In this article we are going to be looking at making noodles to catch catfish. This type of rig may not be legal in all areas, so check the local laws before you do anything.
Buy some noodles from the local china-mart. The noodles might be seasonal, and should be ...
Deer season is here, instead of grabbing a pack, throwing some random gear in and heading out to the woods, lets take a look at some items that should be considered. The way I look at it, your pack needs to contain everything you need to track a wounded deer, ...
A few days ago I asked the SurvivalistBoards Facebook group a question, "Name one thing a first aid kit is not complete without." Some of the answers were helpful, and some were not what I expected.
I would like to thank all of the subscribers for helping out with this list.
Anti-bacterial ...
The past 2 days have been spent working on my truck, and working on some jug lines for an upcoming camping trip. When I started thinking about how much time and effort I put into getting the juglines ready, I was a little set back.
After talking to my wife, I ...
This past weekend I decided it was time to organize the ammunition at the Bug Out Location. We had ammo stored in 3,,, 4 different locations, which made taking inventory a pain in the rear end.
My wife cleared off a wire shelf so I could bring it to the camp ...
For around 14 years or so, a couple of my buddies and I have been talking about making a river trip from the northern part of the Sabine river, all the way to the Orange / Bridge city area. If everything goes according to plan, we will be making the trip sometime in 2012. The trip is currently in the planning phase – we talking about what boats we want to bring, where we are going to launch the boats at, who is going to be going on the trip,,, just stuff like that.
There are two boat launches in the Bon Wier Texas / Merryville Louisiana area that we are looking at using. On Sunday January 15, 2012 my wife and I made a trip to the boat launches to see if it was feasible to launch at either one.
Sunday morning started off bright and when my wife and I crawled out of bed around 8:45am. After getting our shower and having some breakfast, it was finally time to get one the road. We stopped at a local corner store to picked up some snacks, bought a sunday paper for the coupons, then it was to wal-mart to get some gas. If you use the wal-mart gift card, you save 3 cents a gallon on gasoline. A few days before hand, my wife put $40 on a gift card. When we stopped at the super wal-mart in Jasper I put the whole $40 in my truck.
After gassing up, and getting some snacks, it was finally time to get on the road. My wife and I left Jasper heading west on HWY 190 towards Newton. At Newton, we passed over HWY 87, then turned south on HWY 190.
HWY 190 south of Newton is a nice country drive, and a scenic drive. There is very little out there, besides trees and the occasional house.
The plan was to look at the boat launch at Bon Wier where where 190 crosses into Louisiana first, then go to the launch at Merryville.
Well crap, I turn 44 years old years old in few days. Age, kinda like weight, has a way of creeping up on you. It seems like only a few weeks ago I was in high school, only a couple of days ago my kids were being born. Somewhere in the middle of working and raising my kids, I seemed to be getting a years older every time the calendar rolled around.
I don’t guess growing old is that bad. Everyday is a learning experience, everyday is a growing experience, everyday I learn something new. When we stop learning and stop growing, we start dying. Maybe “dying: is a bad word, more like we start degrading, or declining.
As I grow older there are a couple of things I have noticed. My energy level i not what it used to be, and its getting more difficult to keep the weight off.
My weight issues started when I moved away from the welding shops. Instead of being on my feet for 8 – 12 hours a day, I was sitting at a desk working on a computer.
There is an old saying “if you do not use something, you lose it”. This goes for everything from a flashlight to muscle tone. Since I am no longer doing manual labor, I can feel my muscle tone decreasing. It would be almost impossible for me to work a full time job at a desk, and maintain the same amount of endurance that I had from working 10 and 12 hour shifts in the welding field.
All things in life have a negative and a positive, its what keeps hings in balance. This balance is what keeps the earth rotating the sun, keeps our feet on the ground.
Over the years I have learned to appreciate the simple things, such as taking my kids fishing, riding on the river in a flat bottom boat,,, but then again, I have always enjoyed those things.
What is life is important? Money is nice, having a nice home is nice, having a nice car is nice. The important things are the things that money can not buy. The important things are good health, a good relationship with your friends and family, and peace of mind.
As I get older, I find myself wanting peace of mind more then just about anything.
Some of the things I have learned over the years,
Voting for the two major parties is a waste of time. It does not matter if you vote for the democrats or republicans, the voters are going to get raped up the ass when either party wins. If you want real change, vote third party.
The more you eat, the more weight you put on.
We are victims of our own decisions. Unless someone sticks a gun to our side, and forces us to be a victim, we become willing victims.
The heros in life, are the ones that treat others with the highest level of respect.
We should know the difference between those that care for us, and those that do not care, then treat each group accordingly.
As I am sitting here watching the news, there is little voice in the back of my head telling me the US is going to hit rock bottom. Unless Ron Paul gets elected, things are just going to continue to get worse. GOD help us if someone like mit or rick perry gets elected, because they are not going to help anyone besides the bankers.
What I see happening is tensions between the US and china and tensions between the US and iran to continue to rise. Compounded with that, congress is talking about cutting the defense budget.
Let me see if I get this right, iran is continuing to enrich uranium, and the US congress wants to cut money from the defense? When your enemies are building nuclear weapons, shouldn’t we at the very least maintain our current rate of military spending?
There are several directions I see the US going during 2012:
1. iran builds a nuclear bomb, gives the bomb to a small group of terrorist who sneak it a cross the US-mexico border. From there its just a matter of time before a major US city has a nuclear weapon detonated in it.
Its not like a group of terrorist would even have to sneak a nuclear bomb across the border. Why not hire a truck and drive the bomb across? If 10 – 20 million illegal immigrants can find their way into the US, surely its not “that” difficult to get weapons across.
2. israel strikes iran, which threatens the supply of crude oil to russia and china. russia and china see the strike as a threat to their national security. In return, china and/or russia strike israel and the US.
3. The US goes broke, or continues to print money out of thin air. Either way its a lose-lose situation. Over the past few decades has spent more money then we can ever hope to repay. Its just a matter of time before the house of cards comes tumbling down
4. The drought that wiped out billions of dollars in crops comes back in 2012, which drives up prices. The US government will increase subsidies to farmers, which will continue to drive up the national debt. I have no issues with helping the farmers out, but instead of giving billions to foreign nations, why not keep that money here? Instead of giving the banks millions of dollars to bail them out from bad investments, lets give that money to the people. Or better yet, let the banks go belly up.
5. The absolute worst thing that can happen is for obama to get relected. obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act into law, which allows the government to detain US citizens without a trial.
What can you really say about a congress and president that wants to declare the US a battleground? From that declaration the government can detain citizens without a trial.
You might be saying “the government can not detain you without charging you with a crime”. Well, what happened with the Japanese-Americans during World War II? If it happened once, it can happen again.
Buy your food while its still cheap.
Vote third party, why are the democrats even on the ballot?
Buy your guns and ammunition while you can.
As 2012 progresses, I look for people to become worried. Worried people go into panic buying mode. As people start stockpiling food, guns and ammunition, I look for prices to go up.
Just some ramblings of what I expect to see in 2012. Take this with a truckload of salt:
Cost of food
With the drought in Texas from 2011, and people stockpiling food for the end of the world in 2012, I suspect we might see food shortages. If there are shortages, we can expect the price of food to go up.
Some weather forecasters are predicting another decade of drought for the south, and especially for Texas.
If we think the price of food is bad now, and the predictions are true about a decade long drought, we aint seen nothing yet.
Iran, China and Russia
Iran supplies a good bit of crude oil to China and Russia. Any attack on Iran will be see as an attack on the national security of Russia and China. If the US makes a move that disrupts the flow of crude to either china or russia, both nations will be forced to respond to the threat.
Just imagine if either russia or china attacked canada, how would the US react?
The one thing that stands in the way of china causing too many problems, and that is the US Navy. Russia and china are both decades behind the US in sea warfare technology.
North Korea
Some 20 year old kid just got handed the keys to a stockpile of nuclear weapons.
I think there is good reason to be worried about the leadership of north korea.
There are 3 basic priorities in prepping plans – food, water and shelter. Some people like to throw in fire, or the ability to make fire. But if you throw in fire, you need to crawl out from under your rock from time to time.
Some things should be a given, such as packing medicines, fire, or considerations for special needs people. Its impossible for someone to list all of the considerations people might face. Whether its medicines, flood insurance, homeowners insurance, preps for people with special medical needs,,,,, only the reader is going to be familiar with special plans they need to make.
Items such as first aid kits, flashlights, copies of important papers are a given. Do you really need to be reminded of things you should already know about? Do adults have to be reminded to brush their teeth or take a shower before they go to work? We know we should be doing certain things, so I see no reason to go over the same list everytime the discussion comes up.
Now that the special needs and the given items are behind us, lets talk about priorities in a prepping list.
Identify your personal priority.
Take steps to minimize the impact of the priority during a disaster.
During a long term SHTF / teotwawki survivalsituation, fishing will be an important way to gather food. One of the goals of this fishing / camping trip is to practice our SHTF / teotwawki fishing skills. another goal of this trip is to make observations about issues that people might run into.
There are a lot of people out there who plan on bugging out to the wilderness after the food and water run out at their home. Part of the SHTF survival plans are along the lines of “when we run out of food, we will have to go to the food”. This usually includes grabbing the bug out bag and bug out to a wilderness location where they survival can hunt, fish and gather wild foods.
One issue, the person rarely gets past the planning phase. In order to have a balanced SHTF / teotwawki survival plan, people should also test those plans. The only way to test the plans is to get away from the computer and do something. Being an armchair survivalist is not enough. Make your plans, test your plans, analyze the results from the test, make improvements on those observations.
Sunday, December 25th (Christmas), for Christmas I bought two of my sons a Coleman sleeping bag each, a sleeping pad, and a fleece sleeping bag. They needed a sleeping bag for our upcoming camping trip, so why not give them a sleeping bag for Christmas.
Monday, December 26th was gear load out day. I spent just about all day going over my pack, going over the boat, making sure the lights on the boat worked, hooked the boat trailer to the truck, organizing my food bag,,, just getting everything ready to go.
For Christmas my mom and dad gave me an Optimus Terra Solo. My personal belief is that you test your gear before you take it on a trip. To test my new Terra Solo, I setup my single burner Coleman stove on the stove in my kitchen. Then I cooked myself a serving of noodles, just like I would on a camping trip.
With a title of “2012 prepping plans”, you might think this article is about what might happen in December of 2012. Well, that is not what this article is about. If you are worried about 2012, and you consider yourself a prepper or a survivalist, then you are doing it wrong. We should not bother ourselves with dates and predictions of doom and gloom. Our duty to our family and those close to us is to maintain a constant state of readiness. It is impossible to maintain a 100% constant state of readiness. To do so would require us to walk around with a gas mask and bio-suit. What we can do, is have a stockpile of food, water and the ability to protect our family and property.
The goal of this article is to look back on 2011, reflect, and then look forward to 2012. Where do you need to improve your preps, what areas have you neglected and what changes can you make in the coming year.
As 2012 approaches, some of us might be thinking about news years resolutions. Along with the typical lose weight and stop smoking resolutions, I would like everyone to post suggestions related to how prepared you and your family are. Where do you need to make improvements. On top of your own preps, what do you family members need to do to improve?
For example, my step-daughters have no can rotation system setup. I thought about buying them some wire racks and then help them get some kind of system going to help them keep their can goods rotated.
In 2011 I tried to focus on fishing supplies, getting a can rotation system working, stockpiling #10 cans and storing food in mylar bags.
Stockpiling food:
Right now 3 superpails are taking up an entire bottom shelf of my shelving system.
I have 2 shelf units installed, on the bottom shelf I have:
3 super pails on the bottom shelf of one unit
Up to 108 cans on the bottom shelf of one unit
I would like a better way to store my superpails. But where do things balance out? Do 3 five gallon superpails equal 108 cans? Would I be better off storing the superpails in a closet and storing 216 cans on the bottom on the shelving units?
This video is how my shelves looked in October 2011. In the past few months there have been several changes made.
Fishing Gear:
I would think to throw a special thank you out to the person who sent me a box of fishing gear. The person asked to remain unnamed, you know who you are, and Thank You.
Some of the stuff I have been stockpiling are trotlines, droplines (noodles), hooks, fishing line, weights,,, and so on. During the spring of 2011 I tried to buy a bunch of perch fishing stuff – small hooks and weights. I was hoping to take the grandkids and my kids fishing this past summer, and we went a few times.
In the summer of 2011 I ran a couple of trotlines and went fishing out on the Angelina river a few times. When June, July and August rolled around the weather got too hot to do anything outdoors. This summer was one of the hottest and driest on record here in Southeast Texas, and for Texas as a whole. Due to the extreme heat, I tried to limit my outdoor activities. The day time temps would hit 100 degrees before noon in July and August. With heat like that, being out on the boat fishing felt like being in an oven.
Plans for 2012
Some of the things I want to do in 2012 include reviewing my seed stockpile, buy a pressure cooker, plant a small garden in my backyard. Even if I do not plant a garden, I would like to buy beans or peas from the local farmers co-op. Then use the pressure cooker to store the beans and peas. Local farmers co-op is a great way to meet up with local farmers. Ask them what kind of crops they are growing, what kind of pesticide and fertilizer works best for what types of crops.
One of the things I really hope to do in 2012 is to plant a bunch of snap beans, and use a pressure cooker to store them in jars.
I would also like to make a homemade stew with a pressure cooker.
The ammunition at the camp needs to be stored in ammo boxes instead of just sitting on the shelf.
I would like to order a sardine can of 223 or 308.
One of the main things I wan to work on in 2012 is preserving my own food. Maybe even try to make jerky with my pit, which would be a good weekend project.
All right people, post your ideas, opinions, thoughts in this forum thread about prepping in 2012.
Copyright Kevin Felts 2011.
No part of this article may be reproduced without written permission from the author.
Years ago I owned a Ruger P90. but my wife and I fell on hard times and the pistol had to be sold to catch up on bills. Selling firearms is something I do as a last resort. At this time I am 43 years old, and have only had to sell 3 firearms during my adult life, and all three sells I regret.
I want a new 45acp pistol, and this time I want a 1911. The 1911 is more then “just” a pistol or a handgun, its an American tradition. Owning a 1911 is like owning a chevy, ford or dodge, its just one of those things that defines what its like to be a US citizen.
The question is, what make and model 1911 do I get?
My first choice, based on a recommendation from the buddy of mine was the Rock Island 1911. But after doing some research, I found out the Rock Island 1911 is not made in the USA. When given the choice, I would like to buy made in the USA products.
Lance, over at the Gun Slinger told me he had a Remington 1911 R1 in stock. The plans are to make it over to the Gun Slinger in the next couple of weeks to take a look at the R1 and to get a feel for it.
I would like to add a light to the R1, but the pistol does not have a rail on it. But since the R1 does not come with a rail,,, what can I do? I can either add an after market rail, something that clamps to the trigger guard, or buy a 1911 with a factory rail. My ideal setup would be a light + tritium sights. But if I have to go with just the tritium sights, then so be it; I keep a 3 D cell maglight under my side of the bed, + an LED on the computer desk.
Something else I have not mentioned, I like to bring a pistol while camping on the deer lease or camping on the river. If something wonders into the camp site, I would like to be able to protect myself and the people that are with me. I have been carrying a beretta 9mm, but would like to upgrade. Mostly what I am concerned about are animals with rabies, coyotes, snakes,,, stuff like that.
Even though I like the 9mm, I miss the 45. There is just something about shooting a 45 that makes it a pleasure to fire off a few rounds.
The past 2 days have been spent working on my truck, and working on some jug lines for an upcoming camping trip. When I started thinking about how much time and effort I put into getting the juglines ready, I was a little set back.
After talking to my wife, I probably put 6 – 8 hours into redoing, and working on the juglines. The lines had not been used since June 2011. I changed the lines out, added some PVC pipe to the noodles and replaced the J-hooks with circle hooks. When I started cutting the PVC pipe, I was using a hacksaw. After cutting a few pipe, I dug the skilsaw out and started using the saw instead of the hacksaw.
For the sake of discussion lets say this happened after a SHTF / teotwawki event. I would have had to use a hacksaw to cut the PVC pipe. But then again, its doubtful I would have had any PVC laying around. To make the noodles for this weekend I used some 3/4 inch PVC I had in the shed.
Without PVC pipe I would have threaded the line through the middle of the noodle.
Your SHTF survival plans can be organized in a couple of ways. The plans can be written down on pieces of paper, tossed into a hat and drawn at random. The plans could be ideas jotted down in a notebook or a blog. Or the plans could be well organized. Once the plans are organized, then what? Do you just look over the plans and say “yep, that looks good to me”? Personally, I do not think that is good enough.
Lets take stockpiling ammunition for SHTF for example. I do not think its enough to buy ammunition at random. You buy a box here, buy a box there, after awhile you know you have ammo, but how much “exactly” do you have? The same thing can be said about soap, soap dispensers, first aid supplies, spare blankets,,,, and so on.
When you are looking at your food shelves, and the racks are in plain view, it should be easy to tell what can goods you are short on and which ones you need to buy. When I look at my shelving units, I can tell right off the bat when a can of ravioli has been taken, or when my wife and I need to buy some more beans or corn.
The problem lies in things that are rarely seen, such as ammo kept in an ammo cans – out of sight, out of mind.
For the stuff that stays out of sight, its important to pull the stuff out and take a look every once in awhile. A couple of months ago I pulled out my ammo cans and took inventory:
223, check
7.62×39, check
30-30, check 308, check
#4 shot 12 gauge for small game, I needed some more of it so I picked up a couple of boxes a few days later.
22 long rifle, well crap, why do I have so little 22 long rifle?
For non-survivalist, having a couple of boxes of 22 long rifle might be ok. But for people that are planning for a long term SHTF survival situation, the more the merrier.
For around 14 years or so, a couple of my buddies and I have been talking about making a river trip from the northern part of the Sabine river, all the way to the Orange / Bridge city area. If everything goes according to plan, we will be making the trip sometime in 2012. The trip is currently in the planning phase – we talking about what boats we want to bring, where we are going to launch the boats at, who is going to be going on the trip,,, just stuff like that.
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