Are you prepared? Trying to be more self sufficient

Tbh I'm not a huge fan of bottled water. Rain barrels and filters, sure. Couple jugs with other purposes? Sure.

Ditto with 'prep' style cans, hard to keep those in rotation. I'd prefer a deep pantry, at least for 'bug in' purposes.

Heh I mostly use (rechargeable) battery, those see use basically every month for scout outings and the like. Not huge on gas cook top, though I do have a butane one burner for scouts (along with the big propane stuff). The one I like the most though is the induction portable hot plate. As long as you got sun and inverter, you can make some hot meals without burning fuels.

Yeah the truck has 200w on it, and I have some a portable 100w and 60w, and a hiking 10w. Once I redo the truck canopy though, it'll get as much as I can cram on it.

Lol. Depends on the part of Oregon. At least here I'm prepped for wildfires (got lots of smoke from the detroit fire) and storms.

 

Than you. I will try again on lower temp.
I now have 4 trays worth on un-dried fruit. Deciding what to do with it, it hurts just to throw it away.
Re-hydrate and make jam?

 

Sure, as long as they haven't gone bad.

 

Have you considered installing a hand pump on your well? I can pump water without power with mine and for the 2k it cost to have it installed its a small price to pay for the peace of mind.

 

How deep is your well?
I am down to 3K gal in rain water storage (had to take 5 IBS totes down, interfering with new fence).
My well is bored, water start about 50 feet down, so intake for the hand pump would have to be 100 feet long.

 

Connect the totes with overflow pipes ( I have 2 1" pipes running out of the upstream totes), and one downspout can feed as many totes as you want. I have anywhere from 1 to 3 one one downspout. If you connect on the top (easier to put a seal for the pipe in), totes will fill up one at a time. Last tote gets a 2" overflow pipe, leading away from the house.
If rot is a problem (you are in PNW), 4 stacks of concrete blocks will raise the tote high enough to give you good pressure at the end of of a 100ft garden hose. Use galvanized pipe hanging tape and mason anchors+screws to tie blocks and totes together.

 

I'd be trying to eat as much by hand as possible, just snacking. Add to cereal or yogurt for breakfast or dessert even. Blend into smoothies. Use for baking. Jam could be another great idea but not sure how that process would go, you could pretty easily try a really small batch in a saucepan to see how they react to the normal jamming process.

 

I have but have not done it. I did get a Lehman well bucket so I can pull from the well. Also have 600 gallon rain catch system for sanitary and watering garden

 

I have wondered about some of this. Need hunt suggests faraday bags for radios and small electrical stuff. My question is so I protect ham or gmrs radios but how would they be any better than a walkie talkie if the repeaters aren’t protected. I have several battery, solar, or hand crank powered radios but what if there’s no station to get reports from?
I think we can try to prepare for a multitude of different scenarios but who knows until it happens?

 

There’s no real expiration on water if stored properly, cool dark place just like shelved foods, but rotating is good also. We keep about 70-80 gallons on hand with means to expand with water bricks and jerry cans. This reminds me I need to fill the water bricks

 

Well bucket. You have to pull your pump but it’s designed to be lowered into your well and retrieve 2 gallons. It has a valve at bottom that allows water in so you can lower the bucket then it closes when you start to pull up. I have a swing frame that can be placed over the well with a pulley to pull the pump and use the bucket. I need to figure out just how far down the water is and get a rope that’ll handle it.

 

I never do fruits and veggies above 130.

I would cut the berries in half (if you didn't), they'll take days to dry otherwise. Many times, I've just put berries in the blender, then pour the puree on a silicone mat in the dehydrator.

 

Ah fruit leathers are good. I have to be careful with the sugars though. Most berries it’s good to puncture them to dehydrate if you aren’t pureeing them or cut in half as suggested

 

Ive been in the wrong place at the wrong time twice when riots broke out, total chaos. Luckily I have a built tacoma and it doesnt need pavement to get around. Wild fires affect me more being that I live in the middle of nowhere in the woods and we are pretty prepared to bug out if need be. And with winters knocking out power for weeks at my house im used to living without power during winter and then the utilities shutting off power during to heat to prevent wild fires, I already live half the year waiting for the power to not work at my house.

 

Tbh? My philosophy is that we get by with a little help from our friends. Anything short term on the chart, ride it through, help others. Medium and long term, it's all about building relationships. WRT radios... yeah, the 'who are you talking to' question is relevant. And really, your answer is pretty apparent. Have enough to talk to folks you want to. Maybe you can have gear to make a repeater or cell base station. But that's a stretch goal.

 

Fair? But.. if that's really the case and you went over curbs and rioters to get out of a situation, there'd be news stories. And shoot, we got a evac alert during a fire event last year, too.

I really can't say your situation is that different from mine, tbh. I'm edge-of-the-UGB (urban growth boundary, it's an oregon thing) but play in the woods, never mind the day job stuff.

 

Add RIPE figs to your fruit leathers instead of sugar.
Ripe figs are so sweet that we add absolutely no sugar when we make fig jams, fig strawberry, figgy razzle. Use no sugar pectin, and jam sets fine.

 

BINGO!

Prepping is like the old food pyramid. You have to take care of the things you know are going to happen and then start scaling up wards. But if you have something that has a 5% chance of happening, does it make sense to spend $10k on it? Especially if that $10k would have been better spent on other stuff. Numbers overly dramatized to make the point.

Keeping a spare ECU in a Faraday bag is not a bad idea. I just don't think its a good idea because all of the other sensors and senders on the car that the ECU relies on are going to be toast. Then you have the issue of fuel. That $1,000 ECU will get you as far as one or two tanks of gas. That's great if you are in Furgeson, MO or Chop, OR when Riots break out. Hell - spending $10k at that point is worth it to get your family out of harms way. So as long as the buyer / prepper understands what the limitations of his / her system are and what role a spare ECU will play in that and has all of the other financial needs cared for then it can be worthwhile.

If it were me I'd make a Faraday Garage and park a 1985 Chevy Blazer in it. Maybe it only gets 7MPG but it's much more likely to save your bacon that an ECU swap in the middle of a disaster and praying that all of the other components are working.

 

Or a 1985 Merc diesel sedan. Will run on everything, even vegetable oil.

 

So is a "Faraday garage" covered on top with a metal roof and has metal siding?