SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “JWR”. Our goal is to educate our readers, to help them to recognize emerging threats and to be better prepared for both disasters and negative societal trends. You can’t mitigate a risk if you haven’t first identified a risk. Today, we look at America’s Food Supply Chain.
Map of America’s Food Supply Chain
Reader D.C.H. suggested this, at Fast Company: The first map of America’s food supply chain is mind-boggling. The article, based on a Environmental Research Letters study, begins:
“My team at the University of Illinois just developed the first high-resolution map of the U.S. food supply chain.
Our map is a comprehensive snapshot of all food flows between counties in the U.S.—grains, fruits and vegetables, animal feed, and processed food items.
To build the map, we brought together information from eight databases, including the Freight Analysis Framework from Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which tracks where items are shipped around the country, and Port Trade data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which shows the international ports through which goods are traded.”
Your DNA Records Aren’t Private
Your DNA Profile is Private? A Florida Judge Just Said Otherwise
UK Burglars List Where They Look for Valuables
Reader DSV sent this from The Mirror: Burglars explain the first place they look when trying to steal your valuables.
Hawaii’s Big Island is Riddled with Lava Tubes
Linked over at the great Whatfinger.com news aggregation site: Hawaii man dies after falling into lava tube on his property
A PVS-14 Sale
Ready Made Resources is running a big Veteran’s Day sale on White Phosphor AN/PVS-14 night vision goggles. These are top of the line full mil-spec units made by L3 Communications! “Package Contents: Monocular, headmount, transfer arm, soft case, shoulder strap, eye cup, objective lens cap, lanyard, de-mist shield, sacrificial window, lens tissue, AA Batteries (2) & ops manual.” Buyers will also receive a bonus of a free box IR chemlight sticks. Be sure to order before midnight on 11/11/2019.
Hospital Disinfectants Can’t Kill C. Diff
Reader C.B. sent this, over at Medical Express: Hospital disinfectants struggling to kill C. diff bacteria colonies. Here is a quote:
“The deadly and notoriously stubborn superbug, Clostridioides difficile (C. diff), is putting up a winning fight against hospital-grade disinfectants meant to kill it, according to results of a new study published in the Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy journal of the American Society for Microbiology. The C. diff bacterium causes inflammation of the colon with symptoms ranging from diarrhea to life-threatening sepsis and is most common among the elderly in hospitals or other health care facilities.
“We found no disinfectant was able to completely eliminate C. difficile embedded within biofilms, although we did note differences among disinfectants,” reports Kevin Garey, professor of pharmacy practice at the University of Houston and chair of the College of Pharmacy Department of Pharmacy Practice and Translational Research. Garey was the project’s principal investigator. The paper was the doctoral thesis of first author, Tasnuva Rashid, of the University of Texas School of Public Health.
Overall, Clorox, Cidex OPA, and Virex were most effective at killing C. diff spores. Clorox and OPA were also effective at killing total vegetative cell growth, the cellular stage responsible for causing infections. Virex was found to be ineffective against vegetative cell growth in biofilms. Clorox and Virex were most effective in reducing biomass followed by Nixall, Cidex OPA and Vital oxide.”
Property Seized for $8.41 in Unpaid Taxes
And another from DSV: A Michigan Man Underpaid His Property Taxes By $8.41. The County Seized His Property, Sold It—and Kept the Profits.
Review of Latest Version of the M1 Abrams Tank
Another article that I found linked at Whatfinger.com aggregation site: ATTACK! The Latest Version of the M1 Abrams Tank Just Got Even Better.
Michael Bloomberg in 2020 Presidential Bid?
Michael Bloomberg again eyeing 2020 presidential bid: sources. JWR’s Comment: I expect the mass media to begin touting Mikey Bloomberg as “the more sensible and reasonable alternative” to the current pack of Dem hopefuls. Just beware that no matter how they try to spin his positions, he is rabidly anti-gun!
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You can send your news tips to JWR. (Either via e-mail of via our Contact form.) Thanks!
Michael Bloomberg – like the Nanny you never had, and hopefully never will.
Although there are many bad things to living in Maryland, here in Wicomico County, the County Executive extended the re-payment period on delinquent property taxes to try to avoid people losing their properties. But then he is a Republican business man.
I downloaded the spreadsheet and report regarding the food flows. I appreciate the links. It’s been a long time since I waded through an academic article of this caliber. I hope I can succinctly recap what it actually means for my situation and that of my families. It’s going to hurt my brain, but if I can get through it and draw some reasonable conclusions as to personal applicability that can be extrapolated to other’s situations, I will send that to JWR. Wish me luck. LOL.
I look forward to your results.
First I must confess, I did not make it through the entire report in detail, but skimmed through each section. The accompanying spreadsheet was pure data, so not very helpful to a layman. I think the report’s claim to fame, if you will, is compiling data from government and other sources to map out the major transportation “food corridors” across the country. Overall, it’s interesting to note that most of it ends up in California for processing and redistribution, which makes sense since Cali is one of the most populated states. Net-Net, I didn’t find it personally useful. What it did do, is encourage me to review my state’s food capabilities and identify local sources should the U.S. supply chain fail dramatically. I live in Idaho and we produce potatoes, wheat, meat, and produce in abundance, among other things. I already source meat, dairy, eggs from a local ranch, frequent the farmer’s market during summer, and we grow some of our own produce. I looked at what neighboring state’s offer. Utah, for example, produces salt. Washington grows a lot of Apples, but so do we. I ended up “googling” to find out what I could source within our state directly. I found a website – https://www.idahopreferred.com which lists farms and ranches by category and location. I have an email out to a local mill to see if I can pick up wheat berries in bulk. All that to say, should the larger system fail, I think it’s wise to investigate what one can locally source, as well as establish relationships with local ranchers and farmers rather than shop at the large grocery chains. It’s generally more expensive to shop local, but the quality is usually ten-fold, in my opinion. That causes me to choose wisely, preserve foods, and produce very little waste. The few things I can’t source locally, like baking powder, baking soda, olive oil, etc., I stock up on from Costco or Walmart. In a SHTF scenario, having the local relationships (if you can’t do it yourself), will be very valuable. I’m not sure if that’s helpful to you. I thought I would find more applicability in the report.
Lots of good info. Thank you.
The food transportation study is interesting and illustrates something I think about regarding population distribution and wealth distribution.
In the article it is presented that California counties have many of the highest ranked spots in the food distribution neworks. Many other big urban centers also do.
The big urban centers are usually big urban centers for good reason. The sites were chosen by settlers of the past for various attributes that would make them good places to live and then history judged whether they were right. Those attributes could include good land, weather conducive to crop growth, access to water for shipping and/or agriculture or general use, availability of timber and/or minerals, etc.
California has lots of people because it is resource rich. Detroit used to have lots of people because it is resource rich. Ditto for many if not most urban areas.
Conservatives are currently moving out of the resource rich areas of the country…in a nutshell because of liberals. In my own case I live in a fairly rural area that is on the moderate to low end of resources. Poor soil. Adequate to low transportation opportunity. A timber region but frankly not even great for that because of poor soil. Limited growing season. No minerals to speak of. As a pretty sharp friend of mine put it once, “This area is really only good for growing kids.”
I mostly like where I live. If I move anywhere, it would actually be somewhere more remote not less.
Many preppers are taking the same approach as me choosing marginal land that is away from the best economic activities because we don’t want to live under the conditions produced by liberal policies with the associated risks should there be a TEOTWAWKI event.
But when you cede the best land and resources to those who appear to be steering us to destruction, is that a good idea? From a strategic perspective should coservatives not be taking the best land and resources?
Easier said then done but just something that pops into my brain now and then. As with many of my random thoughts, this one will get you a cup of coffee…as long as you include a few dollars of your own. It is that valuable.
I hear you. The problem in California, which I am a native of, is the politicians pert near destroyed the abundance in the central valley by “turning off the water” to save the smelt fish… water costs $6000/acre ft now. I grew up next to acres and acres of orange groves, later apricot groves, walnut trees, etc., and most of that is gone. I agree with you, moving to a less populated region shouldn’t be done without thought of resources. One thing is for sure in Idaho, there’s tons of water and wildlife. I’m all for the patriots who remain in California and hope they can take their state back! I’m rooting for them.
Food Flows: I did a quick read of the food flows and downloaded the study documents for more comprehensive review later as it is a complicated document. It both fascinated me and scared me.
With California fires, water shortages and mismanagement of resources much of the food flow in that area has been disrupted during the last two seasons. The mid-western states grain belt suffered severe damage during last winter’s and spring’s devastation lowering the production and shipping of corn, wheat, soybeans, etc. Topped with the cattle production areas being hit last season with one of the worst blizzards on record, our food production flow appears to be extremely fragile right now.
Another severe winter and devastating spring would have a statistical impact on both our internal flows as well as our exports to other countries. I am definitely concerned.
@Animal House – scares me too with Lib-tards making statements that California will be phasing our gas powered cars and everyone to go electric. Then they shut the electric off for forest fires. As Trump said “California needs to clean up their forests” as other states do to mitigate fires. But California wants to save beetle larva and flies in dead logs.
I was amazed at the article in stating the largest bottleneck was the aging locks on the Mississippi River where most of the grain goes to be dispersed through Louisiana.
Liberals will be the cause of the SHTF scenarios. At one point in my life I thought firearms would fix all this if enough people used them collectively. But its best to keep canning, stocking, building your own reservoirs. Up until those liberals start confiscating lands, guns, and pass laws to stop stockpiling. Oh they will. If one of us has to fight we all should fight together.
The largest areas of human concentration are the historic areas of commerce and agricultural productivity. And yes, these are the areas that the liberal cry babies have there safe spaces. They can have em, once all the conservatives leave. Who will drive the trucks, pilot the ships, till and plant the fields. Not them, they’re too egimicated for that.
The interesting thing that I took away from the food chain study was that a lot of food moved through California and other large populated places, and that most of the food that moved there was from other places and consumed in their large populated areas, and as they are ports, exportation movement took place there. Do not be conned into thinking that these states necessarily produce vast quantities of surplus food. I live in California and we have incredible agriculture production but is from necessity geared to the more expensive crop production. Nuts, fruits, wine grapes, sushi rice,artichokes etc. Most of the basic foods, wheat, corn, beans vegetables, fruit, chickens, beef are brought in from everywhere because the amount of produced food dose not even come close to the consumption. Based on it’s population California is not resource rich, at least from the ability to develop the natural resources. Government interference has just about eliminated the ability to develop it’s resources any further. I would say that on a whole food production has been not only stagnant, but decreasing rapidly based upon population growth. I need to go back and reread the article but upon first reading I see nothing of value from this “study”
I reread the article and as I suspected it is seriously flawed. ” Los Angles shipped in 22 million tons of food and shipped out 17million tons of food. Exactly what did 23million people eat? 6 million tons of food divided by 23 million people equals .26 tons/person. that equals 520 lbs. per person/year. ?? As most of us know and calculate how much food we need to provide per person based on caloric intake there should be mass starvation taking place even now. And also we know that just talking about raw tonnage doesn’t reflect calories. How much lettuce, and non caloric food must be deducted from the figures. I believe that this is junk science at it’s best
I experienced another e-learned nutrition lesson. While we stocked ample mass-produced LT food, we again have started growing our own.
Our potatoes had bugs attack them, our turnips as well.
Why did the bugs attack? They, too, are after high nutrition level food.
We chopped off the few buggy parts and cooked up batches of Neeps N Tatties that taste absolutely heavenly.
Can’t get that great taste and nutrition from the five pounds for a buck sacks of ‘spuds’.
Support your local gardeners and backyard farmer neighbors. Kick in a few bucks from time to time.
God Bless
Perhaps the absolutely worst thing” we the people” have ever done is allowing the government entitles the ability to tax us. No mater where you look they have used the pretext that taxes are for the good of us all. I have noticed that I can find very few taxes that actually benefit me or anyone I know that actually works for a living. I am tired of working to pay taxes for services I never receive and for services that go to people that are not willing to provide for themselves. My only consolation is that in the not to distant future this will come to a grinding halt, and I will be left to my own accountability, as will all the parasites of society. How sad it has come to this.
Do any Survivalblog readers that love the government and their police care to take a wild guess as to who the troops on the ground were in the case of the property getting stolen in Michigan over $8.41 worth of tax???? Can anyone say “unjust” enrichment” ?