Ok this is a quick blog for those female preppers out there, you know who you! There is a wonderful author on the internet that writes survival fiction from a woman's point of view. She has a place here on blogspot: Kathy in FL. I highly recommend you take the time to read some of her stories in your leisure. They are not only very captivating stories but very informative as well, just the kind of stories I love the most! Here is some of here stories:
Carry On
Forsaken Harvest
Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men
This is Me Surviving
To All Things There Is A Season
Over The Mountain And Through The Fire
All Roads Lead Somewhere
If zombies are more of your thing I would also highly recommend reading her zombie survival fiction which to me is right on par with George Romero. It is over on the Zombie Squad forum under the Winchester/fiction section. You might have to join to view it:
Mom's Journal of the Zombie Years
Be sure to check the other useful info on the zombie site while you are there!
Most of these stories are already complete but some of them are still having chapters posted. Hope you enjoy these stories as much as I have, thanks Kathy in Fl for all of your hard work!
Monday, September 5, 2011
Hygiene and Sanitation: You, Your Clothes, and Your Bodily Waste
When preparing for the hard times that inevitably befall us all at some point whether from disaster, economic collapse, job loss, or becoming sick or injured, an important factor to consider is hygiene and sanitation. Poor hygiene and sanitation can lead to a whole host of diseases that can kill you or make you wish you were dead. Here I would like to discuss the areas of going to the bathroom, bathing, and clean clothes. Most of the things you will need are not temperature sensitive like food and water is, allowing you to store the items in an out of the way place like a garage or attic. Some minor building of some helpful things and knowing how to use items should be learned now. Now is the time to stock the basic supplies you will need and learn the skills required to deal with the situation.
| Penywise from morguefile.com |
The one thing everybody does is produce bodily waste but how to dispose of the urine and feces in less than ideal circumstances can be tricky. There is always the time honored method of building an outhouse. Make sure the hole is nice and deep and at least 50 feet from any water source. If the thought of making a midnight trip to the outhouse during a blizzard or thunderstorm does not appeal to you, there are other options available. A five gallon bucket makes a great emergency toilet. You can buy an emergency toilet at many camping stores or make your own. Line a bucket with a trash bag first. Next, put either kitty litter or sawdust in the bottom. Then, do your business in your toilet. Cover your waste with sawdust or a commercial toilet deodorizer. Last, tie the bag and either bury it 50 feet from any water source or place in an outside trash can and properly dispose of it in the trash when the situation is over. The book Humanure by Joseph Jenkins gives great advice on how to build and maintain a composting toilet. If you own your place and have the room, you might want to consider building one. If you do not wish to build a composting toilet or do not own your residence, the five gallon bucket will work just fine. To make an emergency toilet kit, get a five gallon bucket and attach a toilet seat with a lid on to the top. Inside of the bucket put a small box of trash bags, bag of kitty litter or sawdust, and some rolls of toilet paper. Stash the bucket in the garage or attic until you need it. An outhouse, bucket, or composting toilet can all be used as an emergency bathroom but make sure you have the proper supplies and tools on hand before you need them.
Keeping yourself clean without the usual bathroom facilities can be another major dilemma if you do not prepare in advance. A quick and cheap way to bathe in an emergency is to either take a sponge bath or use baby wipes. This method is probably the best if you are sick and have to take care of yourself. Coleman sells a five gallon solar shower kit that can be quite useful. Simply fill with water, hang out in the sun for a few hours to heat up, and then shower with hot water. A similar homemade option would be to use a five gallon bucket and attach a hose and an old shower-head to the bottom as well as an on/off valve. Set outside to heat up and then bath. You might want to paint the outside of the bucket black to help with the heating process. Either the Coleman shower or bucket shower can be used in your bathroom inside as long as the drains are working and you have a way to suspend the container above your head (they are both gravity drained). If the drains are not working, stand in a large wash tub to capture the shower water to be able to dispose of the water outside. Or get a privacy enclosure from a camping store or build one with a tarp and shower outside or in a garage. Be sure to gather all of your emergency bathing supplies in a kit to make finding it easier in an emergency.
| from morguefile.com |
We as a modern society also prefer to have clean clothes instead of wearing dirty ones until they fall off. There are many options for cleaning clothes without the use of the modern washer and dryer. Unless you have a generator, your only option for drying will be a clothes line. You can build an old fashioned clothes line in your backyard if you have the room. If you can not or simply do not want to, there are a few options still available. Many retail stores sell expandable clothes racks you could hang your clothes on to dry. Or you can put some hooks and/or pulleys on a couple of trees, posts, or walls inside and string a clothes line between them when you need to use it. Although drying the clothes outside works the best, make sure you have a way to dry the clothes inside as well. It will be difficult to nearly impossible to dry them properly in the rain or freezing cold. Setting a couple of hooks in opposite walls in an out of the way area will work great. Make sure you get the hooks or pulleys, clothes line, and clothes pins before anything happens.
| from morguefile.com |
Although washing clothes in an emergency can be very difficult if you do not have the necessary equipment beforehand, the list of supplies you can use is numerous and you might already have them. There are three basic steps to washing clothes, getting the soap soaked through the clothes, rinsing the soap out, and wringing the water out. Figuring out how to do these simply steps can be become time consuming and very stressful if you do not prepare some supplies in advance. The oldest and most time honored way is to boil water, put the clothes in with soap, stir with a large stick, wring out soapy water, drain and reheat water or have a second boiling pot of water, put clothes in rinse water, stir with a stick, wring out water, and hang out to dry. Another option is to put hot water, soap, and dirty clothes in a large pot, wash tub, or in the bathroom tub. Use a stick, plunger (any plunger will work not just the laundry washing plungers), or your feet to get the soap soaked through the clothes. Little children think it is fun to stomp on the clothes in a bathtub, me and my brothers had a blast doing it as children when the washer broke down once. Drain the water, wring out as much soapy water as you can, and refill with clean water. Repeat the stirring or stomping process. Wring out as much water as you can and hang out to dry. This can be a very messy process and uses a considerable amount of water but also requires the least amount of supplies beforehand.
Another option to wash clothes is to use the bucket and plunger system. You simply take a five gallon bucket with a lid and put a small hole in the middle of the lid. Slide a plunger in the hole. Repeat the usual steps of soap, wring, rinse, wring to wash the clothes. To soap up and rinse out the clothes you simply move the plunger up and down through the hole. Some camping stores sell a product called a Wonder Washer that is very similar to the bucket/plunger method. It uses a bucket on a stand and a crank to soap up and rinse out. If you have the room and the mechanical ability, you could build something similar yourself. Using a large 30 or 55 gallon drum with a bicycle to turn it is even possible if built beforehand. Some things that could make the washing easier is an old fashioned washboard to scrub the clothes on and a hand crank wringer to wring the water out. This bucket/plunger method uses less water but also needs more preparation before it is needed.
The water you use for cleaning clothes does not have to be safe drinking water. Captured rain water or water from a fairly clean, moving water source will work just fine. The water you need to dispose of after the soap and rinse cycles is called gray water and can be disposed of easier then human waste. If the sewer system does not work, simply make sure that wherever you choose to dispose of the gray water it is at least 50 feet away from any drinking water source. The gray water is safe to the plants and animals so it can be run off into your yard or into the street gutter.
Your hygiene and sanitation supplies should be broken down into three kits: Toilet Kit, Shower Kit, and Clothes Cleaning Kit. The suggested supplies for each kit for is as follows.
Toilet Kit:
1-Five gallon bucket with lid and seat
7-Trash bags per week
1-Bag of kitty liter or sawdust
1-Roll of toilet paper per person per week
Shower Kit:
1-Pack of baby wipes
1-Coleman Solar Shower or five gallon bucket with shower-head
1-Bar of soap or bottle of liquid soap
1-Bottle of shampoo
1-Washrag
1-Privacy Enclosure or tarp and washtub (optional for outside)
Clothes Cleaning Kit:
1-Five gallon bucket
1-Plunger
1-Box/Bottle of laundry detergent
1-Washboard (optional for scrubbing)
1-Wringer (optional to wring clothes)
2-Hooks or pulleys
1-Roll of clothes line
1-Bag of clothes pins
Having all three kits assembled in advance will save time and stress during an emergency. Waiting until the crisis is already here to try to gather the supplies could be too late. Most of the items needed are probably already in your home but simply need to be gathered into a central kit. Save yourself time and heartache later by assembling your needed kits now!
Sunday, July 17, 2011
All about water storage
When it comes to preparing for any emergency, water is perhaps the most important factor to be considered. On one side, without it you will be dead in less than a week. On another side, contaminated water could also kill you in a short time as well. A third shows nosy neighbors could take what you have. Yet another shows government regulations or landlords could limit what your options are. The key to preparing is learning how to balance the different sides of any situation.
First lets tackle storing water in the city. There are several factors that will determine what your options are for storing water in a city environment. Do you rent or own? Do you plan to stay put or bug out? Do you live in a house or an apartment? What are the city regulations? What is the city's plan in an emergency? Will the neighbors see what I am doing? How long of an emergency am I planning on?
If you rent, then building most anything is out of the question and all your storage will need to be portable or at least easily removable. You could use two liter bottles, gallon jugs, or buckets up to the 15 gallon size. A 15 gallon bucket will weigh in at about 105 pounds (one gallon of water weighs 7 pounds) so any larger would be very unwieldly to move. It could be stored in a closet, under a cabinet, in the freezer, in a garage (except in winter for colder climates), or anywhere else you can find the space. These options work fine for a short term emergency and for bugging out but are inadequate for any long term emergency. You will need access to a water source for a longer situation. You can look at area maps to locate the nearest source. You will need containers like the five gallon military cans or the collapsible ones available from wal mart would be sufficient. You will also need a water filter and coffee filters (to pre filter the larger particles out) to make the water drinkable. If you are in a house you could put barrels under the down spouts but be sure you will be able to easily drain it in case it needs to be moved (mine have a spigot at the bottom). You might not want to put larger then a 55 gallon barrel under each one. The water from the roof will need to be filtered in order to make it drinkable but can be used for cleaning purposes as is. Which ever option you choose if you are renting just be sure to make sure it is portable or can be easily removed.
If you own a house, then you have several more options available. Provided you have the space, you can store larger containers of water such as 55 gallon barrels or more if you have the room and the floor it is to be located can support the weight. A cistern can be built to hold several hundred gallons of water (or even thousands). A shallow well can be put in as well, providing an unlimited amount of water. In the case of the cistern and the well you will need to check the city codes (or do it under the radar if you do not care and are willing to suffer the consequences if you are caught). Rain barrels under the down spouts can also be put in. If you have the room in the back yard, you can always put in a pool. A pool does not have to be expensive or glamorous. My brother uses a large, round stock tank. While not fancy, the kids still love playing in it and it provides a few thousand gallons of emergency water. There are many, many sizes of stock tanks available from small ones just a few feet across to the larger ones of more than 20 feet. An advantage of using a stock tank is that they are metal and therefore are more durable in the long run. You could always paint the outside to make it look less like a stock tank or put a small deck around it. Owning a house allows you to have larger containers for storing water as well as being able to build water storage such as cisterns and wells as long as city regulations allow it.
If you rent, then building most anything is out of the question and all your storage will need to be portable or at least easily removable. You could use two liter bottles, gallon jugs, or buckets up to the 15 gallon size. A 15 gallon bucket will weigh in at about 105 pounds (one gallon of water weighs 7 pounds) so any larger would be very unwieldly to move. It could be stored in a closet, under a cabinet, in the freezer, in a garage (except in winter for colder climates), or anywhere else you can find the space. These options work fine for a short term emergency and for bugging out but are inadequate for any long term emergency. You will need access to a water source for a longer situation. You can look at area maps to locate the nearest source. You will need containers like the five gallon military cans or the collapsible ones available from wal mart would be sufficient. You will also need a water filter and coffee filters (to pre filter the larger particles out) to make the water drinkable. If you are in a house you could put barrels under the down spouts but be sure you will be able to easily drain it in case it needs to be moved (mine have a spigot at the bottom). You might not want to put larger then a 55 gallon barrel under each one. The water from the roof will need to be filtered in order to make it drinkable but can be used for cleaning purposes as is. Which ever option you choose if you are renting just be sure to make sure it is portable or can be easily removed.
If you own a house, then you have several more options available. Provided you have the space, you can store larger containers of water such as 55 gallon barrels or more if you have the room and the floor it is to be located can support the weight. A cistern can be built to hold several hundred gallons of water (or even thousands). A shallow well can be put in as well, providing an unlimited amount of water. In the case of the cistern and the well you will need to check the city codes (or do it under the radar if you do not care and are willing to suffer the consequences if you are caught). Rain barrels under the down spouts can also be put in. If you have the room in the back yard, you can always put in a pool. A pool does not have to be expensive or glamorous. My brother uses a large, round stock tank. While not fancy, the kids still love playing in it and it provides a few thousand gallons of emergency water. There are many, many sizes of stock tanks available from small ones just a few feet across to the larger ones of more than 20 feet. An advantage of using a stock tank is that they are metal and therefore are more durable in the long run. You could always paint the outside to make it look less like a stock tank or put a small deck around it. Owning a house allows you to have larger containers for storing water as well as being able to build water storage such as cisterns and wells as long as city regulations allow it.
Make sure to keep what ever you do out of sight of all nosy neighbors, the less others know of what you do the safer you will be later on. People have long memories for the little things they see. Any outside storage or building can be made to look like landscaping or for non prepper uses. Hand pumps in the yard can be surrounded by flowers to look like decorations. Rain barrels can explained away, “with the increase of the water bill, I thought the barrels would save me money for watering the lawn”. Doesn't everyone have at least a small pool nowadays? Also, make sure you do not break any city codes in what you do. The last thing you want is for some city official showing up on your door step telling you what you can and can not do. If you choose to do things regardless of what the government tells you, make sure it is not visible by others like nosy neighbors. Although you do not want to depend on the city's plan, you might want to find out if they have a plan and what it is. Knowing if your neighbors will have some help with regards to water could determine how much you want to store in case you wish to help some of them. Being able to tell your neighbors where they can get water could be very useful information. If you choose to share your water with neighbors you might want to make sure they do not know where you get the water from. Keep out of sight, follow regulations, and know what others options are going to be.
Living outside of the city allows for more options for water storage. Rural properties receive there water from a well and not from a city water tower. You do not want to depend on that well in an emergency! Wells need electricity to run. You could get a generator to run the well but make sure you know in advance how to hook it up to the genny and to make sure it is powerful enough (small generators can not run a well). Make sure you store plenty of fuel if this an option you want. A better choice than a deep well might be a shallow well with a hand pump or a large cistern. There are far fewer regulations for building wells, cisterns, and other structures in the country than in the city and you are almost certainly able to do so legally.
Having a way to make water safe to drink is a must whether you live in the city or in the country. The only water sources that are safe to drink without any filtering are deep wells and that stored in advance. You will need to know of any nearby water sources such as ponds, lakes, and creeks. Have a way to transport the water to your home. First, you will want to pre filter the water to remove the larger particles like leaves, twigs, or small gravel. This can be done with coffee filters, cheese cloth, or a cotton t-shirt. After the water has been pre filtered, you will need a way to make it safe for drinking. There are many options available for filters. You can use a portable filter like a katadyn or MSR or you could get a larger gravity filter like a berkey filter. Be sure to know what the filter is capable of removing and how many gallons of water it will be able to filter before being useless. Chemical purification is another option using any of the tablets available from camping sections in stores or on the web. Unscented household bleach can also be used as well as pool chlorine tablets, just do a web search for instructions on how much to use. The last option is to make your own filter using small sized gravel, activated charcoal (like what is in fish filters, available to buy in large quantities on ebay), and sand. Instructions are available on the net to build one. Having a way to make contaminated water safe to drink could mean the difference between surviving and dieing painfully.
No matter what your particular situation is, having enough water stored to last your family for at least two weeks is essential. You probably should store the first two weeks in portable containers even if you own your house or live in the country in case you have to bug out. Having a way to filter the water in any situation is also essential. Although you only need to store a minimum of one gallon per person per day (14 gallons for two weeks) for drinking, you might seriously consider upping that to five gallons per person per day if you plan on cooking and keeping clean (that means 70 gallons per person for two weeks). Be sure to have a plan to obtain water if the emergency lasts longer than the two weeks. Evaluate your situation and remember, two weeks you can move and a way for getting more.
Here are some links for further information:
There are many more sites with very useful information, just remember google can be your friend.
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