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Jonathan: Welcome everybody to the Health and Wellness Show. My name is Jonathan. I'll be your host for today. Joining us in our virtual studio today we've got Erica, Tiffany and Doug. Gaby is not with us today but she may be joining us at some point if that becomes possible. And we have a special guest today too, Dave, who's going to be talking about some experiences that he had.
Our general topic today is preparation, otherwise glibly known as prepping or preparing for disasters, for emergencies, things like that. It's been painted with this brush I think, especially in recent times as being kind of a whacko or "you think that the entirety of society is going to collapse and you've got your bug-out bag and all that kind of stuff." But it's not a tinfoil hat kind of topic. It's more practical and those are some of the things that we're going to touch on today, talking about general aspects of it and maybe a little bit more focused on some of the health aspects and what you can do to be prepared if the power goes out, say if the hospital is not accessible and there are some emergency things that you need to do on your own.
Then later in the show today we're going to be talking about canning because that's one of the biggest issues, how are you going to have food and how to best prepare your own food, get it canned and get it stored so that you don't need refrigeration necessarily.
So, today we're going to start off with the idea of why we need to prepare. It seems like a lot of people in our modern culture have settled into a comfortable rhythm of always being able to go to the store, always being able to order something, the trucks are always running. But that may no always be the case and so we just wanted to touch on some of the ideas about why it's good to be ready for those things to not be available. Erica is going to cover an article to start with called; The writing is on the wall. Do you want to go over that a little bit?
Erica: Yeah. This week in the news there was a great article under the Society's Child section on the SOTT.net page called; The Writing is On the Wall: Be Prepared by Thomas Miller from Personal Liberty on March 16. The introduction is about how there are many TV shows like Doomsday Preppers and Doomsday Castle that display examples of people preparing for extreme scenarios.
He goes on to say, that these scenarios are often so extreme that even most preppers think they are extreme. The typical response to these scenarios by the average person is to think preppers are crazy and that there's no practical application for preparedness. He says, "I can tell you this is not the case but I guess the news would be boring if stories of preparedness were logical and reinforce the need to prepare. Regardless of how you feel, there are many signs that indicate the practicality of being prepared for a variety of scenarios from natural disaster to job loss to government collapse."
Some of these signs were already seen today and we'll probably cover a few of those signs in the show today. But he says, "It's almost as if the writing is on the wall telling us that we are in store for some tough times." He goes on to give one scenario that's kind of interesting about reports coming out of Venezuela that they're implementing a plan by the Venezuelan government to install fingerprint scanners in grocery stores to prevent the stockpiling of food. This has become a concern because of the plummeting value of their currency and the low prices of oil.
Anybody else want to share anything that they've noticed in the recent weeks or months about news items that are coming out that want you to be a little bit prepared?
Tiffany: Well concerning job loss, I think I read in one of the SOTT articles; there have been over 100,000 oil sector jobs that have been lost. So even if you don't picture the end of the world as we know it or a hurricane or an ice age or something like that, how many people have lost their jobs? It's fairly common. So, prepping would be wise.
Jonathan: Yeah, being prepared is always a good idea not matter what. I think that live in hurricane or natural disaster prone areas are more aware of this than other people, but it doesn't take a societal collapse to require the need for at least a little bit of preparation.
Erica: Exactly.
Doug: And even people who aren't in these hot weather zones, if you keep up on SOTT, you see how the weather is going crazy lately. So even just to that extent, you think you're in a relatively safe area. Tornadoes are going off the charts. There's volcanoes opening up all over the planet; cometary bombardment. We're seeing more fire in the sky than usual. So, it certainly doesn't hurt to be prepared for something that is completely out of the ordinary.
Erica: Exactly. The author goes on to say, that all of these events that are happening seem to justify the effort and expense of prepping and support the aforementioned writing on the wall. So looking at what is happening all around us, there is a definitely greater risk associated with not being prepared for a disaster than there is for being prepared for one.
And so today in the show we're going to cover some of the steps that you should consider in implementing as soon as possible, like establishing food and water stores, implementing a security plan and being prepare for a medical emergency. One thing the author said stimulated some commentary by one of our SOTT editors about the importance of situational awareness. Under the comment it says, "In the perception of what's going on around you. Situational awareness involves being aware what is happening in the vicinity in order to understand how information, events, and one's own actions will impact goals and objectives, both immediately and in the near future." So, knowledge with respect to inputs and outputs of what's going on around you and a feel for the situations, people and events that plays out due to variable outcomes.
Under the definition it says, "Knowing what is going on so you can figure out what to do and the combining of new information with existing knowledge and working memory and the development of a composite picture of the situation along with projections of future status and subsequent decisions as to appropriate courses of action to take."
Doug: I think that's really important. I think that we're encouraged in this society to not really pay much attention to what's going on around you. Everything is very comfortable most of the time. You can always go to the store and just buy something if you need to. So you never really think about what could possibly happen, what you would do if suddenly you couldn't go to the store and buy something, or if that store wasn't there anymore, or that store was shut down or whatever the case may be. So keeping an eye on things and really being aware of your own environment I think is extremely important.
Erica: There was another article that was carried on SOTT last year from The Atlantic, which is a pretty well-read site, with a lot of readers. It's called; Prepping for the end of the world as we know it by Jessica Hester. They have this statistic in there that I found interesting. In 2012 a nationally represented survey by Kelton Research said, "41% of respondents said they believed stocking up on resources or building a bomb shelter was a more worthwhile investment than saving for retirement."
Doug: That's pretty telling.
Jonathan: Yeah. I think one of the things that we can talk about today too is that this doesn't need to be something that makes you really scared or freaked out. I think that it might be a common response in some peoples' minds; like, "Holy crap! I don't have the ability to spend $3,000 and stock up a food closet." But there are some really basic things that you can do and also we wanted to touch on the idea of acquiring skills and also networking with your neighbours. Sometimes human connection can be much more valuable than having an entire stockpile full of goods and resources because as we've seen in many cases over and over, when people work together, you can accomplish much more than you can on your own; so just knowing your neighbours, knowing who they are and like Erica mentioned, situational awareness, understanding the environment that you live in, things like that, knowledge can be its own resource.
Tiffany: It's a good idea to get to know farmers in your area. If there are some small family farms in your area, go over there, meet the farmer, get to know what kind of animals he has, try to make a connection with him. Most farmers really like showing people around their farms and getting new customers, so that's one thing. If there are Amish or Mennonites around you, they live very simply. They're not connected to the electrical grid. Get to know how they run their households and how they get together and have a sense of community.
Jonathan: Totally. And just like you said, a lot of people really like to share information and have discussions about these kinds of things. I've found more often than not, if you sincerely approach someone and say, "Hey, I see that you have this skill" - one of our neighbours gardens every year and his garden is just always overflowing and every time I have a question for him he's like, "Yeah dude, let's sit down and I'll tell you what I know!" And I think that's the case with the majority of people, honestly.
Erica: Just a little added tip to that, there was a four-day campout in North Carolina about a prepper camp. Let me see if I can find the article and I'll get back to it. They held a camp where people could learn skills like that and talk about just what we're talking about today, canning and meeting your neighbours and having a community support if any scenario were to do down.
Tiffany: A good way to get in touch with that is to go on; meetup.com. They have all kinds of prepper and survivalist groups and they have classes and get togethers and skill sharing sessions. Meetup.com is good.
Jonathan: Especially for people who live in more metro areas. Where I live is more of a rural area so we're very fortunate to have this innate sense of how to take care of yourself. The majority of kids that live here grow up learning how to hunt, how to fish, things like that. So, a lot of these skills are kind of bred in as you grow up in that kind of an area. But if you live in a metro area, even the suburbs, but especially in or nearby to a downtown of a large city, I think a lot of those skills are lost over time, especially as we get multiple generations who have lived in the city. Say your parent and your grandparents have all lived in a highly populated area, there's not this need to rely on those kinds of skills because like Doug mentioned, you can always go to the store. They're called, "convenience" stores for a reason; they're always there.
None of us can predict the future, but it really does seem like pretty much any day now we could encounter any number of things. We could have a natural disaster that nobody saw coming. We could have a bolide impact just like happened over Chelyabinsk in Russia. That blew out windows for 400 square miles. You look at something like that happening over a city, the repercussions are really dire, especially with the way that people are driven to panic these days.
Tiffany: Yeah, they'll really just flip out.
Doug: And the possibility of...
Tiffany: There was a really good book out in 2009. It's called; One Second After. It's by William R. Forstchen and it's a fictional book about an EMP pulse that went off over the United States with a disastrous aftermath. Even if you don't strictly think in terms of EMP pulses, I think the scenarios presented in that book will give you a good idea of what the aftermath of a disaster would be like and the effects on the community. So, if you have the chance to pick that up, it's called One Second After.
Jonathan: Cool. Doug, what were you going to say?
Erica: I wanted add...
Doug: I wanted to bring up the possibility - sorry, go ahead Erica.
Erica: Sorry. The prepper camp information is actually in that article; prepping for the end of the world as we know it, the Atlantic article I mentioned earlier. I really recommend listeners to get onto that article and just look at the photos that they have on there and then read about what they do over this four-day camp. It's pretty interesting. The take away message from the article is, "At its core prepping is about wanting to be self-sufficient and self-reliant."
Jonathan: Cool.
Doug: We had mentioned all these possible environmental catastrophes but there's also the very real possibility of a dollar crash in the near future, like an economic catastrophe. That's not necessarily anything that's major death and destruction on an environmental level, but there is certainly the possibility of money becoming completely devalued or massive inflation or things like that. If anybody keeps up with this kind of stuff online, people have been predicting this for the last little while. It looks like it is imminent. Not to freak anybody out or get all panicky or anything like that, but being prepared in that sort of event is also important.
Tiffany: And one can never discount a zombie attack. [Laughter]
Doug: I think it's under way already.
Tiffany: The living dead are amongst us.
Jonathan: With our special guest today, Dave, we were going to go to Dave to talk a little bit about personal experience with this kind of thing. I've known a few people who were involved in different types of natural disasters; the big earthquake that happened in California and Katrina in New Orleans which was especially horrific. But Dave has some personal experience to share with us regarding the hurricane that happened in Hawaii in 2002, was that when that was?
Dave: 1992.
Jonathan: '92. Do you want to talk about what your experience was and how did you see that people responded to a natural disaster in preparing for that kind of thing?
Dave: Maybe I'll give a little background if anybody's not familiar with Hurricane Iniki. I had hiked about 12 miles into a valley on the island of Kauai and without warning, got hit with a category 5 hurricane. I was pretty much by myself for most of the hurricane. I didn't even know I was in a hurricane until I was in the eye. It's kind of a long story but basically everything was destroyed on the whole island. The airport was completely destroyed. You couldn't even recognize the island.
Peoples' responses were really interesting. In the beginning you'd see people come together, kind of a community experience and everyone wanted to help each other. But things can really change. You get two types of people basically; people who want to help and share and you get people who are very selfish and it's all about them and their things. So, the dynamic is very interesting. For instance, we were very isolated, stranded on a beach back in this valley and there were a few of us that survived and we'd set up a community camp. We were just sharing everything. We were glad to be alive, we survived. It was almost a party atmosphere.
Within a day or two, people started coming into the valley. They had left their stuff in the campground there. It was very bizarre because with everything destroyed, who's going to come back to get their sleeping bag, backpack? There was not even a way in to where we were at. The trails were destroyed, but these two ladies showed up in a helicopter to get their sleeping bags and their backpacks. It was very strange, you know?
I'm having a mental fart here. (Laughter) If you guys want to ask any questions, that would help me here.
Tiffany: So there was no siren, no nothing? Nobody knew that hurricane Iniki was on the way?
Dave: Well it was interesting that the authorities knew it was coming but they didn't give much warning. We were up in the valley. They knew we were up there, but they never sent anybody to warn us.
Jonathan: How many days were you back there before you got out and got back to your normal life? Was it a few days or a week or longer?
Dave: I was back there for about two weeks.
Jonathan: Wow!
Dave: The weather was perfect, no wind, sunny, kind of paradise feeling and then literally without warning the hurricane hit. Within an hour there was complete chaos.
Tiffany: Can you describe a little bit about what happened during the hurricane? What did you see?
Dave: Well the environment completely changed. I was in the valley and I was actually on my way down to the beach. It's probably about a mile hike from where I was at. There are three streams you have to cross and they're usually gentle streams. By the time I got to the bottom section, the third crossing, the streams were raging so powerfully I was almost not able to cross. I literally had to run and jump and grab a branch and swing across. And as I got to the other side, where I was standing was completely wiped out.
Jonathan: Wow!
Dave: At the beach there's a campground, so I got to the campground and it was really bizarre. Nobody was there. They had actually come and gotten the people at the beach. So I go to my camp where I had everything set up and within a minute or two the winds were so strong that my camp was completely wiped out, everything gone. My camp blew in the wind and was just gone. And I was thinking, "Oh shit! This is a crazy storm. I've never been in anything like this."
So, at that point it was like you really want to keep a clear mind. I can't emphasize this enough. You talk about prepping and getting prepared for things. That's really great but sometimes you can just get wiped out. Everything is gone instantly and it's very important to really keep your mind. If you've ever been in boy scouts or any kind of survival or hunter safety, that's the first thing they tell you. If you start to panic, sit down and try to think calmly before you react.
Tiffany: So, at this point all of your stuff was wiped out, I guess strewn all over the place.
Dave: Yeah, it was.
Tiffany: What did you do that point?
Dave: Well at that point I was kind of running for my life because there was nowhere to go. I was pinned on the beach between the ocean and a cliff. Fortunately for me I was thinking really clearly. I wasn't in a state of panic, but literally trees are snapping in half and blowing by me. So, my first reaction was to find safety. Luckily I found a small cave that was at the back of the beach where I could sit and start to think, what was going to be my next move.
Jonathan: What were some of the first things that went through your mind when you were in the heart of the storm? Were you thinking about, "How am I going to get out of here" or "What am we going to eat" later in the day or the next day? What were you thinking about at that moment?
Dave: At that point those things don't even enter your mind. It's just to get to safety because there's so much debris flying around it would be easy to be killed or injured. That was my first reaction. My next reaction was my friends who were up in the valley still stuck up there. What can I do to help them? So, I was hanging out in this cave tripping out like, "what's going on?" It was bizarre. After about an hour or two, everything went dead still. So, my first reaction was to try to go back up into the valley to help my friends.
But at that point I couldn't even get to the trail head because everything was wiped out. That's when I climbed to a vantage point to see what was going on and that's when I noticed that I was in the eye of a hurricane. So, then I was just, "Holy crap!!" (Laughter)
Jonathan: Could you see the wall of the storm around you?
Dave: Yes I could. It was like the blackest cloud you could imagine, perfectly circular.
Jonathan: So, did you then go back to the cave? Once you realized you were in the eye, did you head back up into the valley or did you go back to the cave and wait out the rest?
Dave: Yeah, I went back to the cave. There was nowhere else to go. And at that point the wind switched direction so, the cave was no longer safe. All the debris was flying into the cave.
Tiffany: So, how long did it last?
Dave: Probably about 4 or 5 hours maybe before it started to calm down.
Doug: I was just wondering Dave, in the aftermath of it - sorry go ahead Tiff.
Tiffany: Well how did you end up connecting with other people after that?
Dave: Well at the beach there's a waterfall with a stream that goes into the ocean and I noticed a lady across there. At this point it was raging so hard there was nothing I could do to help her. She was kind of pinned. It was intense, because you're seeing somebody helpless over there and there's nothing you can do. Somehow she miraculously got across. As soon as she came across, where she was staying, was completely wiped out by the ocean. So, I saw her come across. I went and got her. We came back to the cave at that point and just kind of re-grouped.
It's kind of a funny thing because the only thing left standing on the beach was an outhouse. So, we went to the outhouse and rode out most of the storm inside of the outhouse. (Laughter) An interesting thing too, was the difference with people. People who were sharing versus people who weren't. We had another couple come in to get their kayak. They had kayaked in before the hurricane and this couple came in to get their kayak. We're all just sitting there, sharing everything, hanging out, waiting to get rescued and they came in and one of the guys was a cop. They got really intense.
In those kinds of situations, all rules go out the door. You're in a survival situation, right? So, they were so worried about their kayak and the fact that we might have stolen some stuff that was at the beach, that the cop threatened us with arrest. Well we ended up getting arrested in the end. When we were finally rescued they flew us in a military helicopter in to the airport which was basically destroyed and everything had been taken over by the military. And as we got off the helicopter, this cop was waiting for us.
Jonathan: Oh man!
Dave: So as soon as we got off, they got the cops to come and arrest us for looting, believe it or not!
Tiffany: So, while you were on the beach Dave, what did you eat? How did you get food? And water?
Dave: There had been campers there and like I said, everything had been destroyed. If you had left your stuff there, a lot of it was buried in the sand or in the ocean. So, what we did was gather whatever supplies we could and we just put them in one spot and said, "We gathered all this. Whoever needs anything, help yourself."
Jonathan: What would you say, along the lines of what we're talking about, about psychological preparation for this kind of thing? So, you said that you were able to stay calm and assess the situation. Were you the only one; were most people kind of calm? Was anybody really freaking out or did you have to help people calm down in that kind of moment?
Tiffany: Did you have to smack anybody? (Laughter)
Dave: With the cop and his girlfriend it almost turned into a fight. One of my friends who I was with stood up to the cop and the situation got super tense. I thought they were going to kill each other over this. I can to kind of step between them and break it up. The energy in a disaster situation is very bizarre. It's like the twilight zone, is the only way I can really describe it.
Jonathan: Along those lines, you had mentioned at the beginning of your story that you noticed how some people are altruistic; some people are compassionate, other people get selfish. How long did it take to turn from the overall sense that you guys were just grateful to be there and were helping each other to, "This is my stuff? Don't touch my stuff!"
Dave: It was based on individuals. In the beginning, even when we were brought out to the main island, people really had that sense of community. But then things started to change when they realized that this wasn't like a day or two or a week that this was going to go on for weeks and months. Then you started to see a change in people. You get the order mentality and, "this is mine" and you get a dividing between people. It's a spooky thing really. You kind of see the writing on the wall, these things coming down in the future, it's going to be pretty crazy because some people are just going to band together in gangs and rob people. There's no question about that.
Jonathan: Sure.
Dave: And as we were talking about earlier, how it's good to have a sense of community with people because you can be really prepared and then everything's wiped out and you're left with your own resources. So, if you have good relations with your neighbours, it's much easier to work through situations like this.
Erica: I think it's an interesting to note that in those situations Dave wasn't prepared. He was camping. He was on a retreat island getaway and had none of those canned foods or the bug-out bag or anything. So, he had to use his mind quickly to adjust to the situation and take what he had in the moment.
Dave: Yeah, we basically survived in the valley when we found a cooler some fishermen had chained to a tree so we survived on beer, chocolate milk and fig Newtons. (Laughter) And I had a nice pink dress to wear, too.
Tiffany: That's when all thoughts of the keto diet go out the window.
Dave: Yeah, at that point, it's whatever you can find.
Jonathan: You're talking like this is really a moment where you guys didn't know if you were going to be there for two or three weeks or even a month or longer, you weren't sure at that point.
Dave: Yeah. The military had landed and they told us, "Hey you guys are better off here than out there, so just hang tight. We'll check in with you and when it's a good time we'll bring you out." That's another thing, in a disaster situation it's mind-blowing how quickly the military will take over everything; the grocery stores, gasoline, they post guards there and they control everything.
Jonathan: Sure and in Hawaii especially. You guys have a really high concentration of military bases so I'm sure they were on it as soon as they could be anyway.
Dave: Yeah, exactly all transportation, airports, everything under their control.
Jonathan: You had mentioned that a couple flew back in with a helicopter to grab their stuff. Did they offer any help or did they just land, grab their stuff and, "We're gone?"
Dave: Exactly. They offered no help. They were so concerned with their gear. We told them, "Hey, your stuff's here. Go through the stuff we've collected. You can take it." And what's interesting is the whole airport was destroyed so there were probably only a couple of helicopters left that could actually fly and somehow these ladies got this helicopter to come in there while the whole island's destroyed. What's up with that?
Jonathan: Wow! Regarding my question earlier about community, compassion, being altruistic towards each other and you noticed that some people form cliques and over time people begin to be a little bit more possessive. I guess chances are low, I don't really know, and that most of us are never going to encounter such a drastic situation that you did. But let's say something does happen where you're cut off and whether you're in the wilderness or not, or if you're in a town or any kind of situation but you don't have direct access to resources, what would you say is the most useful thing? You said that you were able to stay psychologically calm. Did you also have skills, rote mechanical skills, like being able to quickly engineer things, or anything like that? What was the most valuable thing that you found in that moment to have in your possession?
Dave: Well first and foremost is your mind, to think clearly. I guess I've been fortunate where I've always been a do-it-myself kind of guy, whether it's working on the car or farming, those kinds of skills. Labour skills even are really great. First and foremost is your thinking. That's really important. I can't emphasize that anymore.
Jonathan: Thanks so much for sharing that story with us. I'm sure we could take the whole time just to talk about this. It's really fascinating that you went through that and that you were able to get out of it safely and handle that kind of a situation. That brings me to the next part of what we were going to talk about, which is preparing your mind and being able to be mentally prepared for a disaster scenario or an emergency scenario. Doug had an article that he wanted to cover and also to talk about normalcy bias which is, essentially people thinking that, "Of course things are going to be normal. Nothing could ever, not be this way." People get into a rut of thinking that way and then are not able to pull their mind out of it and think quickly on their feet. So Doug, do you want to take a few minutes to cover the articles that you have?
Doug: Yeah sure. The first one was actually a little bit more focused on diet. It was an article written by Larry Bowers, one of our SOTT editors and it's called; Are you prepping your diet? Another way of putting this would be called ketogenic preparedness. Larry says in it that prepping your diet confers significant advantage in disaster survival situations. The ketogenic diet should be a frontline response to general preparedness for the near future.
So, this is just the idea that one of the things that you can do to prepare yourself is to get yourself onto the ketogenic diet. We've talked about the ketogenic diet quite a bit on this show before. We did a two-part series a couple of weeks ago, all about going ketogenic so you can go back and listen to those if you like to get a better idea. There are a couple of other resources too, like Nora Gedgaudas' book Primal Body/Primal Mind or Maria Emmerich's book Keto Adapted. Those are both very good resources for how to get you into a ketogenic state, a fat burning state, as it were.
The best idea is to go ketogenic now. Just to go over it very quickly if you're not familiar with it, the keto diet is getting yourself into a fat-burning state. Most people are in a carbohydrate-burning state where they're depending mostly on carbohydrates or sugar for fuel which unfortunately means you're going with the ups and downs of blood glucose rather than being on a much more stable fuel source like fat. Transiting to the ketogenic diet is not as simple as suddenly deciding, "Okay, I'm on the ketogenic diet now". There are transitions. There are a lot of bumps and difficulties along the road, especially if you're not used to eating a lot of fat or meat. Vegetarians will take a bit longer to make this sort of transition.
You have to remember that you're taking a major metabolic energy function in your body that extends right to the sub-cellular level. So, it does take some time to switch over to this new fuel source but there are a lot of advantages to doing that. The best idea would be to transition now, before you're actually in an emergency situation because if you're going through all those ups and downs of transition when you're also trying to deal with a disaster situation, you're just going to make things a lot more difficult for yourself. It's important to remember that the longer that you're in ketosis, the more adapted you are, the easier it is to switch back and forth. If you are in an emergency situation and you can't stay on the diet, you're going to have a lot less difficulty going back and forth if you're more used to being in a ketogenic state.
One advantage is that you require less food. When you're on a ketogenic diet, fasting is very easy. Often people only require two meals a day, so rather than being in a sugar-burning mode where you're constantly having to fuel that fire, you're having hunger pangs regularly - even a lot of the government bodies out there recommend eating five meals day - it's a lot cheaper and there are a lot less requirements on you if you are in a ketogenic state. You're not constantly thinking about food and where you're going to be getting your next meal from.
Another advantage is that fat is very cheap, especially if you are getting it from farmers, from pasture-raised animals. You can get lard pretty cheap. You can get tallow pretty cheap and having those things on hand may not sound very appealing to just eat a spoonful of lard, but the fact of the matter is, in an emergency situation, the fact that you can fuel yourself that way for an extended period of time is a real advantage.
It also makes canning and storing of these foods a lot easier. You concentrate on meats and healthy fats. You can can things like ghee, lard, tallow, good quality coconut or palm oil, MCT oil, all these things are very easy to store and a lot of them don't actually need any kind of heat canning. You can just keep them in a jar and they'll last for months and months.
Bone broth is another good thing to be canning. Bone broth is like medicine. It has so many good nutrients in it. You can fast for extended periods of time on nothing but bone broth and fat. Another advantage - which kind of gets back to what Dave, was saying - prepping your diet also preps your brain. By getting on the ketogenic diet you have a stabilized mood, you're not dependent on these blood sugar swings, which means you're better able to handle stress in particular situations and think your way out of these situations instead of just going into panic mode because not only are you in a stressful situation but you have low blood sugar. So, your adrenals are kicking in to try and get your blood sugar back up and that's just going to cause stress and probably make a situation a lot worse and you're just not able to see the situation clearly. The more you're able to see, the more knowledge you have, the more knowledge you have access to in the moment, the better you're going to be in the long run.
Also when you're ketogenic you have more ability to do exercise as labour if you have to. If you have to bug out at some point, you might end up having to walk for certain periods of time. You might have to walk over pretty unstable terrain too, especially with what Dave was saying about how all the trees had blown down and all the trails were no longer accessible. Getting across that kind of terrain can be really physically demanding. So, being in a ketogenic state, you're not carrying around a lot of excess fat. With the ketogenic diet you naturally build muscle on it, even without working out. So, these things are definitely a big advantage.
You also have the ability, as I mentioned before, to fast for extended periods of time, to go without food. Sugar burners are required to be constantly stoking that fire, eating often, whereas fat burners only need two meals a day and can go for extended periods of time without food and it's not really a big deal. Intermittent fasting was built into the ketogenic diet anyway. A lot of people on the ketogenic diet will fast for about 12 hours in every 24 hour period. It's very easy to do when you're in ketosis and you don't even really notice necessarily. You won't be bothered by those constant hunger pangs and your body going into emergency mode just because it hasn't eaten in the last three hours.
It's also very healing and detoxing. Getting yourself into the best state of health, you're better able to handle whatever's going to come your way. So, not having to worry about chronic conditions on top of having societal collapse or economic crashes, you don't have to worry about these other things. It's a lot easier to bug out if you're not dealing with something like IBS where you have to be near a toilet all the time or you're not dealing with arthritis and you can't actually move for very long. These chronic conditions are things that a lot of people have reported turning around on the ketogenic diet. A lot of people have even mentioned being able to ditch prescription medications which is another big advantage because depending on how long these societal collapse situations go on, you might not have access to your prescription meds. It's not always easy to find those kinds of things. So, anything you can do to get off those is a big advantage in these kinds of situations.
Also, by burning off your fat stores when you're on a ketogenic diet you actually eliminate a lot of the toxic build up that's built up over the years and tends to store itself in your fat stores. So, because you have more ready access to your fat stores, you're going to get rid of a lot of that toxic build up. But again, this is another reason why you might want to get on to the ketogenic diet beforehand, not when you're faced with these kind of disasters because going through detox symptoms at the same time you're trying to deal with a disaster, again not exactly the most advantageous situation to be in.
With the ketogenic diet you get major improvements in energy and endurance, which of course is always an advantage, but particularly in any kind of emergency situation. This involves a lot of genetic changes. I won't go into that too much. You can look up stuff on the ketogenic diet and genetic changes for more on that. There's a lot less need for supplements on the ketogenic diet, so you'll have a lot less need for stockpiling supplements and stuff. And finally, it's like you're more virulent against pathogenic disease. So, the Ketogenic diet is naturally immune boosting and makes you less susceptible to disease as outbreaks.
There can be a rise in these kinds of disease outbreaks in these kinds of situations because you're a lot less able to deal with things in a sanitary manner so these kinds of things can really jump up exponentially. So, it's a natural immune boost.
So, overall if disaster strikes and you find yourself under stressful conditions, which would you rather be, a sugar burner or a fat burner? The answer to that question is pretty obvious.
Jonathan: For sure.
Doug: Just a couple of things about prepping your mind; I was just discussing this with my roommate actually and he was saying that he thinks cold showers are a great way to prep your mind. We haven't talked very much about cold thermogenesis on the radio show here, but getting yourself cold adapted by taking cold showers or cold baths is really great for the immune system. It boosts immunity and causes more of these beneficial genetic changes as well. But it also just builds your willpower. It gets you used to being in situations that are uncomfortable so that you build up your resistance in that way as well.
Like Jonathan was mentioning before about the normalcy bias, one way that you can prep your mind is to realize that the normalcy bias is a very real thing and you don't necessarily know beforehand whether you're going to be suffering from it. So, having a network around is a very beneficial, advantageous thing because you get many heads in on the discussion and somebody can say, "Hey, I don't think this is so normal. Maybe we should be more proactive about this."
There's a story that I read about a while ago where there was a plane crash somewhere - I don't know the details of it - and many of the passengers just sat there and waited to be told what to do, instead of actually mobilizing and getting off the plane. The few people who did have their wits about them were saying, "No, no, no, we've got to move, we've got to move. We've got to get out of here" were the people who survived. The brain, in order to cope with these kinds of situations will default to this position of, "Everything's normal. Everything's under control. Don't panic. Everything's fine" when really it would be much more advantageous to just get mobilized and get out of there.
Jonathan: I think the key from what you said there is, don't panic and leave out the parts about how everything is going to be fine and everything is normal because it may not be. But the main key is to not panic.
Doug: That's true, absolutely. We've been accustomed to these dire warnings and predictions that don't end up actually amounting to anything. There was the swine flu from a while ago, the SARS epidemic, even Ebola although it's very bad in some places. They've been talking about it and it hasn't really reached "over here" yet. So, there are all these dire warnings and everything on the news is given a sensation twist where they pump up even minor events to these over-the-top disasters. We kind of end up being desensitized, when there are all these things possibly coming down the 'pike, we're so used to now having these not amount to anything that we end up with that normalcy bias, "Yeah, yeah, I know disease, epidemic, whatever, no big deal". But because of this desensitizing it conditions us to this idea that these things are nothing to worry about and that normal life will go on even if there are minor hiccups along the way.
We really need to get ourselves out of that and rely on our knowledge, be aware of the environment and get a more objective view on what's actually going on around you. And remember it's better to be prepared in these situations and have it come to nothing than to not be prepared and have it blow up. We've become very reliant on governments and corporations and technologies and doctors to meet every single one of our needs. But if we're ever cut off from any of those things, the average person on the street is going to be helpless. They're so reliant on governing bodies and corporations, like I said that when those kinds of things are cut off, suddenly this person is like, "Oh wait! What do I do? My normal way of doing things isn't going to get me out of the situation so how can I possibly deal with it?"
These are all things to think about. Come up with a plan. What would you do in this kind of situation; talk about it, network about it. You need to learn enough and be knowledgeable enough to deal with the best way you can with whatever happens or doesn't happen.
Dave: I was just going to add, I think you're on to something important. I think it's good to have, "what if" scenarios. What if the economy collapsed? What if you had a natural disaster? Have plans in place to help with those sorts of situations.
Doug: Definitely. There are courses out there in disaster preparedness. There are all kinds of things you can learn, even just getting your first aid certification, all these different things you can do. It just makes you a more well-rounded human being if nothing else but in emergency situations becomes very, very handy.
Dave: Yes, exactly. We live on an island so; we're prepared for what if. We've have bought military containers that we can store things in if we have to pack it really quickly. We've planned it out. We can load it into our truck and we can get to a safe place very quickly. I think that's important, especially for people living in cities. That's where it's really going to have a heavy impact if you're not prepared.
Doug: Yeah, and I think especially for people in cities is the idea that you have to stay unattached. People are generally very resistant to leaving their home, leaving things behind, prioritizing what they need to take with them if they do leave. But if you have to bug out, you really have to bug out. You can't just stay put because you're used to the comforts of your home. You have to be able to mentally take stock of what's going on around you and knowing when you need to get out. You have to consider this in advance. Decide beforehand what you're taking with you, what you aren't, what the last resort would be if you do have to get out of there.
The exercise of actually making a bug-out bag - I know it gets a bad rap because it gets filed in with all the crazy preppers - but actually sitting down and making a bag that's small enough that you could carry it with you so that you're prioritizing, is a good mental exercise to be thinking about this sort of thing. At some point you might have to leave. So, by making this bug-out bag, you're getting yourself into this mental state of, "What would I actually have to take with me? How much can I carry with me? What is a priority?"
Jonathan: What you said Dave about the, "what if" it's so important to have that in mind. I think one of the main things we can do to fight the normalcy bias is to get rid of these ideas of what could and could not happen because there are so many times people are in a situation like that and say, "Well that just couldn't happen" or "this just can't be happening". Well, it can and an often time is happening and I think very important just as a mental exercise to ask yourself what are your assumptions. Can my power go out? Can my water get shut off? Can the shipping trucks make it to my town? Is my grocery store going to be full of food next week or not? Is that possible or is it not? If I think it's not possible then I have some kind of a bias in place that's blocking my thinking about that. So, it's useful just to do these real basic mental exercises ask yourself what your assumptions are and delve into that.
Doug: I think it's important to realize that these kinds of things happen every day to all kinds of people and nobody who it happens to was expecting it. And so, at some point that certainly could be you.
Dave: If you live in a city, if it was me I'd have plenty of maps and ways to get around because if there was a natural disaster, especially if there was a state-wide thing, the first place that authorities are going go to is the city and they're going to lock down that first to control it. So, if you really had to get out of there, you want to have alternative routes to try to get by the roadblocks or whatever they have set up.
Doug: Yeah, I think an escape route is a really good thing to have.
Erica: And also if you have other family members, children or elderly people in your family, to have an emergency plan if communication is shut down. Here in Hawaii we have over the last few years, very frequent tsunami warnings and after hurricane Iniki where there was no warning even though the national weather service knew for days ahead of time that this category 5 hurricane could possibly hit the island, nobody had any idea. It was actually alternative ham radio operators on the island of Kauai that set up a communication system to get information out to people because you're wondering, is it going to be a week? Is it going to be two weeks? For us, having communication with our children about, "if this scenario happens where the sirens start going off and you're not near home, what to do in that event"; how you're going to get to a safe place; here in Hawaii everything is on the shore, so getting to what they call a tsunami evacuation zone, getting the high ground. So being prepared for that and having a basic outline for everybody in your family. If this situation starts to go down, this is what we need to do.
First and foremost stay calm. Practice your breathing techniques to keep you present and not get caught up in the chaos because we've seen it happen just after the Fukushima disaster in Japan. We had 24 hours notice about the potential of a tsunami hitting the island, but we watched people lose it almost instantly. They were driving to the gas station. They were driving over the medians. People started driving recklessly. All critical thought went out the window.
Dave: The first thing people do when they hear a warning is go straight to the store for all the generators, all the water. Everything's off the shelf within an hour or two. (Bad audio)
Jonathan: You would say not even a day really, you're just looking at a couple of hour's window there.
Dave: Yeah, exactly. Everything will be gone quickly so if you're not prepared you'll be very fortunate to get anything from a store. As soon as they announce the warnings, there are lines for gasoline. It's the first thing people do is go get gasoline. And then glogs off everything so if you're cut off from your home, it can be challenging to get back.
Jonathan: Along the lines of health and wellness being the gist of our show, Tiffany has some stuff that she wanted to go over, the personal first aid kit and what you can do because that's a huge thing to think about in situations like this where normally if you get a bad cut you can take care of it very quickly or if it's really bad you can go to the doctor and have it stitched up or bandaged up. Sometimes those kinds of avenues are not going to be available to people in an emergency situation. So it's very good to have some very basic medical supplies on hand. Tiffany, do you want to go over some of that?
Tiffany: Sure. Before I get into that, like you guys are saying and we were talking about before, if the grid goes down, the power is out, the grocery stores have their shelves totally ransacked within an hour and there's nothing available, you can't have access to the hospital or to a pharmacy, what are you going to do? So, before any of that stuff even happens, if you have medical procedures or dental procedures that you've been putting off doing, you need to get those done now, like if you need dentures, if you need your teeth cleaned, if you need eye glasses, any stuff like that, you need to do that now.
I was on YouTube the other day and there was this interesting interview. It was called; Essential Medical Supplies, Off-Grid Prescription with Dr. Jay Nielson. He has a camp or mission set up down in Haiti. This doctor is into prepping. In this interview he says that everyone should ask themselves this question: "What medications am I on that I can't live without?" If you're able to identify medications that cause you great hardship to do without, see if you can work with your doctor ahead of time getting extra prescriptions. You can say you want to make sure that you don't run out in case of emergency or if there's a disaster or if you get snowed in or something along those lines. Just try to work it out with your doctor where you can get at least a few months or up to a year or so of extra supply so you don't run out of the medication.
Secondly, you want to ask yourself, "Do you really want to be in a position where you're relying on medications you can't get?" That's along the lines of what Doug was talking about earlier. If you have a health condition, what are you going to do to get off of those medications? So, the Ketogenic diet is the best thing for that and because so many medication are useless on the ketogenic diet because you just don't need them. Say for instance you're a type II diabetic and you get on the Ketogenic diet and you don't need your glucophage or your metformin or your insulin anymore that would be a great load off of your back if you could do that.
So, some more on this interview, the doctor thought that it's a good idea for people to focus on the big picture, like what are the life-threatening risks that you can run into health-wise in a disaster and the first one being infection. If you can get with your doctor and say, "Can you give me some antibiotics just for an emergency in case something happens? Can you give me doxycycline?" Doxycycline is cheap. It's effective. Not very many people are allergic to it.
Things that naturally you can use against viruses are olive leaf, liquid vitamin D, and colloidal silver. Artemisia is good for malaria, so if there's flooding and maybe you live in a swampy area and there's a risk for malaria. The second thing is wound management. You're going to need some topical antibiotics. Clindamycin is good. The doctor said you can just take a tablet of Clindamycin and drop it into some isopropyl alcohol and that can be a good topical antibiotic. Other items include antibiotic ointments like bacitracin, salves, calendula, tea tree oil, lavender oil, all different sizes of bandages, ace bandages, large safety pins to hold your bandages in place, gauze dressings, both sterile and non-sterile, ABD pads, the same thing that you can use to dress a wound as well as some good quality metal scissors, not the plastic ones. You don't want your stuff breaking down on you. Tape is a good thing to secure your dressings as well.
The third life-threatening thing that he mentioned was, infectious diarrhoea, again, say if there are floods or your water gets cut off, sanitation isn't so great. What if there is an outbreak of cholera? So, you're going to need some Imodium. That's good for diarrhoea and he mentions something called VitaLyte which is similar to Pedialyte. VitaLyte has trace minerals and water. You're going to want to replace the fluids that you lose through infectious diarrhoea or maybe vomiting.
The fourth thing he mentioned was pain control. Say you have to bug out and you're walking and fall down a cliff or something. The first 48 hours of pain are the worst so you're going to have to have things in your first aid kit like ibuprofen, Aleve or Tylenol. So, you went to the doctor at some point and he gave you some pain medications that you didn't want to take. Keep that stuff! Keep it in your medicine chest and you can have it in your stock in case of an emergency.
Another thing about medications of all types is the expiration dates aren't exactly correct. I think part of that is to make more money if you're a big pharma company and people throw their meds out if they expire. But according to this doctor, medications and pills can maintain 80% potency for about 10 years as long as you store them correctly and that means keep them out of the heat, keep them out of the humidity. Don't expose them to light or variables in temperature. Keep the temperature constant and keep them sealed and most of your drugs will be good for up to 10 years if you store them right.
Doug: That applies to supplements as well. If you have any supplements. The expiry date means very little. They're usually good for a least a year afterward if not more.
Tiffany: Insulin is a topic that causes me some concern because there are type I diabetics who don't manufacture any insulin whatsoever. But even with insulin, if it's stored correctly, it can last up to two years. So, that buys a little time. But the doctor brought up was life-threatening allergies. Say you're allergic to bee stings or something like that; it's good to have cortisone, antihistamines like Benadryl, inhalers, nebulizer solutions if you have electricity to use a nebulizer. Make sure you have those kinds of things in your first aid kit.
Some more things that you can put into your first aid kit are splints, like you fell off of that cliff so you need something to immobilize a broken bone. If you're bugging out and you're walking for a while and you forgot your good hiking boots, you're going to need some moleskin to decrease your risk of blisters. If you're tending to somebody's wound you're going to need some gloves. You might need some sterile gloves or hand sanitizer if you can't find good clean water and soap, antiseptic wipes, Betadyne swabs, alcohol pads, masks. Say there's an infectious respiratory disease going around, regular surgical masks and maybe the special M95 masks; tweezers, magnifying glass, a pen light. You can use a tongue depressor to immobilize a broken finger. In the case of a bleed you might need some clotting powders and dressings again. Cayenne pepper can be used to help minor bleeds. If it's a major bleed make sure you have a quality tourniquet. You're going to need some Q-tips.
If you're in a wilderness area it's always a good idea to have a snake bite kit. If you're in a wilderness area you don't want to be dealing with poison ivy or poison oak or sumac, so Fels Naphtha Soap is good. Have some calamine lotion in your kit. Have a dental kit. If one of your fillings falls out, you're going to want some zinc oxide powder and you can add a couple of drops of clove oil in there and temporarily fill your filling that fell out. You can use baking soda and hydrogen peroxide and some peppermint oil if you want to brush your teeth. Clove oil is good for dental pain.
You don't want to forget eye cups and eye wash in case you get a splinter in your eye or something falls in your eye. For hay fever and allergies, it might be good to stock up on something like Claritin also, again, Benadryl or Sudafed if you're congested. I'm not a big fan of medications but sometimes that's all there is and if it's an emergency situation it would be better to have those things than to have to go out and try and find an herb for it and it's a disaster situation and you want to stay indoors.
Jonathan: Especially along the line of severe allergic reactions. If you're going into anaphylaxis then you might really need something like an EpiPen. So, some of those more drastic measures are good to have around.
Tiffany: Yeah. There are lots of essential oils like, eucalyptus oil. You can use that for decongestions. Arnica oil can be mixed with St. John's Wort and use that as an analgesic; lavender, camomile and rosemary, eucalyptus and marjoram are also good analgesics. In the case of sunburns you want to use some zinc oxide cream or coconut oil. Antifungals and antiseptics are treated with tea tree oil or lavender oil. Peppermint oil is good for respiratory and nasal congestion. There are lots of such oils that you can use in place of medications that you can't get.
For the more hardcore people, those who have some medical training, doctors or nurses or EMTs, and there's a viral outbreak, it would be so convenient if you could get your hands on some IV kits and how to start an IV on somebody and replace fluids if they can't drink or they're having extreme dehydration due to vomiting and diarrhoea. Some of this stuff you can find on Amazon but the bad thing is for IV fluids you have to have a medical licence. That's just an idea out there for people with a medical licence.
If you can get your hands on that and you can actually practice medicine for your family and your neighbours and friends. Amazon may also have stapler kits. If you have a really bad gash and it needs to be stapled, but make sure you know how to use these things. Don't just go around stapling people. Emergency dental kits are sold on Amazon. They have suture kits in case you need to sew up a wound. And for absolute worst case scenarios, there are field surgical kits. So, if you're really super interested in learning how to do wilderness medicine or things like that, now's the time to learn all you can. Practice a little bit on fake arms or oranges or something and try to get used to the idea of actually putting your hands on people and helping them when they're in pain.
So, that's just a short list of things that you can put into your first aid kit.
Jonathan: I'm sure this is a whole entire field of study by itself, but people could get into, like you said, wilderness medicine. It was really interesting that you brought up people with medical licenses. I'm sure we have a few who are listening and we'd just really like to encourage those people that while you are in the system and have access to the system and the requisite training to do these things, you're going to be really valuable in an emergency situation. So, while I don't have medical training so I might know that I can put iodine on a cut to prevent infection, I have no idea how to set up an IV. I wouldn't even feel safe trying to do that on somebody. So, those people that have that training are going to be really important and I would encourage them to be ready as well. Be ready to share your knowledge with people and your training in those kinds of situations.
Tiffany: Absolutely, because what if the doctor, nurse or EMT gets hurt? Who's going to take care of them?
Jonathan: Right. When you brought up infections early on I wanted to also mention iodine. We talked about iodine a little bit. I've had so many really beneficial experiences with iodine. I hunt and fish and I like to keep my knives sharp regularly because I use them in different scenarios and I've cut myself quite a bit by accident and iodine is instrumental in that. As soon as I get any kind of a cut or a skin tear or something like that, I put iodine on it and it prevents infection right away. It cleans it out and especially in cases of extreme scenarios like living near where there might be some radiation leakage - there are plenty of reactors in the states and people might live near those. Iodine is important to keep radiation from being taken up into your thyroid so you can take it once a day or once every other day, just a drop in a glass of water to prevent that from being taken up and it will really go a long way to protecting you from radiation poisoning.
Iodine can also be used to sterilize water. You would want to do some of your own research on the proportions that need to be used, but it's a really instrumental compound to have at the ready.
Tiffany: DMSO is another good one to have. That's antiviral. It's great for burns. Say you're experimenting with starting fires out in the wilderness and you burn yourself, it's always good to have DMSO on hand. You can use it for wounds also.
Jonathan: Sure.
Tiffany: So, if anybody wants to learn more about all of this medical preparation because there's no way we can do it all just in one show, there are loads and loads of YouTube videos out there and there are some great books. I have a few. The first one I listed was; The Survival Medicine Handbook-A Guide for When Help is not on the Way, because what if it is end of the world as we know it and there's not going to be a military helicopter coming to rescue you in two weeks? So, this survival medicine handbook works on the assumption that there's not going to be a hospital or a doctor available in the aftermath of a catastrophic event and it gives step-by-step instruction to identify and treat over 100 different medical issues.
Another book is Wilderness Medicine - Beyond First Aid by William Forgey. He's a doctor and this book also gives information on how to assess, recognize and treat different medical emergencies, how to manage physical symptoms and caring for wounds and broken bones.
The third one has information in respect of being out in the wilderness and you have your bug out bag but supplies are getting kind of low. This book might come in handy. It's called; The Complete Guide to Edible Wild Plants, Mushrooms, Fruits and Nuts and how to identify them and how to cook them.
Another one is called; The Forager's Harvest, a Guide to Identifying, Harvesting and Preparing Edible Wild Plants.For the handier there's the; SAS Survival Handbook for Any Climate and Any Situation. Even if you're not handy it's good to get this book so maybe you can become handy. The book teaches you about camp craft and what we were talking about with Dave earlier, how important it is to keep your wits about you. This book goes into fear management and coping with disaster as well as basic survival needs - food and first aid. Also if you're like Dave and you know how to hunt, there's; A Basic Butchering of Livestock and Game.
And finally, as we mentioned before, we're going to do a little recipe on canning, a good book to get is; A Guide to Canning, Freezing, Curing and Smoking Meat, Fish and Game. So, that's it for the books that I have, but there are loads of them out there. Just check out Amazon.
Jonathan: Yeah, it's definitely a really, really good idea, I would say totally essential to have either books on hand or to get online and find reliable resources and print them out. We're talking about emergency scenarios where clearly one of the first things is going to be that you can't get on the internet. Not everybody's going to be popping out their phones and looking up remedies and things like that so it's important to have the stuff on hand. So, printing out things I think is also a really good idea. If you can't afford the books for whatever reason and you have a printer handy, just start looking up this information and start putting it into a binder.
I like that you mentioned the wild berries and herbs handbooks. I think that's really instrumental for people. I just wanted to go over some of these idea regarding things that you can do without a ton of resources. One of the main things is living off the land and the environment around you which is definitely not easy but it can be done. You need to learn a lot of information about these kinds of things so that you don't ingest the wrong things. Where I live we have a lot of different types of berries that are available. Some of them are very toxic. Some of them are even fatal. You really need to know what you can and can't ingest so it's always good to have a handbook on hand to be looking out for these things when you are out.
If you do go for hikes or are out camping, don't test the berries by eating all the different ones, but bring your book with you and look at them and practice visually identifying things So, that you know what's safe and what's not. Also you had mentioned basic butchering. If you have the skills to hunt either boar or deer or anything like that, you have to know how to break that animal down. You have to know how to use the different parts of it and you have to know how to do it quickly so that the meat doesn't spoil. You have to know how to get it into storage as quickly as possible because meat, especially in warm weather, can turn very, very quickly. Also if you're in a camping situation you don't want to leave it lying around because then you can attract predators.
Obviously we're not going to go over all of these topics in detail right now. We don't have that much time, but we encourage people to look up those things. Some people aren't interested in hunting. Some people are. Some people have that experience. But if you don't have the experience and you are interested in it, start gathering information and resources so that you can learn about how to do these kinds of things.
For me personally a really important thing as well is fishing. Fish are one of the most successful sources of protein and fat that you can find; especially if you live in an area with a lot of lakes or streams. Some people don't but for those that do, especially in the Midwest, on the east coast or anywhere near an area where you have a lot of fish. It's kind of funny now because fishing has turned into this thing where you have to have the $150 rod and all the special kind of bait and hooks but you don't really need all of those things. There are basic skills that you can learn about how to put together a real simple line and do hand-lining. I would really encourage people to grab a couple of packs of fish hooks and just have those available. It is pretty hard to make your own hooks that are actually going to be effective so it's good to stock up on a few fish hooks just so you have them around. Have some line around. Learn about how to do makeshift bobbers which is just going to make things a lot easier. Pretty much anything that floats can be utilized as a bobber.
You can also make traps and I've done this before and it's effective; making a basic fish trap out of a tubular bottle where you cut off the top of the bottle. Depending on the size of the fish that you're going for you can cut off just below the cap and then 4-6 inches down where the curve of the bottle becomes straight, cut that off and invert that and then wire it shut. Poke some holes in the bottle so that it will sink and then drop some bread or cheese, which works as well, into the bottle and tie a rope to it and drop it into wherever you're fishing and leave it there for a few hours and then come back and check it occasionally. You can catch a lot of different kinds of fish that way. Sometimes it's successful and sometimes it's not. Sometimes it's kind of a crap shoot but it is a method that can be utilized especially for stream fish like chubs. Small trout sometimes will go for this kind of thing. It's just another tool to have in your toolbox.
Along those lines too of identifying things, get a book that helps you identify different types of fish in your area and where they live. Do they live in streams or lakes? Are they bottom feeders? Are they not? For instance where I am we have a lot of northern pike that are available. We have a lot of trout in the streams. I mentioned chubs. We have those too. A lot of people don't think of chubs as being an edible fish but they actually are and they can be caught in great quantities. They're like large minnows, if anybody is not familiar with what those are. But it's good to be able to identify these different types of things and understand what's more practical to go for and what's not. For instance any anglers who are listening to this would agree that rock bass are not that palatable. You have to work really hard to get any meat off of them at all.
If you're in a real emergency it's not even that necessary to get a lot of meat off of the fish. You can also clean them with salt brine and then boil them and make a broth out of the fish and make fish stew. That way you're getting a lot of the nutrients from the bones and from the fats that are in the fish itself. These are all skills to keep in mind and think about for emergency situations, understanding how to do these kinds of things. You don't have to be Davey Crockett necessarily to understand just how to do basic hunting and you don't even need firearms for this.
Now of course firearms have made hunting a lot easier over the years but there's a reason that the Native Americans and other indigenous cultures have used bows going back thousands of years; because they are highly effective and you can become very skilled in using a bow. So, that's another skill that I would recommend people practice with and look into if they're curious about that. Bows can even be made by hand from a number of resources. You have to have a lot more skill to be able to actually do that. At the very least I would recommend, if you can afford it, get either a compound bow or a recurve bow and just start practicing with it and getting your target practice down. That way you're not relying on ammunition. You can actually make your own arrows. You become much more adaptable to different types of scenarios. You can take down large game with a bow and arrow. So, it's not something that's limited to small game.
We've gone a little bit over our normal time here and we're running a little bit short so let's go to Zoya's segment. She's going to talk about preparation with pets. So, here is Zoya's regular pet health segment here and we will be back afterwards to talk for a short time about canning.
Zoya: Hello and welcome to the natural pet health segment of the Health and Wellness Show. Today we are going to talk about prepping for pets, why it's important to spend extra time thinking about what we are going to do with the furry members of the family in case of an economic collapse or a natural disaster. Consider the impact of a disaster such as Hurricane Katrina. Records show that more than 250,000 pets, including cats, dogs and fish, were left stranded by the storm and the subsequent flooding by owners who thought they would have returned in a few days but were unable to do so.
But each situation is different and there are all kinds of emergency cases. In some cases you may have to leave your pet in a safe location and come back later and in others to take them with you. We are going to concentrate on cases where your pet goes wherever you go. The upside of having animals with you is that pets can be useful in survival situations. They can warn you that storms are coming. They can defend your home and they can provide a multitude of services to help you survive.
For example, dogs, cows, horses and other livestock can tell you when storms are approaching. They get nervous and they begin to gather in herds facing the same location. Depending on the type of animals you have, you may get a few hours notice to prepare. So, there are two main things which you need to remember; that pets will require food and that they may get sick. Therefore storing backpack food and some medications is a necessary part of your prepping.
I talked a bit about things you may need in an emergency kit in one of the previous shows so you can look it up and listen to it. Essentially it is similar to human emergency kits. There are also various herbs and remedies that may be useful for both pets and humans and this was also covered in a previous show. In any case, in the article version of the show I'll include several important and useful links.
As for food, one big advantage of being a pet on a raw food diet is there is no need to worry about carrying extra weight in the form of dry food. If you are on the paleo or ketogenic diet yourself, your pet - either a cat or dog - will be able to eat whatever you eat and if they will require anything additional, they can get it themselves by hunting or gathering. You probably noticed that when a kitty or a dog feel a bit sick they go outside and eat grass or look for some other appropriate plants. Luckily for us, unless we are talking about toy dog breeds like Pomeranians or Shiatsu or Chihuahua, many dogs and cats have much better instincts than us when it comes to survival.
But don't feel discouraged because even small breeds like Yorkshire terriers can be trained. In fact, since they are terriers, Yorkshire terriers in the past were used for rat hunting. It all comes down to the time the owner is ready to spend on the animal in order to make them emergency ready.
So, make sure you have a water bowl and food bowl in your pet kit, a sturdy leash and collar for your pet. Make sure that your pet is permanently tagged and the tag contains details such as your name, your phone number or any other details that will help others to find you and return the pet to you. Kitties should always have a small crate. They get frightened and can take off if you let them out. Some kind of litter box would be helpful. You can use just plain dirt for litter if necessary. So, if it's a cat, make sure they have a leash just in case, and a comfortable, but not heavy carrier. And just a note about leashes and collars; make your leashes and collars from bar cord as if it can be disassembled and used in an emergency. Also remember that should a city evacuation be under order, the last thing you want to do is waste time trying to round up your four-legged friends. Make sure your pet is crate trained, or at least crate friendly so the animal will respond immediately when called during a disaster.
Many animal behaviour experts advise pet owners to develop a trigger to get the animal to go to the crate, be it a word, noise or whistle, then follow up by rewarding the pet with a treat every time the specific sound is presented. Investing time in this type of training up front could prove beneficial should you need to retrieve your pet quickly so it can be relocated to a safer area.
Also consider keeping a spare crate in your car or at a friend's house. In some instances you might not have more than a split second to grab your pet with your own two hands and go. If your pet takes medication on a regular basis keep tabs on where you store it so you can grab any prescriptions at a moment's notice if necessary. Factor in standard monthly needs such as heartworm and flea medication along with any special meds your furry friends may require, such as steroids. Natural vets don't recommend overuse of steroids for pets but sometimes in cases of real emergencies they can be real lifesavers.
Try to keep a two or three week supply of medication on hand at all times as you never know how long it might be before you can replenish. Store it in a waterproof container to avoid contaminating or ruining your supply. In addition to medical records kept on file with your vet, make an extra copy to store in your purse, car or office and consider giving a family member or friend the list as well.
Don't forget to take enough water for your pet. A dog will need about one cup of water for every 2-1/2 kilos of body weight. They will need a little more in hot weather. Dogs can or do drink some really questionable water and don't seem to mind but some can be more particular. Some dogs are also more sensitive to either cold or hot weather therefore it is also important to learn about your dog's or cat's breed sensitivities and prepare for them.
Now let's talk a bit about training pets for emergencies. There are several reasons why you should provide your pet with training in case of emergency. Dogs or even birds can provide protection. Horses can be used for work or as a means of transportation and even pigs can be trained. But the key word is training. Just as your animals can help you if properly trained, a barking dog can be your downfall.
Here are some basic training categories that you should provide when prepping for pets. The first category is obedience. Your dogs should be trained to come, to be quiet and to sit and stay. In case you're hiding, a barking dog can be a dead giveaway if you are there. Your horse should be taught to stand still, to be saddled and mounted and to take a beat without a fight. You can lose valuable time chasing it in circles trying to mount.
The second category is desensitization. We all remember what happens to a lot of animals during a Fourth of July parade in the US, for example. So, many things will be strange to your animals. The sounds of guns, the smell of smoke, all of these can frighten animals. Get them used to all of this before the emergency situation so that they will remain obedient, useful and safe.
The third category is service. Train your animals to be of use. Dogs can pull people or small carts, carry backpacks and act as protectors. Horses can be ridden or used as plough animals and can pull the sick or wounded. Pigs can be trained to defend the house or even carry items. Birds can even be trained to protect you or to act as an alarm. Train your pets to serve a purpose; if at all possible, otherwise they will just be extra mouths to feed.
So, it's imperative that you train your animals so that you don't put them in danger and can actually help you in a survival situation. Research what your pet can do then either learn how to train them or work with a professional trainer.
So, this is it for this segment and I hope that it was useful for you and have a nice day. Good-bye.
Jonathan: I love that outro. Thanks a lot Zoya. That was great and really helpful information and something that people might not be thinking about normally; how to handle their pets or even how to train their pets to be helpful to them in an emergency situation so definitely some information to be considered and looked up further.
In our last few minutes we don't have the time to give you a full education on how to can things so we're encouraging everybody to do their own research and look these things up. I think that it's something that's very important to learn, especially considering that power is a modern convenience. It is somewhat tenuous. The grid is not actually that stable despite what we may think or have a normalcy bias about. So, refrigeration is not always going to be there and it's important to learn how to preserve a bunch of different types of food through canning.
If you type, "canning" or "pressure canning" into Google you'll get millions of results and so there's tonnes and tonnes of information out there, tonnes of books that you can order and have at the ready so you can practice on your own. We just wanted to go over some of the basics here.
You can do canning with a pressure cooker or you can do a water bath in a large pot. I'm just going to cover the basic procedures of the pressure canning, which is to have your mason jars at the ready. Make sure you get good quality mason jars that can withstand the heat. Make sure that you have clean lids and rings. It's also very handy, though not necessarily required, to have a funnel so you can funnel the contents of whatever you're canning into the jar and have a real easy cleanup.
You want to prepare your pressure cooker by putting a few quarts of water in the bottom. You don't want to fill it up very much. You just want enough to create the steam inside. You're going to heat up your jars a little bit beforehand. You can place them upside down into hot water. Don't necessarily bring it to boiling right away, but with the lid off, just heat up your water on the stove, put the jars in there so you can get the jars hot. If you haven't seen a jar handler, look them up. It's like a set of tongs that allows you to grab the edges of the jar without using your hands. Those are very handy. So get some of those.
You want to heat up the jars and then take them out of the water, put the contents into the jar and then make sure that you wipe the lip of the jar as well as the lid. Make sure that everything is very clean so that you get a good seal when you screw the lids on. There are two components to a Mason jar lid, the lid and the screw top. Leave one or two inches of head space at the top of the jar and put your jars into the water bath with a grate or some kind of a riser at the bottom so that they're not sitting directly on the bottom of the canner. Also make sure that they're spaced out about an inch in between each jar so that you have room for the steam to move around inside.
There is a lot of information on the SOTT forum about this process. A good site is; simplycanning.com. There's a tonne of information there about very specific procedures. They have charts available for your altitude and how much pressure and time you need to use to make sure that you're safely canning and you're not creating an environment for botulism or other bacteria to fester within the jars.
You put your jars into this shallow bath in the pressure canner, put the lid on, bring the water up to boiling and allow the steam to vent from the pressure canner for about 10 minutes. This pushes all the air out from the canner. After the 10 minutes you close the vent or put your weighted gauge onto the top to allow the pressure to build. Once you can tell that the pressure has reached the correct level then according to the recipe for whatever you're canning, you need to let it sit and monitor that pressure for a certain period of time. Usually it's an hour, an hour and fifteen minutes, hour-and-a-half, sometimes even a little bit longer, but it's very important in this specific way of canning to maintain the correct pressure for that amount of time.
We'd also like to encourage people to use caution when you're doing this. Accidents can happen. If you cool the jars too quickly after they're done they can break. You can cut yourself. You need to let the pressure canner vent before you open it. If you're not careful you can burn yourself with the steam. You could get hit with the steam and then knock the pot over and burn yourself with the boiling water. So, there's a lot of caution that needs to be taken in this process but mainly it's to allow the process to take the time that it needs. So, make sure that you know how much time you need to leave the jars in the canner so that you're actually bringing it to a safe temperature for the right amount of time and then also let them cool for a long time. When I've done this, once the pot has cooled down and you can open the lid, take the jars out with the jar handler and set them on a towel or a wooden cutting board on the counter and just leave them overnight.
It's also very important to not mess with the lids until after they've fully cooled because the lid is your gauge for whether or not it's actually sealed. The Mason jar lids will become concave. They'll get sucked down by the vacuum pressure inside the jar. As they're cooling you'll hear them make a little click in the background to let you know when the lid is inverted and that's your sign that it has actually sealed.
The most important point here is just to let it take the time that it needs. So take them out, don't mess with them. Let them sit on the counter overnight. When you come back to them in the morning then you have your canned goods whether it's vegetables or meat. You can can meat safely. There are a lot of resources online where you can look up the specific methods. You can do everything from sausage patties to cubed meats. You don't want to be shoving a whole steak into a jar but you can take your steaks and cut them up into cubes and pack them in there. I've even seen different recipes where you have a fully prepared meal in the jar itself. You can can ribs with a sauce, put some spices in there, get it flavoured so that way when you open the jar it's ready to eat.
So, that's my general overview of canning. Like I said, we don't really have the time to go into a full in-depth analysis of this. Do you guys have anything to add from your own personal experience with canning?
Doug: What I usually do is I'll can it and then I just turn off the stove. I'm usually doing this in the evening. I just leave it overnight in the canner. I don't take the jars out beforehand, just let the pressure and temperature come down and then in the morning the jars are still hot and I use the tongs to take the jars out and put them on the counter to cool down and make sure the seals are good.
Erica: I also recommend labelling and dating, so if you're doing multiple cans of different types of meat. After the jars cool down you stick a label on it and a date. Jonathan maybe you know more about the shelf life, how many years a can of meat can last, but that way if you started canning years ago and you want to use the older stuff first and try it out then you have an idea of the date of your canned goods and what they are as well.
Jonathan: Exactly, yeah. I don't know the exact times but I know that canned meat can be good for up to a couple of years. Definitely also very important to check the jars before you're going to eat anything. If your lid has popped out and is not showing that it's sealed anymore, don't have it. Better safe than sorry. Just chalk it up to a learning experience and toss it out because the bacteria that can form in there can be very dangerous and botulism is nothing to mess around with.
Doug: And on that point, you should always re-heat the food afterwards if it's at all possible. Don't just eat it cold out of the jar. You want to bring it back up to boiling temperature just to make sure that if anything did grow in it, you're taking an extra precaution to kill that off before you eat it.
Jonathan: Right.
Tiffany: And I would say don't be too obsessed with canning strictly organic, grass-fed meats. If you're in an emergency and the world as we know it situation, it's not going to matter much if your meat is grass-fed or not, as long as you have something to eat.
Doug: Very true.
Jonathan: Yeah. Depending what kind of grocery stores you have around, will run sales on meat that's in its last week or last two weeks towards the sell-by date, so that can be something. I have a couple of friends that do this as well. They'll keep an eye out for sales at the store and you can go get a chuck roast for half off and then cube that up and can it, the same thing with pork ribs and all sorts of things.
Doug: Yeah. I did that with a bunch of chicken thighs from Costco at one point. They were on sale.
Jonathan: There you go. Again we'd like to really say thanks to Dave for being on and talking about his experience. It's awesome to have somebody with direct experience from a disaster-type situation. To recap, based on Dave's story at the beginning of the show, keep your mind clear and to have the mental tools at the ready to learn how to stay calm, to think clearly if you need to be the one. You don't need to have a hero complex and be the coolest person around but if you do need to be the one in a group, who's calm, then you have those tools at the ready and you can say, "Okay, let's calm down. Let's think about this strategically. What do we need to do?"
The second thing that's important definitely, is having skills. So, taking the time to do research, print out materials or buy books. So, that you can learn and practice the skills that you need and to have a network available. One small example is meeting your neighbours. If you don't know your neighbours then tomorrow or even tonight just go knock on the door and say, "Hey, we're neighbours and I wanted to say hi because we should know each other." It's good to know the people that are around you. Know who you can work with and who you might not be able to work with. If you do have farms around, establish connections with those farmers so that they know who you are so that if you do have to approach them in the future and ask to buy food or even to trade for something, then you already have a connection established. Human connection in this kind of a scenario is very important.
Another thing is having your medical supplies at the ready, having a good first aid kit so that you don't run into a problem with infection or any of these things that can really turn out to be fatal in an emergency situation. Even simple things like an infected cut can kill you if you're not able to deal with it properly. So, it's important to have those methods available.
And then preserving food; we all need to eat and if this kind of thing does happen, the grocery stores are not going to be there. Your convenience stores are not going to be there. You're basically going to have what you've set aside and then what you're able to find. So, it's very important to stock up I would say at least a week's worth of food unless you can go more than that. Granted, some people have many months or even a year's worth of food. There are sites online where if you have the money you can buy a pallet that will last you and your family for a year. So, there are a bunch of different options that are available.
In our culture now with jobs not being the greatest, the economies not the greatest, many of us don't have thousands of dollars lying around or even a few hundred dollars. So, we really need to know how to be prepared for these kinds of situations with the limited resources that we do have available. So, if you go grocery shopping, grab one extra thing. Grab one extra roast. Grab an extra box of baking soda or take the $40 or $50 that you have to order a bag of good salt online and set the salt aside. Just be looking into these things and do little steps towards being prepared for an emergency situation so that you don't find yourself totally in the lurch.
Honestly, I wish we had longer. This is a really broad topic and maybe we can go into it more in a different show and talk more in-depth about some of these methods. For now that's our show for today and I'd like to thank everybody for tuning in and we really appreciate our chatters as well. Please be sure to tune back in next week. Thanks for listening everybody!
Everyone: Good-byes.
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