Survive Infinite Dangers: The Family Survival Guide of 21st Century Dangers (13 page)

Chapter 10

Food and Water

In the prior chapter I already listed many of the “food and water” items NOT to buy so please forgive me if I repeat certain information. But “food and water” is among the most important areas you must learn and be well provisioned for your group to survive. Thus repeating something important is worth it if it drives a point home to you. You and your group cannot survive without adequate and correct food and water, period. This is pretty basic. Without enough safe to drink water and food that will do a good job sustaining life you and your group will die. That’s the basics so let’s start there and work backwards. If the disaster was so severe that is permanently threw North American or even the entire world back into the 14
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medieval world you WILL run out of food and water. Remember, this book plans for six months of anarchy and a complete breakdown in society, not a permanent outage! That’s why I recommended you also purchase “HOW TO SURVIVE THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT” by JAMES WESLEY, RAWLES. His book takes you into decades of survival. This book does not. The books are complimentary to each other as you don’t know if a disaster is going to stop the world for six months, six years or 600. Buy both books and you’ll be prepared. One thing though; you may be surprised after reading Mr. Rawles book how much more involved and how much more expensive permanent “off the grid” “Armageddon living” is than just managing to survive for six months. You’re basically having to go back to the year 1350 (adding some of today’s great technology!) and truly be self-sustaining just as the first pioneers did who ventured into, say, western Missouri 260 years ago. No neighbors (other than Indians), no towns, no ANYTHING! You had to produce EVERYTHING. Mr. Rawles book isn’t total permanent Armageddon as he does discuss finance, bartering and other 21
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century activities but growing crops, raising and slaughtering animals for food, canning, homemade clothes and so on is in his book but not in this one.

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Even though both his book and this book are on the same basic subject you’ll be surprised how much information in the two books is NOT repeated in the other. In the few areas where the same topics are covered we pretty much agree on everything. Still, he covered a few areas I wish I had thought of. Rather than plagiarize, I’ll just refer you to his fine book as well as his blog
www.survivalblog.com
. His Internet blog is a “must read” for me.

In selecting food and water as well as all supplies for six-months of safe and secure survival I established certain rules.

1. Everything had to be easily purchased from Super Walmart, Home Depot, the Internet (95% from or through Amazon – Amazon has recently “discovered” the survivalist market and now sells hundreds and hundreds of survivalist items - almost all with Amazon acting as a “middle-man” with the product actually coming from many hundreds of smaller companies) and a sporting goods or gun store. ALL food had to have a storage life of at least 18 months and much longer if possible. Before you write a letter, I support “Buy America” so please do so if you have the time to buy from dozens of different stores and, probably, spend more money.

2. All food must be edible and healthy without being cooked. Cooking odors and smoke can travel a long way plus smells can really ruin your mostly sealed “retreat” no matter how much air freshener cans and bottles of bleach you bought. Remember: this book is written based on the premise of a total collapse of civilization where law and order is whoever has the most guns. If it is a local but major short-term emergency where law and order exists then don’t be nearly as concerned about remaining “stealth”. Buy frozen foods if you like, cook and barbecue and just act like it’s a 4
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of July picnic except (hopefully) there are no fireworks to end the day!

3. Some Walmart stores sell the Remington 870 shotgun (the shotgun I recommend for protection from home invasions) but most or all Walmart stores no longer sell hand guns. I recommend Cabelas or my favorite local gun store (The Bullet Hole in Kansas – they do mail order – Google them) for both. I also recommend Midway USA and Cheaper than Dirt for ammunition. There are many other sources. Just don’t buy reloads. Buy, new and fresh and buy quality. Saving a few dollars then having a gun jam can get you killed.

What foods should you buy? Well, I’ve given you the basics. “No cook, sealed and they last for a long time. Rather than waste many pages listing recommended diets for survival please do it yourself with the help of the Internet. Unlike most survivalist books I am NOT going to waste pages on “recommended menus”. Because I know not 10% of those reading the menus would agree with my tastes. They’ll pick and choose what they personally like. Still, you need a well balanced diet. Refer to on-line Web sites that list “food pyramids” and the like. Put together your own menus! Those in your group may prefer different foods. That’s fine. Just be sure all diets add up to the ‘minimum daily amounts of proper nutrition”. You may wish to be a gourmet cook even with the world in turmoil or you may be like me considering food and water “necessary evils” required to continue living. Write out a balanced and fully nutritional meal plan for a week then multiply it for the months you wish to prepare for. I do not recommend large quantities of basic foods such as 100 pounds of rice and 100 pounds of beans as to turn them into edible food takes work and requiring cooking. I suggest you make your meals as simple and boring as possible. I know many of you will disagree with me. That’s fine. Personally, I’d rather have ready to eat dull tasting food that still satisfies dietary standards to maintain good health than to spend hours grinding, soaking, pealing and who knows what to turn out meals that will be tasty but also A LOT OF WORK! After a week of spending hours grinding wheat to make bread you’ll wish you had followed my advice. But, maybe not!

My wife is an outstanding cook and she’d enjoy every second of months on end of cooking BUT NOT ME. I’ll stick with KISS when it comes to food and drink. Still, plan your meals carefully and don’t leave anything out! Nutrients the body needs at least a trace of can kill you if the amount is dropped to zero. Something as simple as salt! Remember “scurvy” the enemy of pirates and sailors for hundreds of years? The body needs a small amount of vitamin C. The body needs MANY things you never think about as even a poor diet of cheeseburgers and pizzas probably has enough of these trace elements to satisfy the needs of your body. Having LARGE bottles of multi-vitamins is a must. You need calcium, you need milk, and you need many things. EVERYTHING can be found in sealed no cook long life food items. Everything from powdered milk to canned juices (the 100% juice type – read labels of everything you buy!). Consult dietary books and Web sites. Everyone’s tastes are different so, as I say, I’m not going to waste space in this book listing exactly what to eat and drink each day. I’ve just listed the basics. The meal planning is now up to you! Begin by reading the Web site
www.dietaryguidelines.gov/dietaryguidelines/
then put various search words into Google until you’ve put together a well planned list of meals planned down to every ingredient of every meal for every day for every person. Remember, you won’t be able to “run to the market” to pick up something you forgot! Plan well and you’ll emerge in six months healthy and well fed (probably with boring tasteless foods) or you’ll stagger out having planned poorly and your body is about to give up (or, worst case, did give up and you didn’t make it to the final month away from civilization). Thus do not take this task lightly. It is not rocket science but it also shouldn’t be an after thought randomly buying various items at the grocery store. A best case scenario is to have six months of EXACT menus made out in advance with all necessary foods bought and stored away. Meet the nutritional standards you’ll find on various government and NGO Web sites and you’ll thrive on your meals. It will probably be the first time in your life that you ate exactly what you are supposed to eat and drink for optimum health! By planning meals and portions for however many months you wish you’ll know how much food to buy. Stick to the diet or you’ll run out early!

WATER

Just in case, buy a supply of water tablets that are supposed to make rancid water safe to drink. Read about the pills carefully to make sure they don’t just “help” but actually take water full of “bad stuff” and makes it drinkable. You cannot be too careful with liquids you drink. Reducing the amount of liquids to avoid water-borne diseases is not smart as dehydration is the most silent of killers in the mode you will be in. Dehydration causes the body to become less thirsty after a certain point. When you or someone else notices you are dizzy and “spaced out” you probably need a lot of liquid and fast! Juices with nutrients are by far the best. You did buy lots of juices didn’t you? Drinks like canned Gatorade are great and have a shelf life about as long as soda pop (18 months). Bottled and sealed orange juice and the like can’t be beat but once opened, like with all foods, their shelf life drops to a week or two at most.

I am not an expert on sterilizing water. I am not a doctor, chemist, civil engineer or anyone who might be in a professional position that you can count on what they say or write when it comes to water purification. There aren’t many ways to become sicker or even die than drinking bad water or water that has not been properly purified. Use the following information as a starting point but I encourage you to research the subject on Web sites and in books. Everything you read here has been verified from at least three separate sources so I feel confident in but should you? I’d recommend you check the accuracy of everything you read here.

First of all how much water does the average human body need to survive? Everything I read averages out to be a gallon a day and another gallon a day for cooking and cleaning (with much of that water being treatable then reusable). Then there is the need for filing a toilet if you’re lucky enough to be on a septic tank and you have a source of large quantity of water of any quality to fill up the toilet tank (i.e. a swimming pool, a pond or if you’ve been smart enough to collect rain water with a system of gutters running into barrels or larger collection vessels).

But remember to go outside only in two’s, one with a gun and a keen eye and one to fill the buckets. Have dozens of buckets as the fewer trips outside the better. If you have night vision goggles that is the best time to go outside. You may spot some bad guys scouting out your house. You can see them but they can’t see you. A few shots not directly in their direction but close will probably cause them to pick a different house. Always keep in mind gun laws! Shoot someone when your life or the life of someone you are protecting is not in immediate danger and that is murder in most states no matter how bad the guy turns out to be when his record is pulled when civilization returns and arrest warrants or hero badges are being decided upon (hint: you want the hero badges).

If you are connected to a city sewer system don’t use your toilet even if you do have water for toilet tanks as city/community sewer system operates with pumps and the pumps will not be running. If you have no electricity, they have no electricity. Yes, use the toilet but disposal should be in deeply dug latrines as far from your area as possible. If you’re not safely able to leave your area, that’s what the sealable plastic buckets and lime are for.

The first consideration is how to best store water that is already known to be safe to drink. First of all, whatever vessel it is in, keep it out of direct sunlight. In the unlikely disaster the water wasn’t completely sterile or at least safe to drink, sunlight can hasten the growth of bacteria in the water. It seems like most everything that has to do with survival stores best in a dimly lit or dark, (relatively) dry environment between 40 and 60 degrees. Water is no exception.

The water of choice for most people is going to be bottled water. For a few hundred dollars or less you can fill up a corner of your basement with 16 ounce sealed bottles ($3.48 per case of 24 at my local Super Walmart). If you want to save money, buy the bigger bottles used in water coolers. A poorly kept secret is that such bottled water is usually no safer or better for you than 99% of municipal water systems. So if you want to find some empty vessels and bottle your own water from the tap that will save you more money. Just be sure to sterilize the containers and make sure the seal is truly sealed. To me that is a lot of hassle so I bought extra 24 bottle trays of water bottles from Super Walmart on each trip to the store until I had one wall of my basement stacked to the ceiling with water. The (about) 2,400 16 ounce bottles cost me $348. I also have a number of five gallon water cooler type bottles as well as a swimming pool plus my home is on a septic system so the toilet problem (which can be major) is solved as long as it is safe to get to the 22,000 gallon pool. If you do open/close/open water containers treat them like anything else you open to the air (and bacteria). That’s one reason I like the 16 ounce bottles. It should go without saying to save any emptied container for future use for (who knows what). All water cooler companies will be happy to deliver to your basement as they did to mine!

Yes, you can drink rain water fresh but be careful what falls from the sky! Radiation, the last of the anthrax or other Pandemic in the air, ash from burning buildings and so on might be in the water. With Walmart bottles costing less than 20 cents each why go to all those other contraptions other than bragging rights. If I lived off the grid and needed a well I would definitely also have a metal roof, guttering, and a professional chlorination system. Otherwise, if you have Walmart nearby $400 will set you up for a year or more. As an FYI, these very expensive “make water out of thin air” machines are nothing more than fancy dehumidifiers that (as a dehumidifier) might sell for $129, or less. If you want to pull water out of the air buy an inexpensive dehumidifier but, remember, they require 110 volts AC power which means a generator running which means a LOT of gasoline (and noise, fumes, etc.)! Have I talked you into buying water in bulk in advance? Cheap and simple!