Mermorial Day in around the corner; this is a pre- THANKS.

This is a short and simple post. Memorial Day is just around the corner and the support of our US troops will skyrocket. I just want to tell them THANK YOU in advance. Everyday should be a memorial day for our fallen soldiers. Again, THANK YOU!

Secure Your Home: Baby Gates and Kill-Zones

     An interesting conversation arose at work yesterday. A co-worker and myself were talking about how home invasions seem to be on the rise in our area. That led to us talking about home security and various ways to make a home more secure. This conversation gave me the idea to start a series of blog posts about home security. Home security is just as important now as it will be after the SHTF.

     Before I start writing the content of the post I am going to give you a portion of Wikipedia's definition of a kill-zone:

"In military tactics, the kill zone, also known as killing zone, is an area entirely covered by defensive fire, an element of ambush within which an approaching enemy force is trapped and destroyed. The objective of the defensive force is to quickly kill or capture all enemy soldiers inside the kill zone."

    While the name, kill-zone, sounds romanticized it is nothing more that a funnel for the bad guys. A properly designed kill zone a slow down or funnel the bad guys to a point in which you can react to their bad actions. 

     Any survival retreat, bug out or bug in location needs kill-zones. I have found that baby gates make great kill-zones inside of your home. For instance, while you are sleeping your dog growls or barks just enough to get your attention and you hear some shuffling from inside your house. Instinctively you grab your home defense weapon and go to investigate. When you look down the hall an armed bad guy is gingerly climbing the baby gate at the end of your hall. Since he was focused on quietly clearing the obstacle you catch him off guard and potentially save your family. Say the bad guy decided to run in for a quick grab and run burglary. The baby gate may trip him up. The baby gate helped to create a kill-zone inside of your home.

I like these types of gates.

     I have a preferred type of baby gate. The ones with the built in door and latch seem to be the most convenient and hardest to knock down. They are truly semi-permanent. The door is handy because the ones that you take down or step over get real annoying real fast.

     If you have a stair well a gate place at the top and bottom of a stair case can slow a bad guy down exponentially and buy your precious time to react in a bad and potentially violent situation. On top of the stated uses these gates are just handy for controlling pets and they do a good job at their intended use as well.

     I will be posting more of these short home security posts from time to time so be sure to subscribe for free if your haven't already. Just click the 'Subscribe via RSS' button on the top right of the page. If your don't use an RSS reader you can subscribe by email at the bottom of this page.

 

REVIEW: KaBar ZK Kharon folding knife

     For about eight weeks now I have been carrying the folding pocket knife from KaBar's Zombie Killer line. I carry this knife everyday and would argue that I use a knife far more than you average Joe on a daily basis. What I am getting at is that my knives a put through a rough tests just from my day to day use.
     So far I find this little knife to be fairly nice. It certainly isn't as high quality as the KaBar combat knives but it is much better than it's $25-$30 price point suggests. The ZK Kharon just may be the most comfortable slim knife I have ever carried. The bright green color is nice if it gets misplaced too. The little bumps all over the handle are hardly noticed while holding the knife but they seem to help with gripping the handle. The clip can be attached to either side with a T7 torx driver. This was important to me because I carry my knives in my left pocket with the blade up. Knives are usually setup for right pocket carry. The blade tension is adjustable but when I get it set where I like it the blade has an ever so slight wobble. It is not too much of a concern right now; the wobble is very faint. Only time will tell how the hinge wears.
     The blade is just ok on the ZK Kharon. I love the Tanto style blade but these Taiwanese KaBars are not made with very good steel from what I have seen. I have to hone my edge about every two days. KaBar could have sold these for a few more bucks and slapped on a higher quality blade. These ZK knives are nothing more than a smart company capitalizing on the current zombie fad though. When the blade is shot and the knife is ready for the junk drawer I may try to recreate and replace its blade with some good high quality steel.
    Should you buy one of these knives? I say it depends on how much money you are looking to spend. If you can buy a SOG, an AMERICAN MADE KaBar, SureFire, Benchmade, or something along those lines then, by all means, skip over KaBar's Taiwan made folder. All in all I like the ZK Kharon, but it's quality level doesn't even come close to stacking us to my USMC edition fixed blade.

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The .22 And The End Of The World As We Know It

Hello Preppers! I haven't had time to post in a while so I am seizing this opportunity while the baby is with his grandmother.

     It seems that all survivalist, preppers, zombie, and general SHTF forums always have a guy asking about using the 10/22 as a primary firearm. My belief is that a .22 is a terrible choice to be our primary post-apocalyptic weapon. Any rim-fire would be a terrible idea. There just not reliable enough. Ag odd quality rifle chambered in .223/5.56 such as an AR-15, a Sig 556, AK-74, or a Steyr Aug what I like try to persuade people towards.  I use an AR-15. The AR-15 and .223/5.56 is a topic of past posts and I'm sure it will come up in future posts. Back to the .22. Many will argue that a .22 is the one and only option for a SHTF rifle. When asked why the answers are generally the same. The guys and gals will go on about how cheaply they can stockpile .22 ammo. The also like the fact that you can carry more rounds before your load gets heavy. They are correct on both points. For me, these advantages do not out weigh the risk of a definite ammo malfunction. If I'm bugging out and come across a pack of filthy looters I want to know that I can reach of and touch someone and not get the familiar "click" that screams "my primer didn't detonate." I certainly don't want that if I'm staring down a herd of zombies.

     All preppers should have a .22 rifle in their stash; it does not need to be a primary defensive weapon. 10/22's are great for general firearms training, small game hunting, and target practice. If you shoot a rabbit that was intended to be dinner with an AK-47 half of your dinner is going to mixed into the dirt right behind the exit wound that is about the size of the rabbit itself. A .22 could have left that meat intact. The next consideration is which .22 should one buy.

     I am a Ruger 10/22 man myself but my dad swears by the Marlin 10/22. The are both great little pieces but I like detachable mags on the Ruger over the tube mags on the Marlin. The Ruger a certainly yhe most su Savage makes a nice affordable .22 too. A few companies are making drop-in .22 conversions for the AR-15. I'm havent uses any of these conversions yet but I hear that they are reliable and fairly accurate. The .223 and 5.56 barrel is only .003" larger inside that the .22. Without shooting with one I cannot know for sure but I imagine that a converted AR shoots about as accurately as a  worn out .22 rifle. What that means is that it is good for general shooting purposes but it not a geed idea to go match shooting with.

      This is off topic (kinda) but I beleive that everyone should listen to Lee Greenwoods's 'God Bless the USA.' at least on a weekly basis. It makes me want to run out and make sure my flag isn't wrapped around the pole.

-MOAAN ABE

A new way to learn survival skills, #skills2live

If you use Twitter and are not using #PrepperTalk you are missing out. @SurvivorJane of SurvivorJane.com created the Twitter chat a little while back and it has grown at an impressive rate. All day but especially in the evenings fellow preppers use #PrepperTalk to chat about various subjects related to prepping and preppers interests. If you are unsure how to use a hash-tag (#) in Twitter it is simple. Twitter groups all tweets that have a same hash-tag. For example, if I use #zombies any tweet that has #zombies in it will show up on my twitter screen. It basically turns twitter into a handy chat room.

I use #PrepperTalk daily under my @ZSsurvival Twitter name.  I would like to see a hash-tag that groups survival skills such as fire starting, shelter building, trapping, water purification, and so on. I have not seen that so I am going to start new hash-tag, #skills2live. Any time you want to know or have information to share related to the subjects listed in the lines above just use #skills2live on Twitter. If you are not using Twitter you should be but let me warn you #PrepperTalk is addictive but it is a good addiction to have.

Building Your Food Stores Without Going Broke

Today I want to touch on the topic of food storage. Food and water storage needs to be a staple in any preppers lifestyle.  The general rule of thumb is that you need 25 lbs of grains like rice, wheat, corn, etc for each person per month you are prepping for. On that same scale you will need 5 lbs of dry beans. For example. if you are prepping for 3 months for a family of four you need 300 lbs or grains and 60 lbs of beans. You also need 1 gallon of water per each per for everyday. I will discuss water storage in another post. These are very general rules.. I'm sure you can imagine how expensive prepping can get if your buy all of your food at once. They is hope for those of thus that don't have a whole lot of extra cash laying around.

First of all, you NEED a 72 hour kit. Go ahead and shell out the cash to get that kit in place. If disaster strikes tomorrow, and it WILL for someone, you will be glad you did. Now that the 72 hour kit is in place just set it aside. That kit does not count toward your food stores. To start on your food stores you need to go look in your pantry. Make a list of what types of canned goods you keep at home. This list is going to be the basis of you food preps. Any time you go into the grocery store you are going to but a bag of dried beans and a bag of rice. Those are only a buck or two each. You are also going to buy three canned goods from you list. You are out $5-$7 and you have already increased your survivability by a few points. Be sure to mix up the types of beans and canned goods you buy so you have a little variety. Pretty simple, right?

You want to build up at least 3 months of food and water stores as quickly as you can but I suggest just taking inventory once monthly or bi-monthly. Progress will seem slow is you recalculate every time you add to your stores. Storing food preps is not a daunting task but it sure can seem to be sometimes. One way to save a lot of money is to get more bang for your buck. Use coupons! You will get more product for less money, in turn your food stores will grow exponentially faster. Buy one get one free offers on canned goods are like a guaranteed win lottery ticket to preppers.

Once you have built up your three months of food stores you should consider preserving your own food too. Canning is is great way to preserve some good food. Canned meat will be like gold when the SHTF! You can can almost anything including pre-made meals. I love to can molle chicken with green salsa. It goes great over all of that rice you have stored up.

Once you have a nice stockpile you can start using it as you own grocery store. If you take one can of green beans just be sure to replace it with two when you find that by one get one free offer. Doing this helps to rotate your stock as well. I just hope that any of you that are reading my blog don't think SHTF survival will be like a Man vs. Wild episode. You need to store food. Wildlife populations will quickly be depleted by the unprepared if we are cut off from the support of our society for only a few days. Primitive survival skills are great but we are not looking for rescue helicopters when the SHTF! Get you 72 hour kit and set it aside. Start on your preps and look at your progress in a month. You won't be so nervous come December of 2012. It is in the back of all of our minds........"What if they are right."

It looks like Bin Laden is back. Don't worry he will die AGAIN. :D

This is not something I would usually post but I felt that I just had to when I saw "Bin Laden.....will die.....AGAIN!"

This is too funny :D