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Hopefully things would never come to this, but the Church of the Latter Day saints believe in storing food for emergencies. Preferably for a year, there’s several reasons why they do it both scripture based and a general teaching to be not too reliant on others in times of need.

Of course, not everyone lives next door to a family of Latter Day Saints, and it’s a bit rude to assume they’re going to share all that stockpiled food with you. So, if you’re thinking of starting to stock up a bit visiting a few LDS websites is a good place to start. Ok – lets get on with that food calculation..

Container Packaging and standeyo both have identical calculators. Stockupfood.com actually has a login system so you can track how much you need and how much you use. If you’re planning shorter requirements then simplylivingsmart.com has a good adjustable calculator. The majority of the calculators don’t include fresh fruit or veg – so don’t forget to add plenty of vitamins into those calculations too.

I put in 1 year for a single adult and this is what you get.

• Grain: 400lbs (wheat, oats, barley – cereals)
• Legumes: 60lbs (beans, split peas, lentils etc.)
• Dairy: 30lbs (powdered milk, and cheese etc.)
• Sugars: 60lbs (honey, syrup, brown/white sugar etc.)
• Leavening agents: 6lbs (powdered eggs, yeast etc.)
• Salt: 6lbs
• Fats: 30lbs (butter, vegetable oil etc.)
• Water: 14 gallons (2 week supply in storage)

If your looking for a calculator that includes fruit use this one from thefoodguys.com.

Of course as far as water is concerned you’d  need a filtration / purification system. Of course with any food storage you need to regularly rotate stock to avoid spoilage, and to keep the shelf life current. Storing by age, keeping the newest stock at the bottom of the store. Then there’s the other side of storage – for those super wealthy food storage types who can afford freeze dryed ready meals. Mountainhouse.com or AlpineSurvival and Nitro-Pak all have freeze dried food with a 25 year shelf life. They do boxed 72 hour sets of food, or can even provide a full years supply.

SurvivalDigest.com also has some further links and reading over here.

Here’s where solar power comes in, it’s totally silent, and it’s practically maintenance free but the problem with general usage solar power is the panels aren’t usually up to the task of powering much more than the odd light bulb, and you need a constant supply of bright weather.

One of the problems with typical solar / battery systems is that they’re incredibly heavy, or need lots of floor space (like the powercube) or they’re dog-ugly like the Harvester. There’s a new product on the market that changes all that. Called the The Solar Stik™ Breeze. The Concept for the Solar Stik was born out of a need for marine based power on boats that had no room for large scale solar arrays, it was then a natural progression to adapt the Solar Stik to land based use, and more recently add wind power to the configuration so that power generation can continue through the night.
Once the system is set up, power drawn from wind / sun is fed into a battery bank. The entire system is designed to be portable and easily transported. Additionally, multiple units can be connected together if needed for particularly demanding sites. The panels come with a 25 year warranty. Unlike you average generator which typically comes with a 1-3 year warranty. Here’s the YouTube promo..

Click here to view the embedded video.

At around $8,000 the starting price for the Stik is slightly more expensive than other solar devices in this bracket, however they don’t feature the newer technology found within these panels that provide improved power generation.

Visit the product site here for further information.

The Lifesave bottle designed by British inventor Michael Prichard is a big breakthrough in portable filtration. It won the soldier Technology 2007 award and also won best in test of bushcraft and survival skills magazine. It’s has a unique filter that removes 99.9999% of all bacteria, viruses, cysts, parasites, and fungi from the water supply. It’s 15 nanometres filter can cut out almost all viruses which are generally around 25 nanometres.

Not content with sitting back Michael Prichard has continued to improve on the device, adding the lifesaver hydrocarry to the product range. This is basically a rucksack mounted shoulder tube, and integrated dualpump combination to let soldiers quickly filter water without having to remove the device from their backpack.

For larger scale delivery of filtered water, they are also working on larger water containers for family’s. There is even a seawater version due out soon which should be an essential addition to every sailors toolkit. We hope that the costs of these bottle will come down enough so that they can be distributed to relief centres in 3rd world countries. So many lives could be saved if victims of hurricane, flood, and tsunami disasters had access to these kinds of devices.

The lifesaver bottle currently retails for £116.95 inc VAT, it can be bought online, and shipped internationally directly from www.lifesaversystems.com

The book is jam packed full of useful information from hunting, making fire, signalling for help, or making a shelter. Even as a general ‘off the beaten track’ guide it provides great advice for removing leaches, or identifying poisonous snakes, spiders and creepy crawlies.

There’s even basic car safety advice such as what to do if your brakes fail. It’s got almost everything covered and you could certainly class it as an essential camping book.

Seaweed to the rescue! Here’s a bit of info that might encourage you to eat your greens. Kelp can inhibit the absorption by the body of mercury, zinc, tin, and the Sodium Alginate contained within Kelp can even stop absorption by the body of Strontium-90 one of the most hazardous types of radioactive material that gets so readily absorbed into the bones and teeth. So – where do you go for your stash of kelp tablets? Well, pretty much any health food store, and of course there’s always Amazon and Ebay.

Note: Kelp should not be taken by pregnant women under any circumstances (it can cause abortion), people with high bloody pressure, or people with hyperthyroidism.