The Cor Outfitters Intelligence Community: 2017-05-28

Saturday, June 3, 2017

Keeping Your Blades Sharp Post Disaster

Written by Guest Contributor on The Prepper Journal.

Editor’s Note: This post is another entry in the Prepper Writing Contest from Redneck Prepper. If you have information for Preppers that you would like to share and possibly win a $300 Amazon Gift Card to purchase your own prepping supplies, enter today.

As a beginning prepper, I have noticed that much attention is given to the blades and implements that would be needed to survive and thrive after a myriad of disaster scenarios. There seems however to be a lack of information on keeping these tools sharp, especially given the amount of articles about the tools themselves. Whether you are using a pocket knife to cut rope, a shovel or hoe to cultivate plants, or a skinning knife to dress your game, they are all guaranteed to dull with repeated use. I believe it is time to shed some light on the methods and implements used to maintain a working edge on your tools. This is what I will attempt to do.

Garden tools, axes, machetes, and chopping tools

Now that you are ready, either clamp your tool to a table, or secure it in a vice to begin.

While you can find many different and complicated instructions online for keeping your tools sharp, I will attempt to keep this simple and informative.

Your garden tools are different in both material and blade geometry than a knife blade. The first difference you will notice is that the edge is generally thicker and more rounded. This provides the durability needed for tools that will take impacts such as cutting a tree. And the steel is a less brittle alloy, providing both a more durable edge and the ability to more easily sharpen it. This is where the tool file comes in. A high carbon alloy, such as 5160 or D2, is too hard to be cut with a tool file. If you try to file a high carbon knife blade, the file will skate along the top of the surface and never leave a scratch. But it will cut into your tools. Now that we know the correct tool to keep your blades sharp, we move on to technique.

Work Sharp WSKTS-KO Knife and Tool Sharpener Ken Onion Edition – Makes sharpening all edged tools simple.

First you must determine the edge type on your tool. If you look closely at your ax, you will notice it has a double bevel. That means both sides of the edge are cut into a “V” shape with the point in the center of the edge. Look at the edge on your hoe next. You will notice that one side of the blade is flat and the other is beveled to produce a cutting edge. This is where that technique comes in. You always sharpen the blade in the manner in which it was made. Only file the beveled side on the single bevel, file both sides of the double bevel. And as long as you can see the original angle of the bevel that can be used as a guide for you to follow as you file.

The other consideration is how to use the file once you have determined the correct angle and edge type. The most common recommendation is to use the full length of the file as you move along the edge, this way you do not wear the teeth of the file in one small area.

Now that you are ready, either clamp your tool to a table, or secure it in a vice to begin. Align your file with the angle of your blade, and as you move down the edge, press down firmly on the forward stroke. Always release the pressure as you bring the file back. That way you not only have better chance of not cutting yourself, but you will not break the teeth of your file. Now repeat until your tool is sharp.

We are ready to move on to knives next.

Pocket knives, kitchen knives, skinning knives, and survival knives

Now that we assume your blade is only dull, not damaged, or that you have restored the profile to the blade, lets talk about honing

Without getting too technical about the varying alloys and blade geometries that can effect sharpening, I will attempt to give some basic information on keeping your cutting implements in usable form.

Most of the time the average person will attempt to sharpen a dull blade with either a stone or one of those pull through sharpeners that are laying in countless kitchen drawers. While they will make your knife somewhat sharper, they remove excess material and are not normally necessary. We will examine why.

A stone has a basic purpose, it allows you to remove material from the hardened steel of your blade. This is helpful if you have chipped or blunted the cutting edge and it becomes necessary to re-profile the edge. This will get your blade back into the geometry that provides the best cutting edge. But for everyday sharpening this is unneeded and causes your blade to wear prematurely. The same can be said for the pull through sharpener. It will sharpen somewhat, but it will wear your blade out with constant use. There are numerous instructional articles written on using a stone, and they are far better written that I am capable of, so I will not go into great detail on that.

Now that we assume your blade is only dull, not damaged, or that you have restored the profile to the blade, lets talk about honing. Most everyone has seen a chef whipping his blade up and down a cylindrical tool, but do not realize exactly why. That cylindrical object is known as a honing steel. The idea is not to remove material, but to pull the microscopic teeth that make up your cutting edge back into alignment. Those teeth bend down as the knife is used. This method restores the sharpness to your blade without the effort or wear.

Now back to the chef, he is merrily whipping his blade along the length of the steel without a care. As cool as it looks, it is highly impractical and mostly for the purpose of showing off for his audience. For the rest of us, the correct method is to hold your steel firmly in your hand and press the tip against a table or counter top. Now with a light coating of oil on your steel, it is time for the knife. You want to hold the blade at approximately 22.5 degrees to the steel, beginning with the hilt at the top of the steel. Now bring the blade down slowly while also moving the length of the blade along the steel. This will work better if you have at least the same length steel as the blade you are sharpening. You may not be able to see the effect it is having, but it is working. Just be sure you keep track of how many strokes you make on each side of the blade, this needs to be equal on both sides. Now repeat.

Once you are confident that you have made a difference on your knife, wipe the blade with a rag, and check the sharpness carefully. I will not tell you how I do that because someone will surely injure themselves and blame me. You should notice a remarkable difference in sharpness. Congratulations, you have just taken the first step to keeping your blades in optimal cutting condition.

This article is by no means the most informative source on the subject, nor the most articulate. It is however my hope that I have provided some needed information that may benefit someone along their journey. Even if that is by encouraging you to research the subject elsewhere.

Keep your powder dry and your tools sharp out there.

The post Keeping Your Blades Sharp Post Disaster appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

from The Prepper Journal
Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. How prepared are you for emergencies?
#SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

What did you do to prep this week?

Well, folks, it’s a beautiful day in East Tennessee, but unfortunately, instead of getting to enjoy it by going fishing or ATV riding in the mountains I have a mountain of yard work to do. Oh well, maybe I can go fishing tomorrow or later this evening after I get this danged yard work finished, but then it’s never really finished because as soon as it’s cut it just starts growing again at what seems like a supersonic rate.

I have a big announcement! Are you ready? It’s big, really big! Can you guess what it is? Nope, not getting married. Nope, not a new book either...

Read the whole entry... »

from TheSurvivalistBlog.net RSS Feed
Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. Are you ready for any situation?
#SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

Prep Blog Review: 30+ Summer Plants For Preppers

Have you ever wondered what would you do if one day you won’t find food in the stores? Growing your own food is a topic that never gets old and I’m sure you are always looking for new tips and tricks to make your survival garden better and better.

I love growing my own food. Spending time in the garden every day, nurturing my plants is a relaxing and rewarding activity, especially when, at the end of the day, I leave the magic place with a basket full of delicious veggies and herbs. Summer is almost here which means more time spent in the garden, new plants, and also more responsibilities for your garden.

With this thing in mind, for this week’s Prep Blog Review, I’ve gathered four articles about summer plants every prepper should grow.

If you have other ideas or suggestions, please share them in the comment section below.

1. 31 Summer Plants For Preppers

“As a prepper, planning a garden is so much more effort than just choosing pretty flowers or picking out neat vegetable varieties. You want to choose plants that offer a lot of benefits for the amount of space they take up. The following plants are great summer plants for preppers because they offer large harvests, medicinal benefits, and/or a use in a permaculture garden.

Tomatoes are a huge part of the modern diet. Whether it’s in salads, spaghetti sauce, ketchup, or salsa chances are your family eats them. They’re a great plant for beginners and easy to preserve.

For growers in exceptionally cold climates consider cherry tomato varieties which tolerate pots well and can be brought indoors whenever temperatures dip too low.”

Read more on Survival Sullivan.

2. It’s June – What Can I Still Plant In My Garden?

“Even the most avid gardeners have a bad year! Any number of things can keep you out of the garden in April and May, weather problems, work commitments, family problems . . . we’ve all been there.

But don’t give up on your garden just yet. There are still plenty of yummy veggies you can get planted now (in mid to late June) and get a nice harvest before the summer ends.

Let’s talk about what you can still get planted now and also talk about a few things that you can wait on and plant in about 5 or 6 weeks (Around August 1st for most of us).”

Read more on Our Stoney Acres.

3. 10 Healthy Veggies You Can Grow In Water

“Store-bought or homegrown, you can reuse those veggie scraps to grow an endless supply of food starting with just a container of water at home.

DIY water gardens are ideal for anyone who wants to minimize waste, grow organic, save money, and make fewer trips to the market. Homesteaders and city dwellers–this one’s for you.

What you’re going to need:

Mason Jar or shallow bowl

Purified water

Potted soil

Toothpicks/bamboo skewers, depending on the vegetable”

Friday, June 2, 2017

Making a G.O.O.D PLAN: Get Out Of Dodge

Written by Guest Contributor on The Prepper Journal.

Editor’s Note: This post is another entry in the Prepper Writing Contest from Michael Wilhelm. If you have information for Preppers that you would like to share and possibly win a $300 Amazon Gift Card to purchase your own prepping supplies, enter today.

WHAT IS A G.O.O.D. PLAN?

Basically a GOOD Plan is life’s Plan B. Plan A, is what we are currently living. We live in society that pretty much provides for all our basic needs and then some. Plan A is where the electric is always on, clean water comes out of the faucet, when you dial 911 someone shows up to help you. Plan A is where babies are born in hospitals, our kids are educated in schools to prepare them for employment, were adults working at jobs to receive monetary compensation so they can exchange it for things they need and want. Plan A is where some people get married, have kids, enjoy comfortable retirement, and then die. Plan A is commonly referred to as the “Center Holds”. We live a life of electricity, gas for our cars, food available nearly everywhere, and a government that provides a degree of law and order and responds to most emergency that may befall us.

Most of us are on board with Plan A. But what if Plan A fails? What if the Center doesn’t hold? What if events, beyond your control, fall upon you and change all you know and expect from life. Do you have a Plan B? What if you find that you can no long stay in your current home due to lack of power, water and food? What if your neighborhood is no longer safe and you have to leave, to “Get Out Of Dodge”. Where would you go? How would you get there? How would you live once you got there? What is your Plan B?

The primary purpose of this document is to get you thinking about Plan B. And to provide a very basic understanding of things to consider if you decide to develop a Plan B. As with Plan A you layout goals and acquire resources that will support you Plan A goals. Same with Plan B, you develop goals, then start acquiring resources.

The purpose of a GOOD Plan is to get you, and your family, to a place of safety and survival before SHTF (Shit Hits The Fan). Your plan needs to be executable and based in reality. A good GOOD Plan will answer three questions.

Where are you going?
When do you leave?
What are you taking?

Finally, you need to communicate your GOOD plan with your family. Doesn’t help to have a plan if no one’s aware of it.

WHERE ARE YOU GOING?

Survival Retreat

A GOOD Plan assumes that you will be leaving your current / normal place of residence for a Survival Retreat. However, if you currently live in a place that meets the basic requirement of a Survival Retreat, then there is no reason to leave.
A Survival Retreat is a predetermined place that you would be living at for at least a year. By predetermined I mean that you know where the place is, you know how to get there and, if you don’t own it, then you are expected by the owner or have their permission to stay.

The basic first requirements for a retreat is no different from any piece of real estate, it all starts with location. A retreat that is remote, and off the beaten path is preferred over one that is in or next to populated areas. Your retreat needs to be defendable. It needs to have access to fresh water, and a fuel/energy source.

Fresh water can come from rivers, streams, lakes or rainfall. A retreat fuel/energy source is either one that you have stockpiled like gasoline or diesel fuels. Or ones that you have developed like wind, solar, and/or hydro. Additionally, there are natural energy sources like trees, and coal that can be harvested and burned.

Consideration should be given as to how the retreat will support your family. It is large enough? If you plan to grow food, is land suitable for gardening? Can you protect the food you grow from wildlife?

As to defending a retreat, the best ones don’t need defending. Meaning its location is such that access is difficult or well concealed. The goal is to be able to fend off a small band of four to six attackers. What is the most likely avenue of attack? What can you do to neutralize that avenue? For attacks by groups larger than six you need to have a means of escape. The escape route needs to be concealed and will get you and your family out of harms’ way.

Another consideration is your route of travel to the retreat. Ideally you will be leaving before there are roadblocks. But in case you don’t and the primary route is blocked. You need to have a secondary route. Neither route should depend on things like ferries or airplanes. Both routes should be ones that if needed you could walk.

Other things to consider when selecting a retreat

What is its condition, are repairs needed?
Does it have a means of heating and cooking without electric or gas?
Is it physically large enough to support your family?
If you don’t there full time and you stockpile resources, can it be secure?

Ideally you have stockpiled enough food, water, and other survival gear at your retreat that will support your group through at least the first year. This will give to time to establish a mean of addition food source, like a garden, bartering or developing your hunting and fishing skills.

An eye-opening exercise is to make a list of all the things you would need for you and your family to survive for a year without being restocked, access to support systems like medical services, and no power, running water or sewage service.
How much food would you need, how about clothing, medical supplies, weapons and ammo? What knowledge or skills would you need?

Once you have the list, cross off all the items you currently have. I think you will find that other than a camp stove and sleeping bags and some clothing you are in need of a lot of shit.

WHEN DO YOU LEAVE?

bug out before disaster

In developing a GOOD Plan there are two terms that need defined and given consideration that help in determine when to Get Out Of Dodge.

The first term is tipping point. A tipping point is a moment in time that due to a series of events or one major event the odds of society collapsing and going off the deep end, are the same odds as the center holding and life pretty much continue as it has, otherwise a moment when things could go either way. Pandemics, economic collapse and national wide civil unrest are the events that would lead to a tipping point.

A collapse of society is better known to “preppers” as TEOTWAWKI (The End Of The World As We Know It). While TEOTWAWKI indicates once things go to hell, they stay that way forever. I believe that after a period of time things will return to a more civilized / normal way of life. The challenge will be to survive till it does. This leads to two questions, how bad will it get? And how long will it last? The theory is, the worst things gets, the longer it lasts, the longer it lasts, the worst things will get.

The second term is trip wire event (TWE), this is an event or events that when it happen, tells you it’s time to GOOD. The term trip wire comes from the practice of stringing a wire around your camp about 4” off the ground. The wire is connected to a device that can warn you that an intruder is attempting to enter your camp. A TWE is a warning that in the near future shit is going to hit fan. The challenge with TWE is that different events that would result in TEOTWAWKI would have different trip wires. For example, a TWE for a pandemic is different from those for an economic collapse. Though a major pandemic would, or could cause an economic collapse. If you wait to GOOD till the economic collapse you’re leaving too late. TWEs are also flexible and always being reevaluated.

Another challenge with TWEs is selecting ones that when they happen there is enough time to allow you to GOOD before TEOTWAWKI. Like a trip wire around your camp site. Too close to the camp and there’s no time to react. A TWE needs to be before the SHTF, meaning before the electrical power is off, before the grocery stores are out of food, before all the gas stations are closed, before police and firefighters stop showing up for work, before there are roadblocks (either those set up by the government or the ones set up by morons with guns).

Also when considering TWE you don’t want ones that are not so far in advance of the SHTF that you GOOD before it’s necessary. The same is true for a campsite tripwire, too far away can having you react to something that was not really a threat. Staying put till the right time to GOOD will allow you to continue gathering supplies.

In putting together a GOOD Plan you can categorize TEOTWAWKI events into one of two types, CONSIDERED EVENTS and NON-CONSIDERED EVENTS. A Considered Event is one that could happen and you can prepare for it. A Non-considered Event is one that is damn near impossible to happen or if it does no amount of prepping will save you.

Below are Considered Events that I believe warrant the execution of our GOOD plan.

Power Grid Down:
There are three main power grids in this country, Eastern, Western and Texas. All are susceptible to hacking or physical sabotage. The loss of one grid would have a direct impact on the other two. Experts estimate that if the grid is taking down by a hacker it could take months to a year to get the system back up. Experts also say that it’s not a matter of if the grid is hack but more of a matter of when.

Economic Collapse:
This event will have plenty of warnings but when it happens it will hit hard and fast. The impact will push many people over the edge. Don’t wait too long to GOOD. Another challenge in this event will be to have a stockpiled a resource that will have value after the collapse that you can use to barter with for things you don’t have but need to survive.

Pandemic:
Pandemic is basically an outbreak of a disease that is highly contagious, deadly and wide-spread. It could start in any part of the world. The primary goal will be to get away from areas of large populations or if you can’t get away, have a means to isolate yourself from those who are infected.

Civil Unrest:
This event will undoubtedly happen during a pandemic and economy collapse. But there is a long list of other event that could result in wide-spread civil unrest. The primary challenge will be security, protecting your family and resources.

The following are Non-considered Events that I have no intention of planning for.

Global thermonuclear war (this would not include a single nuclear attack by a terrorist)
An attack/invasion by aliens from outer space
A plague that results in people who die becoming flesh-eating zombies
The earth being sucked into a black hole
The earth being hit by a planet killing asteroid (ELE, Extinctions Level Event)

WHAT ARE YOU TAKING?

Ideally you have stockpile resources at your retreat and the items you’re taking are minimal. For the most part you will need damn near everything you didn’t stockpiled. Your GOOD Plan should list out what you’re taking. The recommendation is to pack based on priorities of, security first (weapons and ammo), first aid/medical, then all the non-perishable food you have in your home, any camping gear you have, any type of fuel, and if you have one, take your generator. If space allows, load up clothing, linen, “How To” books, tools and any items that might be used for barter. My recommendation is bring the dog but leave the cat (unless you are willing to eat the cat).

WHAT TO EXPECT IF SHTF?

shtf disaster

Besides for being prepped up with survival supplies and resources, you need to also prep your mind. You need to be mentally prepared for the weeks and months ahead. Prepare to make tough decisions. Decisions that may, and can mean the difference between life and death. So what can you expect? If you think about it, about a week or so after SHTF there’s a good chance basic services, like police, fire and medical responses will be gone or greatly decreased. Once power is off for the entire area for more than three days there’s a good chance things are only going to go from bad to worst. If you turn on a portable TV or radio and the only broadcast is emergency information message telling you to stay at home and wait further orders or tell you were the nearest FEMA camp is located. You can bet the economy is near to or in the process of collapsing.

Once the economy has collapsed the only person still working will be mostly be the first responders and the military. And they will stop showing up once they sense that their families are at risk. Once that happens there goes the last means of public security. Hopefully before any of this happens you and your family will be at a survival retreat. Regardless were you are you will be on your own.

Without securing items like food, water and protection will be mostly gone. If there is no public security people will stop showing up for work and stay home to protect their family. There will be hard times in the first weeks and months. Due to the lack of resources like food, drinking water, medical support and electricity there will be a lot of people dying. The first to go will be the physically impaired. People that cannot fend for themselves, or cannot move under their own power, people who depend on regular medication to stay alive. Nearly all these people will be dead in the first week or less. The next group to go will be the poor. With little or no resources to start with, most will holdout in their homes and apartments waiting, hoping that “someone”is coming to help them. Prior to a total collapse some of the poor and unprepared will be “helped” by the government in being relocated to a FEMA camp. These camps will offer food, shelter, and security until the military collapses. At that point the things with fall into chaos as it did at the Superdome during Katrina. The camp will collapse into a “dog-eat-dog” environment. It will be brutal and deadly. In my option these camps are to be avoided at all costs.

As to the healthy but unprepared a number of them will be injured or killed trying to find a means of survival or escape the cities. Without medical attention the injured will succumb to their wounds/injuries. In a SHTF world, if you are not prepared, a broken arm or leg, a laceration that is allowed to become infected can kill you. The unprepared people who last the longest will and can pose the biggest threat by forming into predatory gangs. These gangs will be armed, mobile and lethal. They will do whatever they want to secure food and resources. As they consume the resources in an area they will move on to other areas of opportunity. Some will travel by vehicle once they figure out how to connect a generator up to a gas pump. Ours will move on foot. The leaders of these gangs will more in likely have been criminals prior to SHTF or maybe military training or both. Due to being forced to “live off the land” these gangs will likely be mostly male and consist of less than 20 people. There are two options for dealing with these gangs. The first, and best option, is to avoid contact. Stay concealed and under the radar. The second is to attack and kill them before they attack and kill you. My guess is that most of these groups will relocate to parts of the country where the climate is mild year round.

In a long-term survival situation, there are lots of areas you will have to be mentally prepared for. Of all of them death will be the most challenging. Death of a love one or a vital member of the group can leave you mentally vulnerable and weak. Your challenge will be to morn but not let the event push you into a feeling of hopelessness. Every member of your group needs to be physically and mentally strong. The way to strengthen your body is through exercise. The same is true for the mind. Your group will need to hold regular meeting to discuss events that can happen. This will help to prepare the group mentally for impactful events. Discussing responses to events and making a plan will help to prevent confusion and inaction if the event occurs.

The post Making a G.O.O.D PLAN: Get Out Of Dodge appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

Botulism and canning – the whys and wherefores

By OhioPrepper – – this is an entry in our non-fiction writing contest.

I’ve been thinking about writing this article for a while, since I’ve explained all of this numerous times over the years, both here and elsewhere; but, when a recent comment on this forum mentioned canning Kale and the response was asking if it could be water bath canned, I knew that folks did not understand some very basic things about canning and botulism. This article will attempt to explain the why of water bath vs. pressure canning; all based on the life cycle of the bacterium Clostridium Botulinum (Cl...

Read the whole entry... »

10 Foods To Eat And Grow For Nuclear Prepping

Radiation cancer treatments, nuclear bombs, nuclear power plants, and nuclear waste dump exposure seem very different, but they all emit ionizing radiation. No matter where radioactive particles come from, they will still do predictable damage to the cells, tissues, and organs of your body.

Today, there is a growing field of interest in which foods can be used to shield cells from the effects of nuclear radiation and perhaps even speed up healing after exposure.

Here are ten foods that you should consider eating more of, and growing to reduce the damaging effect of radiation.

Potatoes

Your thyroid is one of the most sensitive organs when it comes to radiation poisoning. This occurs mainly because radioactive iodine is taken up very quickly by the thyroid. You can get potassium iodine tablets for use after exposure to ionizing radiation, but make sure you get plenty of iodine in your diet too.

Surprisingly, potato skins carry high amounts of iodine, and potatoes are also rich in potassium and other important key nutrients for overall good health.

Potatoes are one of the easiest crops to grow. You can use conventional methods, or grow them in containers. For example, a 4′ x 4′ square area will yield over 100 pounds of potatoes if you continue to pile soil up as the potato roots develop. Read our article about how to make a potato pot to find out more about growing this vegetable.

You can grow potatoes in everything from trash cans to old washing machine tubs as long as you have enough soil and good drainage. Make sure you have access hatches in the container so that you can harvest potatoes once they are big enough and ready to consume.

Strawberries

Strawberries are also a good source of iodine and carry other important nutrients, and they are very easy to grow in hanging baskets, on a windowsill, or out in the garden. When choosing strawberry plants, there are three kinds you can buy:

everbearing strawberries – as long as the temperature and conditions are right, these plants will produce several crops of berries per season.
June bearing strawberries – as their name implies, these plants produce only one crop; usually in June. The berries are usually bigger and you will get more at one time.
Wild strawberries – these are usually small berries that are produced just once a year. They are truly second to none in terms of sweetness, however they are much smaller than the June and ever bearing berries.

Cranberries

Cranberries have the added benefit of being a good source of Vitamin C and Vitamin E, which can help protect cells from ionizing radiation. Cranberries are also rich in other antioxidants and phytonutrients that are known to help fight cancer.

Contrary to popular belief, cranberries can grow well in raised beds, if the soil is acidic, and that the plants get enough water. If your goal is growing cranberries in a container, try the raised beds first so that you know more about what to expect in terms of how this plant will grow in your geographic location. Once you know the basics, transfer what you learned to other growing methods.

Navy Beans

When combined with other beans, navy beans provide almost all the different amino acids and proteins required for good nutrition.

Navy beans also carry a good amount of iron, which your body needs to make blood. This is especially important if you do not have read meat available or other sources of easily digestible iron.

As with other legumes, beans are important for any garden because they help fix nitrogen into the soil. If you are interested in a sustainable garden geared towards nuclear survival, navy beans should be at the top of your list. Here’s a Survivopedia article on how to grow beans for survival.

When choosing seeds for Navy Beans, buy only heirloom, non-hybrid, non-gmo, certified organic seeds. Beans tend to grow quickly, which makes them an ideal test plant for long term survival needs. If you can propagate navy beans from one generation to the next, you will be a long way towards ensuring that you can keep viable seed supplies going without having to buy them.

Oranges

For decades, a great deal has been written on whether or not Vitamin C can fight cancer.

Newer research on people undergoing radiation therapy for cancer suggests that Vitamin C actually shields healthy cells from the toxic effects of radiation.

This finding was used to treat workers at Fukushima before they went into the damaged reactor as well as during their active working time.

Follow up research indicated that workers at the plant who received intravenous Vitamin C had less DNA mutation. In addition, those who were not treated beforehand, but received therapy after showing evidence of DNA mutation experienced a reduction in mutation.

Even though many foods contain Vitamin C, oranges are the best source. A single orange each day provides approximately 90% of the recommended daily allowance. Since oranges are rich in many other nutrients, it is also an ideal prepper food.

Oranges can be grown indoors and in containers in just about any climate. Just make sure they are kept warm enough and receive plenty of sunlight. If you must purchase hybrid trees, learn how to propagate from cuttings so that you can keep them going for as long as possible.

Red Peppers

If you are hesitant about growing oranges, red peppers are an excellent alternative for your nuclear prepping garden.

Red bell peppers also contain a good amount of Vitamin C, as well as Vitamin E. Aside from grape seeds, they also offer higher amounts of quercetin than many other plants, which is a powerful antioxidant that helps prevent and fight cancer. Newer research also suggests that the ability to bind free radicals is key to reducing the effect of ionizing radiation within cells. Therefore, when you consume peppers, you are getting at least three important cellular shields.

Here’s a comprehensive Survivopedia article about growing peppers.

If you already know how to grow green bell peppers, just let them ripen a bit longer and you will have red peppers. They can be grown outdoors, in containers, and also in hydroponic setups. Since peppers are also easily propagated from seeds, you can also practice pollination methods and creating good seed stores from one generation to the next.

When growing peppers, do not forget that the germination and flowering stage can be tricky. Peppers are notorious for germinating slowly, especially if the soil temperature is too warm or too cold. You will also have to pay careful attention to soil temperature and moisture when the plants flower. If it is too hot or cold, the plant will drop the flowers even if they have been pollinated.

This is what you need to know for survival when there’s no doctor around!

Sunflower Seeds

While many people focus on Vitamin C as a cancer fighting and radiation shielding agent, Vitamin E is also very important. Even though researchers say that Vitamin E must be paired with Pentoxifylline (a drug used to make blood more liquid in order to reduce muscle cramps) for maximum effect, it may still be useful by itself.

Many other vitamins can be consumed at higher than the recommended daily allowance, Vitamin E can be toxic at higher levels. That being said, making sure you get the recommended amount each day can still give your cells an important cellular shield against radiation.

It will only take ¼ cup of shelled seeds to meet your daily needs. In addition, sunflower seeds are also packed with other antioxidants and important nutrients that will improve overall health. Aside from being a good food to have on hand for nuclear prepping, sunflower seeds also yield more oil than other plant sources. If you are looking for a safe alternative to other vegetable oils, learning how to make sunflower oil will be of use to you.

If you are looking for the easiest, fastest growing plant for Vitamin E, sunflowers will be your best option. There are many different varieties of sunflowers, as well as many sizes.

Even though these plants grow best outdoors and in the ground, you can try large, deep containers. Sunflower plants can also act as a good support for climbing bean plants as long as their roots still have plenty of room to spread out.

These huge, furry-leafed plants can be very hearty; however they will droop quickly without sufficient water. Make sure they also have plenty of sunlight and good air flow around the plants.

Pumpkin Seeds

Pumpkin seeds are a key source of Vitamin E, while the pumpkins are an excellent source of B vitamins, A, C, and Potassium. If you also tend to favor fried squash flowers, these easy to grow plants will provide you with a tasty, nutritious treat at every stage of growth.

Pumpkins grow quite well in containers, if the vines have plenty of room to spread, and that they will not be disturbed. If a vine has a pumpkin on it, do not touch it. Even moving the vine a few inches will cause the pumpkin to die off. You can also try growing pumpkins in hanging baskets if you don’t have enough ground space for the vines.

Turmeric

This delicious, spicy root is a member of the ginger family, and has an excellent reputation for fighting cancer, and as an anti-inflammatory. It also has several nutrients in it that shield cells from ionizing radiation, while others can reverse DNA damage caused by radiation and promote cell healing.

Overall, if there is one plant that you should learn how to grow and propagate, turmeric is it. This plant is an excellent herb for treating and preventing illness created by nuclear exposure as well as other problems.

You will find that turmeric is not that hard to grow. If you choose to grow it in a shallow container, make sure that there is good drainage. Since the roots tend to grow sideways instead of down, they favor a wider pot as opposed to a deeper one. Save roots with rhizomes on them so that you can propagate them.

As useful as turmeric is, it is not easily absorbed by the body. You will also need to grow black pepper, as this herb contains a molecule, Piperine, which helps reduce the speed at which turmeric is flushed from the body. Piperine can also increase the absorption of other herbal remedies and nutrients. You can purchase black pepper seeds, however it will take some time and practice to grow this plant.

Spirulina

Today, just about everyone interested in a healthy diet option has heard of spirulina. Aside from being filled with important nutrients, it has molecules in it that can bind to heavy metals and other toxins. Even if you are exposed to radioactive dust or other debris, spirulina can help your body get rid of it faster.

All you need to grow spirulina is some alkaline water, a good source of light and some dry spirulina to get the colonies started. While growing algae is one of the easiest things, there are many different kinds, and some are poisonous or may produce toxins. Make sure that you can tell the difference between spirulina and other algaes that may decide to colonize your growing area.

Plenty of algae will grow on fish waste; just be sure to choose fish that are safe for human consumption. Many fish available to hobbyists can carry dangerous diseases including tuberculosis and intestinal parasites. It is best to purchase fish from a trusted source and then do all you can to make sure they remain free of infections that can easily harbor in the algae beds as much as within the fish.

Cocoa

If you love chocolate, you will be happy to hear that it contains reservatrol, a molecule that has a proven track record for preventing radiation damage to chromosomes. Much of the chocolate available to consumers has little, if any nutritional value, so you will have to grow cocoa plants and then harvest the cocoa beans.

As long as you can provide humid, tropical conditions, these plants will grow well enough in an indoor setting. If you are new to gardening, practice with easier plants until you are a master of controlling temperature, humidity, and air flow in just about any setting.

As we learn more about the effects of ionizing radiation in cancer therapies, many foods are proving to shield healthy cells from damage. You can use this information to help select plants that will be part of your prepper garden as well when choosing the best foods for staving off radiation sickness.

No matter whether the radiation comes from a power plant nearby or a nuclear bomb, you can survive the nuclear threat and thrive.

This article has been written by Carmela Tyrell for Survivopedia.

Thursday, June 1, 2017

Preppers and Big Agriculture: What You Don’t Know About Food Preparedness!

Written by Mike Harris on The Prepper Journal.

When we look at food storage as prepared minded individuals we tend to go through a well-organized, quite thorough systematic matrix. We do our due diligence to ensure our food has the right amount of calories, proteins, and carbohydrates. Most of us even ensure we put the right “kinds” of food like fruits and vegetables to supplement. Most preppers don’t have elaborate off-grid gardens or homesteads (less than a fraction of a percentage point of Americans do) and many of the ones that do often use fertilizer (natural or not) to help grow the food they consume.

Many preppers are consumed with the idea of organic which personally I’m not against however as you will see from this article I’m more concerned about food quality and the nutritional properties of the food and the health of the soil than I am with a paid-for certification by a National Organic Program (NOP). Meaning you can grow something “organically” but that doesn’t make it organic legally. This is an importance inference to make especially since most of us buy our food rather than grow it. The last caveat I want to say about #Organic is just because a product says it is organic, that doesn’t automatically mean the quality or the nutritional properties will be superior to those that don’t have that accreditation. Just because I grew something without additives in my backyard and paid an accrediting agent of a NOP doesn’t necessarily make my produce quality better than or on the same level as other producers (accredited or not).

Before I dive head deep into this idea of the importance of food-quality and nutritional value lets break the ice with a joke. What is worth less than a penny? The very same penny tomorrow. This all goes to the main point of this article; our fruits and vegetables are becoming more and more dirt poor (nutritionally speaking). A landmark study on the topic of changes in food composition by Donald Davis and his team of researchers from the University of Texas (UT) at Austin’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry was published in December 2004 in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition. They studied U.S. Department of Agriculture nutritional data from both 1950 and 1999 for 43 different vegetables and fruits, finding “reliable declines” in the amount of protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron, riboflavin (vitamin B2) and vitamin C over the past half century. Davis and his colleagues found that the declining nutritional content was directly contributed to agricultural practices. Practices such as using Fossil fuel intensive synthetic nitrogen fertilizers, Pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and nematicides in order to grow food have become the standard practice.

Also with the corporate rise of modifying crops to improve certain favorable traits (size, growth rate, pest resistance) other than nutrition it’s no surprise we see in for-profit institutions trying to get the most “bang for their buck”. Profit is the driving force behind the unsustainable practices in big agriculture. In agriculture creating products with greater yield, pest resistance and climate adaptability have allowed crops to grow bigger and faster meaning more profit. However the down-side being the inability for these institutions to match the nutrients, and phytochemicals levels to keep pace with their rapid growth. The inability for big agriculture to keep pace with the incredible increase of not only population size but also produce consumer desired yield and nutrition output is not a controversial item of discussion it’s merely a fact.

Thanks to scientists, professors and other think tanks like David Thomas, Michael Crawford, Yoqun Wang, Richard Mithen, Donald Davis and many others who have analyzed the empirical data have shown incredible repercussions in our current agriculture (food production) paradigm. Thanks to these innovative leaders once you analyze the food tables prepared by government scientists between 1951 and 1999 researchers found that potatoes had lost over 90 per cent of their vitamin A and 57 per cent of their vitamin C, while today’s consumers would have to eat eight oranges to get the same amount of vitamin A as their grandparents obtained from one fruit.

These numbers are not just unprecedented but undeniably horrific. As we see an ever increase in soil depletion, the creation of new GMO strains, also coupled with the ever increase in petro-chemical inputs in desperate hopes to match consumer desired output we can only expect that these trends of quality loss, and higher food costs in our commercial market will continue to rise. They will rise until we ultimately reach unsustainability.

What can you do?

So what does this mean to us as “prepared minded” people? In regards to basic food preparedness it most notably means that it will require more and more food to maintain a healthy nutritious lifestyle. This has undeniably caused higher produce costs; it also requires that we have to store more food to meet our nutritional requirements. This is especially a cause for concern when considering most of the popular food items in food preparedness are usually dehydrated foods. Meaning the food was heated up (degrading the already degraded nutritional value) so the water could be extracted. This causes a lighter, longer lasting (the longer food sits, the more nutritional value is lost), easier to store food source that can be reconstituted with water at a later time. So in modern-day 2017 from the time the food is harvested to the time it is consumed as a part of your preparedness planning it has most likely already gone through at least 3 phases of nutritional content degradation. This is not including the fact that food itself was in some circumstances already 8 times less nutritious at harvest then food grown generations past! As I have mentioned earlier this is just looking at it from a basic scratching the surface level of food preparedness.

Understanding where we are currently at in regards to food preparedness, food quality and overall sustainability is nothing short of horrific. But what makes this topic apocalyptic is this unfortunate fact. 99% of everyone who hears this information or reads this article will do absolutely nothing about. Even worse yet, they will continue to perpetuate this paradigm to next generation that will ultimately lead them down the path to unsustainability and ultimately their demise. So what can we do? Well if you are the 99% thank you for reading this far and realize the remaining portion of this article is not for you and I bid you a fair day.

However for the remaining 1% this article was written entirely for you. I will say as bleak as everything sounds now there is good news. There is an awakening one could say. I’m not advocating for a second that anyone gets rid of his or her food storage and start over, not in the slightest. For those who have already amassed stored foods whether they be dehydrated, freeze-dried, or canned and are worried about nutritional value there are simple and inexpensive ways to ensure you are getting the nutrients, vitamins, and minerals your body needs.

One way is through supplementation. Now I will not say what kind of supplementation your body needs or what brands to get. But for myself I insure I have a bottle of vitamins in every container of food storage I have. A two-month supply of a quality multivitamin/multi-mineral supplement will cost you under $4 at most convenient stores. With this in mind I know these supplements won’t contain everything my body needs but something is way better than nothing. The next thing to look at would be where you are getting your foods currently. If you are like me you will notice right away for higher quality, locally produced food items you may have to pay much more. Figuring how to get the most nutrition for your buck would be your next step. Whether this is through a local retailer, or farmer’s markets or even local hobbyist looking to cover their overhead costs there are options out there.

The next step would be looking into what you can do in the future to produce your own high quality food. If you are like myself and have notice the increased price of easy to grow produce like tomatoes or strawberries it might benefit yourself to have a couple of plants yourself. This not only allows you the benefit of knowing where it comes from. It will also give you the piece of mind of knowing you have the ability to grow your own. Coupled this with the knowledge and learning along the way will really set you up for success in the future.

The last thing and most overlooked way to change this agriculture paradigm is by voting. When I say voting I don’t mean for a person I mean vote with your money, your time and your knowledge. Express to your delegates your displeasure with the costs of food, laws and ordinances that criminalize home gardens or seed banks. In some places having a tomato plant, or sharing heirloom seeds is a criminal offense. So change those laws, ordinances, and red tape that would prevent you as a prepared person from being as prepared as you can be.

When it comes to preparedness our bodies and our minds are literally the most important tools we have as a hedge against conflict, animosity, and disaster. Keeping ourselves healthy is paramount to success this is true not only in preparedness but also in life. We can see in everyday life that our health directives need to be revised. As preppers we should be looking at the modern-day enemies that ravage society. If we look at what’s killing people everyday in this country in drastic numbers we can clearly see it’s not ISIS, it’s not the super volcano or the pole switch. It’s not the masked man crawling through your window. It’s cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and dementia. The Greek physician and philosopher Hippocrates declared nearly 2,500 years ago: “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” After centuries upon centuries of human evolution, rises in technological advances, the accumulation of countless gigabytes of empirical data and continued endless years of scientific research we can see that he was right as ever!

Sources:

About the author: Mike Harris is a full-time RV’r spending the last couple years traveling not only the country but all over the world. Being a 4^th generation sailor he has not only operated all over the world but grew up experiencing the rich diversities that make this world great but also a dangerous place. He is still Active duty he is a Search and Rescue Corpsman (Flight Medic) and an Aerospace Medical Technician. His preparedness and desire for sustainability are deep-rooted in reality. Having to endure and face catastrophe is not just a job description but also his personal mission. He has trained both local and federal agencies as well a foreign. He done real life missions he was there during hurricane Sandy and was also apart of the 2515^th NAAD. When not working or prepping you can find him traveling the country in his RV, hiking off the beaten path or enjoying much-needed catch up time with friends and family. You can catch his adventures on his YouTube channel.

The post Preppers and Big Agriculture: What You Don’t Know About Food Preparedness! appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

Survival Story: 438 Days Lost At Sea… (Video)

Great lessons of survival come along with extreme and life changing experiences.

What would a 14 months drift on the ocean mean in terms of survival? Salvador Alvarenga knows it, for sure!

Alvarenga survived 438 days adrift in the Pacific Ocean, drifting 7000 miles from just off Mexico, to the Marshall Islands. His open 24′ fiberglass boat was disabled in a storm and nearly all his gear was swept overboard, disabled or had to be cut loose to keep the boat from sinking.

His story is way beyond ordinary, and now he’s sharing it in this exclusive interview for Survivopedia readers.

When I heard that he was going to be in Salt Lake City for PrepperCon 2017, where I hosted two Q&A sessions on EMP survival, I wanted to meet him and hear his story firsthand.

The Survivor and His Unbelievable Story

At first glance, I must admit that I was somewhat skeptical. In my mind, this feat pushed the boundaries of what I thought was possible. Either way, I wanted to know. As I researched, read, interviewed and analyzed his ordeal at sea, I grew increasingly convinced that his story true. As you can plainly see in the video interview below, it is difficult for him to talk about the experience to this day.

After the interview, I handed him a copy of the English Language version of the book Jonathan Franklin wrote about his experience. He looked at the book and flipped through the photographs, pointing and commenting as if he was seeing an old family album he had not looked at in a long time.

It was clear how deeply traumatizing the ordeal was for him and that he still compartmentalizes many aspects of the experience. This is very understandable given what he went through. That’s why I admire Salvador for being willing to revisit those obviously painful memories in order to help others.

3 Second SEAL Test Will Tell You If You’ll Survive A SHTF Situation

7 Lessons Learned in 483 Days on the Sea

Salvador had some advantages going into his experience. He was a sharking boat captain with 12 years of experience in the open ocean. He was an outdoorsman who fished, hunted, camped and survived his way cross country to Mexico from El Salvador as an illegal immigrant.

His build was ideal, being compact and powerful, winning weight lifting competitions against the other hard working, hard fighting and hard partying fisherman of Costa Azul, which helped retard hypothermia.

So he was no stranger to adversity and problem solving. The man had an iron stomach and a lifetime of conditioning his immune system. He ate raw meats of all kinds, drank raw turtle blood and considered their meat and eggs to be delicacies. He hailed form a culture that considers turtle eggs to be something along the lines of naturopathic Viagra.

Here are the lessons to be learned from his story.

1. “90% of Survival Happens From the Neck Up”

I first heard it put in precisely this way by Adam Kay, the winner of Season 1 of Alone, but the primary lesson taught by Salvador Alvarenga’s experience is the importance of the mental aspects of survival.

Psychology, mental toughness, bravery, adaptability, knowledge and problem solving ability made all the difference in this case. Alvarenga started out the ordeal with a crewman named Cordoba who lacked Salvador’s fundamental optimism.

Religious faith works both ways. In this case, Salvador’s companion was convinced by the vision that a sister from his religious congregation had while fasting. She told him that she foresaw that he would die at sea. His belief that he would die eventually consumed him and became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

After finding a partially digested venomous sea snake in the stomach of a sea bird he had eaten, he became physically ill and stopped eating birds which, since they lacked the gear to fish, where their primary food source. Cordoba eventually starved to death because he refused to eat, which has happened in other cases of survival at sea where survivors were unable to properly cook foods.

2. Catching and Eating Sea Birds Helps

Salvador eventually constructed a roost for sea birds to land on, under which he would lay motionless until birds got comfortable and started preening or dosed off. He would then grab them by the neck and break on of their wings to prevent their escape, eventually keeping a flock of up to thirty of them in the hull like a brood of anorexic broilers and “meat on the hoof.”

He sun-dried meat from the birds on the outboard motor cover, using it as an improvised solar oven of sorts.

3. Turtles, Sea Birds & Raw Fish Eyes Contain Vitamin C

Vitamin C is present in small amounts in raw fish flesh, but occurs in greater amounts in fish eyes. Unlike us mammals, both birds and turtles produce their own Vitamin C, in which their livers are particularly rich.

Salvador ate enough sea turtle liver, bird liver and fish eyes to intake enough Vitamin C to stave off scurvy.

4. Use Floating Trash to Your Advantage

Salvador put floating trash found in or near shipping lanes to good use, occasionally even finding odd scraps of food or a few drops of soda. His haul included 73 half liter bottles which he used to store rainwater and a large piece of Styrofoam which he said helped attract birds.

5. Adaptability Means Disobeying Conventional Training

Had many famous survival instructors swapped places with Salvador, they very likely would not have survived. Part of the problem is theory or book knowledge vs real world knowledge, and part is that is that it is becoming impossible to practice or teach survival in the preservationist, “leave no trace,” overly litigious, fragilista-engineered world we live in.

While certain correct principles of survival apply to all environments and ecosystems, there are far too many ecosystems in this world to write one book that will teach you everything you need to know to survive in all of them, so it is imperative to learn from the locals.

Survival is an inherently dangerous activity and instructors are often compelled to err on the side of safety, which, taken to the extreme, prevents students from learning that which they need to know most of all.

Eating Trigger Fish

How many of you have an SAS Survival Guide in your pack? I have at least a couple of Lofty’s books.

They are a great resource from a world-renowned instructor, but regarding triggerfish, the book advises readers, “Many kinds are poisonous to eat. Avoid them all.” yet virtually every story of long term survival adrift in a boat or life-raft I have researched, whether it took place in the Atlantic or the Pacific, nearly all the survivors ate triggerfish because it is one of the first species begin nibbling at boats adrift, it is noisy when they do, and you may go long periods without access to other species.

While it is true that the flesh of any species of triggerfish could be contaminated with toxins which cause ciguatera, the risk with certain species of triggerfish is lower than others.

Do not get me wrong, ciguatera can be very serious and potentially fatal, especially in a survival situation, but ciguatera occurs in over 400 species of reef fish and the only way to completely avoid is to not eat any reef fish, restricting your diet to deep water species.

Had Salvador had some fishing gear, it would have been advisable to use the triggerfish as bait and chum and fish for deep water species, but he had no such option.

If you are eating fish in restaurants or fishing for recreation it makes sense to exercise a great deal of caution as you choose your meals. Lost at sea, your dining options are likely going to be considerably more restricted.

Avoid species prone to ciguatera like the titan triggerfish, barracuda and red snapper, but gray triggerfish is common table fare in restaurants in many tropical regions. Try to take them away from reef in deep water if possible.

If my choice was between starving to death and running a small risk of ciguatera, I would definitely eat gray triggerfish. Salvador ate more colorful varieties as well and in his situation, I would have done the same. If you ever find yourself there, that is a decision you will have to make.

When you are down to eating powdered fish bones mixed with water, your own hair and fingernails and even wood from the boat, they might start looking pretty tasty.

Eating Shark and Fish Liver

The US Military Multi-service Survival, Evasion & Recovery Field Manual, and therefore survival manuals and courses virtually without end that regurgitate the reference, say not to eat fish liver, period. Some species of fish liver is edible, however, but some is not. Some survivors begin craving liver, eyes and other parts of fish that contain nutrients or vitamins they are lacking.

Fish liver can carry parasites, but all fish body parts can transmit some species of parasites if eaten raw. Avoid eating the stomach of fish large enough to gut, especially raw, as it contains more parasites than any other part of the fish, but it makes great bait to catch other fish.

With reef species, ciguatera can build up in greater concentrations in the liver, so perhaps that is why the field manual blackballs it. Salvador used and even preserved shark liver by drying it for use as a laxative, which was very important due to his high-protein diet full of bird and fish bones. Ouch!

Eating “Raw” Birds and Sea Turtles

Lofty agrees that sea turtles are good eating, which is true, except for the critically endangered hawk’s bill sea turtle which also tends to be contaminated with ciguatera. The hawk’s bill sea turtle can be identified by yellow polka dots on the head and front flippers and can grow to very large size.

Eating raw bird meat can lead to bacterial infections or parasites. I got salmonella once from eating bird meat and it most certainly would have been fatal in a survival situation, but eating the flesh fresh, cutting it into very thin strips and sun drying it as Salvador did, greatly reduces numbers of pathogens.

If you can construct a makeshift solar oven, that would improve your chances. Salvador dried it on the outboard motor housing, but that was the closest thing he had. Keep in mind, though, that Salvador had eaten raw meat all his life, so that would have developed his immune system far beyond that of a typical North American or European.

Drinking Urine

Amongst survival instructors, this is almost as divisive a topic as 1911 vs Glock amongst the tactical pistol crowd. Instructors I respect have weighed in on both sides of the issue.

David Holladay, Cody Lundin, Matt Graham and the guys from Boulder Outdoor Survival School, say not to drink it, while Mykel Hawke, Joe Teti (never thought I would write that those two agree about something) and some of the military crowd saying it’s a go … no pun intended. In Salvador’s case, Cordoba said it would help and they drank it. The question is whether it helped keep him alive or if he survived in spite of drinking it.

While healthy urine is not toxic, it is does contain compounds your body is trying to eliminate and by the time you are in a situation where you are considering drinking your urine, it contains less water and higher concentrations of urea, salts and other waste products. If you store it, bacteria will grow in it and it will start to stink, so I would not save it for later. If you had the gear to distill it, you could distill seawater.

While it used to be taught that urine is microbiologically sterile until it reached the urethra, it is now known that that is not true. It is interesting that military guys would argue for it, because the US Army Survival Field Manual advises against it on the basis that it contains high concentrations of salts which will contribute to further dehydration, but I believe Mykel has a B.S. in biology, so perhaps he based his decision on that.

If you were urinating clear and copious, it would probably do a lot less harm to you, but that would mean you are not even thirsty yet. Did it help him? I doubt it, but the man did survive, so perhaps Mykel has a point. Even David Holladay seemed to reconsider his position for a moment when heard Salvador tell his story. I’m not convinced it changed his mind though. Maybe we should ask him. I am perfectly comfortable sitting inside the question and considering it without rushing to answer it.

6. Ecosystems Form Around Drifting Rafts and Boats

Studying cases of long-term survival adrift at sea shows a certain patterns. The ocean is our planet’s greatest wilderness, with distinct ecosystems created by prevailing weather interacting with the ocean, underwater topography and land masses to produce currents, zones teeming life and rain and oceanic desert regions with little sea life or rainfall.

Fortunately, large sea creatures, drifting boats and rafts and even large floating debris create small, slow-moving ecosystems. The boat or raft creates shade and hiding places for small marine life. Algae and barnacles grow on the hull.

Sea birds find a place to land and leave droppings, which are eaten by small fish, attracting progressively larger fish, which survivors consume, returning offal and waste to the water and so on until the raft or vessel adrift, organisms that it shelters, survivor, predators and prey become a nomadic and slowly snowballing ecosystem. Every one of these organisms is a resource.

Some survivors used barnacles as bait and Salvador ate them for food.

7. Chances of Survival at Sea Are Linked to Location

There is a reason where tales of surviving long periods adrift occur in places like Mexico, the Marshall Islands, North Africa, the Caribbean, Brazil and California. They are all in latitudes relatively near the equator, where it is possible to survive exposure for longer periods of time.

Survival time for fishermen in the Bering Sea is measured in hours, even if they are wearing specialized survival suits. In, relatively speaking, warmer waters, there are portions of the ocean that receive too little rain to survive without a hand-pumped desalinator or some other way to get fresh water.

Did It Ever Happen Before?

Salvador is not the first one drifting away. Here are a few of many previous precedents for survival adrift at sea.

In 1941, Olympian Louis Zamperini and Russell Allen Phillips survived 47 days adrift on two small life rafts after their B-24 crashed into the Pacific due to mechanical problems, eventually drifting into the Marshall Islands.
In 1982, American Steven Callahan of Rhode spent 76 days on a life raft after his sailboat sank, probably after a collision with a while.
In 1973 Maurice and Maralyn Bailey of Britain where sailing to New Zealand when their yacht was struck by a whale and sunk. They survived 117 days adrift in a rubber raft before being rescued.
In 1989, John Glennie, James Nalepka, Rick Hellriegel, and Phil Hoffman survived adrift in the South Pacific off the coast of New Zealand on the wreckage of their overturned Trimaran for 119 days.
In 1942, Poon Lim was the sole survivor when the SS Benlomond was torpedoed by a German U-boat and survived 133 days adrift on an 8′ square wooden raft until he was rescued off the coast of Brazil.
In 2005, Jesus Vidana, Lucio Rendon and Salvador Ordonez, much like what happened to Salvador Alvarenga, were shark fishing of the West coast of Mexico when their 27′ fiberglass boat was disabled and drifted to within 200 miles of the Marshall Islands before being rescued. They lost two companions on the journey including the captain and consumed 103 sea turtles and many species of fish. Unlike Salvador and Cordoba, they had line and more tools which enabled them to fashion hooks from nails and screws.
The longest anyone has ever survived adrift at sea was in the case of a Japanese cargo vessel captained by Oguri Jukichi a crew member named Otokichi in 1813. They drifted almost to California for 484 days before rescue and lost 12 crew members to scurvy. This case is hard to compare as it was a much larger vessel carrying hundreds of bags of beans.

One way or another, Salvador Alvarenga found his way to survival. He was not trained for it. He was a regular guy, like many of us are. His story is the proof that survival means much more than skills and training that one can have in advance. I’d say that what you have inside makes you a survivor.

Are you a survivor? Will you be able to protect your own in a life or death scenario? Click the banner below to find out!

This article have been written by Cache Valley Prepper, based on his interview with Salvador Avarenga for Survivopedia.