what would you buy next ?

[biker bo]

I recived $200 in rebates and need some advice on what to buy next.
I've started to buy frieze dryed food and have a fair amount of canned goods on hand.
As for guns and ammo I have
2-Fals with 830 rounds 150 fmj
1-Rem 700 LTR 308 160 rounds 150 gr soft point
1-AR 15 M4 5.56 and 1- Mini 14 223 round count is around 1200
2-12 guage Combat shot guns 60 rounds of 00 buck shot with less than 50 rounds of # 4
1- marlin 22 lr, 1- ruger sa mark 2 and 1 ruger single 6 22 lr -less than 1000 rounds 22
2- 45 acp with 500 rounds of 230 ball and jhp mixed
1- 38 special with about 150 rounds mixed weight

Now how would you spend the $200. More ammo or a Ruger 10/22 or ???
Besides the $ 200 I will be spending $50 on just 22 lr.

Thanks for your advice.

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[Rix]

If you already have a marlin .22, I'd either sell that and then get a 10/22, or keep the marlin and use the 200 for additional ammo.
Or MRE's, or other things you may be missing or think you need.
Additional magazines comes to mind immediately.

 

[kenno]

ammo or food

 

[Asp]

More .45ACP, .308/7.62 NATO, and/or 556/.223

 

[Crazyeye24]

Depends on how much food you have. Maybe spend it on bottled water, a water filter or a backpack stove with plenty of fuel for boiling the water and cooking food. I don't think you have enough ammo though. I'd stock up on more 308, 223, shotgun shells and 45acp.

 

[deadeye]

Hows the first aid supplies (bandages,meds,etc.), the toiletries (wife/GF inc.)cooking items, water or purifiers, batteries, candles, the list goes on.

 

[Sun195]

I agree with others - you might want to look at food/water/first-aid/etc.

 

[Barefoot343]

agree with everybody else, I would go with either water/barrels or water purifier, food, ammo, PM's, that type of stuf.

 

[kenno]

You can't lose on food or ammo, water,,,I'd get a pureifier, lots lighter than 50 gallons of water, of course your situation may be way differant than mine

 

[slimmer13]

550 paracord, hand tools, pouches/packs/slings/holsters, mags, instructional books, knives, flashlights and batteries are often overlooked. You could even get a good start on a single stage reloading setup for $200.

 

[Mark W.]

hows your fishing gear? $200.00 would outfit a couple of poles and reels along with enough hooks weights bobbers and fake bait to feed you if your close to water with fish.

I also agree with drinking water as well as water for other things like flushing a toilet (you can buy used food buckets and fill them from the tap stack them up somewhere they can't freeze) Drinking water store as much as you can in your freezer to help protect your forzen food during a power outage. We recently had a short outage and the first thing we did once we had the candles lit was to move 3) gallons of water/ice to the fridge to help keep it cool. Once the power was back on back in the freezer it goes.

 

[biker bo]

Happy thanksgiving. I wanted to pick up another 22 rifle so I would have two in the safe.
I've tried to have multiple wepons for each caliber. If one fails I won't be stuck with a bunch ammo I can't use.
I live at the base of a large hill / small mountain. It is in city limits so its not been hunted. There's a lot of game that can be brought home with two people hunting.

After reading all the helpful advice I will be buying more ammunition and a water filter.
Thanks to everyone.

 

[Both Eyes Open]

Good choice Biker Bo, I am in agreement with most everyone here. It appears you have plenty of firearms. More ammo is always good. A raised bed garden wouldn't be a bad idea so you have some fresh veggies available. Canned and dried food gets old after a while. Also with just a small amout of room you can raise small animals for food. My wife and I just started raising rabbits. They taste very similar to chicken if you havn't tried it. If you Food Save the meat it will last for a couple of years in a 0 deg. freezer. We are starting a small subsistance farm to offset the cost of groceries and fuel to get them but it also doubles as a SHTF food source. Just my 2 cents... One more thing. We are raising muscovy ducks and had one for T-giving dinner last night. VERY TASTY!!! Good eggs too. Best of luck and happy Turkey/Duck Day to you and your Family!

 

[Straight Shooter]

Assuming the complete break down of society you look about set for guns but look lacking in shotgun shells. Buckshot is good for bucks and zombies but terrible for birds you may want to eat. I would get a few boxes of game loads. Money will be about worthless so unless you plan to steal what you don't have from others, gold should always remain a solid form of currency. A good garden will go a long ways to keeping you healthy and fed as well as being able to trade the excess for other things you may need.

One note about most steel framed center fire firearms is few will continue to operate long term without regular cleaning and oiling. My ideal survival rifle is a stainless 10/22 with a low powered scope on it and 10,000 rounds of Federal 550 bulk pack and another 1000 Stingers for hunting.

Another thing that has always given me peace of mind is my scout skills. With little to no resources I can build a shelter, a fire and obtain food and water. If I had a 10/22, a knife and a piece of flint/magnesium bar I would flourish.

 

[matthew029]

Definitely some sort of First Aid kit and survival tools.

 

[Thebastidge]

Depends on how much food you have. Maybe spend it on bottled water, a water filter or a backpack stove with plenty of fuel for boiling the water and cooking food. I don't think you have enough ammo though. I'd stock up on more 308, 223, shotgun shells and 45acp.

Don't spend money on bottled water. Bottle your own. Let's start thinking like preppers, not yuppies. The water filter comment is a good one.

But more importantly, the original question is meaningless without context. What are you planning for? Do you have food and other equipment? It sounds like you have plenty of guns, but who can tell without knowing how many people you need to outfit, and what you're trying to do. Hunting? Defensive perimeter of your town? Red Dawn? The point about extra magazines is well-taken.

How about books? Got enough stored up between the ears to make it on your own? First Aid manuals, emergency medicine instructions, how-to's on growing your own food, motor manuals for your vehicles? If the "long emergency" goes multiple years, you will have a lot of winter lockdown time on your hands. I recommend a complete library. There's a reason the school "year" starts after harvest and goes until summer.

Got a case or two of motor oil and some oil filters? Common gaskets or gasket-making material? A full set of metric and standard tools?
Got a way to heat your house if the grid power goes away? A way to procure firewood (chainsaw, axes, splitting mauls, wedges)?

What about training? Do you know how to perform CPR and first aid? Could you rescue a drowning victim (kids tend to drown more than adults, and are also the most likely to fully recover with CPR.) Do you know how to reload your own ammo? Can you make beer, wine, cheese? I recently sent my mom to a cheese-making class, it only cost something like $45. Many of the foods we take for granted like cheese are actually a primitive tech for preserving food. Beer and wine are ways of getting calories while making sure parasites in your water don't make you sick.

Just some suggestions...

 

[biker bo]

I have 4 kids. Oldest is 11 youngest is 3. We will be staying put. My father in law lives here as well. The 11 old can shoot so we have 4 that will be armed.

There's a river that runs less than a mile from our house. Salmon, steelhead, trout and in the summer small mouth bass.

We have fire place in the house, shop and on the deck. So heating and cooking are covered .

I know we need more food but that is something that we work on every trip to the store. Wal-Mart started selling frieze dryed food. I know I know "Wal-Mart". But I can pick up 200 servings for 60 bucks.

Reloading is a sore subject with me. Ex-wife hauled everything but one single stage press to the dump. Bless her heart.

I have a long way to go but with the help of my NWF family I making progress.

Thanks for all the great advice. I can't aford to waste any money on things that will not be needed in a SHTF event.

 

[Thebastidge]

Really good advice for long term storage food is "buy what you eat" rather than "emergency rations". Canned goods will last a very long time if stored in consistent cool temps with low humidity so the cans don't rust. You're better off buying extra of what you normally eat and rotating stock than buying fancy (and expensive) ong term storage stuff that nobody likes.

I wouldn't count on anybody being effective "armed guards" without some training. Especially an 11 year old. Use realistic targets, silhouettes at least. Read this book: Amazon.com: On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society (9780316040938): Dave Grossman: Books

Is your place producing any food? You can get fruit and nut trees for just a few bucks, and in a couple years they start producing perpetual food with very little maintenance. Trees for Sale at the Arbor Day Tree Nursery. Even acorns are edible, they just need some soaking to get the tannins out. Dandelion greens are edible and even tasty when young (just like spinach). Dandelions go green pretty early in the spring and can stave off scurvy- lots of vitamins. Flower beds can just as easily grow herbs, and can be as decorative.

If you're out of town, how about keeping bees? Low maintenance, good for your garden or orchard, could provide a few extra calories in hard times, or trade goods. For $200-300 or less, you could purchase a well-established hive and have your own source of sweets. Chickens are pretty easy, and a good start on animal husbandry. They eat nearly anything, and only take a few minutes a day to care for. Good project for kids to learn important life lessons from even if the zombie apocalypse never happens.

A couple hundred bucks could probably build you a respectable greenhouse, with some planning and some recycling of materials. Often you can get old windows for nothing or close to it. I recommend really studying up a bit on passive solar heatting- one thing you might try is a large water reservoir in your green house, like some 55 gallon barrels (particularly on the western end of your greenhouse, late afternoon sun is typically what adds that last bit of too much heat). The sun heats it during the day, which keeps the greenhouse from overheating (absorbs a lot into the water) and re-radiates at night, keeping the temps much more even. You can even run your gutter downspouts into it to help deal with rain/storm run-off and to avoid running your clean drinking water into your greenhouse. You then water your plants from the barrels as well.

Look into "forest farming" and permaculture. It's mostly about growing things in a way that emulates natural ecosystems- all organic hooey aside, it's low input in terms of fertilizer (costs money) time (costs money) and labour (costs money). The big focus is on perennials. Can you reduce some of your lawn care and change your landscaping to producing food? How about planting a grape vine (or ten) with seedless grapes? Or some hops in a place that needs shade in the summer.

It's the wrong time of year to start planting most of this stuff, but it's the perfect time to start planning. You could save a few bucks towards starting this stuff in the spring.

Look around your place with an eye towards re-organizing to save labour. Where's your wood pile? Is it convenient to get to? In the old days, a stack of wood was often placed along side the house as an extra layer against the cold, getting slowly peeled away towards spring.

My local beer store has distilling kits. They sell them as "water purifiers" but they'll do double duty if you needed to make spirits. How about purchasing a grain mill or sausage grinder, or a pressure canner? Laying in a stock of rings, lids, and jars would go a long way if the local grocery store shuts down. Canning is pretty rewarding, and so is brewing beer and making wine. Smoked and jerked meats last a long time, and smokers and dehydrators are available for reasonable prices, or you can make one yourself with a little thought. Skills that are a fun hobby don't have to be grim preparations, but they'll do double duty. Building a go-kart from scraps with your kid can teach him some pretty good skills in terms of how a gasoline engine works.

Are you on a well or on city water? Can you set up a battery or generator backup to power your pump if on a well? That's probably a good winter project for a couple hundred bucks. A project I recommend to anybody whose home arrangement works is this:

In your laundry, set up a waist-high platform that can support 500 lbs or so and big enough for a 55 gallon barrel. Get an HDPE food grade barrel. Plumb an input at the top of the barrel that will accept a standard washing machine water hose. Attach the cold water spigot in your laundry room to this. Plumb a garden hose type valve at the bottom of the barrel. Attach the washing machine hose from this to your cold water input on your washing machine. You now have a continuously refreshed source of drinking water. If the water sources stops or becomes contaminated, you immediately shut off the spigot upstream from the barrel, close the valve on the bottom of the barrel, and disconnect it from the washing machine. Voila: gravity fed 55 gallon cistern at a convenient height for filling smaller containers.

You can probably come up with all the pieces needed for this for under $75.

Communications: Do you have any radios that can receive NOAA weather channels or shortwave receivers? Hand crank or solar powered radios are quite handy.

Any two-way radios, even FMRS or GMRS? CB? How about Ham radio? The book to study for the exam only costs a few bucks, and the test the same- like $10. Once you have the license you can operate radios in restricted frequencies, and send/receive long distance.

What about small animal traps? You can get them fairly cheap right now, but they probably won't be available if the internet and stores close down. Even rat traps would probably work to catch squirrels.

There are a lot of fora out there for delving more deeply into prepping:

http://americanpreppersnetwork.net/viewforum.php?f=83&sid=5377dc977a21fae5f48932286b787f9a

http://www.survivalmonkey.com/forum/