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Where you are is what matters most.

19K views 155 replies 45 participants last post by  Dude111 
#1 ·
Where you are is what matters most.

In my years of visiting these survival sites (and this is one of the best ) I have noticed that there is too much generalization on topics of everything from water to what weapon you choose for shtf. I have been guilty of it as well. We come from all walks of life urban, country and city dwellers. All of us have different needs.

For instance a man living by creek just needs to boil his water and filter out solids for it to be safe while a person in the desert has to dig for it or drive a well. I can do both here on my little lake. People in the city have to trap rain water or pump it. Not much wood in the desert for heat and not much solar in heavy wooded areas without clearing the land. When I see a post that says just whip up some solar panels and you're good to go I think, what about those guys in Alaska where sunshine is less useful?

Defensive needs are also over generalized. While a bow or .22 might be great for getting game in most woodlands I would rather have a good pistol if If I was trapped on the top floor of 100 Story high rise building or high powered long gun on the plains where the difference between life and death is the ability to make a 400 yard shot on an antelope. A garden in the country can be huge as the land is available while city dwellers need smaller high yield raised beds or converted flower beds. What about desert gardening? Fishing needs from rivers to lakes to Oceans and even little creeks all require different tools. It really is hard to cover all the bases in general terms.

There is entirely too much debate over things which are determined by where you are. A couple years back we decided that having a flexible multiple pronged approach was going to be necessary if we expect to outlast any long term disaster. All of you have special needs determined by where you live and or where you plan to go. Make sure you all know these needs by doing ,not reading what others write. Know your water needs, your soil needs, your defensive needs, your gathering needs, go out and test your theories now. Get out of your house and get moving now. Practice what you need to do. I am going to try hard to be more precise in my posts when answering hard questions. The last thing any of us want to do is lead some newbie down the wrong path. His soil might might not grow your seeds ( meant as his needs are probably not the same as ours) .

A few things I learned along the way. There is no one best rifle or weapon THAT DOES IT ALL. What you need is determined by where you are. There is no best alternative power source, where you are determines what you need. We all need water, where you are determines how you get it. To stock food or grow food? where you are determines this as well. I would suggest to do both if possible. Raising livestock? where you are determines what or how many you can raise if any. To bug in or bug out? Where you are again determines this. Almost every aspect of survival is determined by where you are. The good news? you can determine where you are. Good luck on your plan , work it, test it, live it now. KF
 
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#66 ·
East coast has the highest density of population. The winds blow west to east.
Mid west, pacific north west are more attractive. Less densely populated.
The East Coast has the highest density of hospitals and the most ports, airports, and roads for help to come through. It also has less earthquakes, forest fires, avalanches, etc. We do have quite a few hurricanes, but I think the midwest ends up with more damage from tornadoes than we do from hurricanes.
 
#10 ·
nicely put Kingfish..

i consider all of your comments in my normal life's day.

my work has me commuting 30 miles into a medium sized city and my office (cubicle world) is on the 10th of a 22story building surrounded by larger towers.

so I have considerations like what can I have with me in terms of defense, food, water when at my office.
What should I have in the car to help me get home. (and there have been several accident events that have shut down the commute for over 7 hours.

My main home is both 30 plus miles away from the city and several miles out from the small town...country...bit over 12acres of my own, woods, 2 acre pond, deep creek, well water, plenty of woods, garden, etc...very self reliant for food, heat, water and far enough away to avoid much of the chaos.

That said, I see the various levels of needs that you talk about all wrapped up in a normal day for me.

my work car includes a get home bag that can serve me well for 72hrs, includes a hand gun and enough extra rounds to help me get out of a bad area. a folder bike to keep moving when traffic is gridlocked.
during more riot threat conditions (ie Trayvon example) I also pack a 12ga in the trunk.
of course there's extra water, medical etc beyond my GHB.


At home we are in solid shape on resources..water as I said, we have multiple off-grid sources, and a good berky and other filter systems.

large and small generators and never less than about 60gals of gas and 75gals of diesel on hand.

food enough to feed the wife and I longer than we care to live if it's that bad a time...or enough to cover all our adult kids and their immediate family if they can make it to our house which is the standing family plan. (Plan A)

as for firearms...the main thrust for many preppers and since you included it in your OP..I agree that in urban.. like I mentioned, a pistol and maybe a shotgun..
here at home we have real world use for:
mini 14rach rifle for coyotes
larger bore rifle for deer
12ga for in home defense
pistol for last ditch home defense.

all of these can come in to play respectively should zombie come to call (lol).

the mini is a great front yard sweeper to let a roving raid gang know they need to move on down the road to easier pickens.
the scoped long rifle is needed to be able to answer back to Bubba Ray laying in my tree line 200yds out with his 308 and his camo jammies.

Having these resources also brings it's own set of challenges..our neighbors of course know about the pond/creek, etc and will come to call so they can scoop some jugs, buckets...and they are of course welcome...but it means we have to manage property observation...the garden is far enough back that middle of the night thieves would try to rape it...I can easily reach them with my rifle and with the 5.56 for that matter, but it's still basically just bait ..temptation that some will try and force my hand to deal with.

generators, even our quiet lil honda eu2000 are still just noisey notification that we have resources on hand.


I never fault anyone's preps.. in fact I'm glad to see people prepping..whether it's only a ghb or entire shelves of supplies in a bunker...

if someone feels they only need one good wheel gun or a 22bolt rifle...good for them..I know others who don't feel adequate with a dozen ARs and a 50BMG

somewhere in the middle is my world.. I believe I need more supplies to cover loved ones, more defense tools, hunting tools because I know what our locals have and a 22 bolt rifle isn't going to meet the challenge...at the same time, I'm too old and not inclined to think I'm going to put on the soldier dressup and go out to take control of the local walmart to setup a post SHTF order of rulership.

honestly...many of the young guys who have only played Call of Duty or even the boys who did have to pack out in full battle rattle, but have never spent a night in hell....they really don't want to see us older guys suit up...it'd be a truly bad day.. one that I don't expect I'd live through at my age (hell I didn't expect to live through it when I was young), one that most of us tuck deep away from our loved ones...but we know what ugly is..and how to bring it.
 
#13 ·
To put it in more simple terms, Kingfish, we need to prep for our particular circumstances.

Our particulars are well thought out, arid landscape, despite the largest river on the west side of the country running just 300 yards from our door, long, open stretches of land that surround our wide-spot town, relatively low populations of game animals, despite the massive amounts of undeveloped land.

We have to prep for all eventualities in our specific locales, for my dad and stepmom over in HI, a .30-,30, a .22 rifle and a WWII bring back Luger are sufficient in a landscape where visibility is short distance and shots are taken at 30 yards or less. For us, a .30-.30 is nearly useless, but the old .30-06 can reach out and touch targets to 1,000 yards.

Our preps are location specific, just like our gardens, just like our back up power generating capabilities.
 
#17 ·
I disagree that the East Coast is all "big cities" and potential zombies. You're simply thinking of the cities... and btw: the evac plans are mostly WEST from those places.

There's a lot of rather intimidating swamp on the east coast and we're known for hurricanes too. How many "zombies" are going to feel like running to places that have been ground zero for big storms is "safe". We have black bear, plenty of white tailed deer, squirrels, ducks, geese...turtles... there are gators and snakes in those swamps. There are lots of wide open spaces, too. I'm talking east of the Allegheny's and Smokies.

SURE... DC, NYC, etc are all "east coast"... but trust me, people are going to be running west, instead of running here and unless they have some skills - they won't make it. If they do, they'd better be trainable or they won't eat.

OH... and FYI... much of the time, the wind blows from the east/south rather than the west. So, this place works for us. Maybe you, not so much. That's just fine with us. The thing you need to remember, is wherever you think you're gonna survive, to need to be there and learn what it's really like. It's real easy to let your misconceptions about places lead you from the frying pan to the fire.

Of course: I hear Wyoming is almost inhabitable, too and people shouldn't expect to survive if they move there... :D:
 
#20 ·
I live in PA. I'm a long way from philly. As far as population density, the county which I reside has 2 traffic lights. First one was installed in 2010 and the second just this year. Not many places can claim that anymore. Most small towns have more than that.

No earthquakes, wildfires, tornadoes, nor hurricanes. Last major flood was in '72 and my property is around 150' above flood stage, so I don't have to worry about that.

Racial breakdown is about 98% white, 2% other. Schools are o.k.. Crime is low.

I live on a farm. My land is surrounded by other farms. Not to far from me is close to 5,000 off grid homesteads. The amish. They can fix a barn roof like nothing you have seen.

I'll try to post a couple of pics from last spring. I love it here and will never leave. I'm sure there are many places better, but not for me. This is home and always will be.
 

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#26 ·
Hmmm. I think there's a lot to chew on in the question of whether city folk would automatically run. Maybe another thread's worth.

It occurs to me, that we can't assume city people will think like we do. I know the urban gardener types might be making plans to survive in place... or they will have pre-arranged just where they're bugging out to. Others don't even realize that the stores only have 3 days of inventory. People who are barely subsisting - simply don't have the money to go anywhere, assuming they have somewhere to get to.

I also think using Katrina as a model of what will happen elsewhere isn't a good idea. Superstorm Sandy blew through our place before dropping in on NJ/NYC... and while we had flooding and ocean overwash - we're used to it. We just deal with it. But it's been a long time, since there was NE hurricane and a lot of people living there, at the time, had never experienced one. But where were the regional risk managers? And their disaster prep plans? NOLA has been hit almost as much as we have. Exactly why was it such a cluster of worst-case scenario?

So the OP, I think opens up a lot of questions about how we think about "what will happen" and how people will react.
 
#28 ·
When we lived in the city we saw no way to protect ourselves from the inner city gangs. There are just too many of them. We were less then a mile from an area where drug dealers hung out , shootings took place and some of the worst bars in the county were located. A good friend of mine was shot dead in one of those bars by a young gang member who was robbing the bar. He happened to be sitting there having a beer. In 2006 we were seeing them prowling our subdivision and knew it was time to get out. By 2008 we were bugged out to our new place.

Michigan is a diverse State. We have lots of game, fish and we have tons of water. We have water all around us. Our woods are loaded with Oak trees and we have some pretty good soil in many areas for growing food. Our rabbits and chickens have done well and our gardens and food plots are getting better every year. My 30 young fruit trees are not really taking off yet but ares till growing leaves every year just no fruit yet. We have things like water heat and defense covered. Still working on long term power needs and more food production.

We had a rough winter here and it seemed that February wanted to keep going right through March and into April. Today we finally hit 60 degrees. We are frantically out harvesting bluegills to get back on track as we are normally done by now and getting ready to start Pike fishing. We were late getting the rabbit barn cleaned out due to so much snow but the good news is we had enough in one cleaning to do the entire garden with a nice layer of rabbit manure. Cant wit to get that tilled in and plant the new garden.

Im glad so many liked this post. I had to say something about the diverse people contributing here . So often we forget that everyone is not in the same boat we are. KF
 
#27 ·
I find it interesting when people make blanket statements about the West, or the East.

All of the West is ... , Anything you can say about the West there will be places in the West where you are wrong.

All of the East is ...

I bugged-out to a state with over 3,000 miles of coast line, and over 92% is forest. We have around 10 people per square-mile [though most of this state has less than 1 person per square-mile]. Never been a drought in recorded history. Rivers, lakes, ponds a plenty. You can live off-grid self-sufficient and nobody will blink an eye at it.



Too urban? There are parts of the East Coast that are urban.



I see threads whining about how hard it is to survive on minimum-wage. But around here you can support a family from what you earn growing veggies in an overgrown garden. A 'livable wage' is way below minimum-wage.

:)
 
#30 ·
LOL... gator, I don't think you'll have to worry about most of the "transplants"! They don't have the money to move, as it stands right now. Not any distance, at any rate.

But you might wanna keep an eye out for those that do have the bucks to "invade" -- they could just as easily be undesirables -- but for other reasons!!
 
#31 ·
I not only think it's where you live in your country but also the country you live in. I am semi-rural in the UK, so not a bad position to be in, yes I'd love to live in the country side but with a grass allergy and no money that isn't going to happen any time soon.

I think prepping in the US is different from the UK as it is from Australia. Living in the bush in Australia can't be easy as it is not in the forests of the US.

In most parts prepping does cover most peoples situations but then you have to focus on your own area. There is nothing wrong with getting out there and doing as long as you are physically well and able to do so, if not then VISUALISE IT cause the brain doesn't know the difference.
 
#63 ·
I agree with this wholeheartedly. For a trivial example, it's been many years since I was in the UK, but outside of the major thoroughfares in the population centers, I remember most of the roads being little more than a lane wide. In the US, the roads are more numerous and much bigger. This is serious factor in the buggging out/bugging in decision. Distances are also a big difference, as is the availability of unsettled land.
 
#35 ·
Does anyone have relatives old enough to tell them about the Great Depression? Some of my family lived in a very rural area of Texas, far enough south that the Dust Bowl years didn't destroy everything they had. Back then, the country really was the country, and not just a 5,000 home subdivision built in the country and surrounded by the attending shopping needs. The middle of nowhere often really was the middle of nowhere back then.

But people were still roaming, even out in the middle of nowhere. People on foot, families, looking for work, food, anything they could get. If nothing was to be had, they moved along to the next place. My Texas family all told stories about people knocking on their door wanting to exchange work for some food for themselves and their children. My great grandmother and her sisters would often feed people.

Why do people think that this is so far fetched as to be impossible in the present day? Hundreds of thousands were homeless back then, had no money, no food, just their clothes and a few meager possessions and each other. Why do people think that would change if something happened tomorrow?

What do we have along the border states right now, any given day? People on foot, illegals, no money, no food, looking for work and food and a home, walking for days through the desert, out in the middle of nowhere.

I have no doubt whatsoever that there will be people roaming the cities, suburbs, and open roads looking for work or food, or worse, if TSHTF in a really significant way.

I simply don't understand the logic that most people will simply stay put. We haven't seen a national disaster of the magnitude of the Great Depression combined with the Dust Bowl. I was born in the mid-60s, and I certainly haven't seen or experienced one in my lifetime--yet. My parents were born in '37 and '39, and while they technically lived through some very rough times they don't remember it and both say they have never experienced what their parents went through.

I fully believe if our country suffered some major catastrophy--regardless of the nature of it, economic, war, racial, government--people would not all stay put. To try to convince ourselves otherwise is to ignore what history shows.
 
#43 ·
You can't use the dustbowl / depression as an example of what might happen today .
It was a different time , different circumstances , and most important - a different mindset .
There was no welfare / entitlements . People were more self reliant back then . You didn't have the entitlement mentality many people have today .

No doubt , if tshtf , some would try to escape the cities . It depends on what and how severe the shtf event is but a more likely scenario = City people would head to the burbs and go no further . Suburban people would head to the hills/countryside to escape the city people .
By the time people got to the rural , less developed areas it would be a trickle not a horde .
 
#37 ·
http://www.erroluys.com/RidingtheRails.htm

TxHannah - you reminded me of stories from my grandparents and step-dad, all born 190x. The hobos were mostly younger folk who left home looking for new opportunities. They were able to bet their survival on themselves. I know some younger adults still have this in them; but so many don't.

My step-dad took a job delivering railway express packages on a bike and in the winters used a sled. So he ran into a lot of these hobos. The stories I heard were of good people, simply travelling looking... for who knows what, to settle down. It's realistic to think that something like this will happen again. But so many need to be told what to do - I'm not sure they'd be able to take this kind of chance. I'm not convinced it's going to be one or the other, right now.
 
#41 ·
I live 40 minutes from the nearest town in a small rural community. With thick forest and clear cuts everywhere. We have pigs, chickens and horses for livestock on the place. Preps for my specific area would mostly be winter related. Large stock pile of fire wood, animal feed, ice fishing gear like augers, and ways to be mobile during deep snow like snow shoes, cross country skis, and a snowmobile.
 
#42 ·
But will those meals earned be a continual, uninterrupted thing? It wasn't during the depression, which is precisely the reason why people kept moving on. In a disaster with national scope, where people everywhere are affected--not just localized like Katrina was-- people will of necessity have to keep moving. In a disaster like I'm describing, as during the Depression, there weren't many places people could go to find food and shelter and just stay there permanently.
 
#44 ·
you can tell a lot about people just by how they measure distance: minutes vs. miles.

That alone tells me how well someone will do in a SHTF situation.

and the folks who measure it either way will think they're the ones who will do better. I'll leave it to you to figure out who I think will make it.
 
#47 ·
I think we should realize that what happened in the great depression could happen again. Even though this is a different time National debt , lack of welfare funds and or other handouts just might dry up. We have tent cities here in Michigan. There are people living in abandoned factories in Detroit and other cities here in Michigan alone. Which "where you are" could mean near those concentrations of homeless. Even where my wife and I are today though much safer is still only half an hour drive from some real bad elements and I have to hope that law enforcement takes them out first. It is my belief that the worst of the raider types will die in the first round in battles with LEO groups.

Then we have to look at where we are and work our formula for survival. We are harvesting fish right now and next will be a long season of gardening and stockpiling wood. Ill be adding ammo and starting the build on my solar system . Ill be sinking the heavy pole for the array and getting the Inverter this year. Moving the Rabbits out of the Barn to the new 14 hole rabbit condo. So much to do and not near enough time. I am glad this thread has sparked some interest. It always bothered me when topics got over generalized. KF
 
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