Poor Man Survival
Self Reliance tools for
independent minded people…
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2161-5543
A Digest of Urban
Survival Resources
"Chuck Norris doesn't dodge bullets, they dodge
him."
Home Defense Shotgun Still Your Best Bet in My Book
In a real-world, home-defense scenario where it’s just you
against an unknown number of assailants, being stealthy can increase your odds
of survival. If an attacker doesn’t know where you are—or if you’re even around—he’s
less likely to harm you. Sure, there are times when making some noise could
help you, but because you don’t know for sure, it’s usually best to remain
silent in an attempt to get the upper hand.
So, until any
actual shooting starts, the shotgun itself should be made silent, you should
practice noise discipline in your movements and your plan of defense should
involve the element of stealth. Here are a few points to consider.
First off, make sure your staged shotgun, with whatever
accessories you choose for it, is inherently silent. Some shotguns—especially
some of the semi-automatic, piston-powered guns—naturally have some clanking
parts to them. To tell if yours does, hold your gun, rotate it up and down and
shake it. If it clanks, find the problem and remedy it if possible, or find
another shotgun. If your setup wears a sling, make sure the swivels aren’t
squeaky. If they are, oil the friction points, then give it a wrap of duct
tape. Make sure your spare shells don’t rattle in whatever spare-shell holder
you choose. (This is another good argument for a sidesaddle-type shell holder.)
Moleskin, rubber bands and duct tape are your friends if any of your gear
rattles, clicks or clanks during training—where you should find this stuff out.
Just remember to practice with them to make sure your gear still works as
intended.
Nearly all serious hunters know how to load, shoot and
reload their shotguns with the least-possible noise. When hunting wild turkeys,
for example, if a hunter mistakenly snicks off a safety when the bird is in
range, that hunter will most likely be going home empty-handed because the
turkey will run off before the hunter can shoot it. Rather, the astute hunter
learns how to work a trigger-guard safety between the thumb and forefinger so
it’s totally silent. Mossberg-style tang safeties are a little more difficult,
but it can be done with practice. You should practice with your shotgun until
reloading it and taking it off “safe” becomes second nature and silent.
If you need to check your shotgun to make sure it’s
loaded, practice this until you can do it as silently as possible. Remember,
several semi-automatic shotguns—like Benellis—have rotating bolt heads that
need to go all the way back into battery or they won’t fire. Know what fully
back into battery looks, sounds and feels like, or else you run the risk of
hearing the loudest click you’ll ever hear. And then practice checking and
reloading with the lights out.
Current NRA Director of Education and Training Eric
Frohardt stresses the importance of moving through your house (if you must)
stealthily.
“Any firearm manipulation should happen before you start a
patrol, so the biggest stealth challenge is simply walking around the house
without making noises,” says Frohardt. “There are a number of squeaky spots in
my home and I actually practice avoiding them.”
You should, too. Also, think about the little things like
opening door handles quietly and being aware of your shotgun’s muzzle so you
don’t bang it into every door jamb. Like everything else, this requires
practice.
Lastly, while most home defenders will be doing good to
wake up in the middle of the night and coherently grab a shotgun and a
flashlight, if you could opt for one more thing, it might be a pair of
sneakers. Sure, socks are quieter, but socks are dangerously slippery on bare
floors. Sneakers are quiet, provide traction and offer protection if you must
dash outside, walk over broken glass, fight or whatever.
Building a cellar can be a daunting
task, but I found that it’s well worth the effort.
This is something I’ve pondered for quite some time &
have reviewed it from many perspectives…in particular, I do not want to alert
local township officials of what I am up to for privacy reasons and they sure
as hell don’t any more fees from me!
The size and construction preferences are different for
everyone. Some cellar systems are nothing more than a buried metal trash can
and others are rooms with concrete floors and shelving. No matter what the
perfect cellar system is, the first steps are the same.
Budget and Needs
Assessment
If I am a single person looking to store just enough
vegetables to last through winter, burying metal cans is the best answer for
me. Large families need more. Decide how much space is needed. Do not forget to
account for the space you need to store any non-food items. Think medications
and first aid supplies.
More often than not, your finances determine how much you
can get done. Determining the budget for a project and making that budget fit
what I want to do can take some creativity. Shop at local home stores, then go
online and look for sign up discounts or coupons for percentage off. Coupon
codes can make the difference in being able to put in extra shelving or better
ventilation.
Placement
Cellars need to be at least 10 foot underground to get the
most stable temperature and moisture to optimize the storage of fresh food.
Moisture content anywhere above 85% to 95% is ideal. Anything less than those
percentages will leave food dry and you will see wrinkled skin on your fruit
and veggies and experience food loss.
Outdoor cellars work best with dirt floors. The floors
should be packed earth, not loose dirt. Stay away from trees when you build
your cellar. Roots grow and can compromise the integrity of walls in a dirt
cellar. Use wood shelving. Wood does not conduct heat or fluctuate in
temperature the way that metal does. Metal stabilizing poles are fine, but
don’t use metal to store food on.
Concrete floors are better in an attached cellar like a
basement. A great place to convert to a cellar is cisterns that were built on
to homes outside city limits in the Southeast US in the 1950-70’s. I‘m not
talking about farmhouses, these homes could be less than 500 feet outside city
limits. In the 1980’s most of these homes stopped using cisterns once the city
annexed their neighborhood or county water became available. These cisterns
dried up and became the perfect place to use as a root cellar.
Cisterns were built with a block wall separating the water
reservoir from the basement. By knocking out a doorway and modifying the
existing ventilation, you can get a large root cellar with minimal investment.
Ventilation
For ventilation you need two pipes coming from your cellar.
One needs to be high up in the cellar to vent gasses and warm air. The other
pipe will come in lower to the ground to introduce cooler air thus stabilizing
the airflow within the unit.
I highly recommend investing time into building a cellar.
Having a cool place to store some produce and the foods you’ve canned is
important, especially if you have no basement or your basement doesn’t stay
cool. Check out “The
Complete Root Cellar Book” by Steve Maxwell and Jennifer Mackenzie. It has detailed
plans and tips to successfully build a cellar.
10 ft. x 6 ft.
Below-Ground Tornado Storm Shelter [Home Depot offers several sizes/costs]
Inexpensive
Root Cellar, Easy to Build in Your Own Back Yard, Will Protect Your Life and
Preserve Your Supplies in the Next Crisis [Fee-based]
15 Free Root Cellar Plans DIY
Yours in Self Reliance,
Bruce ‘the Poor Man’
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Without freedom of
thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom - and no such thing as public
liberty without freedom of speech.
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-Benjamin Franklin
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A Final Note…
Contributors and subscribers enable the Poor Man Survivor to post 150+ free essays annually. It is for this reason they are Heroes and Heroines of New Media. Without your financial support, the free content would disappear for the simple reason that I cannot keep body and soul together on my meager book sales & ecommerce alone.
Useful
Resources
Old ammo cans are incredibly useful if you're a prepper.
They're designed to be sturdy, stackable, waterproof, and easy to transport
(with handles on the top and the front). That's why militaries have been using
them for decades.
There are several sizes and shapes, but they all have
the same basic design which hasn't been modified since the 1950s. If you're a
prepper, you should consider acquiring some ammo cans as they have many uses in
addition to storing ammo.
In this video, Sensible Prepper comes up with 25 uses
for ammo cans. Here's his list...
Vitamin and Mineral
Supplements Won't Help You Live Longer, and Could Cause Harm: Getting the right amount
of vitamins and minerals can lower your risk of an early death, but they should
come from food instead of supplements, a recent study suggests
Baby Boomers Face
Retirement Crisis — Little Savings, High Health Costs and Unrealistic
Expectations: It’s National Retirement Planning Week, which means it’s time for
another round of depressing stats about how unprepared we all are for retirement
We’ve
already told you for a long time Alexa spies on you and this bears repeating
[your cell-phone photos Geo-tags your locations]
Hidden Data in Your Photos Exposes Your Personal Information
Whenever you use a digital
camera, whether it be the one in your smartphone or a conventional camera, each
picture is encoded with a lot of identifying information. And when you post the
picture online, you are sharing it with the world. This includes the date and
time the picture was taken and sometimes even the GPS location. Here are ways to prevent this
identifying information from being recorded.
You Can’t
Buy Life Insurance After You’re Dead-Prepare NOW for Emergencies…
Finally,
grab an emergency power cell or solar/battery radio weather radio!
Having
the Patriot Power Cell on-hand for emergencies keeps your essential electronics
up and running in case you need to call for help.
“The Cell is a workhorse of power — it’ll charge your phone
soup to nuts 3 to 8 times… I think of the Patriot Power Cell as “everyday
prepared.” Awesome for travel or avoiding inconveniences while saving your
bacon in an outage. It’s a MUST HAVE for your survival lineup."
10,000 mAh Battery/Water Resistant/2 LED Flashlight/1.5 Watt
Solar Panel/6-Hour Charge Time
In stock again!
3 comments:
I'm with you in that I would want to construct a "fruit cellar" on the 'QT' - no need for local bureau-twits to know what I am up to. All they want to do is collect more money & record into a public database what I have on my private property-enough of that BS! We didn't need that crap when constructing storm cellars & related underground 'non-living' spaces & and I'm not about to start now. Hell, in some places you need a permit to build a damned dog house!
I appreciate your post and it was superb .Thanks for sharing.I would like to hear more about this in future..Again thanks for sharing. Visit My blog post:-imprinttopreviewer
Although a short barreled shotgun is what I too keep at home for self defense, I still keep a 5-shot .38 bedside for easy access and use along with a small high beam flashlight for night time break-ins. I am a very light sleeper & keep smoke bombs handy too as I'm upstairs & can flip these down the steps to confuse intruders along with other alert systems we have in place. Good stuff as always.
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