Survival books?

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I've been reading the forum today and I guess I'm a "gets it" now as my husband and I are convinced that oil supplies are going to be tight next year and it may throw us into a depression. We're not convinced the lights are going to go out but do want to plan for economic hard times.

Can anyone suggest books for how to start our own food storage? I guess we're looking for what to put away and how much of it. How to store it as well.

We're not looking at so much a loss of utilities but more a Great Depression kind of thing where there just may not be money to buy food and other necessary supplies. We want to "hoard" our stuff now.

Any suggestions will be appreciated.

--[Rita]--

-- Rita Hernandez (got_gas?@emptytank.com), December 17, 1999

Answers

Go to http://home.earthlink.net/~kenseger/surv/surv.htm and read the files on MORMAN4 and wheat.

If I had to choose just one single book on survival it would be Nuclear War Survival Skills by Cresson Kearney which you can get order information on or download from http://www.oism.org now while it is the finest book on nuclear war survival, the majority of the book is on general survival topics.

Ball Corporation sells the (title? nickname?) The Ball Blue Book of Canning. Morton Salt Corp. has a wonderful book on preserving with salt.

http://blfarms.com/ATLibrary/ sells a 23 CD set of books on do it your self stuff for about $275 but you need to get your order in today, literally.

You might check http://www.mxbf.com/ and see if you can find an out of print copy of Esther Dickey's Food Storage for the Dickey 4 + 40. Bachelor's book is good too, sorry can't remember the title.

-- Ken Seger (kenseger@earthlink.net), December 17, 1999.


One of my favorite books is Reader's Difests 'Back to Basics' put out in the mid-80's. Not really a 'survival' book...but it covers a wide range of things from gardening to food prep/preservation, furniture making, clothing making, et-al...

-- Satanta (LostPar@dise.com), December 17, 1999.

Two books I am glad I have:

The Encyclopedia of Country Living : An Old Fashioned Recipe Book by Carla Emery

The Encyclopedia of Country Living

Self-Reliant Living; Learn to Provide for Yourself Now and When You Retire. by Jeani McKeever, James M. McKeever

Self-Reliant Living

-- ExCop (yinadral@juno.com), December 17, 1999.


I've been doing food storage since the Gulf War and there's two books that I really like. The first I've only had for a month or so and the second I've had for years.

My now #1 favorite is Alan Hagan's "The Prudent Pantry: Your Guide to Building a Food Insurance Program." He not only tells you how to figure out what to store, how much to store, the way to store but even more importantly *why* to do it. With that you can figure out how to make your own plan but also how to adapt anyone elses to your own needs. He covers a whole lot about water too, finding it, storing it, making it safe to drink. Not what you asked about but it's there. He's got a whole chapter on sanitation and a great books list that I'm going broke buying my way through, he reviews most of them. I don't think his book is in the bookstores but he's got a website you can order it from. It's http://www.providenceco-op.com. He posts in here sometimes so you might see him around.

My #2 favorite is James Stevens "Making the Best of Basics." He's got a lot of lists of things you need that got me started way back when and a lot of "basic" recipes for everything you might store. He doesn't have as much "why to do it" as Hagan's book but it's a good book. They complement each other very nicely.

We don't do as much canning and drying as we once did but the three books we found out that were the best are below. They don't tell you how much to put away, nor why to do it, they're just how-to's of canning and drying.

#1 - Putting Food By. Can't remember the names of the authors. Easily the best book in the market for home-canning and is pretty good for drying and root cellaring too.

#2 - Stocking Up by Rodale Press. A bit friendlier than Putting Food By but not as in-depth.

#3 - The Ball Blue Book. Just a booklet actually, but packed with solid information.

Good luck! The war stuff we got started from never did happen but we used our preparedness supplies to get through two bad winter storms when we lost power for days and a hurricane that we lost power for a week from (bad timing to move from up North).

-- John Doe (john@no-names.com), December 17, 1999.


You'll find an enourmous amount of free information that you asked for at this site: http://www.beprepared.com/Insight/informa.htm

LINK

They also sell a very good book called A Year's Supply. Buy it.

-- Walt (longyear@shentel.net), December 17, 1999.



If you're still checking this forum, try www.preparednessmart.com and see what a big selection of how-to books they have. I have bought several items from this company and have been satisfied. Their catalog on line gives a brief description of each books' contents. They also have a nice color catalog they will send free of charge.

-- Jo Ann (MaJo@Michiana.com), December 20, 1999.

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