Home security for cheap bastards

Our family room is actually an add-on and sits at the back of the house and seeing as I'm half deaf (damn that gunfire) I have a hard time hearing a knock or doorbell so I bought a little motion alarm made by Chamberlain and mounted it on the porch. Damn, that little sucker works great. If anybody walks up on the porch I get a beep from the base unit sitting right next to my Camouflaged Bass Pro Easy Chair.
I think I paid 60 bucks (on sale) for the base and one detector and 20 bucks apiece for the other sensors that are mounted in the back and side yards. Each sensor is gain sensitive and gives a different alarm so I can tell which one is signaling. Each base can handle 4 sensors.
HERE

Michigan Doug - Ammo Whore

Philly residents told how to 'shelter in place' by the City

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – During last week’s events in Boston, residents were told to “shelter in place,” which raises the question, would you know what to do if a similar order was issued in Philadelphia?

In the Emergency Management section of the City of Philadelphia’s website, there are now some guidelines for residents to follow.

First and foremost, the city says residents should be prepared to shelter in place for at least three days, which means stocking supplies like medications, food, batteries, drinking water, flashlights and more inside of an emergency kit.

And if a shelter in place order is issued, you and your family should go indoors immediately with all doors and windows locked and your fireplace damper closed.

MORE WTF HERE

*****

Okay, if you have to have the City, State or federal government tell you how to shelter in place and what you need to keep on hand for such an event, you're fucked right out the gate.

You need to have all that shit on hand already. Lots and lots of it. And let's not forget ammo. Again, lots and lots of it. If you're thinking maybe one or two days before Uncle Sammy and Big Sis comes to rescue your worthless ass, you need to think about Katrina or Sandy. It maybe weeks or even months.

The last paragraph is what I thought was funny - Lock all your doors and windows. I mean, I agree wholeheartedly with it but for different reasons. But why is the City recommending it? For protection against looters or the cops and National Guard when they come to kick in your doors searching for suspects or weapons that you may have on hand to protect yourself?

Thanks to WiscoDave once again for the link.

The Vulgar Curmudgeon

Got a new blog started HERE by a regular reader and commenter of a lot of our blogs, prepper  and III Percenter oriented, called the Vulgar Curmudgeon.
I especially like the name of his blogroll - Government Surveillance Targets, and not surprisingly I'm on it.
Go check it out now and come back to it regularly - if it's as good as his comments (and it looks to be) it'll be a treat.
http://bustednuckles.blogspot.com/

My fishing preps and top picks

Concerning my fishing/survival preps, a reader emailed and asked what was in my fishing gear preps.
Everything. I'm a fisherman. I have more fucking fishing gear than I have hunting gear. I have trout gear, bass gear and I have catfishing gear. I have 3 trout rod and reels, 6 or seven bass outfits and a medium/heavy catfishing outfit. I have a tacklebox dedicated to topwater lures, one for crankbaits, one for spinners, one for plastics and jigs and that's just my bass gear. I also have a box for trout gear as well as one for baitfishing.
I also have a couple of flyrods - one for streams and one for lakes. I have 3 fly boxes, one for dry flies, one for nymphs and another for streamers.

If I had to pick 3 flies that I absolutely knew I could catch trout on, it would be #8 black or olive woolybuggers, #12 elk hair caddis and #12 San Juan worms.

Three lures would be silver Kastmasters, yellow Roostertails, and brown Mepps for bass and trout.

Three plastics? I'd pick electric blue 6" worms, brown or motor oil lizards, and crawdads for bass.

As far as live bait goes, it's worms, hands down. All fish eat worms.

Obviously, your choices may be different depending on your area, but these are the ones that I'd pick for my area.

If you're not a fisherman I would suggest going to a bait shop, talk to the owner and explain what you're doing and ask his advice on the matter.

Survival fishing

Fishing Tackle in Your Prep Kit

Fishing can be a very effective way to sustain yourself in a survival situation, and can take up very little space in a prep kit if you want it to.  Although a full fishing setup is optimal, you can get away with the bare essentials if you need to.  There are a couple of key things you will want to consider when packing your prep kit for survival.

1.  Fishing Line  -  There is a plethora of different fishing lines out on the market.  Monofilament fishing line is your standard fishing line.  It has a couple attributes which are bad for prepping and fishing in general, the number one being, it has a shelf life of about 2 years, and can be much less depending on how much sun exposure it gets.   It also floats, so if your bait/fly/lure doesn't sink, it will land on the meniscus of the water, and any light rays passing through your line will throw a shadow underneath which can spook some fish.  And if it does sink, monofilament fishing line has a much different translucency than water.  To a fish, it can look like a drinking straw is coming off your hook in the right conditions.  The line you want is Fluorocarbon Fishing line.  It lasts for hundreds of years, with or without sun exposure.  It sinks without weight, and accurately matches the translucency of water.  Pound for pound, it's much better than monofilament, but it cost about 3 times more.  8lb test is a good standard for most of North America, but a range of different lines is optimal.  I know that's some techy shit just for fishing line, but every little bit matters when it comes to winning.

2.  Hooks -  Choose your hooks wisely. Gamakatsu fine wire octopus hooks in a size 12 will hook just about any fish besides pike and muskie. Bad hooks will corrode over time and use. Good hooks will last a long long time and allow you to re sharpen them. Your best pair of wire snips will not cut a good fishing hook.  I've tried them all, Daiiche, Tiemco, MFC, Umpqua, Owner, Etc...  Gamakatsu is by far the best.  The Japanese really know their steel.

3.  Knots -  Knowing your knots is essential, not just for fishing, but survival in general.  You can easily carry any purpose knots you know for fishing into a survival situation easily.  For instance a  Perfection loop used for rigging lines, is that same knot you would use for making a snare.  The knots you use can also be detrimental to the quality or your fishing rig.  A simple (double over hand knot) for instance, cuts the breaking strength of your line in half as opposed to a perfection loop which serves the same purpose but only cuts the breaking strength by 5%. 

4. Rod/ Reel - What you need for this is going to depend on what you're fishing.  If you're fishing a small stream or pond, hand lining is simple and effective.  If you're fishing a river you will need a rod and reel of some sort for quick retrieval and corrections. And for a lake you will need distance, and a long rod comes in handy there.  Poles and reels are things you can usually fashion out of stuff around you, but it's tough to beat having a real rod and reel when you need it.  Obviously something that breaks down small is best, but most fishing rods break easily, and I think its necessary to understand how to get by without one.  Taking a thin 6' Branch at fastening some kind of loop to the end of it will give you the lever needed to set the hook, and learning to use your hands in place of a reel with a drag will come quickly after practice.  You can use an empty pop can as a reel spool in a pinch.

5.  Bait -  Bait is as important as everything else, I just thought of it last.  Learn how to fly fish.  Although it's not as simple as hand lining, and the technique is much more difficult than regular spin fishing,  the Technology behind it is stone age.  Yes, a Rapala or a Mepps will catch fish too, but a well versed Fly Fisherman that understands the basic entomology of lakes and rivers will catch more fish more places.  These are the basic food types of freshwater fish of North America.  Caddis, Mayflies, Stoneflies, Terrestrials, and other animals( mice, frogs, fish, crawdads, etc.).  Knowing the life cycles of these bugs and how different kinds of environments effect them is a priceless piece of knowledge. And having some basic imitations for each one will ensure that you have the ability to catch a fish in any freshwater area.  If you want to spin fish you can get yourself a water bobber which will get you the weight needed to cast tiny flies, and doubles as a bobber/indicator.   You can almost always find grubs, worms, and other bugs in a pinch.   Nothing beats knowledge.

Hope this helps a little,

-Montana Pike Hunter

Sturgeon Fishing 101

Thanks for the invitation for a guest post on this subject.
To be totally honest I am no kind of expert by any stretch of the imagination.
I know several guys who have sturgeon fished their whole lives and were kind enough to take me out a few times and teach me the basics.

Sturgeon are the largest fresh water fish in North America yet few people even know they exist. They can be found in the Northern hemisphere only, from Eurasia to North America on both coasts and in the Great Lakes region.
Most people are only dimly aware of sturgeon as their eggs are harvested when caught to make caviar in Russia and other places. This is probably for the better because sturgeon stocks world wide are all teetering on the edge of annihilation due to over fishing and environmental degradations.

There are many different types of sturgeon but here on the West Coast there are mainly two, the Green and the White. It is illegal to retain Green sturgeon.

Sturgeon are often referred to as living fossils as they have been around for over two hundred million years with little change. They are slow growing and can live to be over a hundred years old and do not reach sexual maturity until about twenty years of age.
They can also grow to immense size.

I can only relate my experience fishing for White sturgeon in the Columbia river on the borders of Washington and Oregon but I would imagine as they are all similar that the techniques would be also.

Sturgeon fishing is classified as sport fishing but it is a very serious undertaking. These things get big enough to yank you right off your feet or out of your seat in a boat.
I saw a reproduction of an old newspaper article in the Oregonian telling of a guy back in the late 1800's fishing for sturgeon near Oregon city using a rope, a meat hook and an entire rabbit for bait. He hooked into a monster and after twelve hours of people trying to land it, they hooked a team of horses to the rope to drag the fish in and it instead, drug the horses into the river and drowned them.
The minimum length of a sturgeon legal to keep is , I believe, 38 inches and you can't keep any over 54. That is measuring from the tip of the snout to the middle of the fork in the tail.
You are only allowed to keep ONE per year now. Sturgeon this small are only a few years old and are not sexually mature yet.
You can fish for them only in certain areas during certain times, check your local regulations as they are subject to frequent changes.
Sublegal fish are referred to as "shakers" as you usually just have to shake the hook out of their mouths to release them.

It is not uncommon to see large sturgeon breach out of the water like whales do, I have seen them jump six feet out of the water before.


Guided tours are popular and people come from all over the world to catch them, especially the huge ones that weigh in near a half ton or better.

Sturgeon are bottom feeders and have no teeth. They use their snout to stir up the bottom and they have four barbels like a catfish that they use to sense edible goodies like fresh water mussels, craw dads and small fish.
Most everyone I know uses elastic thread to wrap either a big shrimp or piece of octopus around the hook for bait. They also like earthworms or a combination of all the above. Sometimes the guides who fish for huge oversized sturgeon will wrap a whole shad on. They call it a fish taco.

Bank fishing requires a very long and very stout pole to use as a catapult to cast three to five ounces of lead weight over two hundred feet trying to get to deep water where they live and feed. These poles are usually ten to eleven feet long with an open faced reel and 60 to 80 pound test line. It is quite common to see stainless steel wire leaders also. You can only use a single barbless hook.
Boat fishing for sturgeon is very similar to deep sea bottom fishing regarding poles and equipment.

Even though sturgeon have no teeth, they have rows of razor sharp spots on their backs and down both sides called " scutes" officially. Unofficially, we usually call them "you little fuckers".
Like I said, they are like several rows of razor blades standing on edge so handling them is difficult. Any resulting cuts invariably become infected unless aggressively treated immediately.
When hooked, the sturgeon tends to roll over and over, wrapping themselves up in the line and those scutes will fray and cut a line rather quickly.

When sturgeon bite, you will first notice the tip of your pole jump once or twice and then go still. You want to give them time to get the hook in their mouth and then pick up the pole gently and set the hook with a hard pull.




You have to remember you are using barbless hooks so a steady and unrelenting pressure is required to keep them on the line. The following short video will give you an idea of what you will be dealing with:



Once you actually land one of these monsters that is legal to keep you are now faced with a new dilemma. They do not have scales and it is EXTREMELY CRITICAL that you clean and fillet them in a certain manner.
If you just try and fillet one and cook it without doing it right, you will take one bite, spit it out and swear you will never touch another. There are two layers under the skin and you have to completely remove the outer red layer .
However, done right, this will make the best tasting deep fried fish and chips you have ever eaten. You can also broil or bake it. Sturgeon has a firm, white flesh and is delicious when prepared properly. Broiled with butter spread on top is often called a poor mans lobster.

If you ever get the chance to catch a sturgeon it is something I guarantee you will never forget as long as you live.

I hope this has been somewhat informative and I would urge you to view the myriad Youtube videos and use the internet to explore articles on sturgeon fishing to see more about this subject.
Bustednuckles

*****

Hey, thanks for this informative post. I know a couple guys at work that take a yearly trip up to the Columbia for the sturgeon fishing. There's sturgeon here in the Delta, but nothing in the class that you mention.
Yeah man, I'm pretty sure this is one of those fish that I mentioned not being able to take on an ultralight rod and 2 pound test line.

Fish traps

     I'm no good at catching fish one at a time, but I grew up on a commercial fishing boat. Here's a couple of fish traps- the first one is good for streams- using closely-spaced poles can substitute for a net as a way to get fish to congregate for a short while and increase your catch with rod and reel or a spear. You can also net off streams if you've got a net and take everything and the poles can be stacked nearby when not in use. You can't leave it too long, as any trash or branches can screw it all up as they come downstream. 

 For saltwater,  I used to help tend a sardine weir in downeast Maine, too, when I was in college. This is a permanent shoreline trap requiring an investment in time and 3-4 people with a good boat and access to nets.  They trap fish and then you  periodically corral the fish and heave them out of the water. An adult and a kid can tend and maintain the weir, but you need 4 strong people to build it and hang the nets initially. Looks more intimidating than it is. The picture shows a big ass one that provided about 10% of the US's canned sardines in the 50's and 60's. A manageable weir is 5,000-7,000 sq feet. 

Depending on where someone is, a serviceable crab trap, or crayfish trap if in fresh water, can be made from a 5 gallon bucket with a lid if you can bury it to where the lip is only 1-2 inches above the gravel. The hole in the lid needs to be only 2-3 times the body size of whatever you're looking to catch.  You poke 1-2 small holes an inch or two above the bottom, insert string with a slipknot at the end (to hold bait), put the lid on and bury it. 

Paul B. (Hawsepiper)

*****

Thanks, Paul. I appreciate you taking the time to teach us this - I learned something new too.

Fishing preps

So I'm wondering how many of you have fishing gear in your preps? I'm not talking about your little 2 foot Mighty Mite fishing rod and reel (although that's a start) or 25 feet of line and a couple of hooks, I'm talking about some serious fishing gear. Level wind reels, decent size spinning reels, various rods of different weight, lures, different types of hooks, lines of different weights for different applications? How about seining nets, gill nets, or even crawdad traps?

You don't have to have top of the line gear, but species specific gear can be a great help - you're not going to catch trout out of a clear mountain stream using 20 pound test line and you're not going to catch many bass or catfish on ultra-light trout gear.

Fish is a great source of protein and are abundant. You would be surprised at where you can catch fish - I've got decent size trout out of streams I was straddling. Plus you have to consider that if shit gets really serious, large wild game in the US will be virtually extinct within a few years with everybody in the country shooting everything they can.

I think I'm going to do a few posts here in the near future for the folks that don't know how to fish. Do you think it'll be worth my while? Is there anybody out there that might be interested in doing a guest post on the various netting techniques? I'm pretty ignorant on that end.
Comments, please.

The Ultimate Prepper

The Ultimate Prepper

The Ultimate Survivalist

Knife sharpening tips

Knife sharpening is a skill but it's not a hard to skill to learn. Go HERE to learn how.

And then there's this:
Knife sharpening without tools

Dave's take on the Mental Health thing

Via email from Dave, posted with his permission:

Lots of focus is being put on restricting firearms ownership based on mental health history.  In fact, if I had to pick one area that Fudd recreational shooting groups like the NRA are almost sure to cave on, that would be the one.  But that's troublesome to me.  See, the Left has a long history of declaring their opponents literally insane.  They did it in the Soviet Union and in Nazi Germany.  Nowadays, the de facto standard for psych evaluation is the DSM, and surprise, surprise--every time they publish a new edition, it becomes more and more politicized.  DSM-V has not been published yet, but it has been approved by the APA and NIMH, and the changes are public.  Strangely, "hoarding" (prepping!) has been broken out into a separate category (it used to be considered a manifestation of OCD).  But that's not even the most shocking stuff.  There's a new category for "Behavioral Addictions," which translates into "hobbies."  Normal age-related forgetfulness is now "Minor Neurocognitive Disorder."  Using drugs one time puts you in the same category as an addict.  The definitions for PTSD have been relaxed.  Even regular grieving is "Major Depressive Disorder!"

Now who'd want a Majorly Depressed person owning a gun?  Or a craaaazy prepper, I mean hoarder?

Scary shit!  It's not like it's the first time we've been set up.  But this mental health check thing is going to get through because it's so damn easy to sell it.

People forget:  when you let the government outlaw or otherwise control something that isn't CLEARLY DEFINED, they will simply change the definitions of things in order to control more of them.  

When they came for the "terrorists" with the Patriot Act, I didn't object, because I wasn't a terrorist.
When they came for the illegals with the Real ID Act national biometric database, I didn't object, because I was born here.
When they came for the insane with "common-sense" gun laws, I didn't object, because I wasn't insane.
Then they moved the goalposts, and I became a second-class citizen, a crazy person, and domestic terrorist overnight

Ants and grasshoppers, man.

No, I do not have any "spare" ammo for sale. No, I do not have any ammo to loan (as if I'd ever get it back) and no, I don't have any firearms for sale or loan either.
No.

I've been telling you motherfuckers for months and months to stock up on ammo, even telling you how to do it on the cheap by buying one box per week. Had you done that for a year, you'd have over 1000 rounds of ammo right now. One fucking box a week - ten bucks - but you didn't do it. But now that it can't be had you expect me to dip into my supplies and cheerfully hand over mine? Fuuuuck you.

You couldn't afford to buy a box a week? Seriously? You could afford to buy beer every weekend though, right? What about that $60,000 car you're driving? Sure is a big-ass TV you're watching although I think 60 inches is a bit big for your house. Let's not forget about that Benelli shotgun you just had to have even though a Remington shoots just as true. And damn, does your 14 year old kid really need an iPhone and $100 pre-ripped pants? Really? I hope your vacation in Cabo was nice and enjoyable.

And you thought my priorities were fucked up.

By the way, remember this post when the economy dies and your food runs out, yeah?

Your Git Kit

Every day I make a trip over to Homestead Survival to check out their free (at the time of posting) book selection and almost every time I visit I see a book concerning the perfect bug-out bag.
I downloaded the first few until I realized that the author is giving advice for his/her perfect Git Kit, not mine.
I quit downloading the damned things. If I including everything from every book I'd need a fucking moving van to haul my shit around. Not to say there's not some good ideas in the books, but I haven't added a single thing to my Git Kit. It still has a few meals and cooking gear, water filter, a change of clothes, shelter and sleeping gear, a first aid kit, and meds, firestarting stuff, 550 cord and other odds and ends. That's it.
Figure out what you need, how much you're going to need while remembering that in a worst case scenario you're going to put it on your back and carry it around.
Build it yourself for your needs.

Combat gauze

A little gory but informative.

The Psy-Ops War on Preppers

First of all, where is the headquarters of this “Doomsday Preppers Movement” I’ve been reading about? And where can I sign up? I didn’t realize there was an organized movement, one deserving of capital letters. Who is the leader of this “movement”? I’d like to meet him (or her) immediately!

The propaganda machine is not only going after guns in the wake of the terrible tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School – this has become a two-for-the-price-of-one crisis, allowing the government and media to yet again, demonize preppers.

Psychological Warfare:

Various techniques are used, by any set of groups, and aimed to influence a target audience’s value systems, belief systems, emotions, motives, reasoning, or behavior. It is used to induce confessions or reinforce attitudes and behaviors favorable to the originator’s objectives, and are sometimes combined with black operations or false flag tactics. Target audiences can be governments, organizations, groups, and individuals.

Yesterday the mainstream media began churning out articles about Nancy Lanza, the mother of the shooter, Adam Lanza. When you read the following quotes, ask yourself: “How many of these comments could describe ME?”

A few descriptive quotes:
 

Nancy was a member of the Doomsday Preppers movement, which believes people should prepare for end of the world. (Riehl World View)

According to reports, Nancy Lanza was a so-called ‘prepper’, a part of the survivalist movement which urges individuals to prepare for the breakdown of society by training with weapons and hoarding food and other supplies. ( The UK Independent)

Reports are starting to emerge of the troubled young man and his unusual upbringing. (Yahoo)

Dan Holmes, owner of a landscaping firm who worked on the family’s home, said she was an avid gun collector: ‘She told me she would go target shooting with her kids.’ (UK Daily Mail)

Marsha Lanza described Nancy as ‘self-reliant’.( The UK Independent)

He was reportedly homeschooled by his mother, a school principal and gun enthusiast, who wasn’t satisfied with the education her son was receiving.. (Yahoo)

As America searches for answers, investigators are turning towards Nancy Lanza’s supposed identification as a survivalist. (Yahoo)

Her former sister-in-law Marsha said she had turned her home ‘into a fortress’. (UK Daily Mail)

Mother of Sandy Hook school gunman Adam Lanza was a ‘prepper’ survivalist preparing for economic and social collapse, say reports. ( The UK Independent)

Mrs Lanza is thought to have trained her sons, Adam and Ryan to shoot, even taking them to local ranges. ( The UK Independent)

‘Nancy had a survivalist philosophy which is why she was stockpiling guns. She had them for defense. She was stockpiling food. She grew up on a farm in New Hampshire. She was skilled with guns. We talked about preppers and preparing for the economy collapsing.’ (UK Daily Mail)

Gee…they say this stuff like it’s a BAD thing.

Let’s see.

• Stockpiles (or hoards) food….check.
• Takes children target shooting….check.
• Preparing for economic and/or social collapse….check.
• Serious about home defense….check.
• Home is well-fortified against criminals….check.
• Skilled with weapons….check.
• Survivalist philosophy….check.
• Self-reliant….check.
• Believes that we are capable of educating our children at home….check.

MORE HERE

Thanks to Murray for passing this on.

Hiding your firearms and ammo

http://www.mouseguns.com/storage.htm

Thanks to Stu for the links

Getting back to the basics

Everybody talks about prepping and invariably the subject is food, guns and ammo but how many of you own the basic hand tools?
In a worse case scenario there's not going to electricity or at best it'll be intermittent, yet we're going to have to rebuild and/or repair at some point. Kind of hard to run a Skil Saw or electric drill without power, ain't it? Think about it.
Hey, I'm just as guilty as most over this. Most of my tools are either electric or air powered - I think I own one hand saw (a crosscut), one axe, one ancient bow saw and a handful of files. This is not good.
Even those that own a drill brace, adze, and planers are rusty in their uses - shit, I don't think I've used a drill brace since 7th grade shop class.
As far as metal working goes, yesterday I told you how to use thermite to cut metal but I'll be damned if I know how to weld with it and unfortunately I don't have a safe area now to experiment with it. Nor do I know a single person with a forge to make metal tools and goods.
Just something to think about, guys.