[bonniebede]

Article in the Irish times on facing the challenge to live for 2WEEKS without shopping to see if you could eat out of your cupboards. And they nearly made it, except for a bit of fruit and veg...

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...315732716.html

Some interesting things on the sort of meals they made form items which obviously store longer... pulses etc... and the rapid disappearance of meat from the menu.

But honestly, if two weeks is a stretch....they need to visit here more often.

[mawk]

just called into tesco on my way home. lots of cans on sale and the poor girl on the till gave me the strangest look..

[bonniebede]

If you use their online shopping thing, you can select items and store them in a basket, and it will remember your stuff for you, even if you never buy it. I use it for thought experiment fun and games. but i wonder deos anyone ever notice the baskets i now have stored...
theres the 72 hour pack basket, the 15 euro for a month basket, the one month survival basket, and the one month emergency basket. Then theres the basic basket, which has one years supply of storable food in it...

[krissovo]

Originally Posted by bonniebede

Then theres the basic basket, which has one years supply of storable food in it...

Would be funny if you accidentally ordered a years worth of food after a few glasses of wine A line of tesco's vans outside your door the next morning would be interesting.

[eth0]

The data mining crowd will have fun with that one anyway. The discount vouchers they come up with for the club card might actually be useful for once.

[baords dyslexic]

Originally Posted by eth0

The data mining crowd will have fun with that one anyway. The discount vouchers they come up with for the club card might actually be useful for once.

With a years stock of food I hope the clubcard vouchers have a long expirey date.

[hashey]

anybody know anything about preserving your own veg- is drying or canning better? how long would dried veg/fruit last- also on storage if you had it in a shed would the temp fluctuations affect it much- not so much heat but freezing temps etc- been looking at canning/drying- seems alot cheaper to dry food that to be buying expensive pressure cooker and jars and whatnot- cheaper to buy an air dryer and seal in airtight bags? any ideas?

[silentrust]

Originally Posted by bonniebede

you are right that it doesn't take a year to get a harvest but here is my thinking.

First of all what sort of disaster are you prepping for?
Most fiction scenarios (Day of the Triffids etc) use some plot mechanism to conveniently clear all the pople out of the way. Wake up one morning everyone dies, spend most of your time looking for people. Most realistic eotw scenarios won't be like that, Say collapse of the banking system, hyper inflation and general social mayhem...


There will be lots of people, who will pour out of the cities looking for food, and eat up any available crop in the countryside before they run out, turn to cannibalism, and disappear.

So no use counting a preplanted garden as food supply, it will be too visible and impossible to protect. it is only after the population dwindles thsat you can count on planting.

So figure 2 months to the point where people start dying of hunger, another 4 months as people start scouring the landscape, don't forget there is a lot of food growing in ireland, there's 2 cows for every human being, for goodness sake, and then maybe another two months for the planted food to be gone and even the survivors start to die.

At that stage, anyone left, and that will still be alot of people will either be already bugged out to a rural location, or will have realised they have to do that. In other words the marauders will have dwindled to the point where a survival community might be able to defend their plantings against them.

During all this time you will need to have a well hidden food store, as well as a store of seeds to begin again with. So then three months to start cropping in, once things are calmed down, and wild foraging is viable again because of less need to hide, that's my guesstimate.

Makes me think a year of food is pretty essential.

Does it have to be either/or?

I agree that having a cabin in the woods with a convenient allotment won't be much use in any survival scenario as even if somehow you're able to escape the city to get to it, it'll probably be overrun by other people who were less well prepared than you.

Having said that my girlfriend and I are making a concerted effort to grow large amounts of food in our back garden, mostly through using vertical space. We're not a stage yet where we're self sufficient for veggies (hope to get there one day), so we have started stockpiling some essentials - one tip I did read was that a great place to store said supplies is underneath a Queen sized bed if you have one.

A few sensible additions I'd recommend is peanut butter which is great for a huge dose of protein and also salt.

It's true our house could be overrun but we feel it's safer to be hidden in plain sight, the knee jerk response of most non preppers will probably be to try and get out of town in our view.

[Khannie]

Originally Posted by silentrust

A few sensible additions I'd recommend is peanut butter which is great for a huge dose of protein and also salt.

Fair point. I remember reading that article about that family in Russia who were away off in the wilderness for decades. The father commented on how horrible it was not to have salt, especially during the summer. It featured in a post-apocalyptic book I read before as well. As an island nation though, we're probably going to be OK. Also, salt is super cheap these days so it's an easy one to stock up on.

[silentrust]

Originally Posted by Khannie

Fair point. I remember reading that article about that family in Russia who were away off in the wilderness for decades. The father commented on how horrible it was not to have salt, especially during the summer. It featured in a post-apocalyptic book I read before as well. As an island nation though, we're probably going to be OK. Also, salt is super cheap these days so it's an easy one to stock up on.

I don't suppose the book you read was Pat Frank's Alas Babylon ? For those who don't know this is a gripping read about a family's struggle to survive in Fort Bragg after a horrendous nuclear war between the US and Russia in the late fifties. The protagonist Randy comments that he understands why a predator and prey would both lie down by a salt lick as it's something you either have or you don't.

Having said that as you say, it's a moot point if you're not too far from the sea. Post collapse though I'd rather have the convenience of a bag or two beneath my bed rather than have to haul ass to the seaside and wait for days for the seawater to dry out in containers(!)

Also a bag of rock salt comes in mighty hand in the winter time to de-ice the driveway....

[Khannie]

Originally Posted by silentrust

I don't suppose the book you read was Pat Frank's Alas Babylon ?

It was indeed. Great book.

[silentrust]

Originally Posted by Khannie

It was indeed. Great book.

Yes, definitely my favourite!

I admit I am new to the Survivalism and Self Sufficiency bit but am pleased to see there's a thread which talks about sensible precautions -clean drinking water, toothbrushes and a deck of cards are going to improve our chances a lot more than the contents of a gun rack when the brown stuff hits the fan.

My own strategy is to simply buy two of everything when I do my weekly grocery shop - that way I know I am buying stuff I am going to consume anyway (unlike those preppers who buy sacks of buckwheat with no idea how to refine it) and also allows me to spread the cost of stocking food and other goods, so it doesn't overburden my meagre bank balance. I call this "the rule of two" but it's by no means perfect.

The downside of course is that since arriving in Ireland I have only amassed around six weeks' worth of supplies whereas I think three months' worth is a bare minimum for serious contenders. I would be interested in hearing other people's thoughts on this, as I see some posters think a year's worth of provisions is best.

[silentrust]

Originally Posted by bonniebede

If you use their online shopping thing, you can select items and store them in a basket, and it will remember your stuff for you, even if you never buy it. I use it for thought experiment fun and games. but i wonder deos anyone ever notice the baskets i now have stored...
theres the 72 hour pack basket, the 15 euro for a month basket, the one month survival basket, and the one month emergency basket. Then theres the basic basket, which has one years supply of storable food in it...

Would love to know what you have in your monthly survival basket, do you feel like sharing?

[Khannie]

Originally Posted by silentrust

The downside of course is that since arriving in Ireland I have only amassed around six weeks' worth of supplies whereas I think three months' worth is a bare minimum for serious contenders. I would be interested in hearing other people's thoughts on this, as I see some posters think a year's worth of provisions is best.

Ireland, even in a total disaster situation is more than capable of producing enough food to feed the entire island. People were doing it over a hundred years ago and with advances in technology and knowledge we would be more than capable of doing it again. It's a good place to live from a food creation perspective.

[silentrust]

Originally Posted by Khannie

Ireland, even in a total disaster situation is more than capable of producing enough food to feed the entire island. People were doing it over a hundred years ago and with advances in technology and knowledge we would be more than capable of doing it again. It's a good place to live from a food creation perspective.

Well I am certainly tentatively optimistic about the herbs grown so far in my garden but I think we need to bear in mind that over a century ago there was much more land being used for producing food and there were also far less people (a quick Google tells me that the population according to your 1911 Census was around 4.3 million whereas now it's around 6.3 million.)

Most people are also sadly woefully ignorant of the basics of growing and storing their own food beyond shoving the latest TV dinner into their freezer, then microwave.

You moved to a service based economy as we did in the UK for the best of reasons but it's a whole new ball game now - perhaps with time in a disaster we could begin tilling the wintry earth again but for now I'm going to stock up on essentials to tide myself and the family through until we all master agriculture once more. :-)