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Why do people prep? No matter how you spin it, it’s probably going to boil down to taking care of themselves and those they love. Where the real variable comes into play is how people prep. Some stockpile and fortify, some may pack light and bug out, or others may have their own unique plans.

Ultimately there is no universal answer as to the “right way” to properly prepare for a massive disaster scenario due to the varying nature of personalities in individuals. There is, however, is a key aspect of how people prep that should be implemented to any prepper’s plan if they plan to survive: physical fitness.

Now before thinking this article is about having the best looking six-pack when things go south (trust me, it’s not), consider this question, “Am I in a condition where I feel confident to take care of loved ones and myself physically if disaster strikes?”. Apply this question to your scenario of choice, hell, apply it to your everyday life when things are going good. More than likely the answer to this question is “no”, and there is nothing wrong with that.

In all honesty, even if you are active, working out regularly, and eating healthy, there is room for improvement – it’s the nature of self-betterment and making your body best survival tool in a disaster.

How Prepper Fitness could help you in a Doomsday Scenario?

SHTF (who knows how). It’s code red and your rushing around too initiating your own variation on surviving this disaster. You’re sweating, adrenaline is pumping through you, and the only thing on your mind is getting to your checkpoint. As you’re running around, your blood pressure becomes dangerously high and you have a heart attack. Congrats, you just lost at doomsday.

Of course this scenario is a hypothetical and has no scientific analysis to back it up. But for a lot of people, a doomsday scenario could be as simple as the consequences of poor maintenance to their body in terms of diet and exercise. Physical fitness should be one of the essential building blocks of preparing, yet it seems that this foundation work on many prepper guides/plans is overlooked or simply glazed over.

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As you’re running around, your blood pressure becomes dangerously high and you have a heart attack. Congrats, you just lost at doomsday.

Prepper fitness doesn’t have to be something crazy like running a marathon through the desert without water or joining a gym. Fitness can be as simple as just getting out of your comfort zone for one hour of your day. Much like prepper plans, fitness plans can vary from person-to-person depending on goals, but ultimately doing fitness based activity that pushes the limits of your body consistently will make you a stronger and a physically more efficient survivalist.

So where should someone begin if they are not as fit as they would like to be? Much like learning a new skill or plan for prepping, go to the Internet for information and ideas. Honestly, you don’t even need a gym membership for a great cardio workout – or even weights to build muscle for that matter. Focusing on body weight exercises, light jogging/power walking, and functional lifts at first can make you healthier and stronger, but can also be fun to a degree.

A general introduction to Prepper Fitness

Depending on how serious you want to take this, I would suggest investing in a few things (although not necessary, can serve to be helpful): a heart monitor, pedometer, some of your prepping supplies, and a semi-truck/tractor tire.

Cardio – This does NOT mean running per se, cardio is simply training that gets your heart rate up. Ideally for fat loss/cardio training, you want your heart rate to be “in the zone” (Target Heart Rates by American Heart Association). Cardio training can be monitored with a heart rate monitor, which can also serve as a safety precaution while training, and can be accomplished in a number of ways such as: swimming, hiking, power walking, biking, jogging, or even HIIT workouts. The key to cardio training is consistency and always improving. It’s smart to keep a log of your workouts to monitor progress. Don’t get discouraged though, sometimes progress can come in the form of walking a mile faster than you ever have or sometimes progress can come in the form of showing up to exercise when your brain wants to make a million excuses not to.

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Some of the best exercises you can do, can be done using only your body weight.

“Weight” Training – as mentioned earlier, you really don’t need iron based weights to lift. Some of the best exercises you can do, can be done using only your body weight. One preface that must be mentioned in this portion is always consider your form first whenever lifting something or exercising – improper form can lead to potential injury in the short and long-term. Here is a quick list of some great body weight exercises that can be easily added to your workout circuit:

  • Air Squats – excellent for your quads, glutes, and hamstrings
  • Lunges – builds stamina and quads as well as works the calves, glutes, and hamstrings
  • Pushups – works your chest as well as your shoulders and triceps with many variations available
  • Pullups – great for your lats, back, and biceps.
  • Side Leg Raises – works your hips/adductors
  • Dips – adaptable workout for your triceps that also works your chest and shoulders

 

 

Functional Training – of course we are preppers, so a lot of the training done should be survival themed right? Try adding these exercises to your workout that can easily add purpose to your workout:

  • Sledgehammer swings on a tire – think you might need to split a lot of wood?
  • Tire Flips – for anytime you think you might have to lift something heavy off the ground…
  • Bucket Carries – water is necessary, not light, and probably inconveniently located
  • Rope Climbs – wonder if you may need to get somewhere when you don’t have a ladder?
  • Log Carries – Get good at carrying awkward things… do you honestly think everything you need will fit conveniently in your rucksack?
  • Running – this may come in handy at some point in life!

WRAP-UP

Although this is not designed to be a complete guide to prepper fitness, it is meant to get preppers thinking and give basic considerations on where to begin their journey into becoming the best survival instrument in their tool box. The best advice one can take away from this is to try to make fitness a fun and enjoyable part of your day/life, it will not only help make it a consistent part of your routine, but you may even have fun doing something that is physically great for your body!

Two final notes: 1. Remember to stretch before and after exercising, there are too many benefits to stretching and flexibility to list here. 2. Material in this article is provided for educational purposes only, and is not to be used for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Not all exercises may be applicable to readers; always consult a physician before trying a new diet or exercise program. I am not responsible or liable for any injuries, damages, loss, or accidents.

On a different note, here’s some other self-sufficiency and preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

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Are you in a condition where you feel confident to take care of loved ones and yourself physically if disaster strikes?

Have you heard of the Grey Man concept?

The Grey Man concept simply means blending in and not sticking out. You want to dress, move and act in a way that is completely forgettable. This is done so that you do not draw unnecessary attention to yourself as you go about life and I think the initial focus was on people who were carrying concealed firearms. There are lots of examples of how this larger concept could work in your favor to keep you safe and many survival and prepper blogs bring this concept up as a way to live or a strategy for how to avoid becoming a target of people intend to do you harm.

I was thinking of this idea in a different context though as it related to life after a SHTF scenario. One of our readers contacted me with some questions after reading a post from Selco on the SHTF School blog. Selco is from the Balkans and lived through the Balkan war from 92 – 95. He has created an excellent online course titled “One Year in Hell” that offers training derived from his own experiences living surrounded in the real SHTF world of a war zone and without power for a year.

Did you ever hear of “survivor’s guilt”?

Feeling of being guilty because you survived but many others you know did not. There is something else that can “help” you to not feel that because it can kill you. It is what I call “survivalist hate” by people around you.

I often read how people want to help other folks when SHTF, and it is really good, but in reality, it works differently.

When SHTF, I mean real SHTF, most of the people will not like you because you are prepared, people will hate you, even if you help them. They will hate you because you are prepared and you have food, water, weapon, and shelter for you and your family, and they do not have anything like that.

I have seen how people robbed man, and his family, torching his house because he had lots of goods (he gave some of that stuff to some folks week before) and by that logic folks said that he knew that S. is going to hit the fan, and he was like guilty for them. People were angry that he prepared but did not tell them.

This is what you can call “survivalist hate”. Think about it, sentences like “he could have warned us” or “he must have stolen this from somewhere, otherwise he would have not that much”. Do not expect normal logical thinking. It does not happen much in normal times and is less in survival scenarios for most common folks.

It was these words that caused our reader to question how much they should volunteer to help their community in an emergency. Mark had been thinking about trying to organize resources in the community now, before any crisis, but reading Selco’s story above had him reconsidering going out on a limb, telegraphing he might have resources or skills and potentially becoming a victim like the man robbed for his supplies.

This is what led me to consider the Grey Man concept as it could be applied to your home and resources if the SHTF. It is one thing to control your appearance and actions in a crowd to avoid detection, but what about your supplies in your home?

Always invisible in plain sight

Depending on the crisis, I have to believe there is a timeline of phases that people go through. The crisis would dictate that timeline to a large degree in that an Earthquake, for example, would destroy everything relatively quickly and then you would be recovering for some time afterwards.

The initial violence would be upfront and then people would start dealing with problems after the shaking stopped. It would be similar to any other natural disasters I assume. Something like a regional war or an economic collapse or even pandemic would cause a different timeline. Regardless of how long it took people to start feeling the effects of any crisis eventually your neighbors could be dealing with illnesses or injury, disruptions in food, safety concerns from looters or approaching military forces.

Unless you were quarantined in your homes, invariably neighbors would be talking at some point, sharing information and learning how others were faring. It is at this time that the prepared individual could fall into that situation described above.

There are many aspects to this and realistically how you act toward your neighbors and the situations you could face after a crisis could be the subject of a dozen articles but I will focus on this one viewpoint in this post. There is something to be said for charity and something else for self-preservation. If we were faced with a situation like above, what could you do to keep your family safe and your supplies that you have been storing up in your hands and not the hands of an angry mob?

Never draws attention to himself

Two things come to mind when trying to think about the Grey Man concept and your home. The first is that before anything happens you want to be practicing OPSEC as much as feasible in your situation. The less people know about the supplies you have stored, what you may be preparing for, your political beliefs, etc. the less likely they are going to think of you if something happens.

  • I have said it before, but unless you live in an area where this is common (and there are lots of areas where it is) I wouldn’t be seen out at the Chili’s in your camouflage pants and army boots. Don’t get me wrong, I have these myself, but I save the camo for hunting season. Whenever I am hunting, there are thousands of other guys who look just like me and I blend in. Not necessarily at Chili’s but you get the point.
  • If you are getting supplies of food shipped in, make sure these are dealt with in a way that doesn’t draw attention. I wouldn’t stack boxes of MRE’s up in front of the shed while your neighbor is mowing their grass.
  • If you are loading guns into the car for a trip to the range, do this discretely. I normally do a quick visual check to make sure no one is outside first and back the car into the garage so I can get them loaded quickly.
  • Have a safe being delivered to the house? Try to do this during the day if most of your neighbors are at work.
  • Large purchases from Sams or Costco could be construed the same way. A bulk pack of toilet paper is one thing, but 5 – fifty-pound bags of rice or several 45 lbs. pails of freeze-dried food are another. Are you practicing open carry to make a statement?

The next part and probably the harder of the two to pull off would be after SHTF. How do you keep your supplies secret? How do you maintain OPSEC whenever everyone else is watching you simply because they have nothing else to do?

Grey man avoids confrontation

It would really depend on the scenario I think. For instance, if everyone was without power, I might not light my house up at night. Knowing that you have a power source, maybe solar panels could give it away that you have resources they don’t have. Of course, the situation will dictate how badly you are hated for having power if your neighbors don’t but I think eventually it could cause problems.

Let’s say there wasn’t an EMP but the grid was taken down by terrorists. Every appliance still works, but the power simply isn’t coming through the wires anymore. Your electricity could at a bare minimum provide conveniences like power for fans, ability to recharge batteries or enable entertainment devices. One of the prepper supplies I made sure I had was a giant roll of heavy black plastic. This has many uses, but one of them could be to blackout my windows. At night, I could run electric and not draw attention.

Food is another resource that will be tough to keep secret, especially if you are cooking outside. The smell of food to a hungry person is not something you can easily keep a lid on. You could heat water outside and use that for your freeze-dried foods as one way to keep the fact that your family is still eating somewhat under wraps. Eventually though people will notice that you aren’t getting slimmer.

What about weapons? This is one that I have considered because I have made preparations that would allow me certain tactical advantages over my unprepped neighbors. What if there was the threat of violence from people walking through and looting? Would I go walking down the street in my tactical holster, bulletproof vest and battle rifle on day one? Probably not, but eventually if things got bad enough that might be my daily outfit. I think if that were the case, my neighbors and I would have other things to worry about than what I had in my house. My hope is that if things ever get that bad, I will be able to help my neighbors and my contributions on that front will give me grace. Maybe that is foolish.

Even if you are completely secretive about your supplies or your neighbors are completely self-sufficient themselves you could face a time when someone is banging on your door demanding you to share what you have. Have you thought about what you would do if that happened?

Like I said, there are many aspects to this concept and the final, possible confrontation is for another post. Practicing the Grey Man concept for your home in a SHTF scenario might put that off for a little while longer though or prevent it entirely and I think that is the whole point.

On a different note, here’s some other self-sufficiency and preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

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Have you heard of the Grey Man concept? The Grey Man concept simply means blending in and not sticking out. You want to dress, move and act in a way that

Remember the 80s? If you were a kid of the 80s like I was, you probably grew up blabbing to your friends over a walkie-talkie. If you were really cool, you had one that was disguised as a Pepsi bottle too. If you’re stewing at how young I am, I promise I had a string phone too.

Meanwhile, cell phones have become our main, if not only, communication devices because of their versatility, portability and ease of use. However, the problem with relying on them too heavily is that during an emergency, the likelihood of them failing can become a big concern.

If we think about contingencies and recognise the limitations of the devices we rely on so heavily these days, what can we use to fill that gap if the cell networks become overloaded? Enter the venerable radio.

Radio communication is an extensive subject and one that causes a lot of head scratching. I’m not claiming to be an expert, but I have been learning over the years and I’d like to share that experience with you today.

Here are 7 things I wish I knew about radio prepping before I started. And let’s thank Darryl for contributing.

1. How to get a License

We have all heard that if SHTF, no one is going to care if you have a license or not. There are two problems with this:

#1. Operating an amateur radio is a skill.

#2. Hams won’t talk to unlicensed operators.

Ham radio has much more power than other public radio service.

I have also heard that during an emergency, I won’t need a license. There is no such exception to FCC Part 97. Some misquote para. 97.403 and 97.405 as justification, but 97.403 makes it clear that the exception is for the immediate safety of human life and immediate protection of property.

I am sorry, but hams are very snobby about their licenses. If they suspect that you aren’t licensed, they will dig until they find out. We have our ways.

Related: Radio Silence – Communication Without Electronics

2. FCC License Information Is Public

#1. This includes your address, so I recommend that you don’t use your SHTF address as your mailing address for your license. Many hams, including me, have the full FCC database download.

#2. Call signs are in one of ten call areas based upon where you live. Since call areas are fairly large, your call area isn’t a dead giveaway of your location, but it won’t hurt to have a vanity call with a different call area than where you live. Vanity calls are now free and aren’t hard to get. Of course, anyone that has the FCC database will know close to where you are at.

There are three classes of license: Technician, General, and Extra.

Techs have very limited HF privileges; General and Extra have quite a bit more. What HF privileges Techs have aren’t really useful during SHTF. So if you want to talk more than a few miles without the aid of a repeater, then you need a General class license.

3. Bands and Uses (Background for Other Important Information)

There are two main groups of ham bands: HF from 0 to 30 Mhz and VUHF+ from 30Mhz to microwave plus.

I won’t bore you with all the non-HF bands as there are many of them. For full details, see here.

4. VUHF(VHF and UHF) bands are mainly line of sight. This includes the following:

#1. 6 Meters 50-54 Mhz

This band is called the magic band as when conditions are right, its range is thousands of miles, but you can’t depend on it

#2. 2 Meters 144-148 Mhz (just above the FM broadcast band and below the public service VHF band)

This is the heavy lifting band of amateur radio. Most amateur traffic is on this band. Very few people reading this won’t be within the range of a 2-meter repeater. A repeater is ham speak for a station that receives on one frequency and transmits on another frequency to extend the range to tens or hundreds of miles. However, don’t count on repeaters being up after TSHTF.

#3. 1.25 Meter 222.0-225.0 Mhz (This isn’t used much, and not a lot of radios and repeaters can transmit on this band. This would be a good band for near private comms.)

#4. 70 Centimeter 420-450 Mhz (note: There is as much bandwidth on this single band as there is in the entire HF section (not just ham HF). This is also close to FRM/GMRS/.)

Related: The Keys To Effective Prepper Communication

5. HF going from the bottom to the top (Again, I am omitting some of the non-useful bands):

(160-40 Meters will “get longer” during the night, which means it will skip over closer stations and reach greater distances. 20-10 Meters will skip or shut down at times.)

#1. 160 Meters 1.8-2.0 Mhz (regional area) (just above AM broadcast band)

This is a hard band because it takes a very long antenna; therefore, it isn’t heavily used.

It is mainly a nighttime band when it can reach thousands of miles if conditions are right and hundreds of miles during normal conditions. It is mainly used in winter when thunderstorms are at a minimum as the lighting causes interference, called QRN in ham speak.

#2. 80 Meters 3.5-4.0 Mhz (regional area)

This is kind of a hard band, but there are lots of low-cost wire antennas that will get the job done because the length that is required is only to have the 160-meter antenna.

This is the ideal band for preppers to communicate for a few hundred miles because it is easy to bounce it off the sky. More on that later.

#3. 40 Meters 7.0-7.3 Mhz (regional area)

This is another good band for preppers. It’s mainly a nighttime band, but it is usable during daytime for shorter distances.

#4. 20 (14.0-14.35 Mhz, 17(18.068-18.168), 15(21.0-21.45), 12(24.89-24.99 Mhz), and 10 Meters (28.0-29.7 Mhz)

I have lumped these bands together because they are similar in propagation, which is mainly daylight. Twenty meters is the bread and butter band. It is open the longest, and everyone flocks to it.

Twelve and 10 meters are really only open during maximum sunspot cycles.

6. Radio Transmissions Are Not Anonymous!

This is something most people don’t think about. When you press that transmit button, you are sending up a flare for miles (maybe hundreds of miles) saying, “Here I am.” This is done with Radio Direction Finding (RDF), which hams call fox hunting, and they do it for sport.

From the time the SHTF until people start to get hungry and gangs form, there will be a grace period when you can transmit without a lot of concern. However, at some point, the zombie gangs will learn to hunt foxes. It isn’t hard to learn either.

Since the gangs will be looking for low hanging fruit, they will most likely hunt in this order:

#1. CB. They are cheap and powerful. They are the prepper’s go-to radio.

#2. GRMS, FRS, MURS, etc. Lots of FRSs but limit range means they have to be close to hunt. GRMS has more power and therefore greater range. Lots of overlapping channels.

#3. Public service VUHF, HAM VHF

#4. Ham UHF 30 Mhz is a lot of bandwidth to scan through.

#5. Ham HF is hard, so most scanners don’t go below about 26 Mhz.

If you want to communicate with others, you will need to know how to take countermeasures to prevent being hunted. Most of these countermeasures only apply to ham radios. None are foolproof.

Related Prepping 101 – Communication Options

7. Countermeasures

All

  • Keep transmissions short.
  • Rotate frequencies.
  • Use code words for locations.
  • Night time is safer, but that is relative.
  • Set up a hiding cross band repeater as far away from your location as possible. This will extend your range, and if it goes down, then you know there are hunters in the area.
  • Use stealth. Wire antennas are hard to see.

VUHF

  • Avoid channelized radio services. (i.e., CB, FRS, GMRS, MURS, etc.) CBs are the worst!
  • Transmit and receive on different frequencies.
  • Use amateur satellite with directional.
  • Use odd frequencies.
  • Make up your own call signs when not communicating with hams.

HF

HF will be the last to be hunted because most of the signals that can be picked up will be too far away to raid. I don’t think they will ever be hunted, but I am not going to bet my life on it.

  • Use digital modes (PSK-31 may be the best). Lots of signals sound like noise, and it takes good equipment to pick out a DF individual.
  • Use NVIS antennas for 80 and 40 meters. With NVIS, most of the signal goes straight up then bounces down in all directions.

On a different note, here’s some other self-sufficiency and preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

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The problem with relying on your phone too heavily is that during an emergency, the likelihood of them failing can become a big concern.

Being the not-so-proud resident of a city that has more issues than a high-school teenager, electrical the most part, I was kinda forced to go full MacGyver on a lot of stuff. Sure, I don’t mind opening the tap only to see muddy water or realizing that I can’t take a shower before going to work because some neighhbor shut off the main line to install a new sink, but I really go berserk each time the power goes out. Never mind the fact that I can’t use my PC, but, apparently, I’m the only around here who has to remind the others about keeping their damned smartphones charged at all time. Anyway, seeing that the authorities aren’t lifting a finger to find a more permanent solution to these blackouts, I began searching for ways to power up and\or charge my electronics.

Of course, one doesn’t need a degree in physics to figure out that most of the tips you find online are not only BS, but dangerous as well. So, after snooping around for a bit, I came across this pretty ingenious and simple way of charging any kind of phone battery using stuff lying around the house. Tried on a couple of my electronics, and guess what – it worked like a charm. Sure, it’s not as efficient as the outlet charging method, but hey. , it works. We do live in troubling times – today, it’s a power outage (if that seems like a trifle, go and check out what happened in Venezuela at the beginning of the month). Tomorrow, it can be an EMP attack. So, having said that, here’s my caveman-style trick of charging any electronic gadget when the power goes out the window.

You will need:

  • One 9V Alkaline battery (go for Varta or Duracell if you want extra juice).
  • One spring (you can salvage one from an old ballpoint pen).
  • A car charger (make sure the car charger has a USB port).
  • Your phone’s power cable minus the dongle.
  • Tape.

To try this charging method, I’ve used my daughter’s Samsung Galaxy J7 (2016), which has a 3600 mAh battery. Already got the stuff? Good! Here’s what you’ll need to do next.

Assembling the charger

Step 1. Take apart the ballpoint and salvage the string. Don’t straighten it or anything. You’ll need it intact. Step 2.  Insert one end of the spring in the battery’s negative pole. FYI, it’s the big one. It’s always the big one. Step 3. While holding the spring end inserted into the battery’s negative terminal, connect the other end to car charger’s positive terminal – it’s the little metallic bar on the side. Step 4. Once the two terminals are connected, use plenty of tape to secure the battery to the charger. Step 5. Connect the charger’s metallic nub to the battery’s positive terminal. Again, tape the shit out of them to prevent them from falling apart. Step 6. Wrap some more tape around the thingamajig. Step 7. Connect your phone’s power cable to the car charger’s USB slot. Step 8. Plug in the phone. Step 9. Charge your phone like a boss!

More on makeshifts phone-charging methods

You know the saying: if it looks stupid, but it works, then it’s not stupid (just ugly).  One thing you need to understand is that you won’t get a full charge out of a single 9V battery. The Varta cell I’ve used put out 550 mAh. And considering that the phone has a 3,600 mAh battery, it means that you need around six or 7 batteries for a full charge. Wouldn’t recommend relying solely on bats to get a full charge because you will have to redo the entire process. This method’s great if you need just enough juice to power up your phone to call a family member or 9-1-1 in case of an emergency.

Still, you need to consider that there are different types of phone batteries out there on the market. For instance, my wife has an Apple iPhone 8, which has a 1,821 mAh battery. Obviously, it takes fewer 9Vs to juice up her phone compared to that of my daughter. Careful about these newer models, as some of them might not draw electricity from below-nominal sources. Another charging method which I’ve been trying to try out for months (I think I will use a tablet this time), involves D batteries, paperclips, and, of course, some tape.

Takes a little bit of tinkering though – compared to the method I just showed you, this one is a bit trickier because you will need to arrange the batts in a certain fashion.

To pull this off, you’ll need eight D batteries, paperclips (those without plastic covers), tape, your phone’s cable, and a car charger. Basically, you must arrange the batteries in such a fashion that the negative terminal from the one on top can be bridged with the positive terminal on the bottom battery with a paperclip. Do this on both sides and then use two paperclips and tape to secure the car charger’s positive and negative terminal. Don’t know for sure how efficient this method is, but considering that one D battery has an output of 1.5V, I don’t think it’s really that efficient.

It’s still worth a shot if you have a lot of Ds lying around and no other way to charge your phone. Anyway, I hope you’ve enjoyed my take on going full MacGyver on dying phones. Word of caution though: I wouldn’t try this method to power up a laptop or any device bigger than a small phone or tablet. You can end up damaging the power supply and losing everything inside if you tinker with supplies other than those specified in the manual.

You should also keep an eye out on the device while it’s charging. If you hear a strange, buzz-like sound, disconnect the device immediately. Let me know in the comment section how the method worked out for you.

Other Self-sufficiency and Preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

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We do live in troubling times – today, it’s a power outage. Tomorrow, it can be an EMP attack.

The best state for homesteading depends on many things and may not be the same for everyone. Every state has pros and cons, so which is best for you will depend on how you rank the individual pros and cons. For example, I would never consider homesteading in Alaska; it is far too cold for me. My son, however, loves it there and many people successfully homestead in the state.

So to determine the best states for homesteading, I decided to look first at the factors I am looking for in a homesteading location. You may not agree with my ranking; that is fine. We don’t want to be bidding against each other for the one ideal piece of property. Here are some of the factors that I consider to be most important in choosing your homestead location.

 

 

Good Soil and Easy Access to Water

This seems obvious, but I once tried to build a homestead on hard Texas clay. I had chosen a house with land, without considering the quality of the land. It was hard digging for that garden and my vegetables were small and sometimes misshapen. Check the soil in many different places around the property and consider whether water is available near the garden spot and where you might want animals. Also check the quality of the water and consider having it tested.

Another thing to check is the history of the land. An environmental assessment will tell you whether it has any environmental risks associated with former use. You don’t want to be gardening on a former hazardous waste site. This may seem rare to you, but it happens more often than you might think.

Related – Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation

Moderate Temperatures

If you want to grow all your food, you need moderate weather and a long growing season. I consider USDA Hardiness Zone 7 to be a good cutoff for me. Lower zones can still be farmed, but you will need more land because of the shorter growing season.

I live in zone 9b where I have a long growing season. We grow two crops a year, planting in the early spring and in the late summer. Most plants die back at mid-summer because of the heat, but even then many plants thrive. While the garden produces well, people and animals may find the heat unbearable.

Southern states get more sun and are warmer, while coastal land benefits from the moderating effects of ocean breezes, but have higher humidity in general.

Remote Location or a Low Population Density

It is possible to homestead in the suburbs of a big city; however, most prepping homesteaders are looking for a more remote location. A remote location insulates you from many societal problems should SHTF, however it also might limit your access to emergency care or help when you need it. If you choose a remote location, take care to develop a good relationship with your neighbors, you will be relying on their skills as well as your own.

Instead of a remote location, you might choose a location in a state with low population density. Living near a small town has many of the advantages of the city, while still offering you insulation from the desperate masses.

 

 

Find a Community of Like-Minded People

Probably most important is choosing a place where you feel you belong. You belong because you love the area, but also because you have much in common with the community. If you don’t share similar values and ideologies with your neighbors, you may end up being the odd-man out.

To survive in a SHTF situation, you will need to band together with your neighbors. If they don’t trust you or feel that you aren’t their “type,” you may never be able to establish that connection. You could be shunned because of your politics or your beliefs on any particular issue. Get to know the neighbors before you buy.

Related –4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis

My Thoughts on The Best States for Homesteading

The best state for homesteading is fairly personal and depends on our personal likes and dislikes. However, I am going to discuss the pros and cons of several states from my point of view. Perhaps you will have other areas of concern or reasons to choose a particular state. If so, leave me a comment below telling me why you like your state or don’t like mine.

States with Fertile Land, Easy Access to Water, and Moderate Temperatures

Oregon and Washington have fertile land, plenty of rain and moderate temperatures, putting them high on the list for farmers and some homesteaders. However, I would think carefully before locating in these states due to their high concentration of liberal voters. It is probably only a matter of time before these states pass laws against rainwater collection or other laws that may not be friendly to homesteaders. Unless you are like-minded, this may not be your community.

Virginia, Iowa, and Tennessee also have moderate temperatures, fertile land, and plenty of rain. Most homesteaders are able to grow good crops and raise animals. Land is moderately priced and the population density is favorable to homesteaders. You’ll find other homesteaders as well as experienced farmers here.

States with Warm Winters and Long Growing Seasons

The southern states of Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, and eastern parts of Oklahoma enjoy mild winters, fertile land and generous rain fall. However, The summers can be hot, hot, hot. You’ll enjoy a long growing season, if you can work in the heat and humidity.

Choose your land carefully because some areas are prone to flooding and others are swampy during some months of the year.

Related –The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us

Moderate Temperatures, Good Soil and Rainfall

The summers are a little more comfortable in South Carolina and Georgia than in the steamier states of the south. It is still hot in the summer, however, the moderate humidity (inland) makes a world of difference. First frost is usually around October or November, so you’ll enjoy a long growing season with a mild winter. Some areas have rich black soil, while others have rocky clay, and still others are sandy, so check your soil before buying. South Carolina and Georgia land prices and taxes are very reasonable in most areas.

Make Sure You Have the Basics

New Mexico and Arizona show up on many homestead lists, however, I do not agree. For me, the lack of easily available water is a deal breaker.

They enjoy cheap land and warm weather, but it is tough to grow your own food without water. Many people truck in their water, but in a SHTF situation, it may not be as easy.

Which State is On Your List?

If your favorite state is not on the list, don’t worry. This list is colored by my own preferences for warm weather and inexpensive land, however there is no reason you can’t homestead anywhere.

Every state has its own challenges and advantages, so a lot depends on your skill level and how much land you can afford. Let me know your preferences in the comments below.

Other Self-sufficiency and Preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

5 Comments

You may not agree with my ranking; that is fine. We don’t want to be bidding against each other for the one ideal piece of property.

Oh, how I love food! Let me count the ways.

Actually, I don’t like food-food, but the homemade variety. And nothing beats a meal cooked during an SHTF situation.

Yes, I know how that sounds, but admit it that the best meal you’ve ever eaten was back when your can was on the line. Even spam taste better when it’s eating from tin plate set beside a romantic 24-hours emergency candle.

Which brings us to the topic du jour – how to make spam at home.

I know most of you people have enough cans in your emergency supplies pantry to make it through WWIII, but wouldn’t it be neat to learn how to make some yourself instead of buying? Sure it would, and I am going to show you how easy it is to make this stuff. What can I say about spam? The dish is so popular that it inspired songs and even phrases like the one we use each day: “for when the spam hits the fan.”

Now, as for the recipe, I have to warn you that it takes a little bit of muscle to pull this through because everything will have to chop, diced, and ground. So, without further ado, here’s how to prepare emergency spam. Ingredients:

  • Pork shoulder (about two-and-a-half pounds). You can use other pork cuts as well. Just be sure that your cut of choice has enough fat on it.
  • Good-quality ham (about three ounces).
  • Tender Quick Meat Cure (bought mine from Amazon. Aim from one tablespoon at first and then half a tablespoon later.
  • Garlic (two cloves are more than enough for this recipe).

Already gathered your ingredients? Great! Then it’s time for phase two of our spam cookery.

How to prepare homemade spam

Step 1.

Get your oven ready. Pre-heat to 300 degrees Fahrenheit.

Step 2.

Tend to the meat. Take your pork shoulder or cut of choice and cut it into small cubes.

Step 3.

Set up your grinder. After you finish installing the thingy, grind the pork shoulder cubes. If you prefer your mixture to be less chunky, grind the meat one more time.

Step 4.

Ham and garlic. Take your ham and mince it. Place it afterward in a food processor. Now mince your garlic and add it to the ham.

Step 5.

Finely mince the ham and garlic. Don’t make it into a paste, though.

Step 6.

Grab a large bowl and wash your hands. Place the ground pork meat, ham, and garlic in a large bowl. Add one tablespoon of Tender Quick Meat Cure and use your hands to mix the ingredients. If the mix seems too loose, add half of spoon of Tender Quick Meat Cure.

Step 7.

It’s time to shape your ham. Grab a baking tray from the pantry. For this recipe, I used a small ceramic terrine tray my wife got from her mother. Put the mixture inside the tray and use your hands to spread the mixture over the entire surface.

 

Step 8.

It’s oven time! By now, your oven should have reached the desired temp. Cover you spam tray with an aluminum foil. Make sure it’s wrapped around nice and tight, especially around the handles. Now, take a large baking tray from the pantry and place the spam tray smack in the middle. Fill the larger with water (should be ¾ full). Place in the oven for three to four hours. Check the larger tray every half an hour and make sure that there’s still water there.

Step 9.

Time’s up! Let’s pop the lid. This is the most important part of making ham. Remove the tray from the oven and allow it to cool for a bit. After that, use some gloves or something to get the spam tray out of the bigger tray. Have to warn you that this part’s a little bit disgusting. Take the aluminum foil off the spam tray. That yellowish goo on top of your meat is pure fat. Take a ladle or a large spoon and remove the excess fat. Temporarily place it in a plate or bowl. After it cools down, throw it in the garbage because it cannot be reused. Don’t forget to leave a thin layer on fat on top of your spam.

Step 10.

Bag and tag. Grab yourself a lid from the pantry and place it on top of the spam tray. All you need to do know is to find some sort of weight to put on top of the lid. This prevents the blob inside from expanding and from drawing too much moisture from the air. I used two small bricks to weigh down the lid, but you can use anything you have on hand as long as it’s heavy and keep the lid shut.

Step 11.

The ice-man cometh! Place the tray with the weight on top inside the fridge. You can also turn this into full-blackout recipe by swapping the fridge with a cool and dry place. Don’t worry about the meat turning bad because it’s packed with enough salt.

 

That’s it!

If you’ve gone through every step, you should have fresh, homemade spam in 24 hours or less. Now, bear in mind that this is not the canned spam variety which means that it doesn’t have a very long shelf life. However, if you know a little bit about canning, you can go for the kill.

I haven’t gotten around to canning my span mostly because I don’t know a thing about how to seal those blasted things. My mother told me that there’s a special tool for that job, but I’ve yet to discover it. Anyway, it’s not like there’s enough spam to can – my family made quick work of it.

Like my recipe? Let me know your thoughts in the comment section. Also, if you know of any canning method, I’ll be grateful if you would care to share it.

Other Self-sufficiency and Preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

0 Comments

Nothing beats a cooked meal during a SHTF situation. You have no idea how easy it is to make this stuff.

If I could, I would write an ode to the bug out bag.

A couple of days ago, I was wondering what the H would I do if that B.O.B would go missing or worse, gets damaged beyond repair? Well, in the world of prepping, a broken backpack means nothing as long as you have a couple of materials at the ready.

In today’s article, I’m going to show you a quick easy way to craft your own backpack. Apparently, this type of carrier is called a horseshoe rucksack although I cannot see any resemblance between this thing and the metal hoop that goes around the horse’s hoof.

Anyway, from a historical perspective, the horseshoe backpack was, let’s say, invented around the time of Napoleon’s military campaigns. This kind of rucksack was used by foot soldiers to carry stuff like toiletries, spare ammo, paintings or valuables.

Well, I have to admit that given its aspect, the horseshoe rucksack goes above and beyond the call of duty – it’s incredibly light, can be used to store any number of objects and, most importantly, it’s incredibly resilient.

So, without further ado, here’s how you can craft your own horseshoe rucksack.

Materials required

For this project you will need the following items:

  • Cordage (works with anything from 550 paracords to string and dental floss).
  • Heavy poncho (you can replace with light rain poncho or a rectangular piece of the tarp).
  • Everything that goes inside your B.O.B or scavenged items.

Yup, it’s that simple. Soldiers didn’t like this type of rucksack for nothing. Imagine having to spend hours crafting an intricate backpack knowing that the sarge could give the “move out” order at any moment. All done gathering all the necessary gear? Great! Find yourself a quiet spot to piece together your horseshoe backpack and get to work.

How to assemble a horseshoe backpack

Step 1. Take out your heavy rain poncho\light rain poncho\tarp and set it on the ground.

Step 2. Fold it in the middle two times. You should end up with a rectangular piece. Don’t forget to tuck away the hood.

Step 3. Place your items on one side of the backpack. Arrange them in a straight line. If you have sharp or objects with jagged edges, wrap them in pieces of cloth to protect your tarp or poncho. Keep in mind that you’ll still need to use that for other purposes like water collection or shelter-crafting.

Step 4. When you’re done arranging the objects on the tarp\poncho, grab one side and start rolling it. Remember when you were little, and your mother asked you to roll the carpet? It’s the same thing. Be careful not to let any of the objects slip.

Step 5. After rolling the tarp\poncho, take some cordage, cut a small piece, and tie one of the ends. Don’t forget to make a tight knot. You wouldn’t want to lose the stuff inside the rucksack.

Step 6. Tie the other end of the poncho\tarp roll using a small piece of cordage.

Step 7. Cut two more pieces of string and make knots along the length. Now it’s time for the strap.

Step 8. Measure a piece of string and cut it with your survival knife or sharp rock. Take one end and tie it to the string attached to the upper part of your rucksack. Finally, tie the other end to the lower part, and you’re done. It’s adventure time!

Additional considerations on the horseshoe rucksack

Technically speaking, you can craft one of these backpacks from, well, anything you have on hand – a T-Shirt, a long piece of sterile gauze, a bedsheet or whatever. However, there is a good reason behind the use of a heavy rain poncho.

First of all, by default, ponchos are waterproof or, at least, it should be if it doesn’t have any holes in it. Second, ponchos, especially army-grade ones are resistant to tearing, breaking, and warping. So, you can be sure that everything inside will be dry and very well protected.

The old horseshoe backpack has only a single caveat: it’s not suitable for carrying heavier items. If you bug out back contains stuff like AM\FM radio, personal emergency buoy, extra smartphones or whatever, you will need to find other ways to carry them with you – I would recommend a pouch made from a piece of cordage and a piece of cloth.

There’s a big difference between hiking with a regular backpack and using the horseshoe – in the first case, the overall design distributes weight equally. The same thing cannot be said about our horseshoe backpack. I should also mention the fact that hiking with that thing on for more than four hours is totally unadvisable.

If the lack of weight balance is not a major turnoff, then the strap tearing into your shoulder is. Still, I wouldn’t consider this a caveat since you can easily fix it by adding some kind of padding to the string segment resting on your shoulder.  If you still have your old backpack, use your knife to cut a piece of strap. Aim for the one with extra padding. Place it over your shoulder, and that’s it!

When tying the horseshoe rucksack, I would advise you to be extra careful around the dangling end. For extra safety, tie another piece of cordage around it.

Other Options?

In case you have to hike for a longer amount of time, the horseshoe backpack’s not exactly the best option.

For this, I would recommend building a so-called cage backpack. Instead of using your heavy poncho, construct a cage-like frame by stacking small pieces of wood. Secure them using your cordage of choice. Mount two string straps and that’s it. In addition, this type of backpack is quite useful, especially if you’re forced to hunt – you can’t really fit the game, no matter how small, inside the horseshow.

Congrats! You now know how to make a simple backpack. What’s your take on this? Hit the comments section and let me know.

Other Self-sufficiency and Preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

0 Comments

Well, in the world of prepping, a broken backpack means nothing as long as you have a couple of materials at the ready.

These are two resources I came across on the web today.

The Basics of Wound Care is a booklet that you can download that goes into pretty graphic detail about identifying and treating a wide variety of wounds. If pictures of really nasty wounds cause you to get sick, you better just download this one and let somebody else read it.

Another really great book is Practical Plastic Surgery for Non-surgeons and at first I thought to myself, who is going to be augmenting breasts (yes, that is covered in the book) after the SHTF? Which in retrospect could be a barter-able skill… I am kidding.

The book does go into a lot of great information for treating wounds and injuries and is broken into chapters. If you don’t get the entire book, you can just download the individual chapters that seem most appropriate to you. I would recommend, Suturing, Basic Surgery, Gunshot Wounds and Burns.

To download the entire Plastic Surgery for Non-Surgeons book, click here.

But you can also download an individual chapter.

Let me know if you found this interesting or just a waste of time. But then, who doesn’t like some free knowledge. Just let me know what you think about the quality of information shared for free in these two books.

Hello, my name is Dr. Ralph La Guardia, I am a physician, an internist and I am also board certified in both geriatrics and bariatrics.

However, my true passion is integrative medicine, which is the combination of traditional and alternative medicine. I have taken the best treatments of both disciplines to develop a highly effective method of treating medical problems of all types. 

I am also a prepper and I have written the most complete medical guide ever written called

The Doomsday Book Of Medicine

My reason for writing this book was to fill the gap in the disaster literature for medical treatment. I read all the books on survival medicine and I am here to tell you, they are all rip offs. They are nothing more than first aid manuals, often written by authors with absolutely no medical training. I am sure their intentions were good, but the results were horrific.

These so-called medical guides were full of worthless advice like this: if you are bitten by a snake, call poison control. They tell you to stockpile your medications, try to tell your insurance company that you need a year’s worth of your diabetes or blood pressure meds, and let me know how that goes for you.

I have been in private practice for over thirty years. During that time, I read countless books and thousands of articles in obscure medical journals, looking for alternative cures. I tested what works and what doesn’t and will teach you all of it, for every medical problem from head to toe, everything from fevers to diabetes to pneumonia to snake bites.

Get this book now and begin to learn such secrets as

– What is 8 times more effective at preventing the flu than a flu vaccine?

– The antioxidant that is 6,000 x more powerful than vitamin c.

– The amino acid that not only treats anxiety and depression but also helps alleviate alcohol and drug craving.

– The common weed that is not only the perfect food but also can be used to make biofuel for your vehicles, after gasoline is no longer available.

– The common cleaning product that will not only cure your arthritis but also make your bones so rock hard that surgeons have difficulty cutting thru them.

There has never been a book like this, so easy to read and so jam packed full of life saving medical information that cannot be found anywhere else.

I give you practical advice “from the trenches” that you can find nowhere else.

For each problem, I teach you what it is, and more importantly I give you scores of ways to treat each problem without prescription pharmaceuticals, often with everyday items already in your pantry or medicine cabinet.

You can prepare for a crisis in endless ways, stockpiling food, guns and ammo and finding a secure “bugout” place that you can make impregnable, but what are you going to do if you or one of your loved ones get sick, really sick, life threatening sick … then what?

You won’t know how to diagnose what is going on, and more importantly you won’t have any idea how to treat it. You will sit there hopeless as your loved ones succumb to an illness or an injury and be totally helpless.

What are you going to do when your meds run out? How are you going to stop your child’s burning fever? How are you going to help a loved one with a severe burn, or a broken bone, or a snake bite? What are you going to do when they are coughing and cannot stop, is it flu or pneumonia? And you have no antibiotics left.

I was sick of people with good intentions getting ripped off by worthless medical guides, so I decided to do something about it and I wrote The Doomsday Book of Medicine; over 800 pages jammed full of medical information written in an easy to read format that requires absolutely no medical knowledge.

I teach you how to both diagnose and treat any medical problem you are going to encounter. And more importantly, I give you many ways to treat it. I also teach you how to make your own medical chest that you can stock with over the counter nonprescription items, so you too can treat any medical problem that you or your loved ones may find themselves in.

You don’t have to wait for a crisis to use this book

Most of my readers use it in their everyday lives to treat any medical problems that might occur. It is their “go to book” saving them time and money on costly doctor visits. Not only is this book the most complete medical guide ever written for non-medical people, it is also a manual that you can use to keep your body vigorously healthy and disease free.

I’ll teach you how to grow nutrient dense foods that will nourish your mind and body. You will learn the secrets of the soil that will make your body impregnable to disease. You will learn essential health practices, the right way to take vitamins, and why they currently aren’t working for you. You will learn the essential tools for treating most diseases you are likely to encounter.

No other book on the market today will teach you all of this as well as how to make your own wound care solutions, saline solutions, eye irrigant, natural insect repellent, sunscreen, fecal transplant solution, hydrating fluids and even toothpaste.

The Doomsday Book Of Medicine is jammed packed with over 800 pages of medical secrets that you can find nowhere else. It took me over 30 years in private practice, and endless research to find all of these cures, and now for the first time they are all presented in one easy to read format.

The Doomsday Book Of Medicine is your answer to the vital question: what are you going to do when there are no doctors or medicine available?

Other Self-sufficiency and Preparedness solutions recommended for you:

The Lost Ways (The vital self-sufficiency lessons our great grand-fathers left us)
Survival MD (Knowledge to survive any medical crisis situation)
Backyard Liberty (Liberal’s hidden agenda: more than just your guns…)
Alive After the Fall (Build yourself the only unlimited water source you’ll ever need)
The Lost ways II (4 Important Forgotten Skills used by our Ancestors that can help you in any crisis)
The Patriot Privacy Kit (Secure your privacy in just 10 simple steps)

0 Comments

I was sick of people with good intentions getting ripped off by worthless medical guides, so I decided to do something about it and I wrote The Doomsday Book of

Hemp seed and hemp oil have been called the perfect food for humanity. The reason for this is that hemp oil contains all the essential fatty acids and essential amino acids your body needs. You remember essential means that they cannot be manufactured by your body and therefore are essential to get in your diet to maintain good health and functioning of your body.

In the case of hemp oil it has them all, all the fats and all twenty of the amino acids your body needs to make proteins of all types.

Hemp oil contains the perfect balance of fatty acids, with a 3:1 ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids and is the only seed that contains this perfect balance. Fish oil also contains many essential fatty acids but frequently is contaminated with mercury and other toxins that have polluted the world’s oceans, unless you get a pharmaceutical grade fish oil such as Lovaza or Vascepa, both of which are only available by prescription.

Hemp oil also contains a very rare protein called globule edestins that is very similar to the globulin protein found in human blood plasma, which is known to help digestion. Hemp oil also contains albumin, which is the same protein found in egg whites.

The proteins in hemp are more easily digested than meat, eggs, cheeses, milk, or just about any other protein source, including soy. Hemp seeds and oil also contain GLA or gamma linolenic acid, which is very rare, and helps with breast pain and skin problems like eczema.

In fact, hemp seeds are the most nutritious seeds in the world.

In addition to the above-mentioned ingredients, hemp seeds also contain vitamins such as vitamins D and E, enzymes, and a relative lack of sugars, starches, and saturated fats, and has the highest content of unsaturated (the good ones) fatty acids found in the entire plant kingdom. For this reason many people consider hemp seeds and hemp oil to be an ideal food for your body or a Super Food by some nutritionists.

WHY YOUR HEMP OIL NEEDS TO COME FROM OUTSIDE THE U.S.A.

In the United States hemp oil cannot be processed unless the seed is killed with high temperatures. The problem with that is that high temperatures destroy the essential fatty acids by changing their composition and accelerating the destruction of the beneficial properties of hemp oil. For that reason you should look for cold-pressed oil which will by necessity have to come from outside the United States.

This is also the reason why Canada produces most of the cold-pressed hemp oil consumed in the Unites States.

By the way

  • The heat destruction of the essential fatty acids in hemp and other seed oils is the reason you should not use them for frying.
  • Also seed oils will become rancid if left exposed and not refrigerated, so always store them in your refrigerator to vastly increase their shelf life.
  • When you buy any seed oils always look for cold-pressed, which produces the highest quality oils while retaining most of their beneficial qualities. What health benefits are associated with the use of Hemp Oil?

Hemp oil has many health-enhancing qualities due to the many healthy substances it contains.

As I said earlier, the most important of the healthy substances contained in hemp oil are the essential fatty acids. Many people are confused by the health benefits of fats and think all fats are unhealthy, but nothing could be further from the truth. Without essential fatty acids life would be impossible. Your body needs fats to produce many of its structures, including most notably your brain, as well as other important substances like prostaglandins.

Prostaglandins are a group of hormone-like lipid (fat) compounds that are made from the action of enzymes on essential fatty acids.

Now that I have made your eyes glassy and have you yawning with that explanation, allow me to explain why prostaglandins are so very important for your health.

  • Prostaglandins are produced by every cell in the body except red blood cells, which speaks volumes about their importance.
  • They control inflammation, blood pressure, platelet aggregation, mediate pain in the spinal nerves, control fever, regulate kidney function, regulate intraocular (inside your eyeball) pressure, control labor, cell growth regulation, and acid secretion by the stomach.

So, if you have a lack of essential fatty acids which are needed to make prostaglandins, you will naturally have low levels of them and will lack their positive effects in your body and consequently suffer with a large number of conditions. at is why hemp oil has been reported to have so many different positive effects such as:

  1. Significantly decrease inflammation in joints and muscles, thereby helping arthritis, muscle aches, fibromyalgia.Lower blood pressure by relaxing blood vessels.
  2. Prevent platelet aggregation, which prevents clot formation and thereby strokes and heart attacks.
  3. Helps control pain.Control fevers.
  4. Help glaucoma.
  5. Help labor pain.
  6. Helps asthma by relaxation of airways.
  7. Improve circulation by relaxing the blood vessels and allowing greater blood flow.
  8. Improving immunity and thereby helping reduce infections of all types as well as cancer.
  9. Helping with skin problems like eczema, psoriasis, and acne.
  10. GI problems like ulcers, irritable bowel syndrome, abdominal cramping, and constipation.

HOW TO TAKE HEMP OIL

Hemp oil is best taken without heating it, such as added to salads or other vegetables as a condiment. It can be added to vinegar, replacing olive oil and making a wonderful salad dressing that is quite tasty.

It has a nutty flavor and can be taken orally without mixing it in anything, or can be added to organic yogurt or to any food you might prefer. Depending on the severity of your medical issues, you can take up to five tablespoons a day, but I would normally recommend taking two tablespoons a day for general health maintenance. If you are eating the shelled hemp seeds, you need to take about four heaping teaspoons daily.

Hemp oil can also be applied topically if you have a skin condition of any type by rubbing it into the skin several times a day until the issue resolves. Hemp oil is a natural moisturizer and is also useful as a sunblock.

DOES HEMP OIL HAVE ANY SIDE EFFECTS?

Any substance can cause side effects if ingested, since different people react in different ways. at being said, hemp oil is very well tolerated. ere could be a little diarrhea or loose stools or abdominal cramping. Since it may affect the clotting ability of platelets, it may cause bleeding or bruising problems in patients already on Coumadin (warfarin) or other blood thinners.

OTHER USES OF HEMP OIL FOR PREPPERS

  1. Hemp oil can be used mixed with lemon oil as a wonderful varnish to finished wood.
  2. Hemp oil can be used to make candles.
  3. Hemp oil can be used as a lubricant for bicycle chains and chainsaws, etc.
  4. Hemp oil can be used as a biodiesel fuel. For we Preppers this alone may prove to be one of its greatest uses, since marijuana is so easy to grow (hence its nickname “weed”).

Growing an ample supply for medicinal and biodiesel fuel use will probably become widespread.

Those above-named benefits of hemp oil are primarily from its high content of essential fatty acids.

From a survivalist or Prepper viewpoint hemp oil answers all of our problems as far as nutrition is concerned, because here in one seed oil we are able to give our bodies all twenty of the amino acids, including the nine essential amino acids that we cannot produce ourselves, in addition to which we can get all the essential fatty acids and a host of other vitamins, minerals, and enzymes.

Due to its high nutritional content it indeed qualifies as a Super Food for our needs.

Cannabis sativa is also very easy to grow, does not require any special soils, does not need pesticides or even fertilizer and has no natural enemies that ravage it. In short, Cannabis is a weed and is very easy to grow and provides us with complete nutrition as well as a useful medicine, and, if you are so inclined, a psychoactive substance (it will get you high).

It will probably be a very useful product to have for barter due to its multiple uses, but I would venture to guess that many people will be growing it. In a survival situation Cannabis sativa will be a very useful thing to add to your medicine chest; at least keep a nice supply of the seeds handy.

Want more practical advice such as this one?

Check out Dr. Ralph La Guardia’s The Doomsday Book of Medicine.

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From a survivalist or Prepper viewpoint hemp oil answers all of our problems as far as nutrition is concerned.

The good part about getting older is you stop trying to prove anything to anyone, including yourself. All you are in the pursuit of is collecting experiences – beautiful, fragile little soap bubbles that you store in your heart, and every once in a while you pull one out and gaze at the delicate pictures it shows you. No soap? No worries. That’s what we’re here for.

There are several ways to make soap, all of which start with lye.

One of the simplest ways to make some soap is, after using a frying pan over a hardwood camp fire, take some of the ashes from the fire and sprinkle them on the fat in the pan, add some water. They will combine and make you a small batch of soap. You cannot use softwoods like pine to make lye because of their high resin content, so stick with hard woods like oak, maple, and as, for example.

Larger quantities of soap can easily be made by constructing a lye-leaching container.

To make a lye-leaching container you have to:

  • use a wooden barrel, or a plastic or a steel container. Lye has a pH of 13 and will eat through aluminum, it is a very dangerous, strongly alkaline solution.
  • Drill or punch holes in the bottom of the container to allow drainage
  • Fill the bottom of the container with a layer of gravel on top of which will be a two or three inch layer of straw or dried grass, on top of that will go your wood ashes.
  • Tamp down the ashes to compress them and make a depression in the middle of the ashes.
  • Now the top of the container has to be open so you can pour water onto the ashes and allow that water to dissolve the lye from the ash and then pass through the straw and then the gravel for a second filtration.
  • You should fill the depression with water and then wait several hours as the water slowly trickles out the bottom.

The first batch produced will be the strongest. You can get a second batch of lye by using the same barrel’s contents and passing water through it. This second pass lye has to be re-passed through the barrel to make it strong enough. The lye is then combined with animal fat to make soap; you have to keep adding enough fat to consume all the lye. ere are actual tables called saponification tables that tell you the required ratio of fat to lye. You can also use any vegetable oil instead of animal fat.

Remember, oils are just liquid fat at room temperatures.

Caution: If you get lye in your eyes you have to douse them with milk; if you get lye on your skin douse it with vinegar to neutralize it. Lye is a very caustic substance… meaning it burns like hell! Anything at either end of the pH spectrum will be dangerous…either a strong acid with a very low pH or a strong base or alkali with a very high pH. Lye has a pH of about 13, which is very strong. Lye will easily eat right through things like aluminum.

HOW TO MAKE ACTIVATED CHARCOAL

Activated charcoal can be made from charcoal you have made in your improvised oven and then it needs to be treated with acid and reheated again. From the stage of making charcoal you can also make black powder or wood alcohol or just leave it as charcoal if you want to smelt any metals, since charcoal burns much hotter than wood and thus has been used in forges since ancient times.

The best way is to start with the smallest pieces of wood, so cut up your wood as best you can. Eventually, you are going to have to grind these small pieces up into a fine powder, so it is critical to start with very small pieces of wood. A hardwood sawdust would be an ideal place to start.

Whatever you use for making the oven to burn your charcoal, it has to have two common features — it has to be able to be sealed to prevent oxygen from entering, or you will just completely burn the wood and form ash but no coal. Secondly, you need to have a vent hole, large enough to allow the volatile chemicals in the wood to escape after they have been changed into gases yet small enough to prevent oxygen from being drawn in.

You have to design a setup so your closed oven can be suspended over a fire, allowing it to heat up without the presence of oxygen, to boil off the water and eventually cook off all the volatile chemicals that are in the wood; once these two are gone you will have your carbon and ash left.

Since water boils off at about 212 F at sea level ( as you go up in altitude water will boil at a lower temperature), the first thing you will see exiting your vent hole will be steam.

  • Once you see steam coming out you should cook the wood for at least another four hours. This is not written in stone and depends on the amount of wood you have in your oven and the heat production of your fire, etc.
  • After four or five hours have passed and you think you are finished making your charcoal, remove the oven from the fire. This step is critical. You have to wait until the oven has completely cooled down before you open it, otherwise the char will burst into flame if it is hot and exposed to a sudden rush of oxygen by you opening the oven.
  • At this point you have made charcoal, and if you want to go on to make black powder or use it for smelting an ore, you are ready to do that.
  • For our purposes we need to acid-treat the charcoal and reheat it before we have made activated charcoal.
  • For an acid a good source is battery acid, which you can buy in any auto supply store. Be advised, this acid is very dangerous and has to be handled very carefully to avoid serious acid burns. You should be wearing an apron, goggles, gloves, and a mask over your nose and mouth to keep from inhaling any noxious fumes.
  • Pour the acid into a glass cooking pan, put each piece of coal into the acid bath and allow it to soak for about five minutes, then carefully remove the charcoal and drain off the excess acid and place the charcoal back into the oven.
  • Keep repeating this process until you have soaked all of the charcoal in acid.

As an alternative to battery acid, which is strong sulfuric acid, you can use hydrochloric acid which you can buy in pool supply stores as muriatic acid. It is used to clean the linings of cement swimming pools or you can find it in hardware stores. You can also use nitric acid, but that is harder to find and usually you can only get it from chemical supply stores that probably won’t sell it to you.

  • Now put all the acid-treated charcoal back into your oven
  • Reseal it and reheat it for another four or five hours until it is completely heated.
  • Just like in the earlier step, you need to allow the oven to cool down before you open it and expose it to oxygen or you will have another flash fire as the activated charcoal catches fire.
  • Carefully open up the oven, remove the charcoal and grind it up into as fine a powder as you can, and now you have made activated charcoal.

Note: for the purposes of home water purification, if you are making your own activated charcoal, coconut husks are supposedly the best material to use for this. The problem with that is, where are you going to find coconut husks unless you stockpile them now for later use, unless of course you live in a tropical area then it will not be a problem. If you do happen to live in a tropical environment with many coconuts available you should also learn how to make coconut oil which has many medicinal as well as nutritional uses.

An alternative method for making your own activated charcoal involves

  • using two steel barrels, one fifty-five gallon and one thirty-five gallon with its lid, and a few thick, long pieces of rebar.
  • Cut two one foot by one foot holes in the fifty-five gallon drum’s sides and then take the thirty-five gallon drum and drill nine or ten holes in its bottom.
  • Now fill the fifty-five gallon drum with your firewood.
  • Fill the thirty-five gallon drum with the wood you want to make into charcoal and seal it up so the only holes are those in its bottom, facing the fifty- five gallon drum fire.
  • Slide the thirty-five gallon drum onto the long rebar rods and place it on top of the fifty-five gallon drum.
  • Now, light the fifty-five gallon drum’s wood on fire.
  • Cook it as above for four or five hours and then remove the thirty-five gallon drum from the fire and allow it to properly cool and once it is cooled, open it and there is your charcoal.

The difference with this and the previous method is the gas in the thirty-five gallon drum has nowhere to go but out into the fire below, thus stoking that fire and letting it burn even hotter, so in effect you are circulating the wood gases back into the fifty-five gallon drum’s fire to make it even hotter.

There are many other methods available to you on YouTube and other websites.

Or you can just get Dr. Ralph La Guardia’s The Doomsday Book of Medicine, and have it all in one place.

Follow the link and find out more about this book. It will simply teach you how to build your own healthcare system. That means prepping for day to day problems and issues. Because becoming a final prepper takes practice. You don’t have to wait until it’s too late to open a survival book.

Get this book now if you want something to change.

Spoiler alert – it’s all about good soil. And it’s not a metaphor, even if it also works like that.

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How much do you know about activated charcoal? Well, seems like it knows a lot about you. Read here about its many medical uses.

As preppers we need to build strong bodies literally from the ground up.

This is the only way we can guarantee ourselves good, long-lasting, disease free bodies that will resist the inevitable epidemics that will sweep through a post-apocalyptic society, killing off many of the original survivors. It is also the only way we will be able to bear children who are healthy both mentally and physically, and who are better able to survive in this post-apocalyptic, nightmare world.

When I say from the ground up I mean it literally, the “dirty” secret to good health lies in the dirt or soil of our gardens, fields, and orchards. It is the only way to build healthy bodies and immune systems that will be able to resist everything thrown at them.

We are incredible machines that will build remarkably strong bodies if provided with the proper environment or terrain and all the building blocks they need. I alluded to the mistake that modern medicine is making by attacking the organisms that they feel are causing diseases. is idea of one germ causing one disease state is known as Germ theory.

Don’t mistake what I am saying. Germ theory has served us well, but in my opinion its time has come and gone.

The endless war we have waged against germs has been lost.

We have to face facts, antibiotics worked for years but now the bacteria have outsmarted us and resistance is spreading faster than new, novel antibiotics can be developed. It has been an arms race of sorts since the 1940s and we are losing it.

That leaves us with two options, double down and try as hard as we can to come up with new antibiotics, or try option two ….build healthier cells and immerse them in a healthier environment that will be able to resist infections and prevent them from ever taking hold.

Louis Pasteur was the father of Germ theory, but by the time of his death he saw its futility and on his deathbed he recanted and proclaimed, “It is the terrain that is most important.”

The terrain is the area between cells and all around them it is also known as the ECM or extracellular matrix. is is not a dead zone at all, it is the way cells get their nutrients by diffusion of nutrients between cells. Oxygen is also delivered through the terrain, waste products are removed, and cells communicate with each other through it.

Cells send messages to each other through the terrain, which also provides a structure to embed the cells into and allows the cells to adhere or stick to each other. Growth factors that control cell behavior such as hormones and other protein molecules lie within the terrain and await activation so they can control cell functions.

As you can see, this is not a glue merely holding cells together but rather it is the key to controlling cell health and in turn human health. To ignore its importance in favor of finding new ways to attack germs is utter madness.

Why do we continuously try to reinvent the wheel?

The idea that the environment or “the Terrain” the cells are immersed in predisposes cells to become sick or diseased was abandoned in favor of Germ theory almost a hundred years ago by modern medicine and unfortunately new theories take a long time to become accepted as truths.

Modern medicine is still on the attack, embracing germ theory to the exclusion of evidence to the contrary and its continual failure to permanently conquer germs with ever more toxic antibiotics. Even recent progress that has been made in studying and identifying the human microbiome (the beneficial bacteria and fungi that live and breed in our intestines) and its incredible contribution to our health and our immunity has been ignored in favor of ever stronger antibiotics that devastate these wonderful probiotics.

The evidence continues to mount in favor of the terrain, yet it is continually ignored or played down. Healthy cells produce healthy tissues and organs and healthy bodies, plain and simple. These cells require all the building blocks I mentioned above, plus the right pH (slightly alkaline), and plentiful oxygen provided by good blood flow (which also removes waste products that are acidic).

These healthy cells actually vibrate at certain frequencies, “buzzing” together, having the correct pH, well oxygenated and also the correct electrical voltage all adding up to vibrantly healthy tissue. These cells will never become infected by any germ that tries to attack them. The germs will be repelled by the electric charge and will not find a receptive environment due to the alkaline pH and will not be able to penetrate the cell membrane that is strong and healthy, in good repair and strongly vibrating, and fully able to resist any assaults.

Germs cannot overcome this collective electric charge of healthy cells which repels them, they cannot survive in an alkaline pH, and they cannot gain entry into cells that are strong and healthy. Germs need low oxygen, acidic environments to grow and reproduce and be able to spread.

They need a certain frequency of vibration to be able to enter a cell. Think of it like an FM radio dial ….if you want to listen to a certain channel, you can only gain entry to that channel at the correct frequency. The wrong frequency number on the dial and you get static and you can never pick up or enter that station. It is the same for germs; these microorganisms are alive and as living organisms they too vibrate at a certain frequency, they need cells which are “sick” and whose electrical charge and vibratory frequency are compromised enough to allow them to enter; if not, it is like searching for an FM station at the wrong frequency.

The blueprint for perfect, healthy, disease-resistant bodies is already encoded in our DNA.

We have recently discovered epigenetic (literally meaning around or outside the genes) mechanisms that in turn are the on and off signals for our genes. Many of these epigenetic influences are negative and disease- promoting, but not all.

We are rapidly learning how to better control negative epigenetic influences, and the good news is that they can be overcome.

The messengers for this epigenetic control come in the form of microRNA. We can provide our bodies with all the proper building blocks to construct the perfect body but this needs to be done in the context of the right terrain with the proper pH and also by providing microRNA to send the correct signals to our genes so they can correctly choreograph this amazing construction project.

In order to build healthy cells as I described above, you need to start in your dirt or soil; that is the “dirty” secret to good health.

Healthy soils will grow healthy plants, animals grazing on healthy plants will build healthy, strong bodies and humans eating these plants and animals will in turn become strong, robust, and very disease resistant.

In effect, to develop our own healthy terrain we need to start with healthy terrains in our gardens, fields, orchards, lakes, rivers, and pastures.

This is just an excerpt from Dr. Ralph la Guardia’s 800+ page The Doomsday Book of Medicine.

The chapter about how to build a healthy soil alone is worth the price of the whole book. It will teach how to grow nutrient dense foods that will nourish your mind and body. You will learn the secrets of the soil that will make your body impregnable to disease. You will learn essential health practices, the right way to take vitamins, and why they currently aren’t working for you. You will learn the essential tools for treating most diseases you are likely to encounter.

No other book on the market today will teach you all of this as well as how to make your own wound care solutions, saline solutions, eye irrigant, natural insect repellent, sunscreen, hydrating fluids and even toothpaste.

The Doomsday Book Of Medicine is jammed packed with over 800 pages of medical secrets that you can find nowhere else. It took me over 30 years in private practice, and endless research to find all of these cures, and now for the first time they are all presented in one easy to read format. You can read more about it here. 

Have a good one,

Charles

 

 

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When I say from the ground up I mean it literally, the “dirty” secret to good health lies in the dirt or soil of our gardens, fields, and orchards.

What Never Spoils Could Never Hurt You

Today’s tool recommendation? How about honey? Sweet…of me, I know. But I’m serious. Here’s what my honey can do.

Honey never spoils…you could eat thousand-year-old honey if you found it. Why is that, you ask?

The reason is simple …honey has amazing antibacterial, antifungal, and antiviral properties…so nothing can really grow in it and hence it does not spoil. And that is one of the reasons it is so good to use on wounds. The Romans were masters of practicality…they did incredibly well with what little they had.

Physicians in the Roman army routinely slathered honey on all those nasty wounds their troops had after battles. They did not have the luxury of modern antibiotics and so they used honey and herbal treatments.

I have used honey in my practice for over twenty-five years with great success. Wound clinics routinely prescribed ridiculously expensive creams and salves for my patients, and many times with little success. I routinely intervened and told them to buy a jar of raw local honey at the farmer’s market or the local grocer. After using my honey treatment they returned to the wound clinics and repeatedly astonished the doctors and nurses there with their speedy recovery and lack of infections.

Honey and Wound Healing

Here’s the science behind honey’s amazing properties.

  • Honey is very viscous (thick) and therefore has a very strong osmotic effect (think of osmosis as gravity).
  • Honey is very osmotically active so like gravity, it has a strong pull, so it pulls or draws fluids out of the less osmotically active wound, carrying debris, dirt, and bacteria, etc. away from the wound onto the dressing.
  • That is why it is good to apply the honey directly to a wound dressing and then apply that to the wound. This way you can change the dressing each time it is soaked with fluids from the wound.
  • This osmotic effect also helps keep the wound moist, preventing premature scabbing and aiding in healing.
  • Honey also has a very strong attractive effect upon water, which it will combine with and make it unavailable to thirsty bacteria, fungi, and viruses. As the bacteria in a wound feed on the glucose in honey they will produce lactic acid. This will also prevent the foul smell of many wounds.
  • As honey gets combined with water it will produce hydrogen peroxide. This is the same substance that your body’s white blood cells produce to destroy foreign invaders. This is why hydrogen peroxide has a strong antiseptic effect. This also promotes wound healing. The hydrogen peroxide in honey is steadily produced and hence has a long-term positive effect on the wound.
  • Honey also causes the chelation of iron, thus binding it to proteins and rendering it unavailable to bacteria, which need iron to reproduce. Therefore, whenever you bind iron up and make it unavailable to bacteria, you are producing an antimicrobial effect.
  • Honey also helps promote granulation of wounds. at is the step after the production of a clot to close a wound.

Note: Granulation tissue is the yellow tissue in the base of a wound. I have found that even by nurses it is very often mistaken for pus. is is your body’s way of filling in a wound gap and allowing normal tissue to grow into that from all sides and heal a wound. You can tell the difference of it from pus because it is nice and uniform, lining a wound with the look of a thin layer of lemon pudding and without any foul smell that pus usually produces.

Honey for Burns, Skin Ulcers, and Dry Skin

Honey also works very well on burns;

  • use it the same way, covering the burned area with a large gauze soaked with honey.
  • Change it just like the wound dressing, whenever it is soaked with fluids that it has drawn out of the burn. It will prevent the major problem with burns, infection.
  • It will also produce better healing and less scarring, which can be critical in treating burns.

Honey also works very well in skin ulceration. I have treated many patients with large, deep decubitus ulcers (bed sores) and they have healed remarkably well. Honey applied to a dressing along with proper positioning of the patient to alleviate those pressure points will work wonders for patients with bed sores.

Honey has also been used to treat dry, parched, or injured skin of any type. Women as far back as Cleopatra have used raw honey for face masks and to beautify their hair and skin. The great moisturizing effect of honey on dry, ageing skin is due to its ability to attract and retain moisture in the skin without making the skin too oily. For this reason as well as raw honey’s antibacterial effects, it works very well in cases of acne.

Raw honey has been used for every conceivable kind of skin problem, including athlete’s foot.

Honey for an Upset Stomach

  • Raw honey, when combined with ginger and lemon juice, makes a very potent treatment for nausea and vomiting as well as gastric distress of any type, including ulcers.
  • Raw honey also contains large amounts of amylase which is concentrated in the pollen of flowers. Amylase is a digestive enzyme that digests starches such as bread, pasta, potatoes, and rice, thus it aids in digestion and is an excellent treatment for indigestion.

I think I made you consider at least getting some to just eat it, for now.

Question is – What Type of Honey Should You Buy?

Dr. La Guardia tell you all about it in his book; the community is already referring to it as The Bible of Survival.

Are you ready to finally make the switch from surviving to thriving?

Get this book today.

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Honey never spoils