredients: ivory soap, vinegar, and bleach.  I keep a sufficient amount of cash hidden in the house.  I try to keep the gas tanks full and got everything that needed fixin’ on both our SUVs fixed.  We paid off the debt.  It is like undergoing a lifestyle change in advance of actually needing to.  Every time I go to do something or buy something, I ask myself if it is necessary.  I might as well start practicing now to live without.  A startling fact is that many of us who were born in and around the 1950s, have lived incredibly well for most of our lives.  That, we fear, is about to change.

This is hard.  My husband has ignored my efforts for a year or two, but he has not resisted them.  My grown children started noticing my efforts and asked what I was doing.  I think they feared that I had suffered an early entrance into Alzheimer’s.  I decided that I would walk the talk before talking about it.  Now that I have everyone’s attention, I am pulling the disparate efforts together like a project manager of a reluctant development team.
First_things_first.  I prayed.  However, it was more like crying.  I know that our Father is not the father of fear.  I want to prepare in peace, and confidence, trusting that God will bless our efforts. 

My mother’s response to “prepping” was that the rapture would occur, the Lord will return, and all of His people will be caught up in the air to be with Him.  I reminded my dear mother of History and that no man knows the time of His coming.  I lovingly encouraged her to stock up her pantry, keep some cash on hand, the gas tank full, and have had her practice to driving to our home in the adjoining state a few times.  Should she be unable to drive, I have a son-in-law who has agreed to gather her and my father on his way out of town with his little family.  She has agreed to the arrangement, even though she thinks I’ve lost it.

My grown daughters, as precious and wonderful as they are, also think I’ve lost it.  Nevertheless, they are playing along and that is all I care about.  Two of my sons are completely onboard.  One is serving in our military, the other is taking steps to get things fixed with his car, stock up on a week’s worth of rations, and he too is practicing at the gun range.  He has also built up strength by mountain biking and believes he can get out of the metro area he lives in on his bike with a backpack full of supplies.  That is probably very smart planning.  The other son is completely out of touch with anything that smacks of reality, bless his heart.  He thinks the world owes him a living and he is chasing it down for all he is worth.  We may get him going in the right direction eventually.

In three days, we will be convening in one location, my home, to discuss our emergency evacuation plans.  We will be building our bug out bags together.  I purchased the supplies and stocked them in a spare bedroom.  I begged, pleaded, played Pitiful Pearl, and demanded that the family meet together for a planning meeting.  I convinced a good dozen of the family members to meet and that is a good start. 
You see, when your life has never truly been hard, it is difficult to imagine what hard is, and planning for hard is so unfamiliar, it is too hard to do.

I am truly minimizing the fact that my life has not been easy because compared to the rest of the world, it has been easy.  I lived too close for comfort to the poverty line for many years raising my first set of children as a single mother.  I have an undeniable work ethic and taught it to my children.  I remarried years later to a man who had also been a single parent for a long time and he too will never stop working at something.  While he thinks I’m a bit off my rocker, I saw a glimmer of understanding the other day and he said to me, “what is the best route out of here if we need to go”, and “remember we have the business warehouse if we need to stockpile”.  Gasp!  He has been observing!

While this all may sound simplistic to those of you who are “professional preppers”, there may be many out there, who like me, just don’t know where to begin.  You grab your Starbucks in the drive-through on your way to work.  You take business calls via the Bluetooth on your commute.  You fly into work and dig through mountains of demands, and deal with exasperating people all day long.  You fight the traffic on the way home.  You throw off your jacket, tie on an apron, and do amazing things with pre-packaged foods as you pour a glass of wine as you flip through the mail.  You pay the bills online; call your mother; throw food to the dog; throw a load of clothes in the washer, kiss your husband and pass out.  But you cannot sleep.  Because you are afraid.

I do not want to live in fear.  I want to prepare and this is my plan. 

Firstly, I have begun to simplify my life in an organized way and to stock up on basic food supplies.  I will dispense with as much luxury as I can make myself let go of.  Oh yes, store brand coffee in the big cans tastes horrible, but I call it my emergency coffee and it is inexpensive.  Store brand dried milk, rice, pasta, sugar, flour, and olive oil are beginning to line the pantry walls, along with canned goods.  Bottles of spring water are beginning to crowd the pantry floor.  This is child’s play in the prepper world, but you must start somewhere.  My motto: Just do it.

One of the interesting things about our modern society that I learned in my studying is that we have what is called Just-In-TimeJIT supply chain.  Just-In-Time means that there are no longer local warehouses full of food and other supplies.  There are centralized warehouses across the country and the closest one to you could be many states away.  Your local grocery store would run out of food in days should SHTF.  Moreover, they would not be able to restock.  Once the shelves empty, they would stay empty.  That is why something as simple as buying extra at the grocery store is so important.

Secondly, I have taken the initiative to purchase bug out bags for almost a dozen family members.  In order to receive the bug out bag, one must attend a family planning meeting.  These preparations are what I call Stage 1 and this stage assumes that you will prepare where you are. 

Stage 1 consists of:

  • Realization that the threat of TEOTWAWKI is real
  • Respond with preparation efforts as a family or community
  • Stock the pantry
  • Keep cash on hand
  • Prepare your bug out bag(s)
  • Take a skills inventory
  • Pray together, take deep breaths, and encourage one another
  • Plan together for Stage 2

Stage 2 assumes that you must leave your home.  It may mean that many will have to leave their homes and congregate at a family member’s home that has been deemed the “safest” after thoughtful consideration by the group.  The “safe house” will need to be stocked for the group and all members should contribute.  Our family is in Stage 1, which is better than Stage 0.  We have quarterly meetings planned to determine how the “safe house” should be provisioned and to monitor its provisioning.  We are also in the process of identifying a “way station”.  We live on the edge of a vast desert, not a green and lush national forest.  We have identified where small towns and water sources exist by taking short trips.  Effectively, what a way station will do is allow you to transport your provisions to an out of the way location most likely not affected by the same problems, as a larger town or city would be.  It is only a stopgap measure.

Stage 3 is truly TEOTWAWKI and in our formative planning stage from the viewpoint of Stage 1, we are each in the process of obtaining passports should there come a time when we need to leave the country.  That topic could fill a book and there are a few I know of who are writing or have written books advising Americans on alternative places to live.  SurvivalBlog has copious information on retreats and a most recent column entitled “I Can See You” — A Digital View of Your Survival Preparations, by Dave X, has led me to believe that it might be better to “disappear in place” or leave the country rather than build a retreat. The takeaways for newbies like me:

  • People will think you are crazy, an extremist, and overreacting – Ignore them.
  • Your family may be secretly wishing someone would take charge and project manage the family into preparedness – Start talking about it.
  • Educate yourself – Every spare moment.
  • Getting to Stage 1 is “do able” – Just do it.
  • Planning for Stage 2 requires a group, be it a family or community.
  • Planning for Stage 3 is the final goal, but remember that Heaven is the truly final destination.

Perhaps the most difficult part of emergency preparedness is facing the reality of TEOTWAWKI.  It is like discovering you have cancer, only it’s your country that has cancer.  Drastic surgery and chemotherapy may only delay the inevitable – death of one of the greatest countries this world has ever seen.  Just remember, and know in your heart of hearts, that we are only sojourners on this earth.

Hypertension Prevention and Planning, by Dr. Bob and Docswife

Along our continuing efforts to make prevention a big part of our push to inform, we need to now address hypertension.  High blood pressure is by far and away the most common condition experienced by the general population of the United States. Anti-hypertensive drugs are a multi-billion dollar business and for good reason.  High blood pressure, especially under or untreated, can lead to heart disease, stroke, memory problems, headaches, kidney failure, liver disease, bowel troubles, blindness, and can contribute to other serious disease states.  High blood pressure is a serious problem.  If you have high blood pressure; surely you have been told to eat right, lose weight, control your stress, cut down on your salt intake, get in shape, and take your medication.  With the right luck (genetically) and hard work, most people can reduce or eliminate their need for medication by following those lifestyle modifications.  But, we are Americans.  We don’t like being told what to do and most of us are too darn lazy to change our lifestyle and so instead, we take pills.  That time is past.  Prepping means doing everything you can to be ready to live a self-sufficient, independent life if there was a disaster of regional or national scale.
 
Sometimes, the best efforts lead to poor rewards here on Earth.  After you have mastered yoga, maintained your diet and exercise program, and become a model blood pressure control experiment–sometimes you still need to be on medication due to your genetics.  Stupid ancestors, left you hypertension and no trust fund.  The nerve.  There are major differences in medications for blood pressure control.  The first being the most important from a planning standpoint:  generic verses branded.  Brand-named medications are very expensive, and most-often completely unnecessary.  Generic hypertension medications include nearly all classes of medications and are usually very cheap.  Atenolol, for example, is about 15 dollars a year.  Brand-named Beta Blockers can run hundreds of dollars a month.  The same applies to almost every category of blood pressure medications:  ACE-inhibitors, Aldosterone Antagonists, ARBs, Antiadrenergic Agents, Beta-Blockers, Calcium-Channel Blockers, Diuretics (3 types), Nitrates, and “other”.  There were only seven types when medical school started for me, now there’s nine. What will it be in another 15 years?  Surely more types and lots more of these meds going generic.
 
One problem has popped up recently in regard to generics though:  drug companies sometimes won’t make generics because they don’t make enough money on them.  This is especially the case if the government is involved.  Recently, this happened across the US with the generic medication Triamterene/HCTZ (Maxzide and Dyazide).  Earlier this year many folks could not get this medication… sometimes for months, and had to switch to other medications altogether.  There have been many articles rearing up over the last months about possible medication shortages here in the US, from antibiotics to hypertension meds.

For the sake of scenario discussion, what happens when you run out of blood pressure meds and your pressure goes up?  The things that you would expect will happen:  pressure in your head, eyes, and neck; possibly headaches and neck pain; often swelling of the feet/legs and hands.  As blood pressures are high and stay high; the risk of stroke, heart attack, and kidney failure increases, as do eye problems from the hemorrhage risk.  Often small bleeds inside the head can cause spotty vision, nausea, vomiting, and confusion before death.  But, high blood pressure is labeled “the silent killer” for a reason; most of the time a person does not experience the symptoms of high blood pressure until it is too late.
 
So, what is a person with medication-controlled hypertension to do to prepare for TEOTWAWKI?  Mexico?  Canada?  The pet store?  Your doctor’s office?  My Surviving Healthy site?  Any, all, some is your answer.  The pet store is not likely to be a help to you, but other sources can prepare you for an uncertain future.  Make sure you do absolutely everything you can to adjust your lifestyle to drop your blood pressure, as mentioned above.  After that, work with your doctor to get on only generic medications if at all possible.  Then, if your doctor will not work with you to stockpile medications, you need to find another way.  You will need to investigate costs, border issues, travel, and storage before you will be able to put meds up on your storage shelves.  Stock bottles of 100 or 1000 will have a much longer expiration and will last longer on your shelves than standard 30-day prescriptions.  Try to get stock bottles whenever possible, many pharmacies will provide 100 count stock bottles instead of a 90 day supply, if asked.
 
With or without medications WTSHTF, if you suffer from high blood pressure, avoid heavy upper-body straining as this has been shown to increase sudden intercranial hemorrhages.  Avoid dead-lift type straining also as the same mechanism would apply.  Leave the heavy lifting to the normal blood pressure folks.  Control your stress and make your medications last as long as possible if facing a shortage by staggering doses over the timeperiod you expect to be unable to get your medication.  If you have 90 days left and expect to not see any more for a year for example, stagger the pills every 3-4 days to get them to last as close to that year as possible.  Being out for 6 months by taking them every other day will certainly be more dangerous than spacing them out over more time.  Neither is a great option, it is much better for you to be able to have some medication on your shelves to plan for disasters–short or long.

JWR Adds: Dr. Bob is is one of the few consulting physicians in the U.S. who prescribes antibiotics for disaster preparedness as part of his normal scope of practice. His web site is: SurvivingHealthy.com.

An Update To Our Contact Page–Combatting Spammers

Because our e-mail box is now getting hammered with more than 100 pieces of spam mail per day, we are now reluctantly removing the direct e-mail links in SurvivalBlog. Henceforth, all of the “e-mail us” links will be directed to our Contact page. There, at the the top of the page, you will see a fractured e-mail address: james–AT SYMBOL–rawles.to (Change the “–AT SYMBOL–” to @). This formatting is designed to divert web spiders that harvest e-mail addressess for Nigerian scammers and those V*agra hucksters. Sorry for any inconvenience that this might cause you. Note that there is no need to update your e-mail address book. (Our e-mail address hasn’t changed–only the way we show it on the site.)

Economics and Investing:

Debasement of 5 Pence and 10 Pence coins in England is causing problems: New coins won’t work in parking meters and vending machines. (Thanks to G.G. for the link.)

B.B. sent this charming news: Treasury dips into pension funds to avoid debt: “The Treasury on Tuesday started dipping into federal pension funds in order to give the Obama administration more credit to pay government bills.”

China Brings US Treasury Holdings To One Year Low, Russia Cuts Treasury Exposure By 50% In One Year. (Thanks to S.M. for the link.)

Craig D. flagged this: World Bank warns on risk of global recession

Items from The Economatrix:

Europe Must Move Quickly After Downgrades–Merkel

S&P Downgrades Eurozone’s EFSF Bailout Fund

How to Prepare for the Difficult Years Ahead

Oil Pries Waver On Concerns About Global Demand