So  after complaining into to ether about how the Becker BK-2’s stock grips suck, one of my 3 readers sent me a sweet link to aftermarket Ka-bar grips that look way better than the crappy stock set.

Disclaimer: I have not used or even seen these things in person, but I am very familiar with what I don’t like about my stock grips and from the look of it these are a big improvement, and for 30 bucks its probably worth the risk..maybe I will even order a pair and find out for my self

Check out these custom micarta grips at tomskabars.com.   Thanks to Jim for the heads up!

Google is great for all kinds of reasons, other than the fact if they ever go away I will basically loose all the information I have created or gathered in the last 8 years, but that aside….
Google has come up with google flu trends.  Based on google search criteria in different regions of the US google is attemping to predict the severity or flu infection across the world.   From Google:

We have found a close relationship between how many people search for flu-related topics and how many people actually have flu symptoms. Of course, not every person who searches for “flu” is actually sick, but a pattern emerges when all the flu-related search queries are added together. We compared our query counts with traditional flu surveillance systems and found that many search queries tend to be popular exactly when flu season is happening. By counting how often we see these search queries, we can estimate how much flu is circulating in different countries and regions around the world. Our results have been published in the journal Nature.

Check out http://www.google.org/flutrends/ for more info and all kinds of cool graphs proving that you will get sick and that you will be googleing while in bed.

Just a quick note on the toughness and practicality of the Becker BK2 knife:

Recently I sold my car and was trying to remove the locked Yakima racks before the new buyer drove the thing away.  Well wouldn’t you know it, that after 4 years I had lost the keys to remove the lock cores needed in order to get the racks off.  My choices?

A. Buy replacement lock cores at REI and get ripped off.

B.  Call a locksmith and get ripped off.

C.  Break out the BK2 that’s in my car and see what kind of prying the thing will take.

Naturally I choise option C, and with in 45 seconds of prying a very solid lock and retaining plate, the plate had popped off, the lock had falln out, and the knife still looks like it did the day I bought it.  Yet another real world example of how durable this realativly low cost work horse of a knife really is.

So we have learned you can grow your body weight in potatoes in a few square feet of raised bed (or trash can, or old tires), but when all you have to eat is potatoes because your emergency food supply ran out you will be looking for something to liven those babys up.

There are all kinds of expensive prefab herb garden set ups that really only last one season and are just plain lame, so try this on for size:

Take that old shoe organizer some girl left at your house, or go down to big lots and buy one for 3 bucks, hang and plant. Not everything is difficult…its that easy. This planting solution takes NO floor space. If I maxed out my capacity on my balcony I could hold 4 of these growing 16 units of veggies each. Although the space alloted per plant is small, you can grow anything with a shallow root mass, including most herbs letuce, oinions and garlic.

Remember survivalism = multi use, modular, low cost, long life, easily availible. If all of your survival tools fit this criteria you are well on your way to being a well rounded urban survivalist….plus, gardening is fun.

the picture is from www.greenupgrader.com a great resource for alternative gardening ideas.

Being an urban survivalist can be tough, everything is expensive, there are people crawling all over each other, and the space we have to ourselves can be very limiting.  These factors make sustainable, food production very difficult.  However if you have a little open space and a little time you can build a garden that will give you much of what you need to eat.

My balcony is about 14×6, yet I grow tomatoes, onions, potatoes, avocados, asparagus, 6 types of peppers, lettuce, tomatillos, garlic, basil and house a rabbit, as well as bikes and patio furniture.  There are many ways to maximize small growing spaces for certain types of food, from training tomatoes to grow in an compact space to growing potatoes vertically to maximize yield. Below is a great how to link on growing potatoes in a self contained container with very high yields. If you are careful with your lay out you can grow a significant portion of your normal good stock for next to nothing in a very small space.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN HOW TO GROW 100 LBS OF POTATOES IN 4 SQ FEET or see the info from the seattle times below

According to this article from the Seattle Times, potatoes planted inside a box with this method can grow up to 100 pounds of potatoes in just 4 square feet. All that is required:

• Lumber
• Seed potatoes
• Soil
• Careful attention to watering

The Times’ guide for building a potato growing box yields up to a 100 lbs. of potatoes in a mere 4 square feet is shown below:

Plant as early as April or as late as August 1, with an approximated 3 month till harvest turnaround time.

Here are some pointers from the article:

• Cut apart larger seed potatoes, making sure there are at least two eyes in each piece you plant.
• Dust the cut pieces with fir dust, which seals the open ends from bacteria.
• Fertilize with 10-20-20 fertilizer at planting and a couple of times during the season.
• Water so that the plants are kept at an even level of moisture.
• Don’t plant in the same area in consecutive years or use the same soil to fill your potato box, as potatoes can attract various diseases.

“To save space, Lutovsky recommends building a box and planting inside it, adding sides to the box as the plant grows and filling the new space with mulch or soil.

When the plant blossoms, it starts setting potatoes in this added soil. Soon after that, you can start removing the bottom boards from your box and “robbing” the plant, reaching in carefully and pulling out new potatoes.”

A while back I posted about how excited I was to see zombieland, because well it looked bad ass.  So last night I checked it out.  Here’s the deal:

I still don’t get the whole omission with Zombies attaching us,  maybe I have too many realistic things to worry about, or maybe im just not that easily scared (take that future zombies!).  The entire movie focuses on shooting zombies and that geeky guy from Adventureland in yet another amusement park trying to make out with yet another hot girl that wouldn’t ever talk to him in real life.

Like most Hollywood movies Zombieland is entertaining and totally ridiculous. no one ever gets hurt, no one reloads, no one stops to try to figure out how to eat or why everything is still powered or they are driving a cadillac instead of, I dunno, a tank or something…really thats as much as you need to know.

If you like a genuine portrayal of the human struggle or something with substance don’t watch this film, If you want to watch Woody Harrelson kick a lot of ass, then check it out, thats really all I got.

There are way too many options for bug out bags that it can be a little overwhelming choosing one unless you have experience with other packs for other applications.  There are many very complication breaks downs of what to look for so we are going to keep choosing a bug out bag simple.

Volume: At Least 3500 cubic inches – I have tried to put together a good bug out bag time and time again with lessor backs and it just isn’t enough space for multiple days of supplies

Color- Something low key- civilian outdoor colors are terrible for not being seen, example: I own an osprey that I use for recreational backpacking and I kid you not its neon orange red and black..in an urban survival situation you want to make sure both you and your BOB can hide if need be.

Fit:  Spend the money and get a pack that is fully adjustable.  Many people don’t know what its like to carry around a 50 plus lb bag for days at a time but trying to do so with a poorly fitting pack will kill your back.  ITS WORTH IT

Config: Lots of pockets is better! BOB don’t really need to hold large singular items so its best to use a bag that does your gear sorting for you, its really difficult to access your gear if its all in one big pouch and what you need is right in the middle.

Frame: This is a source of much debate and I will just claim my side right now.  CHOOSE AN EXTERNAL FRAME PACK.  External frames tend to hold more better.  That osprey I mentioned earlier is a great example.  Its an internal frame contoured pack and almost the same volume as my current bug our bag but it only holds about 60% of what i need due to its odd contoured shape.  My external framed BOB is a nice square main compartment with no odd curves keeping me from storing straight objects like tent poles, a shotgun, or even a shovel.  These external frames are great for additional use, from clipping other gear to them with MOLE or carabiners to being able to modify them for use as a sled in the snow…seriously they are way better, yes you will look like a boy scout but you will be better prepared

Now that you have a good guideline to what to look for in a bug out bag let me warn you of what to avoid: Almost everything you find easily in a retail setting branded as “Tactical” is a piece of junk, avoid it like the plague, they don’t work better, no one things you are cooler, and girls wont want to date you more..so forget about it.  Go for quality and fit before anything else.

Tomorrow I will be reviewing my BOB, until then all 3 of you will just have to wait to see what I use…I know the suspense is killing you.

HHS is getting the ordering right, with a supplemental order of an additional 29 million doses of the vaccine that defends against H1n1.

In the recent past there had been much concern that the vaccine was being under ordered leaving millions of at risk Americans susceptible to infection.  Most states are on track for a delivery date some time in the next three weeks with the vaccine now told to be a nasal spray and not delivered by injection.

This additional order comes one week after the FDA formally approved the vaccine. The FDA’s announcement means that CSL Limited, MedImmune LLC, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Limited, and Sanofi Pasteur Inc., all have the official go ahead to fulfill the first large round orders of the vaccine.

From the Examiner.com

Contrary to earlier reports saying that it may take two doses of the vaccine to provide the proper immunity to the virus, the FDA confirmed – in its press release – that clinical trials indicate “the 2009 H1N1 vaccines induce a robust immune response in most healthy adults eight to 10 days after a single dose.” They go on to say that the response time is typical of even seasonal flu vaccines.

The drug manufacturer Novartis claimed on September, 3,  that “the study showed a strong, potentially protective, immune response in 80% of subjects after one dose.” MedImmune also claims that its intranasal spray vaccine “prompts the body to begin mounting an immune response after the first dose.”

So there you have it, much of the concern of the execution of this vaccine have been solved over the past week, as more information comes in will be posted here. oink oink.

Im just going to explain the photo reference now so you wont spend the whole day confused….above is a picture of Kool and The Gange…the band..get it? the gang…..ugh get with it.

The urban survival what if debate often ends up with a scenario of gangs and looters roaming the streets.  I dont generally buy the what if hype, but this time we should all be listening up.

A while back I wrote about knowing your community, and who is in it to develop a realistic survival plan based on who and what is in your community.  To stress the importance of this understanding check this out:

According to CAL/GANG, a statewide database maintained by the California Department of Justice, the city of Los Angeles is home to 463 gangs with 39,032 members — about the same number as residents of Encino.

Among those, Latino gangs are the most numerous, with 22,309 members. Predominantly African American are the so-called Crip gangs, with 10,306 members, and Blood-affiliated gangs, with 4,209. The rest are smaller gangs. These numbers are down from 1997, when the database showed 64,000 gang members.

Countywide, CAL/GANG estimates there are 1,108 gangs with 85,298 members. About 53,121 are members of predominantly Latino gangs, while the Crips, with 210 cliques, have 17,542. The numbers include those for the city of Los Angeles.

To be listed in the CAL/GANG system, a person must meet two or more of the following criteria: be an admitted gang member, be named by a reliable informant, wear gang attire, display gang signs or tattoos, frequent gang areas or be arrested with known gang members

So if you live in a large city or urban area, even if you don’t agree with the position of preparing to be attacked by your own community the fact remains that in a large city  setting like LA your enemy might not be the natural disaster or the economic downturn, it might be the gangs that already roam your streets every day.

What am I saying exactly? I’m not saying go out and stock pile weapons but I am saying you should try to  understand the threat level on the street in its current condition and them multiply it significantly to understand a glimpse of the threat level you may face when dealing with a large scale disaster.  This is a problem that is mostly unique to the urban survivalist and we need to prepare for real world situations.  Like it or not they are out there and like it or not you should build your preparedness around real world foreseeable threats.

More more information about gangs check out www.streetgangs.com

Thanks to the avid stumbler/ doggie blogger/ all around good guy Brad over at www.goschnauzer.com I have learned how to make a belt, that looks and feels like a normal belt into (drum roll please…..) a 50 foot stash of paracord that you have ready at the moments notice!

Why would you do this? Because its cool, and that’s really important. Also because paracord can be used for near anything, like building a shelter, hanging a clothes line,  repairs etc..

What you need:

about 11 bucks of paracord

a belt buckle

The rest is explained in the link below.  I would credit it and inset it into the blog but these guys, no matter how cool the project has a super strict policy about using their content with out approval, and I have bigger things to worry about…so click the link below to see the step by step guide to making a paracord survival belt.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE A PARACORD SURVIVAL BELT

CLICK HERE TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE A PARACORD SURVIVAL BELT

CLICK HERE TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE A PARACORD SURVIVAL BELT