I am really new at this. However, I find it difficult to deny that an economic collapse is imminent. Nevertheless, I'm not here to debate my theories as to what may or may not happen. I seek advice from an experienced prepper. My wife and I and our newborn twins (4 month old girls) live in North Carolina. We have started some light food preparation. However, in spite of what we have already saved we have an additional budget of one thousand dollars and we are looking to buy food. We have already stockpiled some guns and ammunition. We have also put away what additional food we could save. My question is, given an extra 1,000 dollars what would you buy in terms of food. From reading there seems to be two schools of thought. First is to buy things that we actually use from our local grocery stores. Second theory is to buy prepackaged food from companies such as Augason Farms. Any thoughts on what to buy and how to do it would be greatly appreciated. The more detailed the better. We are also a bit worried about storage. We plan to store the food in our storage shed but worry about the winter cold. Would a small heater help with this? Thanks for your imput.
Newbie Prepper Seeks Advice
- Thread starter Gregg
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This is an area I too am dealing with. A third option that I have thought about, but am a bit nervous about treading into is "canning" my own food. They say you can keep certain things you can for many years. Though I personally am leaning towards the prepackaged items that have a life span up to 20 - 25 years. For me it is the simplicity, and hassel free aspect. Plus nothing can taste any worse than the 1980's MRE's we had in the Army.
Thanks Clyde.
1. Why not use some of your guns to hunt some game and then prepare it, such as using its own animal fat, making pemmican etc..
2. China has the lowest cost rations 2400 calories for about between 50 cents and $3 per unit plus shipping.
3. Hardtack lasts a long time and flour can be bought relatively cheap.
4. You probably have a lot of food just growing in your yard and neighbour hood parts, lots of weeds are very edible and grow very fast. They can even be grown indoors, ragweed and dandelion are some of the easiest to grow and extremely nutritous, nettle is another good one, these can be dried out.
Noodles are probably some of the cheapest food sources, a pack of noodles usually costs about 25 cents or so and has about 500 calories, so that is about 1 day worth of food energy for $1.25.
The highest energy content food is oil, olive oil is one of my favorites. It can last for years. There are other types of oils.
Protien powder is probably the cheapest source of protien other than getting it from nature.
Lentils grow extremely easily. Radishes also grow well. The benefit of lentils however is that the seeds will grow and can be eaten. Getting dried legume seeds sucha s beans and lentils is great because it is both a food source and can be changed up, lentils are one of the cheapest vegetable seeds that is sold and they taste quite good fresh.
Collecting weeds and planting them is an easy way of building up a food source. For myself since I'm out in the middle of no where, I can use the vast public forests up here to plant gardens of wild edibles that serve as caches. If available in your area, this is goo, each site could plant enough food for a day and will grow back each year. Weeds grow very easily and knowing which weeds are good and how to prepare them is a good first go.
1 8k bag of rice should last your family a week, and goes good as a weed base.
IMO mixing and matching all these things should get you a low cost solution for 6 months or longer.
52 bags of rice is $520 or less.
Couldn't edit the post above, however,
doing seeds that can be grown that you can just get bagged is the way to go imo, because you can use them as an immediate food source, or to plant. Beans and lentils are very easy growers, and can be grown indoors.
They can also be used to make spouts, by simply soaking them in water.
Be prepared to eat whatever you store, and cycle things out a bit to keep things as fresh as possible.
You don't need to buy garden seeds for this, they sell bags of 1kg or larger bags of lentils and
beans in most grocery stores. Usually they are a buck or two, which is what you could end up paying for 25 to 100 seeds for gardening.
Seeds to have a lifespan so whatever seeds you store check how long they remain viable, and rotate them out every few years.
You'd be suprised how long $10 worth of lentils and beans can last.
So Rice + Beans + Lentils.
The rice is a base.
The beans provide some benefits as protien and carbs
I'm pricing an order of Chinese rations which as far as I can tell are the cheapest, however hardtack, especially honey coated may be another solution, but honey can be costly. The hardtack is a very easy ration.
doing seeds that can be grown that you can just get bagged is the way to go imo, because you can use them as an immediate food source, or to plant. Beans and lentils are very easy growers, and can be grown indoors.
They can also be used to make spouts, by simply soaking them in water.
Be prepared to eat whatever you store, and cycle things out a bit to keep things as fresh as possible.
You don't need to buy garden seeds for this, they sell bags of 1kg or larger bags of lentils and
beans in most grocery stores. Usually they are a buck or two, which is what you could end up paying for 25 to 100 seeds for gardening.
Seeds to have a lifespan so whatever seeds you store check how long they remain viable, and rotate them out every few years.
You'd be suprised how long $10 worth of lentils and beans can last.
So Rice + Beans + Lentils.
The rice is a base.
The beans provide some benefits as protien and carbs
I'm pricing an order of Chinese rations which as far as I can tell are the cheapest, however hardtack, especially honey coated may be another solution, but honey can be costly. The hardtack is a very easy ration.
I forgot to add the bets source of seeds to plant is from foods you eat locally. Or what you have left. Example you eat an apple, plant the apple seeds. 4-5 years later you could have apples.
Same goes for a squash, or saving a potato or two to plant.
People shoulnd't have to throw anything out they use. It is all able to be used for other purposes. From compost, or other projects, everything has a use.
Anything made of metal such as pop cans and tin cans should be saved.
Plastic bottles can be used as planters or a thousand other uses.
Same goes for a squash, or saving a potato or two to plant.
People shoulnd't have to throw anything out they use. It is all able to be used for other purposes. From compost, or other projects, everything has a use.
Anything made of metal such as pop cans and tin cans should be saved.
Plastic bottles can be used as planters or a thousand other uses.
Thank you for the response. I found it extremely helpful. On that note of making use if what we eat and use. My family is a meat and potato type of family. Any advice for meat other than hunting which I intend to do. Is Spam a viable option? Are there other types of canned meat that would suffice?
Its easy to raise your own. but you need to feed what you raise. There may be laws on using or butchering animals though as there are up here. If you arn't concerned about the law, you can raise your own. I'm in a rural area though, people can raise poultry, but you will need to feed them. I have been working on a system of feeding hens with maggots and other insects, bone meal and some wild grains. the stuff that feeds the maggots gets decomposed and can subsequently be used as nitrogen rich fertilizer.
Pigs are also easy to raise and eat anything, but can stink.
goats are often liked and give milk. Anything more than one milk animal that can be butchered in a crisis is more farm material imo, as you need to do some animal husbandry.
I'd do protein powder. Meat can be expensive.
You might want to look into any Co-Op farms in you area, you might be able to buy direct from farms. Raising chicks for chicken is another option. I'm pretty much vegan though and only buy Fish. I have a diet in which I only eat naturally deceased animals, as opposed to slaughtering them. Or potentially if an animal is in critical condition and has no hope of recovery and is in continuous pain.
Of course I eat anything but I don't buy anything when it comes to meat.
Insects are a great source of protien..... maybe not meat and potatoes though..
Rodents are easily caught but I wouldn't recommend it in an urban setting. Birds can also be trapped but they are better for eggs imo. Most birds will seek refuge in a bird shelter.
There can be laws on this though so mind the law before you consider trapping, especially birds.
There can be laws on this though so mind the law before you consider trapping, especially birds.
Hello there. Canned meats are easy. They are a good viable source of protein. Spam is alright if salty. I can a lot of meats myself, because I know what my family eats. We also keep meat on the hoof, so to speak.
My best piece of advice would be to store what you eat and eat what you store. Rotate your stock as you use it that way things aren't 'left behind'. If you don't want to eat something now, it's still not going to be appealing when the **** hits.
If your twins are breastfed, you want to make sure you have a well balanced diet for mom so she can feed them. If you are bottle feeding and no shame if you are, I did. Work on transitioning cereals and other things into their diets so you won't be so dependent on formula.
If you have a garden, I wouldn't rely on planting beans and lentils you buy at the market to eat. The reason being is that most of the time they don't germinate or grow well and produce like actual seed stock will. I've been on a farm my entire life and I'm speaking from what I know. When we do pintos and other dried beans, X amount is set to the side to plant the following year.
Another thing if you garden. Plant heirloom seeds, that way you will always have true plants growing the same fruits and vegetables each year. If you try to grow seeds taken from a hybrid variety, most of the time you will be sorely disappointed in what you get as results.
You can put up your own fruits and vegetables yourself. The initial outlay can be costly if you can't find what you need second hand, but everything lasts for years. You can put up your own meat as well.
I don't buy the 25 year shelf life dehydrated anything and I'll tell you why. If I'm still eating that stuff in 25 years and I haven't been able to do for myself then I deserve to just be shot on the spot. Period end of discussion. I have failed life.
Okay, now to storage. You mentioned storing your food in an outer building. Would you be able to keep that building heated above freezing if the power/gas is out or gone? If not, don't put canned goods where they will freeze. Commercially canned foods do NOT go bad if they are frozen and thawed, but I can tell you that the consistency blows a goat. If you are storing home canned goods, DO NOT let them freeze, you'll lose your food and your jars to breakage. Dry goods can be stored in an unheated building, just make sure that you get them in rodent proof containers or you will lose your food to the critters. If you can, put a black snake in the building for rodent control.
Now, things like milk, cheese and butter can be bought dried and I do have some on hand. You can also wax your own hard cheese blocks for storage. Lasts for quite awhile. We have dairy goats so I do make our own cheese and I get cream from a friend of mine who owns dairy cattle, so I do our own butter too.
While you definitely need to make sure you get through whatever comes to pass, you also need to think about what happens after that all settles. How you are going to keep your family fed, safe, clothed, and housed.
My best piece of advice would be to store what you eat and eat what you store. Rotate your stock as you use it that way things aren't 'left behind'. If you don't want to eat something now, it's still not going to be appealing when the **** hits.
If your twins are breastfed, you want to make sure you have a well balanced diet for mom so she can feed them. If you are bottle feeding and no shame if you are, I did. Work on transitioning cereals and other things into their diets so you won't be so dependent on formula.
If you have a garden, I wouldn't rely on planting beans and lentils you buy at the market to eat. The reason being is that most of the time they don't germinate or grow well and produce like actual seed stock will. I've been on a farm my entire life and I'm speaking from what I know. When we do pintos and other dried beans, X amount is set to the side to plant the following year.
Another thing if you garden. Plant heirloom seeds, that way you will always have true plants growing the same fruits and vegetables each year. If you try to grow seeds taken from a hybrid variety, most of the time you will be sorely disappointed in what you get as results.
You can put up your own fruits and vegetables yourself. The initial outlay can be costly if you can't find what you need second hand, but everything lasts for years. You can put up your own meat as well.
I don't buy the 25 year shelf life dehydrated anything and I'll tell you why. If I'm still eating that stuff in 25 years and I haven't been able to do for myself then I deserve to just be shot on the spot. Period end of discussion. I have failed life.
Okay, now to storage. You mentioned storing your food in an outer building. Would you be able to keep that building heated above freezing if the power/gas is out or gone? If not, don't put canned goods where they will freeze. Commercially canned foods do NOT go bad if they are frozen and thawed, but I can tell you that the consistency blows a goat. If you are storing home canned goods, DO NOT let them freeze, you'll lose your food and your jars to breakage. Dry goods can be stored in an unheated building, just make sure that you get them in rodent proof containers or you will lose your food to the critters. If you can, put a black snake in the building for rodent control.
Now, things like milk, cheese and butter can be bought dried and I do have some on hand. You can also wax your own hard cheese blocks for storage. Lasts for quite awhile. We have dairy goats so I do make our own cheese and I get cream from a friend of mine who owns dairy cattle, so I do our own butter too.
While you definitely need to make sure you get through whatever comes to pass, you also need to think about what happens after that all settles. How you are going to keep your family fed, safe, clothed, and housed.
In mind with this... if you are in a forested rural area with wildlife, if you set up your property right you can attract meat to you, instead of you going for it.
I've had success with germinating, you can always water sieve to get out any non germinating to eat.
Lentils have extremely high germination rates.
Lentils have extremely high germination rates.
Getting the lentils and beans to germinate is NOT the problem. The problem is you may well be buying a hybrid lentil or bean at the market and yes they will germinate, but if you are growing them for a crop you are going to be sadly disappointed with what you get.
William, I'm curious. Have you ever farmed as a living? I mean it is absolutely vital to your families' lives that the crops succeed and produce heavily? Have you ever gone to the pantry and wondered how in the hell your family is going to survive until the next season's crops are in? When going shopping isn't an option. When sprouting what seed you have saved isn't an option? When the area around you is so hunted out that you couldn't get a squirrel if you offered peanut brittle as bait?
While I will say that you do offer good advice and I'm not saying you aren't, you need to also realize that there are people on this board, myself being one that farms and actually does have a damned clue about what is going on.
William, I'm curious. Have you ever farmed as a living? I mean it is absolutely vital to your families' lives that the crops succeed and produce heavily? Have you ever gone to the pantry and wondered how in the hell your family is going to survive until the next season's crops are in? When going shopping isn't an option. When sprouting what seed you have saved isn't an option? When the area around you is so hunted out that you couldn't get a squirrel if you offered peanut brittle as bait?
While I will say that you do offer good advice and I'm not saying you aren't, you need to also realize that there are people on this board, myself being one that farms and actually does have a damned clue about what is going on.
Gregg, since I didn't get a chance to say this earlier. Congratulations on the twins. It's always good to know that we will live on through our children.
Welcome to the forum. You will find alot of people here that have alot of experience in surviving and prepping. I agree with all that old-anorak said. Let me tell you something "that old buzzard knows her stuff". LOL on the old buzzard part. All joking aside, if you need answers on gardening, old anorak (and alot of others on this site) can answer your questions. I personally have learned alot from old- anorak. I'm from south Louisiana and have been prepping for a few yrs. now. We have enough food stored to last for about 2yrs. and counting. We don't stop prepping. I have canned everything from meat (chicken, beef, pork, wild game, rabbits, nutria). We had 4 freezers full of meat. Now we have only one. All the rest is in jars. We have also canned almost any type of veggies you can name. As for fruits, we have figs, black berries, Peaches,dewberries, strawberries, ect. I opened a jar of blackberries a while back that was canned in 1988 and they were as good as the day I canned them. I regularly eat my old stock to see if it is still good. We have eaten canned soup that was canned over 2 1/2yrs ago. It was as good as when I canned it. I've found anything you can right will last for at least 15 to 20yrs. My first advice to you would invest into a good pressure canner. If you follow the instructions, you will be just fine. I found mine on E-BAY for $73.00. It has been one of the best investments I've ever made. Dehydrating is also another way to keep food for long term storage. We buy alot of our supplies at SAMS. We get 50# of rice for $17.00. Some times we can pick up 100# bags of rice from the mill down here for $25.00. All this weed eating might be fine if you don't have anything else but I would rather eat something I canned that I like. We also buy our flour at SAMS in 25# bags. To store your rice, flour, beens and all kinds of other stuff in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers( I use hand and body warmers) they are alot cheaper. Put your Mylar bag into 5gal. buckets so nothing gets to your bags. You can find some advice on long term storage and storing in Mylar bags on youtube. What ever you feel you need to know just ask and someone on this forum will be able to answer you. Again welcome.
Hey Gregg Welcome!
I grew up in North Carolina/Virginia and the vast majority of my family are still in the Carolinas...nice to hear from "Home Folk"!
My husband and I have been preppers for years, its more of a way of life for us. Regarding Food Storage...we built our 1+ year food storage via the one-extra method, meaning each time I shopped, for example: If I needed a bottle of mustard then I purchased two bottles, one to use and one for storage. At the end of a year, it gave us a years worth of food stockpiled...food that we are accustomed to eating! I don't know about you but when tshtf, I will be stressed enough, my gut won't need a new diet to contend with!! The drawback with this is it will take a full year to accumulate your food storage. Personally, if you are "Bugging-In" I don't care for dehydrated, pre-packaged foods and would opt instead to purchase shelf-stable, healthy, food stuffs that my family is accustomed to eating. The key to this is look at what you eat, and determine how you make it from scratch...thats what you store: shortening, olive oil, flour, sugar, salt, pepper, spices, yeast (keeps in the freezer forever), cornstarch, pasta, nuts, peanut butter, then you go out from there. I can all our meat, then I don't have to care what the grid does. Soups and Veggies you can buy at Save-A-Lots cheap and after this year, you can your own home grown! Don't forget things like Jello--cheap, shelf stable and gives your family a boost when they need something sweet.
That being said, don't forget seeds! Even in the mountains of NC, you have a really strong growing season, so be certain to add 2-3 years worth of Heirloom Seeds to your preps. Also, assuming you are Bugging-In, spend some of that money and put in a root cellar. This will give you safe year-round storage for your food preps without having to try to heat/cool your storage shed. Now, don't freak out and think that a root cellar will cost you thousands of dollars!! Our closest neighbor (2 miles away) just put in a root cellar and he did one for another prepper friend and start to finish, both projects cost less than $800 each! Get this, he bought a dead school bus, drug it to his place, dug a hole big enough to bury it. He then pushed it into the hole, went down, jacked it up, took off the wheels and leveled it on railroad ties. He then built access to the back door as the entry and then backfilled the hole! Before he covered it up, he did put a vent pipe in the roof and then using poles and salvaged tin, he built a sloped roof over top of the bus roof to take the weight of the soil and then covered that roof, leaving the vent pipe exposed. They are fabulous root cellar storage! He built shelves around the walls, down the center he has bins with sand for carrots, potatos, etc. He even built a rack to hang his onions! His latest "luxary" is he went to Harbor Freight and purchased their solar lights for a shed and he now has solar lights in the bus/cellar!
Yes, food storage is vitally important but so is the means to safely store it. You must also look at shelter, heat, water--when there is no power grid to support those things. Something else to consider is a Pressure Canner and a Hot Water Bath Canner, as well as Jars and Lids...you are going to need these items to assure food preservation for your family's future.
Blessings,
Shenandoah
Thank you Mastercajun. If you look into canners, make sure the canner will fit under the range hood over your stove and that you will be able to move it fully loaded. I use two 23quart ones because I just can't move a big one.
All the advice you have been getting from old-anorak and shenandoah are right on the spot. I forgot the mention to buy only Heirloom Seeds. They are good because you can save seeds from your harvest to plant from year to year. You will also have to get somekind of renewable water source. With all the rain we get in south La. I have a water system that will now hold 4,000gal. If you have a way to get some of the 5gal. bottles from office water coolers, you can store your water in them. I put mine under the house. that way the sunlight doesn't get to them. I put Pool Shock in the bottles (I don't use bleach because of all the extra Sh*t they put in it and it has a short shelf life). Pool Shock will stay good until you use it, as long as youi keep it dry. I seal mine in vacuum sealer bags. I opened a 5gal. bottle a while back that was stored almost 2yrs. ago. tested it and it was fine. So, I drank it and I'm still here and no adverse reaction. I wouldn't trust Bleach.
I've grown lentils for the last two years.
That is a moot point. Each seed produces 6 or more seeds. My vegies suplimented my rice last year. None the less you can get much more food out of planting lentils than eating the seeds. You should only eat the ones that float.
Yes, that is my summers. I'll be facing that same scenario in about 3 weeks, when I'm back up north without water, electricity, or heat. Until I get my solar hooked up again, and I can get some snow melted for water. All in sub zero temps. Then I can wait eagerly for last froest when my startified seeds (mostly cranberry this year) and other last frost crops can go in the ground. Probably sometime after the first week of May (last year it snowed June 1st)
Hey, why don't you stop making stupid assumptions about people. The lentils germinate, it is a good tip. You were claiming they don't. They do. They have much higher germination rates than a lot of other types of seeds I have that I get from farmers like you, and they don't have mites packed into them.
In addition to growing stuff in near subarctic conditions I also hunt for mushrooms and other wild edibles.
The field mice and birds are camping out in one of my structures, I will not be suprised if I have a colony of field mice in my place when I open the place up again. They were actually camped out in an old oven, which I find sadly humorous.
I have to add cash crop farming is not suitable to sustainable food growth for survival. You need to develop more of a permaculture environment with many types of plants for a healty diet. Eating just one or two crops creates nutritional deficits.
|Beans and lentils are easy growers and good crops to store seeds for, since they are very cheap seeds to get compared to gardener variety seeds.
IMO getting seeds that are creepers are a good go if they will come back up on their own year after year. Seeds for sowing at 1 dollar per pack can get expsive. As long as you arn't buying GMO just buy the seeds you get from what you eat.
Onions from bulbs are also good because they will grow up again and again, same goes with chives etc..
I'm not teaching people how to grow cash crops here. I'm talking about good cheap things to store you can grow with. Lentils are the best I know of in terms of cost economy.
|Beans and lentils are easy growers and good crops to store seeds for, since they are very cheap seeds to get compared to gardener variety seeds.
IMO getting seeds that are creepers are a good go if they will come back up on their own year after year. Seeds for sowing at 1 dollar per pack can get expsive. As long as you arn't buying GMO just buy the seeds you get from what you eat.
Onions from bulbs are also good because they will grow up again and again, same goes with chives etc..
I'm not teaching people how to grow cash crops here. I'm talking about good cheap things to store you can grow with. Lentils are the best I know of in terms of cost economy.
Hunting is fine. Buying freeze dried food is fine but look into aquaponics. You raise fish and use the fish tank water to feed plants. Endless supply of food for a fraction of what you'd spend. On a stockpile
Just bless your little heart WilliamAshley.
