[andy]

population. Only 3% live on working farms and ranches. Probably 90%+ live in towns or cities and even the farmer types aint a LICK better prepared than anyone else. Forget about going so far that you need a 4 wheeled vehicle. Forget about driving out of a large city. You will have to go thru the sewers, or be extremely lucky. At the edge of town, you can easily cache a mountain bike. Until you are well clear of people, best figure on traveling overland, not on roads(altho a silent running bicycle, at night, sure beats a noisy truck for spotting ambushes in time).

The KNOWN ABOUT (which is damned near all of them) cabins, barns, farms, ranches, etc, will BE where all the city folks are HEADED. Small towns have plenty enough predator-types, and a great many "good folks" wont have any choice but to BECOME such, really. They are in no position to "band together", and no, they AINT going to "accept" you in a year or two. They probably will NEVER accept you, they MIGHT accept your kids, after they've been there for 20 years. They'll just TAKE whatever gear and food you bring with you, and if you "think" that you wont be tortured for any useful info you have, you are VERY niieve.

 

[andy]

no, you don't need tons of supplies in order live for a year, and no, you don't want an above ground, "findable, burn downable, shootupable" retreat building, either. I'd not really want a below ground shelter, either, if it was to be ready in advance. Somebody's BOUND to learn about it, and that means 100 othere know about it. Best to stick to well hidden spiderholes(at your retreat area and along your chosen route) In nearby caches of food and gear, include a short handled shovel and pickaxe-mattock, buckets, ponchos, etc, for nighttime enlarging of the spiderhole into a dugout shelter.

Given the typical 30-40 lbs of fat and unused muscle on the US Male, you can last a year on 600 lbs of food, half of which it's feasible to grab after shtf (for a few months) IN a year, so many will be dead (or things will otherwise settle down) that you can plant small, scattered, hidden garden plots.

It will be perfectly feasible to gill net, seine, trap, trotline many scores of lbs of fish, and as well, take as much flesh food in the form of dogs, cats, etc, as well as some edible plants, if you know how and where to find, harvest and prepare them. NOt nearly as many people know that as know about fishing and hunting, for instance.

Depending on the climate, time of year shtf hits, and how severe it gets, how quickly, you may be free to garden in as little as 6 months, too, ya know. I would not count on being able to take livestock for more than a week after shtf, nor grain from graneries, feedstores, etc. After 2 weeks , dont count on big game, nor on small game, birds or fish after a month. The dogs and cats won't last much longer, if any. So be ready with salt-brine, to jerk this flesh food, and to dry fruits and tubers, and to bag or bucket-seal them away from the air, and from rodents and insects. be ready to EAT rodents, snakes, and insects, to include grubs and maggots, actually.

Not a damned thing says you will GET to your chosen survival site. It can easily be denied to you, by hostile men, flood, fire, radiation, germs, etc. So you'd better have at least two, pretty far apart and in different directions from your "home base". That pretty much makes it unfeasible to have extensive caches, (in both places) much less shelters (that are fireproof and defendable and "unfindable".

 

[andy]

it's more important to cache GEAR, than food. Gear to help you collect, store or grow food, as in non-hybrid garden seeds, salt and spices, gill nets, woven wire, trotlines, snares, books on edible plant recognition and preparation.

 

[andy]

dont cache food with much of anything else, because it draws animals. Likewise, don't cache weapons with much of anything else, nor metal items with much of anything else, because of metal detectors. The food caches will have to have "linings" in the hole, of "Sacrete" concrete, and about a 4 ft diameter Sacrete "lid" underneath the top covering of soil, sod, forest debris, etc. This will discourage animal digging, without having to use metal to keep out rodents. Best to have yet- another cache of food, tho, which IS in metal cans, with "ratwire' to keep out the rodents.

Best to just cache low-$, simple stuff like hard winter wheat, blackstrap molasses, salt, spices, stuff that "keeps" for YEARS without it going bad, that won't freeze, etc. Widely available plant foods, like pine tree inner bark, acorns, pine "nuts", may apples, and cattails will suffice to "stretch" the grain you've stored, ya know. burying stuff is a HUGE PITA, compounded by your need to keep it all a secret from anyone who might be in the area. That means burial at night, without having driven up to the cache area after darkness fell. Doing that would mean anyone there would know about you, and you wouldn't know about them. If you arrive in daylight, and make a "casual" circuit of the area, you are likelly to notice anyone who's around.

Pick a spot that's surrounded by vegetation, to hide you from prying eyes. Try not to use your red lensed light at all (with the # of tape on the lense) and if you do have to use it, keep it pointed down, and turn it off ASAP. After dawn, return for another casual circuit of the area, and look for any signs of digging that you missed in the darkness. If you are smart, dont bury more than about a 5 gallon bucket sized container at any one place, and a poncho will suffice to keep the dirt up where you can dispose-hide it later, if it wont all compact back into the hole.

It's a good idea to shallowly hide-bury an old shovel, entrencing tool, axe, et. not too far from each cache,, with an insulated wire attached to it, so that you can just pull it up, even if the ground is frozen. Accessing a buried container, with just your bare hands, could easily be a nightmare if the ground is frozen, ya know.

Every cache should have a set of ski gloves,longjohns, trotline setup, a balaclava and a couple of large "heavy duty" trash bags in it, along with a paraffin candle (3 wicks, make it yourself, non metallic container) and a couple of non-metallic ways of starting a fire, along with some means of purifying water, even if it's only something to boil water in(preferably non metallic) Matches, (sealed up, of course)and a magnifying glass, some Vasolined cotton-balls, will get you going. Some "potable aqua" tablets, AND a "water straw" would be a great idea, along with something in which to carry water (maybe an unlubed condom, and the crockery pot?) A means of carrying all that gear would be a nice idea. Maybe a bail or handle on the container itsself? Soap, and bug dope, bugnetting will of course be a blessing, the netting keeps flies from laying eggs in your flesh food as you dry it.

Best to bury the treble hooks, snare wire, knife, etc, away from the non-metallic stuff. You can put metallic gear in a metal container, and be fairly sure that earth pressure, freezing and thawing wont have harmed it for many years. Avoid deep burial, because that increases lots of your problems. That is, discrete burial, later access, and earth pressure tends to crush things like pvc pipe, much less plastic buckets.

 

[Aslan]

Not a damned thing says you will GET to your chosen survival site. It can easily be denied to you, by hostile men, flood, fire, radiation, germs, etc. So you'd better have at least two, pretty far apart and in different directions from your "home base". That pretty much makes it unfeasible to have extensive caches, (in both places) much less shelters (that are fireproof and defendable and "unfindable".

That's why we have more than two - which of course shows what you know about what is or isn't feasible.

My home is located such that I can easily bug out without any fear of lots of traffic. I have multiple places I can go to and multiple ways to get to each.

I even have a couple places in Canada to go, if need be.

How well you prepare depends on your priorities. Bugging in can work effectively if you have prepared to do so. Bugging in also may be the best option for certian geographic locations.

To instantly claim a figure like 99% is pretty silly. Mormon communities, for instance, are probably 99% equipped to bug in. They have lots of cached supplies, weapons, and know how to use them.

I suspect that most of the people on this board could bug in, if they wanted, or they can bug out. In either event, they are probably better equipped and prepared than you are.

:devil:

 

[Aslan]

dont cache food with much of anything else, because it draws animals. Likewise, don't cache weapons with much of anything else, nor metal items with much of anything else, because of metal detectors. The food caches will have to have "linings" in the hole, of "Sacrete" concrete, and about a 4 ft diameter Sacrete "lid" underneath the top covering of soil, sod, forest debris, etc. This will discourage animal digging, without having to use metal to keep out rodents. Best to have yet- another cache of food, tho, which IS in metal cans, with "ratwire' to keep out the RODENTS.

metal detectors can be made a non-issue very easily, if you are really worried about them. (why would someone be sweeping a area with a metal detector, unless you chose a really poor spot for your cache anyway?)

If you are concerned about metal detectors, simply create a debris field of scrap metal and crap. since SHTF isn't likely to start today, or tomorrow, etc. You can over time bury all kinds of worthless metal all over the place in the same area as a cache. after about 1000 false hits, most people would stop looking. (the best place to hide a bit of metal is with lots of other metal.)

Or, you can find a pipeline, or some other metalic structure and place your cache under it.

besides, you really should put the cache where people aren't going walk or look. If you use any judgement at all, metal detectors won't be a factor.

:devil:

 

[andy]

very few cities r more than a few days by bicycle

from accepatble retreat areas, IF you have caches there, and IF you know how to keep from being detected. Yes, at first, there's likely to be quite a few people in that area, but if you have a spiderhole or two, and quickly and discretely expand it to a dugout, and you are very sneaky-discrete, they will never notice you, and they will either starve or move on in a fairly short period of time. The few that remain(after a month or so) you can deal with, if you have-to, with the silenced .22 autoloader.