After TSHTF we will eventually arrive at a stage where we will be working solely to feed ourselves. Very few of us will be spared from working Dawn to Dusk in the fields during the growing season. We will be working to ensure we grow enough to keep outselves and put enough away for the Winter as well as some extra to barter and pay for specialist skills or any items we find necessary to live.
It will be a hard time with little time for recreation and improving our lives. Yet, especially after the first few years, we will start to be dependant on our crops having started to run out of key supplies which these crops will have to suppliment. Unlike now we will have no nanny state to go to if it all goes wrong and collect welfare. We have to get it right.
So to make sure we do.
- Make sure you have good gardening tools. Enough for all
- Make sure you have plenty of seeds which will seed true
- Try and prepare the land now. Which we have power tools and fertilisers
- Try and practise your gardening skills now even if it is on a smaller scale
In addition I am a great believer in having bees. At least two hives but preferably three hives. They aid in pollination of the crop as well as providing honey.
Finally, you will also need to get your hands dirty and kill prey animals for food. There is no way around it in a collapse as the nutriets in an animal cannot be replicated without vitamin supplements. Vegetarians will be few and far between. Even now many suffer from diseases that are caused by their diets and strangely enough they are allowed to make their children follow their fad.
- Learn how to humanely kill and prepare prey animals
- Keep some prey animals now if you have the space. Chickens,Rabbits, Ducks, Guinea Pigs, etc. You can’t keep them in a box ready to go so now is the time
- Make sure you or someone close has males of your animals as well as females
- Try and keep at least two areas with your animals in. If something happens to one; disease, attack from animals or simply a fire you need backup
- Try and practise your husbandry skills now while you can get help
This should provide you with the best chance of providing your own food to keep yourself alive.
You can’t live on your stores forever nor can you reasonably expect to hunt for your food. Hunting is for supplementing and a change only.
I think your missing one thing SD. In any ASHTF situation, WROL (without rule of law) will apply.
The people you see roaming the streets now burgling, raping murdering etc… do so with ROL (rule of law) in place.
It’s all well and good being able to sow seeds, grow your crops etc… but the ability to protect them is paramount. A few dozen crossbow bolts, nor alarm mines will suffice. In my opinion it’s a dangerous mistake to underestimate the enemy.
Once WROL applies, anything goes, for us and for them. You must be prepared to defend your BOL/family/food to the death with extreme prejudice, there will be NO room for second thoughts or not being able to fend off roving gangs looking for food.
Much as a lot of preppers wish to bury their heads in the sand and romanticise the whole ASHTF scenarios, we cannot be under any illusions as to just how many people will survive, and will be looking for free food and possibly sexual recreation, that last bit goes out to our female members, although males may need to consider this also. I personally think it would be more along the lines of present day Columbia with the drug cartels in charge only without the army and the police and the fear of arrest to worry about. Many preppers believe we will be left alone to get on with it, maybe if your in an armed compound like the old medieval hill forts, but you you cannot ignore history, why do you think there were hill forts with spiked log walls?, why were castles developed?, why were weapons made?
I think this site as well as others is guilty of underestimating the possible violent, deadly clashes that will erupt in the country side as well as the cities as people fight for food and their lives. Do not make the mistake of believing you are safe in the country side, history has many stories of country dwellers their belongings and their families being destroyed by invading armies and starving townies. What will you do if a gang of roving starving people 100 strong come for you?
I’m sure you’ve seen starving people fighting for food in Africa… That’s civilised behaviour with rol in place and no weapons, imagine them with no rol and all armed with spears and machete’s….
Whilst I think the possibility of us being invaded is remote, the mass exodus of civilians from cities such as London, Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle, Norwich, Sheffield, Leicester, Edinburgh, Glasgow etc… is not. Look at the population chart here: http://www.citypopulation.de/UK-England.html and for our American friends: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population
Whilst not everybody is or will flee the cities I.E. the old, infirm, the waifs and strays etc. there are and will be a great many determined, hungry and potentially violent people looking for your food and whatever else they can get.
You may not be able to defend your bol against many attackers, so what do you do?
Hide. Outfit your bol or retreat with a hidey hole for you and your family and/or your most valuable possessions, after all if it can’t be seen it can’t be taken, that goes for people as well. Plan for your bol to be attacked, plan for denial of entry for the attackers, plan for your bol to be overtaken, plan for your retreat and safe escape.
Remember the old adage: “Run away live to fight another day” fight battles you can win, don’t be overly confident of your ability to defeat large numbers of people, it’s better to bug out, regroup at an alternative R.V. and go from there. To remain alive is our goal is it not?
Failure to plan for mass exodus to YOUR location, just because you think it won’t or can’t happen could possibly be yours and your family’s/groups downfall.
Mike,
Totally agree. We are all agreed that we need to be out of the cities but in many cases we just cannot.
Therefore we have to adapt and we do try and discuss this on the site.
As you said though it is not perfect but what is?
Mike, I am completely in agreement with you.
Society barely controls the rogue elements of society even with Rule of Law. If ROL ceases, gang based mob rule will prevail.
I don’t think that it will be possible to defend our suppplies if we get detected. Maybe we can defend against occasional lone individuals, but eventually there is a high chance of being detected by organized gangs of raider / foragers. And then force of numbers will be against us. It is easy to envisage gang bosses sending in waves of expendable wannabe’s to overwhelm our defences. If we succeed in defending against repeated waves of attack, it is naive to think that they will let us alone. We will become a threat to the Gang master’s status… We will be a challenge that has to be overwhelmed so that they can maintain their power over the mob. Either they will keep toying with us as a kind of macho game, or simply burn us out, supplies, families and all. This is not a rosy scenario, I know, but I feel it is entirely probable.
A tactic of maintaining a very low profile, but being prepared to abandon our reserves if necessary might work. In consequence it means setting up multiple caches to fall back upon in case of crisis. I’m already struggling with the cost od setting aside provisions in a single Bug out Location, so this seems a difficult to realise strategy. Alternatively, having been displaced we will likely have to become raiders ourselves in order to survive?
This is a cozy picture of the future, but its one that if we are serious about our prepping, we should plan for.
I think this is possible but is also worst case. I suspect there will be so much fighting followed by a lack of energy to travel far that those well out will have a good chance.
Point taken, but organized hordes could become powerful and relatively well nourished for a while.
We should not understimate the intelligence of the potential leaders of such groups. That intelligence coupled to an amoral ruthless attitude is a major force to be reckoned with.
Maybe by being in a truely remote part of the country one stands a better chance of remaining undetected. Any of us within 30 miles of larger towns need to be prepared for the mobs that will surely come to power, for a while at least.
It is good having a large horde but you need to feed and house them. They will have to roam large areas to keep themselves fed and even the best stocked prepper would only feed them for a short time. As has been suggested if they come slink away and come back when they are passed.
The scenarios in Mad Max and a million other movies with large bands of outlaws in a well defended location is in my opinion unlikely.