�When it is extremely important that your pants stay up, use both a belt and suspenders, along with buttons on your shirttails,� a Russian proverb says. This basic homily echoes the Golden Rule of Survival, known as the Rule of Threes.

The Pacific Northwest Nez Perce Indians probably deserve the most thanks for refining this rule into a genuinely workable survival plan. Most likely this plan became part of their culture in about 1730 with arrival of their first horses. The Nez Perce were the only tribe of North American Indians who learned to selectively breed their stock, leading to development of the famous Appaloosa warhorse.

The Nez Perce were unique in several other regards. They were the only tribe that did not routinely starve every winter. They had a lifesaving survival plan that soon became an integral part of their culture.

It was a model of simplicity, explaining in large part its great success. The Nez Perce discovered that for everything really, truly important to life, three separate and distinct methods of supply must be developed. As it evolved through the years, this Rule of Threes proved to be extremely wise. Obviously the Nez Perce applied this rule to their life in the country, but experienced city survivors have found that it works equally well for them.

The system�s corollary proved equally profound. The Nez Perce found�especially in the short run�it does not take very much in an absolute sense to stay alive. Elements of basic survival were simply seen as food, water, energy, shelter, and possibly articles of personal encouragement. In our culture these personal items might be art, music, or perhaps a Bible. One woman I know believes this should include a hot shower once a week. Because these items are so absolutely necessary, positive provision for their supply must be made. Twentieth-century experience suggests that we must include medications, clothing, and self-defense in this list. But we also now know passive defense systems�such as simply laying low and hiding�are often as effective as active ones.

First contact with Europeans for the Nez Perce came on September 20, 1805, when Lewis and Clark rode down out of the mountains into their remote area of what is now the state of Idaho. At that time the Nez Perce already owned six modern (for that era) rifles! These had been bartered from the Mandans and Hidatsa, who had bought them from French and British traders. Because their Appaloosa horses were so valuable, the Nez Perce were able to trade for equally valuable items such as rifles, powder, and balls. Another rule of survival comes into view

Even before firearms, the Nez Perce were able to survive using their Rule of Threes. Later on, having a few figurative trade dollars in their pouches allowed them to survive in much better style. It�s still true today�those with their financial houses in order will survive better and more easily than those who are forced to live under more basic conditions. Those with money for guns and ammo, especially in cities, have a far better chance at survival.

While the basic Rule of Threes works in a day-to-day, practical sense in the city or country, it can also be deployed by those who are into recreational nuts-twigs-and-berries primitive survival. The rule gently draws all of us into a workable plan. People don�t have to leave their current homes for mice-infested, drafty cabins in the hills in order to live.

Employing the Rule of Threes, we know that when food is vital for you and your family�s survival, you should develop at least three separate and distinct sources of supply. No one source can in any way be dependent on the other for its implementation. Each on its own should be capable of feeding you and your family during an emergency.

My father and his family in post-World War�I Germany, for example, relied on the rabbits and pigeons they tended, the garden vegetables they raised, and wild edibles they found in the fields and city parks, as well as what they bartered for with surrounding farmers. They lived in the center of a large city.

In a more modern context, city dwellers can expect to rely on their domestic rabbits, their gardens, and scrounged edibles gathered from surrounding fields, parks, and rivers, as well as consumption of stocks of previously stored supplies as needed.

The other vital rule is the Rule of Survival Thermodynamics. This means that you must never put more energy into a survival activity than is taken out. Those who fail to heed this warning quickly become casualties.

This generally rules out sport hunting and fishing, but opportunistic shooting of critters for the pot in the course of other survival-related activities probably would not violate this precept. Keep in mind that in Indian cultures, most edible critters were caught in snares or deadfalls. Theories of fair chase and conservation did not enter the equation.

Gardening as a survival technique may also be impractical for many people who haven�t gardened before in their specific area. However, survivors who are already practiced in their city-based gardening skills can probably see a net gain for their efforts.

Foraging in the city can also yield food, but it is difficult. Our early Indians learned to properly treat acorn meat (washing out the tannic acid), hunt wild bees, dig edible flower bulbs, and collect cattails and many other edible plants. Today, in the city or country, the only foraging technique that practically qualifies for most Americans involves gathering cattails. Other edibles are sparse, hard to recognize, of little food value, and generally unavailable in winter. As a practical matter, collecting nuts, berries, and twigs generally makes little survival sense.

But the good news for city dwellers is that cattails are every where. My old, old account regarding cattails with which many survivors are already familiar, involves the time I was riding in a taxi from National Airport at Washington, D.C., (now Ronald Reagan National Airport) into town with a skeptical newspaper reporter anxious to discredit all survivors. We passed acre upon acre of cattails growing wild along the Potomac River. My point about these being an excellent survival food that was commonly available in an emergency was instantly made.

During the fall and winter, cattail roots can be sliced and boiled, substituting for potatoes. In spring and summer, tender shoots can be harvested and steamed for the table. In season, cattail pollen is relatively easy to collect, substituting for flour as much as 50 percent by volume in biscuits. Green cattail flowers are also nutritious and abundant when collected and eaten before they mature and brown. Most important, easily identified cattails grow everywhere in the United States in great abundance. Nothing else looks like a cattail and they are never toxic. The danger is, of course, that over time, many city survivors will obliterate limited city cattail beds, but so far this has not happened. Despite my best efforts at promotion, few people seem to know about and use cattails!

Another valuable food source available to city dwellers is rabbits and pigeons. Those who have never raised livestock before will find these animals fairly easy to raise. Rabbits are some of the best composters available, and they eat just about any cellulose at hand. After learning how to handle them, three females and a buck will produce enough meat for two rabbit-meat meals per week, while simultaneously fertilizing the garden. And they are good city animals. I recently discovered an extensive, mostly hidden, rabbit enterprise in a crowded English city.

As a food source, common pigeons are another critter with great charm when raised in the city. They fly out to get their own food and water from a roost that can be established virtually anywhere. Fifteen adults easily produce sufficient meat for another two meals per week. There will be more about raising these critters in the city in subsequent chapters.

Game animals of all kinds from rabbits to carp are best trapped. Learning how isn�t difficult. Set out great numbers of traps, repeating what works. In cities, expect to catch cats, dogs, and rats; in the country, look for deer, rabbits, and geese. Trapping wild or semi-wild game is part of the Rule of Threes for both city and rural survival.

Bartering with farmers and stockmen for edibles is another alternative. Those living near farms may be able learn how to preserve harvests themselves. Like country survivors, the city variety must be willing and able to preserve their own food.

Most city survivors will elect to make stockpiling a large part of their three-legged food survival program. Understanding how to effectively stockpile intimidates some folks. Here�s a simple way to determine what you�ll need: Instead of guessing about what you think you�ll need, just start buying doubles of all the essential items you normally purchase. For 8 months preceding the hour of need, start saving all these extra supplies in one set-aside survival area. Soon there will be more than enough lightbulbs, hand soap, sanitary napkins, coffee, and so on, to see you past an emergency.

Three sources of potable water are a must. One source could be the municipal pipe into your home, but is not a source you can count on. City dwellers might consider renting a shallow well auger to sink their own backyard well. It is not too early to think about the availability of pond, river, or lake water as part of one�s water Rule of Threes. You�ll also want to consider a rig to catch and store rainwater from house and building roofs. All that is needed to implement this collection storage plan in most city circumstances are some extra gutter, plastic tarp, and plastic storage barrels (which for some reason are most often blue). Other suggestions are to store water in bottles, bladders such as waterbeds, or fiberglass water tanks.

Planning three sources of energy is not tough once you overcome the realization that they probably all must be purchased well ahead of need or, within cities, actively scrounged up by creative survivors. I plan to use 1,000 gallons of stored fuel oil to run my generator and provide some heat, and 1,000 gallons of propane to cook, heat water, and perhaps warm the house. Large propane storage tanks may not be legal in cities, but I know of two current survivors who have 1,000-gallon propane tanks buried out of sight under their garage floor. My third energy source is 25 cords of scrap wood that I can replenish from abandoned buildings and storage areas as needed. I could heat, cook, and survive with scrap pallet wood alone.

Depending on one�s specific circumstances, there are also coal, geothermal devices, solar cells, and fuel cells. Small, increasingly inexpensive fuel cells used for direct electrical conversion from LP (liquid propane) gas are coming on the scene. There are also very unconventional fuel sources. My father ran out every time a team of horses came by to scoop up any road apples, which were either dried for fuel or shoveled into the garden as fertilizer. Although road apples have gone the way of dinosaurs in most places, your city survival plan will eventually entail these sorts of improvisations.

Shelter in our list of threes also encompasses clothing and emergency medical supplies. Most people in our outdoor-oriented society have sufficient boots, jackets, and warm, woolly sweaters to wear when the place can�t be kept at 62 degrees. Emergency medical supplies are a complex, separate, and very philosophical issue that should be addressed by survivors as quickly as possible.

Shelter might be your present home or apartment. First backup can include an abandoned cellar, backyard dugout, a tent, or per haps a cooperative area, depending on risk levels. Others may have a travel camper, old bus body, or even an old warehouse in which to hide a shelter. You may make tentative plans to move in with your kids or back to your parents. Anything just so long as the Rule of Threes relative to shelters is addressed.

It�s tough advice for city people, but no matter what, never, never become a refugee. Survival rates among refugees with no control of their destinies are dismal. Refugees are totally the wards of government. If you believe the government does an adequate job of running the post office, Social Security, and the military, then you will probably be satisfied with the way it will run your life as a refugee. Effective hiding is an important part of city survival as it relates to the Rule of Threes.

Our technology is changing quickly. For this and reasons of personal circumstances, skills, and likes and dislikes, our personal survival plans are never final. Readers should include survival means that I have never dreamed of within their own Rule of Threes. A survivor in east Boise, Idaho, has his own private geothermal heat. well, for instance! We will miss opportunities unless we are constantly alert for them.

This is the overall guiding philosophy to survival. Obviously it applies to city survival. Commit to it and you will live. To gloss over parts of it is to suffer extreme consequences.

�Successful city survivors will have to drink lots of brown and green water.�

After hearing this a second and third time from survivors of Berlin and Beirut, it was obvious that this was going to be a very nasty chapter.

It�s akin to the social structure in socialistic economies. Everyone is equal, but some comrades are more equal than all the others. Supplies of water are like that! All absolute elements of survival will lead to death when denied, but depending on weather, workload, and physical condition of the survivor, water is the most immediate. Without it you die quickly and cruelly.

The Rule of Threes is an iron rule in the case of city survivors and water.

But there is great cause for hope. In a very few cases, water continues to run from the pipe. It may not be usable without further treatment, but it is something to work with. For purposes of this chapter, though, tap water is not a consideration. Few experienced been there, done that city survivors mention using it.

It isn�t an accident of history that many cities in the world were built around natural waterways. Easier transportation using boats and barges in the early days led to that. Cities grew around profitable commerce. Securing adequate potable water may simply be a matter of laying in securely covered, easily filled and cleaned plastic buckets, a carrying yoke, filter racks, purification chemicals, and larger retreat-type storage tanks to be used to haul, treat, and store water from rivers and ponds running through or lying around our cities.

In real life it is seldom that easy. Survival is never particularly easy or convenient. It is not a game for lazy folks who cannot or will not plan ahead.

For a brief time in World War I Germany, my father hauled his water from an obscure shallow well. The well was reasonably close as well as being sheltered from view Because the water was drawn from a depth of only about 20 feet, it probably contained contaminants and growies. At least these weren�t large, lumpy green and brown ones, and the family all lived through it. Then somebody stole the handpump. His mother traded for another. Somebody stole that one, too. The pump should have been taken off between uses, but it was too late. Now it was a long hike to the river.

I don�t know of a community well left in any large city anywhere in the world. In some places where there are larger, open spaces occupied by gardens, parks, backyards, or even median strips in roadways, it might be possible to drill, drive, or auger in private, shallow wells. When these are put in place, they usually provide sufficient water for a family I recently saw one not too far from the center of London. And a survivor from Atlanta wrote that he had produced a shallow well in his backyard behind a three-story apartment complex! These things do occur, but of course won�t unless survivors look for opportunities to put them in place before an emergency

When much younger I used a gasoline engine power head that slowly turned a 2.5-inch auger shaft to drill shallow wells. It was OK technology for wells no deeper than 25 feet where the underlying material was sandy and rock free. How times have changed! Everything is more sophisticated, expensive, and certain. Deeprock Manufacturing, 2200 Anderson Road, Opelika, AL 36801, sells a small two- or three-man well-drilling outfit, complete with mud pump (to lubricate and flush out the hole) that will go down 200 feet! Other than those living in the and West, everyone is assured of water using one of these outfits. The cost is about $3,000 for their smallest model, #2000, which will even drill through solid rock. It takes two people about a day to drill their own private well. Frequently these rigs are available from rental shops. In areas where they are commonly used, a good resale market exists.

All well bores must be cased. For ease of operation and speed, use the smallest drill or auger possible that will also produce an adequate sized well hole. Bore a hole about 1 � to 2 inches larger than the well casing. The casing can be plastic if it will slip straight down easily. When additional pounding is required to set the casing, steel is a must. Plastic or steel, a pointed brass well screen is installed on the bottom end of all well casings. Install a well of a size on the very low end of what is common in your area�usually a 1.25-inch one.

Old-fashioned drill augers we used long ago did not have reverse. We quickly learned not to get into this business without a large, rugged set of pipe wrenches with which to back the auger out if stuck by a rock.

Standard power heads are available to rent just about anyplace in the United States. Contractors use them with 12-inch augers to dig postholes. With careful planning, it is possible to purchase 20 feet of 2-inch auger shaft that fits on these standard contractor-type power heads, allowing insertion of a standard 1.25-inch well casing.

How do you tell whether there is water at the bottom of the hole? Pour water into the hollow well pipe. If it rapidly flows away through the sand and gravel screen, there is water below.

Another detail that makes life easier for do-it-yourself well developers: Three or four 7- or 8-foot well-casing sections with appropriate connections are easier to place than trying to insert a single 20-foot length of pipe.

It ain�t easy, but shallow wells can also be driven down into sandy, rock-free ground by hand. The presence of tough clay or any coarse gravel or rock precludes using the following method, which is already so much work that I am reluctant to mention it.

The tools required are a 10-pound (or larger) steel maul, two 36-inch steel pipe wrenches, a 5-gallon water bucket, and some very sturdy boxes, logs, or scaffolds to build up a place to work from. Start with three 6-foot lengths of heavy, steel 1.25-inch well pipe. Special heavy-duty drive couplings needed to connect the pipe sections and a special drive cap to protect pipe threads while whacking away at the pipe end are also required. You will also need a special, heavy-duty well point screen made for this type of mauling. These fittings are not common, but all large plumbing shops I know of can order them. If not, try Lehman�s Hardware and Appliances, Inc., Box 41, Kidron, OH 44636. Their stuff is a bit price) but is of very good quality and fully guaranteed. Lehman�s sells predominantly to the Amish community and are very nice folks indeed to work with. I recommend paying up promptly, gladly, and without a whimper, no matter what the price.

Deploying three or four stout men, take turns pounding the point and pipe down into the ground. Two things make this marginally easier. Using the two pipe wrenches and a section of pipe over the handle, keep rotating the well pipe and point as it goes down. Keeping the pipe full of water is messy when it is hit, but will marginally lubricate the point as it goes down.

The maximum depth is 20 to 25 feet. Never assume that this will be easy, but in areas where surface water rises to within 20 feet of the ground and where there is no gravel or rock, it works like a champ. No expensive equipment is needed, there�s not much mess or fuss, and it can usually be undertaken in an afternoon. It�s all we had when I was a kid. Many wells of this type were driven right in our friends� backyards in the middle of town.

Water can, theoretically, be pumped by hand from as deep as 200 feet using special handpumps. These and more practical shallow-well pitcher-and-stand pumps are available from Lehman�s Hardware.

What can you do if you have the opportunity to rope-haul fresh drinking water up from a steep canyon or perhaps a very deep abandoned well? Climbing down to the water may be impossible, so what to do?

Lehman�s sells a special 2-gallon bucket with a unique valve that opens when it hits the water, closing again automatically when the bucket is withdrawn. A rope the length of the drop is required. It�s lots of work using this method, but it may be the only game in town when the water cannot be otherwise reached.

The need for potable water is of such a high order that an initial emergency storage supply must be provided. Waterbed bladders, cheap fiberglass tanks, blue barrels, or whatever else work nicely, just so long as you don�t use those ridiculous small packets and cans that some survival houses sell. The huge amount of trash generated by these little packets alone may expose the retreat. I personally use a 250-gallon fiberglass tank purchased for $150 (peanuts, given water�s importance).

This storage will get you past the onset of an emergency, but it�s absolutely not meant as a continuing means of survival. How much water will you need Figure about 1 gallon a day per person if no one washes anything except teeth and a single cup or plate. As a simple matter of hygienics, this is practical only in the very short run.

In other words, when the sound of gunfire can be heard in the distance, fill all the fiberglass tanks, blue plastic barrels, waterbed bladders, 5-gallon jugs, and whatever else. Uncovered water, as in bathtubs, usually doesn�t work. There�s too much pollution accompanied by evaporation. I don�t even own a bathtub, but if I did, I wouldn�t want it full of slimy; green water!

Shallow-well water must be chlorinated, but does not generally have to be filtered. As always, common sense in your individual situation is advised.

Saltwater will be available to many city survivors. Lehman�s has small, reverse-osmosis water purifiers and filters. Model TEC 25D for about $325 looks like it might work. Under normal conditions it is rated at 18 gallons per day. I called Lehman�s to find out whether this unit would function as an emergency small-scale desalination plant. One person said �probably,� another �might,� and the third, most knowledgeable, guy said, �Probably not, because ocean water carries salt concentrations that are too high.� I personally would like to field-test this outfit. Let�s say it cleaned half its rated capacity, or 9 gallons per day, and that the membrane lasted 1 year rather than 3 (replacements cost about $100). These would be good units for some city survivors. The only restriction is that a water pressure of 40 pounds per square inch is required to operate. This pressure could be achieved by generator-run electric pumps or by a 2-story column of water in a standpipe. I live 500 miles from the nearest saltwater, so field-testing a model TEC 250 probably won�t happen.

Common reverse-osmosis desalinization units require very little power. Smaller and smaller sizes are increasingly on the market. I looked at one in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, that cost U.S. $175,000 installed! It produced 80 gallons of pure, fresh water per minute. Practical for some cheap, deserted islands, but certainly not for most city survivors.

One fellow survived several weeks under really desperate conditions in Mombasa, Kenya. He had made a tiny distillery unit that produced about a gallon per day, but his method doesn�t sound particularly practical because of the vast amount of energy required. He soldered a long coil of 3/8-inch flexible copper pipe to the lid vent of a 16-quart pressure cooker pot. During the cool of the evening he slowly boiled away salt water, allowing water vapors to condense in the tube. Mere cupfuls of water were all he got. Had he not been able to supplement this with rainwater, he probably would have been toast.

In aggressively capitalistic Beirut, water sellers quickly took to the streets after the city collapsed. Theirs was a profit motive that ended up saving lives. They trucked in relatively safe, pure drinking water they loaded at outlying springs and wells and sold it by the liter. While you can�t depend on entrepreneurs appearing, unless you are in a previously hard-core socialistic area with few remaining entrepreneurs, it is reasonable that such suppliers will quickly evolve.

But you can�t always count on the marketplace. I know about the tremendous importance of this firsthand. It involved my being sent to Algiers on business. Really the end of the earth. There were many, many things to do, all heavily hindered by the fact that I had to spend large blocks of time each morning in search of drinking water. The climate was hot and loathsome, requiring lots of water. Much against my will, the experience became deeply educational.

After 3 days I had a regular route moving from shop to shop, inquiring about the day�s supply. No Wal-Marts in Algiers or anywhere in Algeria. For unfathomable reasons, the owner of one obscure little shop or stall might have a liter bottle to sell, when previously he just shook his head. Price was about $1.80 but I certainly didn�t quibble. Usually only a single bottle was available; when it was a half-liter, I continued the march. For about 10 days I lived on 2 liters of purchased bottled water per day. Most days it took 3 hours to line up a supply.

I�m sorry to report that finally, good old intrepid Ragnar was done in by the Algerian system. No business could be done; everything was too inefficient. I booked the next flight out. Back in Paris I sat in a tub for 3 hours!

City survivors often talk about stealing needed supplies. Of lining up with the enemy to receive water from the supply truck, of breaking into factories, or hospitals, and so forth, to appropriate supplies. These targets of opportunity may work on a temporary basis, but along with windmills, eating seaweed, apples, or whatever else are not considered here. The Rule of Threes requires that we plan for what at the time appears to be a certain source.

Mannan Sheikh was 12 years old when Britain dissolved its Indian Empire on Friday, August 15, 1947. Independence granted to the subcontinent led to immediate, serious�often vicious and irrational�violence. Mannan, a Muslim, vividly remembers the terror, bloodshed, pain, and great destruction as Hindus and Muslims sorted themselves out into two separate countries. Mannan and his family walked from their previous homes in New Delhi, India, to their new place in Karachi, Pakistan.

I asked what they did for fuel along their exit route.

�We scrounged and stole it,� he responded softly. �Those of us who did it best lived the best. We had sticks, grass, camel dung, and some kerosene with which to warm ourselves and our food each morning with all the tens of thousands similarly engaged. It is little wonder governments take such a dim view of refugees, treating them so horribly�

Sources of fuel required to sustain life will certainly be on almost everyone�s list of threes. I cannot imagine a situation where this vital requirement is taken lightly and there will still be survival.

Some city survivors will be located in sufficiently warm places that they will require little. more than a sweater at night and some fuel to cook with and to warm wash water. In many U.S. cities, even at their nastiest time of the winter, survivors will need do little more than put on an extra sweater. In other places in the northern United States and Europe, great quantities of fuel and the means to use it will be essential for city survival.

Rural survivors generally rely on stored sources of energy. Several thousand gallons of fuel oil, large cylinders of LP gas, barrels of gasoline, and piles of coal are common. In many instances these comprise only a year�s to 18 months� supply Anything more than that must be scrounged up from renewable sources such as a seam of coal in the hill behind the house, firewood, windmills, or even solar energy of one sort or another.

Renewable sources are not as far-fetched nor as impossible for city survivors as one might initially suppose. Storage and renewal of energy in a city is possible for those who plan ahead. Many are doing it right now.

A city survivor in Knoxville, Tennessee, wrote to tell me about the seam of low-grade coal he discovered in a roadcut about a mile from his home. His intention was to stockpile about 30 to 40 burlap bags of purchase coal and then to strip coal from the seam as needed. He said that probably no one else knew about this little �gold mine of energy�

Here is another unique source of fuel for city survivors that readers have written about. A survivor from Minneapolis suggests stockpiling packed compressed and wrapped bales of common peat as sold by garden supply stores. He uses a small cast-iron stove both to cook and to heat his small retreat area in the big city. One 40-pound, 4-cubic-foot bale heated his basement apartment for about 3 weeks, he claims. On that basis, eight bales would just about see him through the cold time. More remarkable, he also found a way to renew his peat supply

An old, now-drained swamp lies to the north of his built-up area. It contains a vein of peat 40 feet deep in many places. During the summer dry time he carefully dug several large trailer loads of wild peat, which he took back to his apartment. Attempts to sundry the material on plastic tarps were only modestly successful, he claims. Still, the material burns, cooks, and heats just fine, but it is very difficult to compact and store, he reports. Also, it is messy. I reminded him that while not perfect, it was an energy source he could live with.

Perhaps the important concept for city survivors involves looking around with a knowing, intelligent eye. Other renewable sources of energy besides miscellaneous sticks, grass, firewood (from parks and arboreta), animal dung, old furniture, garbage, and refuse are out there. Several friends report successfully using dried kernel corn and wheat in pellet-type stoves. Seems like an incredible waste of something that should be eaten. But we never know. How far do you live from grain terminals? The claim is made that no city dweller in Portland, Oregon, lives more than a mile from a grain terminal. Turning dried grains into a flammable energy source takes some additional stove maintenance and operator skill, but it apparently is a feasible plan.

But, back to advanced purchase and fuel storage in a city. History shows that city survivors in the very center of an intensely built-up area may not be able to take advantage of very many renewable sources of energy, and they may not be able to store same with ease. But, they can definitely store some energy for emergency use and there is always the possibility of some scrounging.

Right now, city survivors are unobtrusively laying in bales of peat, tanks and drums of diesel oil, cans of gasoline, and stacks of firewood in the backyard, garage, or against the side of the duplex. Purchase of older, used, steel 250-gallon fuel oil tanks is possible. These are common in places where natural gas lines have recently been laid and homeowners have converted their oil burners. Used fuel oil tanks are still common in junkyards and at heating and plumbing shops. Right now, there are at least six in a building recycler�s yard within 2 miles of my desk. I have purchased many of these used tanks in good, sound condition for $50 each. I set them in the garage, the basement, or along the side of the duplex where I had them filled with oil. After several weeks the out side tanks blended in with their surroundings. No one paid them notice any longer.

The important concept for city survivors is to not to make assumptions. Storage of energy is probably possible and it probably won�t be very high-tech or complicated.

How much to store? The ugliness in India took 2 years to pass. Madrid, during the Spanish Civil War, was besieged for about 8 months, and Berlin was back to some idea of normal after an especially harsh winter season (of about 6 months). Using Berlin as an example in this case is tough. City survivors would have had to act at least 3 years ahead of total collapse.

Most been there, done that folks recommend a 1 year�s supply of energy under storage. Of course, this amount should be supplemented by at least two other independent and separate sources of supply. The Rule of Threes is never suspended.

Knowing how these energy sources will be used at your specific retreat is very important. Many concepts are workable, but not particularly practical or efficient. I looked at an inner city apartment retreat recently. There was a workable fireplace in which fuel could be burned for cooking. Not wise, it seemed. Certainly meals would be prepared, but little to no heating of the room would be accomplished.

I advise the purchase of a simple, small, inexpensive cast-iron stove and about 6 feet of vent pipe plus an elbow to run the pipe up the chimney. Total cost, including a fireproof mat to set the stove on, about $450. Without the fireplace, the little stove could have been set in the middle of the room with vent pipe out through a hole cut in a side wall. Larger vent pipes additionally heat the room and cool sufficiently by the time they exit the wall, so they pose little fire danger. Little heating and cooking stoves of this type are a bit tricky to operate, but survivors learn surprisingly fast. The stoves� additional charm is that they will burn just about anything, even diesel fuel, if set up correctly

To efficiently burn diesel fuel in a cast-iron stove made for logs, coal, and other such combustibles, construct or scrounge a heavy pot or iron/steel container as large as possible that will sit inside the stove. Fill it two-thirds full of diesel oil. Place a piece of burning cardboard or heavy paper in the oil. Fumes from the warmed oil will burn at the top with a low-grade, warm glow. Intensity and heat output plus oil consumption are controlled by the air intake in the stove and outlet on the rear stove vent. These are very much similar in operation to commercial �spark heaters.�

Because they require storage of bulky, tough-to-handle, highly refined kerosene, I am not particularly fond of the little oriental space-heating stoves often sold by Wal-Mart and Home Depot under the trade name of Sun (or something similar). Numerous city survivors, including my son, claim they will use these because of the following:

��They are inexpensive to purchase and install.

��They are commonly available without hassle from local hardware and builder supply outlets.

��They require no outside source of electrical energy.

��They nicely heat a modestly well-insulated four-room apartment.

��They are light and easily portable.

Similarly informed people often differ in their opinions. And keep in mind that city survivors, including me, may pay with our lives for bad decisions and lack of prior planning. I dislike these heaters because of these factors:

��The fuel is expensive and difficult to find and store.

��They have a relatively low energy output that can only be used to heat. No cooking can be done on these units.

��The kerosene fuel has a relatively low energy output per gallon and can only be used in these little stoves.

��These heaters are cantankerous, difficult, and short-lived in an environment screaming for rugged simplicity and long life.

I like common diesel fuel that can be used in both machinery and heaters. Diesel is the likely fuel you will get from military fuel dumps, old petroleum distribution points, abandoned vehicles, and street merchants. Diesel is what you will probably store in 55-gallon barrels or in the big tank next to the fence.

Some very nice, entirely commercial space heaters are available for city survivors who want to heat with diesel fuel. First, be sure it isn�t possible to scrounge one of the old. army surplus, collapsible, multifuel stoves. A few new ones with only storage corrosion are still out there. Second, consider converting a small cast-iron stove to use oil as previously mentioned. These units are very versatile.

Local plumbing/heating/hardware people will have diesel-oil-burning stoves and space heaters. Stoves run on oil fumes. They require no electricity and are very reliable (Oil is gravity-fed from a storage barrel to the stove). Most weigh about 200 pounds and will heat a small house (six rooms) nicely. They cost about $1,200.

Try Wolf� Steel, 9 Napoleon Road, RR 1, Barrie, Ontario, Canada L4M 4Y8 if your local dealer doesn�t have something suitable. Wolf Steel manufactures a stove called the Napoleon. It�s expensive, but very nice and extremely simple.

Oil space heaters use electric pressure pumps and high-capacity fans to turn diesel oil into heat. They range in price from $160 to $2,000 (for great, giant units used to heat airplane hangars). These are nice units if power is available. Order from Granger Supply if you draw a blank at your local dealer. Granger has one outlet or more in every state in the union.

Oil space heaters are often used in hunting camps, summer homes, garages, and barns. City survivors may wish to purchase their heaters now to learn how to operate them. I, for instance, have burned up three of these units when they accidentally became unplugged. Chickens sitting on the power cord burned one and also the chicken house. Who said true intelligence only comes from actually doing something? This sure is true of my experience with oil space heaters.

Stoves require venting, but no electricity. Space heaters are not vented, but consume lots of electrical energy.

Solar power, windmills, and perhaps small hydroelectric projects are trendy now among city survivors. They are frequently mentioned as the 21st century�s answer to individual electrical power in cities. Solar power systems are being installed around the world with increasing frequency. As a result, we know a bit more about them. I looked at three recently. All are in smaller cities: Pullman, Washington; Kodiak, Alaska; and Boulder, Colorado.

The system in Boulder is extremely simple, with a hot-water pipe on the roof warmed by the sun. Given installation, price, simplicity, and lack of maintenance, it may still be the most practical. Small, discreet copper pipes laid on a south-sloping roof section warm the water, which heats the house. Its installation 20 years ago was very inexpensive. Most people who visit the house are not aware the system exists. Over its life, the system has saved at least $200 to $300 per year in energy costs, the owner claims.

The extent to which a real solar power (sunlight-to-electricity) system would stick out, compromising a retreat, is still subject to debate. One owner says people never notice. The other says it�s obvious what he�s doing. One thing is certain�if an enemy observed and decided to destroy a retreat�s solar power system, damage in a survival sense would be serious. All hope of having electrical power would be gone if this were the only means of providing it.

In other words, even though it works like a champ, solar power still may not be practical for city survivors.

Great misconceptions continue to be attached to solar power. The greatest of these claims is that it will become more practical and cost-efficient as prices for solar panels continue to fall. Well, yes�but really, no�might be the real best answer to this one. Most of the very high cost of a solar power system is not in the panels!

The system in Pullman, Washington, that I examined very closely cost about $65,000 complete. On a bright summer day it supplies enough power to run a large house, a guest-house, and an extensive shop.

Of this 65 grand, 16 solar panels at $375 each total $6,000. The inverter needed to turn the 48-volt direct current to 220-volt alternating current costs right at $9,800. Forty-eight-volt direct current is produced because of its easy storage in twenty-four 2-volt lead acid batteries.

It�s another fallacy that solar panels generate enough electricity on cloudy, short, or wintry days for any practical direct use. This fellow spent more than $9,000 on storage batteries alone. There were also automatic combiner boxes, transfer switches, power panels, and several hundred feet of very expensive, very heavy-gauge wiring. Add another minimum $25,000 to the system for this stuff alone.

His system automatically took power from the solar system till the latter could no longer keep up, then from the grid, and then from batteries. When all of these failed, a diesel generator kicked in. (The diesel generator was not included in the price of the system.) I liked his system, but he only had 300 gallons of diesel oil in reserve.

It seems likely that this is a workable solar power system for real big-city survivors only if they can accommodate the expense. One thing is certain�it would be an injustice and fraud for me to try to set out a specific system that would perform in any reader�s personal circumstances. The one thing I know about solar power today is that is still very, very complex and, overall, very expensive.

However, many people are installing solar power systems specifically designed for their application. In Kodiak, Alaska, we were 12 miles from the grid. Bringing in power costs at least $10,000 per mile. There�d be no chance for any electricity here if it were not for solar power.

Windmills, similarly, are more complicated than many people believe. They also require collection boxes, storage systems, and wiring. The man in Pullman intends to put in a windmill if the city fathers will allow it. (This is university country)

In conclusion, solar power and windmills are currently practical for city survivors. But great diligence during the research phase, as well as deep pockets, will continue to be required. My suggestion is to become familiar, at least in part, with solar power so that you can install the system you need when you can.

Start the process by subscribing to Home Power Magazine, Box 520, Ashland., OR 97520. Home Power�s real strengths are its main advertisers. Without a magazine of this type, we have no idea where to go for needed component supplies. I have written to the magazine suggesting a decrease in articles and an increase in advertising, which is of much greater value.

Average Americans, even those who are somewhat self-sufficient, firmly believe that survival in the city is impossible.

I encountered such a couple recently from Spokane, Washington, who flat-out told me, �If there are serious disruptions, we are all going to die.� Spokane is only a modestly sized city, but she couldn�t make up her mind whether to nod her head (�yes, we are all going to die�) or shake it from side to side (�we don�t have a. prayer�).

Maybe yes and maybe no, I always respond. My father survived World War I in a very big city in Germany. Abdullah, an exchange student, made it right through the worst of Beirut, and Martin Fischer�s grandmother lived through the entire Soviet occupation when she was a younger woman and wouldn�t dare leave the house.

�But what did these people eat?� is always the response.

�Same thing survivors out in the country eat,� I tell them.

Survivors�city or country�have a Rule of Threes with which they must operate. This means that, for every one of life�s absolute needs, they must make advance provision by three separate and distinct methods. City or country, renewable food is provided through storing supplies, gardening, raising livestock, hunting and gathering, scrounging, purchasing, or bartering.

Pick any three. They all have worked in the past and will work again for those willing to make them work.

Hunting and gathering inside a city is possible. I asked a couple from rural Kenya wherever tribal taboos prohibited their eating dogs, cats, and rats in a survival situation. �No,� she responded, �we can eat those animals even outside of survival. It�s critters with scales, like fish, snakes, and even chicken that are taboo.�

Their prohibitions were not nearly so severe as those found among Muslims, but they could�nevertheless�lead to some nastiness. She quickly assured me that she often ate fish. �Grandma still won�t eat them,� she said, �but I have no problem. Thankfully these taboos are in retreat.�

Other than water critters, many other different animals that could advantageously end up in the pot are available in the city. Cats and dogs are some of these!

For some unexplained reason, some cities have many more dogs than cats and vice versa. Both critters are fairly easy to trap using snares in places they commonly run. They can also be taken with silenced .22 rifles when the opportunity is there. Carry your gun and shoot them whey. you see them; don�t go out hunting.

Snares are a kind of wire lasso into which critters push themselves resulting in their capture. Pushing into a snare is fairly natural for wild critters that move around through tight holes, under fences, or through openings in buildings. Professional snares have one-way locks that prevent the cable from loosening.

Ideally, city survivors will have a few snares in their tool kit. If not, snares can be made from light wire. A man living in a western suburb of Chicago caught two marauding beavers by using homemade soft copper-wire snares the first time he ever tried.

Out in the wild, rabbits are often snared with nylon cord or shoelaces. Readers who wish to purchase the real thing similar to ones pictured can write Neil or Rhonda Bock at The Snare Shop, 13191 Phoenix Avenue, Carroll, IA, 51401. The cost, complete, is about $1 per snare delivered in dozen lots.

Snares have been used to catch every animal on earth. Longtime readers are aware of my exploits using snares on moose, deer, and bear. Snares often strangle critters, especially those set to catch by the neck. Leghold snares are also reasonably easy, but not as easy at catching critters about the neck as they push through brush and grass.

Check snares at least once every day unless many critters start falling victim; then check more often. Unless set by experienced trappers, baits are seldom used. Set snares with an 8-inch loop from 12 to 14 inches off the ground for dogs. Smaller critters like cats are caught with smaller loops set closer to the ground.

To city survivors, rats are an absolute bonanza. It is impossible to deplete or hinder a large, active colony even by taking as many as three or four 1-pound critters per week. Six to 12 young are born every 30 days to females, which rebreed 4 or 5 days after giving birth. Females start bearing at four to six months. Rats thrive on virtually any food, including power cables, feed bags, paper, nutshells, fruits, vegetables, or anything else of cellulose they can get a tooth into.

A slick colony trap can be constructed out of a 55- or 30-gallon steel barrel. Rig a smooth board or length of slick aluminum on a hinge on the barrel so that the board or metal extends to the ground but is carefully balanced at the top. Construct it so that a 12-ounce weight on the end over the barrel tips the beam into the barrel, dumping Mr. Rat inside.

Rub a very small amount of cheese or meat onto the end of the balance arm. Rats that walk from the floor up onto the barrel on the balance arm are tipped, screeching and scratching, into the smooth-sided barrel. Empty the barrel twice a day or they will eat each other.

The first trapped rat will call others to come have a look. These traps must be set in among colonies of rats. At times, larger barrels must be dug into the ground a bit; otherwise the balance arms, which must reach the ground, are too long to balance correctly.

Rats can also be caught in small cage-type live traps set in their runs or with bait near the run. Commercial cage traps are available, or you can simply make a little cage trap out of �-inch hardware cloth with a front door that only swings inward as the rat pushes on it to get to the bait.

Snaring rats with very light cable is practical, but you gotta be very hungry. Make snares out of six or eight hair-thin wires pulled from an appliance cord. Loops are set about 1 � inches in diameter in rat runs. Set out eight or 10 snares at a time. After sufficient rats are caught, pull the snares for a week.

Ductile copper acts as its own irreversible slipknot. Hung up, rats quickly strangle themselves, explaining why the traps should be set out in large numbers and checked frequently, and why this is such a disgusting procedure. Even 1 question regularly eating strangled rat

There are a few edible birds in cities. Especially cities with older buildings, damaged and opened so that roosts are convenient. There are pigeons, seagulls, starlings, and even an occasional robin or thrush. Birds are good food for survivors when they can be caught without great effort. Birds fly out to get their own food and water without outside help or direction. The been there, done that folks tell me my large flight traps as described in Survival Poaching and Live Off the Land in the City and Country are impractical for real hard-core city survival. Too big, obvious, tough to build, and too tough to move, they say.

One effective method, previously mentioned for ducks and geese, is to bait very small fishhooks tied to light fishing line with single kernels of corn, a pea, or grain of wheat. Fishhooks can be set unobtrusively in large numbers on building tops in parks or wherever birds feed and where hooking them will not attract attention.

African bird snares are a practical, efficient alternative to larger, cumbersome, obvious bird traps. African bird snares perform nicely on all birds from sparrow size up through turkeys. Snare sizes must be adjusted, but realistically there are only three: small for robins; intermediate for pheasants, grouse, and ducks; and larger sizes for turkeys and geese.

These snare assemblies are made from cross-strips of flat wood. Simple laths., pickets, or even paint can stirrers will work for little snare assemblies. Two-by-four limbs or pieces of wood make a good basis for goose and turkey snares.

Small, hair-thin wires are pulled from copper-wire appliance cord for the snares themselves. Each device has four snares, one on each arm of the wooden cross. Use five or six strands of wire for little birds and 10 or 12 strands on larger critters.

Bait is placed in the middle of the cross. Birds that come in to eat quickly get their legs or necks caught in the snare. Loss of the device is sometimes a problem. Even very small birds can pull the snare assembly out of sight in rough, rubbly areas.

Other, much more complex bird-catching devices are out there, but hooks and African bird snares will virtually always do the job without a great deal of stumbling around.

Absolutely every city in the world I know of has cattails growing someplace within its boundaries. I have observed them from Barrow, Alaska, to Washington, D.C., to Quito, Ecuador.

Cattails were real manna for our Indians. They specifically camped near large cattail beds so they could feed off the plants. Cattails are always nutritious and healthy, even when grown in heavily polluted waters. There�s no question about their identity. They are the ones with brown, tufty, wiener-like flowers at the end of a long stem that we used to dip in diesel and burn for torches when we were kids. It is impossible to mistake these guys for something else.

Cattails as a source of food have so many ways of treating you, you are bound to like one of them. Starting at first blush of spring, shoots grow up from the main roots that eventually become this year�s stem and leaves. These fresh, new little shoots are good eating. Dig and cut up these shoots when they are about 4 to 10 inches long. After 10 inches, the shoots start getting stringy and tough, with a kind of bitter taste, but they still can be harvested, steamcooked, and eaten up until the plants are about 18 inches tall.

Cut the young shoots into macaroni-sized chunks. Boil or steam. They are best with salt and butter, but these seasonings probably won�t be available in survival circumstances. Reportedly they are nutritious. These shoots can also be canned, frozen, or pickled, much like asparagus. When the main season is on, production from just a small patch can be surprisingly large.

Next comes a harvest from the flowers. These are the dry, brown wiener-shaped tops that all of us have seen in cattail patches. Before maturing, these flowers are green, tender, and good, much like ears of corn. Pack them as early as possible. Steam in a flat, covered pan for abort 15 minutes.

Shortly after the flowers mature, they pollinate. We often see clouds of yellow dust flying about bodies of water without knowing the pollen is from the cattails. This pollen ranges from edible to quite good. Collect it by placing a thin plastic bag over the flower and shaking vigorously Usually a teaspoon of pollen will be harvested per plant.

Use this pollen half-and-half with wheat flour or use it straight just like flour. The resulting biscuits are heavy, filling, and hard. Some people say they may even be as nutritious as biscuits made with flour Realistically, I have no way of measuring this nutrition.

Cattail roots actually fatten up in anticipation of winter�s lean times. During fall and winter these roots are dug up, cleaned, and cut up to be boiled and eaten. Eat the whole porridge-like mess or filter and dry the starch from the fiber as a kind of super-bland mashed-potato mix. Entire families have lived through winters on these roots with only addition of a small rabbit, a rat or�in some cases�a muskrat to the pot. Don�t mistake this for good, but it is life-sustaining. All survival food is monotonous.

Exercise care with winter harvest of cattails. The bed will be slowly killed by removal of the roots.

There are common edible items that city survivor hunter/gatherers can expect to find and use to augment their food supplies in or near built-up areas. All will definitely not be available all of the time. When available, all are relatively quick and easy, nicely meeting survival-thermodynamics criteria. Cattails are the exception, in that they are always available in some form or another. In spite of my best efforts to call attention to their value as emergency food, few survivors seem to know or care about cattails.

Gardens are possible even in the most intense inner city situations. Even in the heart of the asphalt jungle, gardens can be eked out of vacant lots, along boulevards, in grassy median strips along superhighways, and in highway cloverleaf structures. I have even seen nice rooftop gardens in downtown Rome and Chicago. These gardens raised ornamental plants, but could easily have contained something as practical as beans, zucchini, carrots, and potatoes.

Available water seems to be the limiting factor in cities, much more than locating a patch of suitable topsoil.

Theft from one�s survival garden in the city was a concern for me, personally. Out in the country garden theft is common. �Not to worry,� the been there, done that committee says. �Most inner city people don�t know a green bean from an edible pod pea,� they say �(The) average city slicker will know large, typical vegetables, such a pumpkins and carrots, tended in neat, orderly, weed-free rows. But they fail miserably to recognize carrots or potatoes growing randomly in the ground.�

City survival gardeners require very fast-growing, high-yield garden vegetables that average people won�t recognize growing out in what seems like the wild. That these vegetables are also easy to process and are nutritious is another bonus. These are the garden items experts always suggest: potatoes, green beans, carrots, and zucchini.

Potatoes just barely made the list. Even though they produce more food per unit of land than any other crop on earth, they are relatively difficult to grow and store. Raising successive crops of potatoes on the same ground is a sure formula for devolution into nothing yields.

A multitude of fungal and bacterial diseases limit amateur potato production. Successfully keeping potato tubers for seed over the winter is never easy. Anyone who has ever kept spuds under the sink knows that even treated, commercial potatoes sprout and spoil easily. Potatoes are a 120-day crop in the northern hemisphere. They should be started as soon as the soil temperature reaches 54 degrees.

Potato tops are not good for anything except nourishing and supporting the tubers below. Few people will actually recognize a potato plant growing out by itself. Plant seed pieces about 4 inches deep. Sprouting occurs within 3 weeks. Soil should be mounded up around the plants to give the spuds more room in which to grow.

Carrots yield well, and they are fairly easy to raise and store. In most cases, mature carrots are simply left in the ground over the winter. Cover with 6 inches of leaves, grass, and duff. Dig up as needed for the pot.

The devil with carrots is getting the seed sprouted in the spring. Their minuscule seeds are easily buried too deep and lost. I cover cover the seeds with a light layer of peat moss and a piece of heavy canvas for 10 days to give them a chance to warm and sprout.

This leaves green beans and zucchini. Beans are excellent for city survivors because the mature pods can be left to dry on the plant when there are too many green beans to be otherwise processed. Production of food from 200 bean plants can be prodigious. Beans manufacture their own nitrogen fertilizer. Seeds saved from the last crop are always viable. When finally induced to sprout, beans do well on even very tired, poor soil.

Most zucchini are also open-pollinating, meaning seeds can be kept from one year to the next. Zucchini are a very short-term crop; it only takes around 53 days from planting to harvesting mature fruit. Everyone knows about the production ability of zucchini. In many places it is the subject of jokes. The biggest problem is storage; zucchini can be kept fresh for about 60 days, but after that they get moldy and deteriorate. Long-term storage entails freezing or canning.

All gardening, city or country, requires practice. Learning curves can be steep, but no two areas in the world are exactly the same relative to gardening techniques. City residents who believe they might someday become survivors can easily learn by placing a few hills of beans, zucchini, and potatoes out in the flower patch for practice. Few seeds and little space are required to experiment. Knowledge gained will be invaluable, especially when spread over a whole lifetime. Small-scale fooling around with garden vegetables leads to a continued supply of fresh seeds at the retreat.

I raised beans, carrots, and zucchini experimentally in a small plot across the street from a condo in which I lived in Boise, Idaho. There was abundant space in the lawns and flower beds among the high-rise buildings. But these flower beds were well tended and I risked having my little experimental garden mistaken for weeds and pulled up. Across the street I noticed a landowner who never mowed, pulled weeds, or fussed in any fashion with his yard. I planted there during the dark of night just a batch of seeds to see what would happen.

Nobody expects very much activity on the part of greenskeepers or gardeners during a city�s collapse. No doubt, concerns about errant weeding would not be justified if everything else around has turned to worms. My experimental seeds sprouted and grew, but languished when I was unable to water them. Boise receives only 7 inches of rain per year, on average�it�s really a desert.

City survivors could successfully learn hunting and gathering techniques on the job. They could also learn to garden in 3 to 4 years. By then, the emergency will have passed or you will have died of starvation.

Food storage and barter are also valid components of a successful city survival food program. Most city survivors emphasize this component over all others. It is a concern that too many survivors will take what presently seems like the quick, easy approach, making food storage their only survival food option. Since we never know with certainty how long any crisis will last, some sort of food replacement strategy will always have to be part of an entire program. Unfortunately storage is not only easy, it leaves a false impression that something has actually been done. The continuing admonition of this book is to start now, even on a very modest scale, to learn how to garden, hunt and gather, and raise edible livestock. We can�t simply store huge quantities of food and allow events to overtake us.

Even under ideal conditions, when little or no prior planning is made to begin consuming stored food, stockpiles will gradually start to diminish as they are used a little bit at a time to support foods coming in from the garden, field, rabbit hutch, and pigeon loft.

But how much food do city survivors need to store? The rule of thumb is that humans will require between 1 and 1� pounds of dehydrated protein, carbohydrates, and calories on a dry-matter basis per day. A second rule of thumb suggests that bland, monotonous foods that survivors in their initial doldrums and boredom are not tempted to sit around and eat should be stored. In other words, you won�t be tempted to sit around eating if the groceries are monotonous.

This psychology may preclude use of some more traditional survival foods. Various plans�including army surplus MREs (meals, ready to eat), cases and cases of bully beef, and peas, dried, dehydrated, etc.�have all been put forward as survival food plans. I, too, have some MREs as well as dehydrated food in storage. But these are expensive and of limited value. I still much prefer more basic, common boring commodities, which are cheap, easy, and convenient. There�s no need to send across the country when you can get them at the local grocery.

Whole grains such as whole wheat, barley and untreated dried peas are too basic, in my opinion. Wheat and barley as they come from the farm, are very inexpensive and easy to acquire. But, if they come directly from the farm they will also contain dirt, trash, chaff, rodent droppings, and bugs that are not particularly nice to deal with in our food. Also, this stuff is the devil to store over the long term.

Avoid all of the instruction regarding dry ice, freezing, and whatnot by purchasing commodities that have been factory cleaned, sterilized, and packaged. To that end I really like dried split peas, dried milk, lentils, dried beans, milled wheat flour, basic sugar, and vegetable oil as stored survival rations.

Dried split peas, lentils, and dried beans are, to some extent, an acquired taste. Especially if that�s all there is with little variety day to day. But add a bit of rabbit, pigeon, cattail, fish, duck, or rat from time to time and these foods start tasting good. They are also extremely nutritious.

All these dried goods are simple and cheap to purchase as well as easy to store. Absolutely every large warehouse supermarket I have been in has all of these items in large, durable, sealed bags.

My basic supply for a family of four for 1 year, assuming some augmentation from fields and garden, is as follows:

Try buying this level of eating using MREs for anywhere near this money.

Reconstituted with water and bulked with a few other items brought into the retreat, the above stocks will definitely sustain life for a party of four for 1 year. Simplicity always counts heavily in survival situations, and this inventory is simplicity itself. The entire year�s supply will fit under a folding table!

As long as the bags are kept from dampness, rats and mice, bugs, and physical damage, all this supply can be stacked as is on shelves. I presently keep two-thirds of my supply piled on an open shelf in a special, mouse-proofed storeroom.

Most city survivors take the additional precaution of further sealing their emergency rations in large plastic garbage cans. Although rotating supplies is advised, I have peas and lentils sealed in these cans from 1976! All are in reasonably good condition, with little to no stale taste when cooked up.

Barter of excess or unneeded food supplies is mentioned by all of the been there, done that crew. Because this list of emergency foods is so modest and currently so cheap and easy, survivors may wish to double or triple listed amounts. Storage and caching involves more than this humble list of food, and will be covered in depth in Chapter 9.

Many of these food items are very much an acquired taste. It is likely you won�t like lentils. Most Americans do not. Experimenting a bit now could make the process easier later. In their defense, lentils are considered to :)e one of the best, most nutritious highdensity sources of vegetable protein!

This chapter is about sustaining life on a number of unusual to weird to frequently repulsive food items. Not a lot of familiar meat and potato items are found here. My mind goes back to the Indians (on the Indian subcontinent) as contrasted with the Chinese whenever I contemplate food issues and survival. Both countries have roughly similar land areas, population densities, growing seasons, soil, rainfall, and general crop-raising capacities.

Yet there are dramatic differences in their societies. At the same time that the Indians go hungry, sometimes starving as a result of periodic famine, the Chinese grow fat. The question is, �Why?� It�s simplicity itself. My personal, on-the-ground observation is that the Chinese eat everything from shark fins to bird nests, to duck feet and tongues, convincing themselves in the process that they are eating delicacies.

Indians, on the other hand, are beset and constrained by dozens and dozens of cultural, religious, social, and structural taboos that preclude them from enjoying and eating things all around them. Indians of some sort or another won�t eat pork, cattle, chickens, snakes, some seafood, some mammals, and a host of stuff in between. An average Indian hotel restaurant usually has five different menus, virtually from five different kitchens requiring five different sets of pots and pans. How they traditionally sorted it out without using computers is a mystery. The problems with confusion and inefficiencies in this system are obvious.

Survivors, in the city or anyplace else, don�t have time for such fooling around. You will have to eat what is on hand, receiving with thanks whatever will sustain life.

Quick, why do commercial potato farmers often leave the equivalent of fifty 100-pound bags of potatoes per acre lying in the field to waste? Fully understanding this concept is central to understanding the means and necessity of survival food preservation.

No matter if it is a tiny city survivors garden plot or a 40,000-acre Iowa corn farm, edible food matures and comes rushing in over a very short time span. Harvest doesn�t happen all at once, but almost. Potato farmers, worried about 450-bags-to-the-acre yields, won�t give a rip for tiny potatoes�worth, at most, a penny a pound�that fall through the sorting chain.

It�s all a Golden Rule of Food Production, of which most long-term city residents are completely unaware: Provisions must be made, both in the survivor�s thinking and his emergency supplies, to handle rush harvests. Nine times out of 10, harvests happen quickly, often under great duress. Think of it as suddenly being given a 1,200 pound steer that is only yours if you can process it. Also saying that temperatures are in the 90s adds realism to the example.

What are you going to do with the critter? Eat one or two steaks or a pound of burger? That would be nice, but it doesn�t work that way. To eat one steak you either have to eat it all or figure some way to preserve the remainder. Russian quartermasters, for example, delivered live cattle to the soldiers on the Eastern Front during World War�I as their daily food ration. Russian quartermasters didn�t fuss with MREs. One cow reportedly was issued for every 600 soldiers. Soldiers butchered the critters right there on the front line and ate it all immediately.

One way, but probably not always the best way, of storing food is delaying butchering till the time of need or, in the case of vegetable gardens, delaying harvesting. Indeed, live fish can be left in the fish trap; turtles, as mentioned, can be wired up in deep holes in the river; pigeons can be left on the roost; and rabbits, to some limited extent, can be left in their hutch. Back on the farm we frequently butchered chickens when company came over unexpectedly. But that was chickens.

Problem is, fish and turtles might contrive to escape; rabbits and pigeons grow older and tougher, eating lots of precious food in the process; and, of course, garden vegetables can easily rot on the vine or in the ground if they are not dealt with promptly. Theft is a serious problem in any high-energy survival situation. Leave too much largesse on display and others may recognize and appropriate it.

Adding shelf life to food is an ancient problem. Most techniques we currently have available came over on the Mayflower. The only exception is freezing and perhaps freeze-drying. Freezing is a viable survival technique in some circumstances, but generally we still rely on salting, drying, and canning or some combination of the above. Preservation by canning really only came on the scene about 1795 during the time of Napoleon, who encouraged this new technology as a means of feeding his armies! Making jerky out of surplus meat is the oldest and perhaps least exotic food preservation technique. In a complete survival circumstance, it is often the only way of preserving our hypothetical 1,200-pound steer.

The most important thing to remember when faced with butchering an animal is this: don�t panic. These directions are not as complicated as they first seem. Everything is actually pretty logical. But remember that the longer the animal has been dead the more complicated the process becomes, so try to begin butchering 10 to 15 minutes after it has been slaughtered. Starting at absolute ground zero for those who have never gutted and butchered a critter, here is how to proceed:

Roll it over on its back with legs skyward. Make a cut with your knife through the skin all the way from the base of the bottom lip straight down the middle to the bunghole. Nature has placed a kind of line along the belly of most critters to follow when cutting.

Cut through the skin deep into the neck, exposing the critter�s tough, rubbery, almost corrugated windpipe. Cut the head off, leaving as much of the neck as possible. Pull the windpipe free of the neck up to the brisket. Using a carpenter�s saw, cut through the brisket, continuing straight down through the bottom of the rib cage.

Cut down to, but not into, the stomach and intestine area. Puncture of the gut or stomach is messy but a thorough washing later can salvage the situation. General aesthetics and cleanliness are better served by not cutting into the guts. This becomes progressively more difficult the longer the critter is dead. Gases collect in the stomach, pressing it out against the wall of the critter.

Forcibly spread the two rib sides. Pull the windpipe, still attached to the heart and lungs, out of the carcass. Cutting around the diaphragm muscle separating the heart and lungs from the intestinal cavity will be necessary. Try to pull all�heart, liver, lungs, stomach, and intestines�clear of the carcass. Other than salvaging the heart and liver, most of this is left for the coyotes and birds. Notice we did not bleed the critter. By now it is obvious that quickly dressed animals will bleed profusely without special attention.

Feel for the Achilles tendon immediately up from the heel. Carefully poke your knife into the space between the tendon and the bone on each leg, making a hole into which you can put a hook. Be very careful not to cut the tendon. Hang the carcass up by its two hind legs. The legs should be spread-eagled and the carcass clear of the floor. Starting with a knife at the bunghole, cut along the top edge of the skin on each leg aiming toward the heel. Cut the skin clear around the leg just below the hook�again, be careful not to cut the tendon by which you are hanging the critter�and start cutting and peeling the skin away from the body. Done carefully, you should be able to do this without nicking either meat or skin. Leave as much fat and muscle on the carcass as possible. Experienced skinners�my wife included�do a cow, goat, deer, or horse in 10 minutes or less. First timers may take as much as an hour. Survivors are generally quick studies. Next time the process won�t be so time consuming and bewildering.

After skinning is complete, examine the inside of the carcass for anything that looks like guts that you may have missed the first time. Kidneys, especially, have a habit of hiding in the fat immediately under the ribs. Saw down the middle of the carcass from neck to bunghole along the backbone. Cut through the center of the bone, not the meat on either side of the backbone. Halving these critters is probably the most physically demanding part of the process, but necessary if they are to be chilled out properly. Wash the critter down, preferably with cold running water from a hose, if you have it available. This is particularly important if there were punctured guts or stomach. If you do not have access to running water, try hanging in the cold open air. In hot Africa, we hung meat overnight to chill, but had to eat it or jerk it the next day.

Cutting the critter up into much smaller �butcher shop�-sized pieces of meat is controversial. Everybody has his own way of doing it. Certainly I have butchered thousands of critters and I do not believe I have ever cut two out exactly the same. Wash down the floor at this point to deal with the debris and blood and keep the area tidy. The critter will continue to bleed some, but this blood on the wet floor can be dealt with later.

Look at the butcher-shop schematic above for ideas regarding various cuts of meat that can be taken from a halved carcass.

Everything down to goat- and dog-sized critters is handled in much the same fashion. Rabbits, cats, and rat-sized animals are much quicker and easier to process. I have often, for example, skinned and gutted five rabbits in 10 minutes. But I have been doing this work since I was 11.

Smaller animals are always skinned first and then stripped of entrails. Cut off the head unless it is a mink or coon-type critter for which the skin is saved. Hang it spread-eagled by the hind legs. Cut from the bung to the top of the legs, through the skin, along the top edge. Carefully cut and peel the skin down over the head in one great tube, resulting in what the trade calls a �case-skinned critter.� Other methods are workable, but this one is as simple and easy for beginners as it gets.

The entrails are exposed and removed by cutting up from the top of the rib cage through the body wall to the bung. Simply strip everything out that looks like guts. Be certain to look up clear into the chest cavity for the heart and lungs. Left inside, they can quickly sour the meat.

How to dress poultry? Most neophyte survivors take the simple expedient of summarily pulling the weak skin from the bird by grasping and tugging on the attached feathers. Professionally, birds are almost always plucked, leaving the skin�which most people consider tasty and nutritious�intact. In my opinion, birds destined for the smokehouse are best left with the skin on.

Plucking is fairly easy when done correctly. Heat water to between 140 and 150 degrees for such birds as chickens, turkeys, quail, pheasant, and grouse, and between 160 and 170 degrees for ducks and geese. Add a small bit of detergent to the water to dissolve the oil in the feathers and allow the hot water to soak in. Time of dipping depends on the size of the bird, with a minute being about right for chickens. Swish the bird up and down, allowing the heat to penetrate to the skin. Test by pulling a few feathers. When the bird is perfectly dipped, the feathers will pull easily from the body and legs, though you will have to tug a bit on the long wing feathers. If the bird is dipped for too short a time, or if the water is not hot enough, the feathers will not come out. If the bird is dipped for too long, or if the water is too hot, the skin cooks and comes off with the feathers.

After plucking, singe off remaining hair-like feathers (pinfeathers) on the carcass. Cut a small hole in the rear of the bird�two or three fingers for small birds and fist-size for larger birds�through which the entrails can be removed. Slide your fingers in over the top of the guts and pull the whole mass out in a lump, going back in to probe along the back ribs and up into the chest cavity to be sure you have all the pieces. Be careful of the bile sac on the liver�puncturing it will allow the green liquid to spill, souring the meat. Salvage the heart, liver, and gizzard. The bile sac can be cut or peeled away and thrown away with the guts. The easiest way to deal with the gizzard is just to cut off the two protruding ends where the meat is, taking care not to puncture the inner sac containing the stones, which is tossed with the guts. There is also a plump sac called the crop that is between the neck and the top of the chest cavity. If full, you can find it easily. Approach it from the neck when you retrieve the windpipe. If you are careful and don�t puncture it, it all comes out in one neat piece; puncture it and you get seeds, grass, bugs, or whatever the critter was eating all over the meat. All birds have crops, although they are less well developed in ducks and geese. When pulling the windpipe, be sure to get the larynx.

First-timers are usually shocked and discouraged to discover how little edible meat remains of a once large, plump critter.

But carrots and potatoes are more easily stored by other methods. In the case of carrots, leave the untreated ones in the ground. Cover them over with a layer of leaves, grass, and duff. In most climates in the continental United States, carrots can be dug and eaten any time till late spring.

Potatoes must have moisture and air moving through them to keep. Some varieties keep much better than others. Red Pontiacs are poor keepers. Spuds with thick, rough-netted skins such as russet Burbanks store quite well. The very best storing potato for survivors is a variety known as Nooksack, named after the Nooksack River in Oregon. They keep like stones. I wish it were otherwise, but this is an obscure variety It is doubtful that even seasoned gardeners will ever be able to find this variety to grow. But here is how to store all kinds of potatoes:

Dig a fairly large hole in the ground 18 inches deep in a well-drained, somewhat sheltered spot. Line this hole with dry grass and leaves. Place a bushel of spuds in the hole on the lining. Cover with a layer of grass and then 4 inches of soil.

Air and moisture from the soil will move through the potatoes, keeping them in nice condition. Only problem is, once the cache of potatoes is opened, they generally must all be taken and used within the next 30 days. Once disturbed, they all go bad relatively quickly

Will city survivors have access to tomatoes? In the unlikely event some come your way, store them for the intermediate term as follows. Clip plants at ground level while green tomatoes are still on the vine. Hang these intact vines from the roof in a sheltered, not particularly warm area Fruit on these vines will slowly ripen, and should be picked from time to time. We have enjoyed fresh, red tomatoes off the vine as late as February after clipping and hanging in October the year previous.

In times past, vegetables were often salted, pickling them in large brine barrels. Results were and still are borderline. But maybe it will be appropriate to try this method again.

At any rate, city survivors should expect to keep very busy putting up the crop at harvest time. Some of this technology is as old as time, but it will all work like a champ in a survival context. The total food supplies we raise or forage from the land and put up one way or another may be modest, but their importance will be tough to overemphasize.

Trading is a significant component of city survival. The past 100 years� experience demonstrates that those who understand and prepare for the process do well. Others don�t.

Our understanding of how we might use trading to survive in the city has changed dramatically. Survivors must be extremely practical people. They absolutely must engage in activities that work, even if it means breaking moral or religious codes. A Moslem who wants to survive, for example, would have to ignore his religion�s taboos about pork if that were the only food around. How do we know what actually works? Again, by looking around us at actual city survival situations.

Some of the devices to follow will upset some city survivors. This is because these devices do not fit into their preconceived notion of how they fervently wish events would unfold. Let the record note that I wish that our government would collapse and that we could start anew with one based on freedom rather than legal plunder. But looking out over the various countries in the world, there is little cause for hope. We just don�t see this happening.

Electing to vigorously pursue some trading strategies will be tough because we really don�t want them to work. The use of U.S. dollars as a medium of exchange is an excellent example.

Only a government can take perfectly good paper, cover it with perfectly good ink, and create perfectly worthless money. There�s no argument that our money has been mercilessly debased and devalued over the past few decades.

It has already been established that those with their financial houses in good order will have the best chance of surviving. Great numbers of examples out of history prove this point. Cubans with money for boats and fuel were able to make it to Mexico, the United States, and Spain early on. Chinese with money are currently emigrating to Canada. Rhodesians with cash are now sprinkled all around the world. They didn�t all make it, but only Jews with lots of cash had a chance of getting out of Nazi Europe. Later they had the only real chance of getting to Palestine, before it became Israel. I have even encountered an extremely wealthy, former high ranking Nazi living in the United States who used his considerable money to buy connections that eventually got him and much of his loot out of post-World War�II Europe.

As much as I hate to admit it, the medium of exchange for the foreseeable future appears to be U.S. dollars. This, I realize, is something of a reversal of my past position. But if the late 20th century has taught us anything, it is that politicians hold on and on. Mexicans, Russians, Poles, South Africans, Kenyans, and just about everybody collects dollars. Not euros, not Swiss francs, not German marks, not Hong Kong dollars, and certainly not Chinese renminbi or Japanese yen. The yen was once considered one of the strongest currencies, but 8 years of grinding recession finally wore it down.

I will gladly change my position on U.S. dollars when I see something coming that will also grind them down. Then I can trade my dollars for hard goods and consumables that always have value.

In times past, U.S. dollars, British pounds, German marks, and Swiss francs were equally prized by traders throughout the world. No longer. Everything is U.S. dollars�even in agricultural villages in remote Mexico, prices are quoted in dollars.

It�s kind of like being the chief leper in a leper colony. Because national finances are run so very poorly in most other countries, our own post-freedom economy stands out as being strongest.

New Zealand may be the only exception! Although New Zealand is headed in the correct direction economically and politically with increased emphasis on freedom it currently is experiencing a severe recession. This isn�t of their own doing. Traditionally New Zealand exported raw materials to Asia while importing many manufactured goods. The collapse of Asian markets and 2 years of El Nino-induced agricultural failure has taken its toll.

At any rate, New Zealand�s economy is and always will be too small to be much of a player in world markets. This also may be what happened to little Switzerland�it is a good economy but it�s too small to be influential.

America�s economy is so very large that it will dominate for the foreseeable future. Here is another example. While living in rural Africa, I frequently came across original Maria Theresa thalers being used in trade. This was 70 years after the collapse of the Austrio-Hungarian Empire. Certainly things move much faster these days, but even if the United States does somehow manage to collapse, it may still take years before people realize that its dollars are worthless.

At this writing absolutely everything worldwide is denominated in U.S. dollars. Oil, refinery products, computers, wheat, corn, gold, precious and nonprecious metals, iron, steel. cocoa, lumber, cases of tomatoes, melons, tobacco, and even a night with a woman. I can�t think of anything not denominated and traded worldwide in dollars. As a practical matter, if there were no U.S. dollars we would have to invent them!

Dollars are even being sent rather than food to refugees in ravaged, war-torn areas. It�s the trendy new way of arranging for food aid. Dollars in refugees� hands, we have found, encourage the inflow of food by private shippers and producers from hundreds of miles away As prices go up, local farmers are encouraged to plant more. Aid organizations sending food shipments into an area discourage farmers by lowering prices in their markets. When it�s done by government agents, it is always handled in a corrupt and inefficient manner. Money gets the economy running again, whereas actual bags of foodstuffs depress it.

The bottom line�especially for city survivors who will be close to quantities of goods and services�is that storing lots of cash has the potential to overcome great deficiencies in one�s survival plan. However, gold�including gold coins�is a poor trade good.

Cuba�s economy has been in a state of collapse since the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991 when all Soviet aid to Cuba was halted. I have been there twice since that time. Under-the-counter barter in the tightly knit Cuban society keeps its economy afloat, but this is barter of my two chickens for your cabbage and dozen eggs, or my skill and labor to repair your Soviet-built motorcycle in exchange for your sugar ration. While there I traded extensively in the underground economy using dollars, but never for gold coins. They wouldn�t have known what to do with gold: gold of any kind had absolutely no practical value to Cubans. It was much the same in East Berlin before the wall came down. Mexicans are in the same boat. Their economy has been devastated by recent massive peso devaluations and they want gringo dollars, not gold coins.

Gold coins are somewhat similar to the piano my dad�s family traded for three sacks of potatoes. Apparently the only reason this deal was finally consummated was out of some sort of perverse sense of humor on the owner�s part. Like the piano, gold packs too much value into too little space for owners ever to realize its full potential. It won�t do to trade the piano one piece at a time.

Gold coin does meet the survivor�s Rule of Portability, but other trade goods do this job better. On the other end of the trade spectrum, small gold coins are also difficult to handle. Teensy, tiny $1 and $5 gold pieces might even blow away in the wind! Our current experience indicates that gold is not a good exchange medium in a primitive survival economy.

Bargaining in survival situations, either for money or for other goods, will be common. Most Americans have no clue how to bargain. Some consider the exercise to be tacky

Here is a brief summary of a nonthreatening method of bargaining that is usually effective and does not impinge on the desire of most Americans not to be confrontational. Americans really don�t like to come right out and tell the other guy his stuff is priced too high and that they will only offer so much. This is too rude and abrupt, even for city survivors who, in prior lives, may have been very rude and abrupt.

Begin by determining that the other guy really has something you need at the retreat. In survival situations, it is common for owners not to display valuable goods till the deal is fairly far along. If you have nothing he particularly wants, then assume the deal will have to be for cash. This original posture should be stretched out as long as possible. Part of any successful bargaining technique involves inducing the other party to invest time in the process.

Perhaps it is time spent listening to information about the quality of the item. Maybe it�s the item�s history or the owner�s history; his current survival problems, health of his wife and kids, the grandkids, weather, sources of supply, position of the enemy or whatever. Americans tend not to be listeners. But in this case you gotta spend at least 15 minutes earnestly BS-ing and listening.

When he finally gets around to setting his price, don�t react by saying it�s too high. Simply tell him that this item is exactly what you need and want, that :t is in the condition you hoped for, and that he has talked you into the item. You like the item so much you only wish you could afford it. Lay it on thick about wanting the item, but it is out of your reach financially. At times sellers will voluntarily lower their price, without a buyer�s counteroffer.

Make up some lame excuse why you can�t afford the item. �Just traded my last two flashlights for a generator belt,� says you. Also, be mentally prepared to simply walk away from the deal if the seller doesn�t respond.

Usually the seller will ask how much you can afford to pay. Don�t lowball him, which will expose the game. Simply say he could help out a bunch by selling it for X amount. At this point, it is incumbent upon you to find some reason for the fellow to help by lowering his price. Usually this reason originates in the initial conversation. Maybe it�s the offer of your help in your special area of expertise in the future.

The main goal is not to confront him harshly or be belligerent in any way, but to keep on talking in a manner that convinces the seller that he should help you and that it is now his problem to make the sale.

By not being confrontational when no deal is made, it is easily possible to come back the next day with another offer. You might claim, �I found another 5 gallons of gas in our storage area,� or whatever.

This is exactly the system used throughout the Orient, where saving face is of utmost importance. It also nicely fits most Americans� personalities. After practice, count on at least a 75-percent success ratio.

Chances to trade for necessary and even unnecessary items are far greater in the city than they are in the country. More people and more goods lying about to trade for make this possible. Some survivors, who by luck or chance happen to store the correct trade goods, can make up for complete ignorance or lack of planning. Some will make a fortune. I wouldn�t want to play it this close, but the been there, done that crew claims it frequently happens.

Ownership and deployment of proper firearms is a sufficiently serious consideration for city survivors that an entire chapter on the subject seems appropriate.

While I believe good evidence exists to support my belief that country survivors could get by without firearms, other experience screams that city survivors absolutely must have adequate guns of the correct type. The idea that country survivors could get by without guns is based on the real-life experience of Bill Moreland, who lived alone without contact with any other humans for 13 years. Moreland�s adventure is relatively recent. He survived in Idaho�s rugged Clearwater National Forest from 1932 to 1945. Incredibly, Moreland had a .22-caliber rifle with perhaps 25 rounds of ammunition for only the last 2 years of his saga.

Personal experiences of city survivors during the past 30 years abundantly demonstrate that all city survivors will have far too many opportunities to defend their area. They will also seriously (perhaps fatally) cripple their survival food plans by not being able to shoot the occasional dog, cat, rat, goat, or duck if no guns are available. The experiences have convinced me that city survival is impossible without adequate firearms and the knowledge of how to use them.

Some of the guns and. ammunition mentioned below are tough to acquire. Rather than belaboring this issue, I assume that successful survivors will be people of tenacity, perseverance, and resourcefulness. A silencer is a good example of something that will test a survivor�s resolve. Under most city survival circumstances in the United States they are very illegal. At the same time, silencers�or something like them�are essential.

Many survivalists like myself have discovered perfectly workable substitutes for silenced weapons. These are inexpensive, relatively easy to make, and legal. Some readers will demand the real thing. Since many, many books are out there on the subject of homemade silencers, I won�t try to cover that information here.

The first serious problem I encountered while researching this chapter involves the fact that even average Americans who know little about guns know infinitely more about them than survivors of Beirut or Berlin who may have actually shot it out with marauding intruders.

Here is an example. City survivors will definitely need sniper rifles, I was told with great seriousness and enthusiasm by an Arab friend from Beirut.

�So what constitutes a sniper rifle?� I asked.

�Its one with a telescopic sight,� I was informed. To me, a sniper rifle is a tactical rifle capable of 4-inch groups at a minimum 800 yards. This fellow was actually describing what we commonly refer to as a deer rifle.

Are accurate 500-yard shots inside cities sufficient? Perhaps yes and perhaps no. Firearms are always very personal matters. My position is that sniper rifles of some sort are extremely important, and that an 800- to 1,000-yard rifle will also do well at 500 yards. But it doesn�t work the other way around.

My analysis of this Beiruti fellow�s grasp of this subject was complicated by the fact that, although he had been an active soldier engaged in fighting in the city, he had no clue regarding differences between hunting and sniper rifles. He did not even know how to sight in a rifle with optic sights!

Israeli army tacticians started it with development of their Uzi submachine guns. Instead of taking careful aim, the concept here was to let a hail of bullets fly in the direction of a potential target, who cowered to hide or ran in terror.

The concept of just firing toward a target rather than taking aim became doctrine in the Middle East and then in the old Soviet army. Things are slowly changing back again, but we still see military units today composed of infantry who engage the enemy by firing AK-47s blindly around corners or over the tops of barriers. There are also increasing numbers of soldiers who carry what we might refer to as scope-sighted deer rifles. They are called snipers, but these are the guys who are supposed to shoot at specific enemy targets out to the limit of their weapon�s range (about 500 to 600 yards). Will shooters aiming at an enemy again outnumber general-direction shooters? Changes seem to be occurring. How far they go is anybody�s guess.

My personal conviction is that true long-range, superaccurate sniper rifles are the next wave. This is principally because these weapons can inflict incredible material damage on enemy equipment without actually physically engaging enemy personnel. For those who can really acclimate themselves to coldly shooting another human, sniper rifles can also be a real deterrent to invaders. Shoot the pilot or ruin his helicopter on the ground; the results are similar.

There is .always the danger of fighting this war with last war�s technology. Sniper rifles may fall into that category, but for the foreseeable future they seem to have secured their role as destroyers of valuable, often irreplaceable property from great distance and as a deterrent to infantry. It also seems that after a veritable explosion of recent sniper rifle technology, things have stabilized to some extent. It�s a good time to put a sniper rifle together.

Assembling a tactical rifle takes at least 18 months and about $2,000. City survivors who might need this type of equipment are well advised to get cracking. Not only does assembling all the components take time, it only takes one nut to bring the wrath of the government down on these weapons. Absolutely everyone with any qualifications who makes these weapons is currently booked ahead about 6 to 8 months. If new regulations are proposed, prices will zoom skyward and waiting lines will become hopeless.

There are, of course, many ways to proceed. First and easiest, but not usually best, is to purchase a completely assembled, heavy-barreled Winchester or Remington sniper rifle. Because these stock packages are not usually �-minute-of-angle grade without further tuning by a competent sniper rifle gunsmith, this is not usually considered to be the best course of action.

Bill Hicks and Co., Ltd., 15155 23rd Avenue North, Minneapolis, MN 55447, often seems to have the best inventory of these types of rifles. Hicks is a wholesaler, so one would have to ask a local dealer to order for them.

Most basic actions used in tactical rifles require extensive hand turning on the part of skilled gunsmiths who have worked on many rifles of this type. One dramatic exception includes rifles and actions manufactured by Sako in Finland. Sakos are usually very accurate right out of the box. Alas, bare Sako actions are not imported in large numbers. When one is found for sale, the price will be high to very high. Bill Hicks and Co., Ltd., is often a good place to inquire about Sako actions. If not, contact Stoeger Industries, 5 Mandsard Court, Wayne, NJ 07470, to find out which wholesale distributors recently took delivery on a number of actions. Probably it will be a Sako Model L691 Mag action unless you intend to try and make a much smaller .308 or .223 into a tactical rifle. Sako�s small actions are Model S49s.

The price when an action is finally located will be about $375. That�s what the last one cost me.

Several excellent gunsmiths in the United States have experience making tactical rifle barrels and fitting them to actions. No matter who does this work, be double sure to ask how many tacti cal rifles he has done in the past. Experience at this business is not only handy, it is vital.

Brian Sipe, of the Montana Rifleman, 1765 Montana Highway #35, Kalispel, MT 59901, has done most of the tactical rifle barrels on guns I have put together. However, Sipe is often booked solid 7 to 10 months ahead. Mel Doyles, RR 2, Box 196M, St. Maries, ID 83861, is another good hand at this business.

Most of the tactical rifles I have assembled have been in .300 Winchester Magnum. Equipped with 26-inch barrels, they shoot out about 3,200 feet per second using 168-grain Hornaday boattail National Match bullets. Off-the-shelf ammo is not available. Start with 68 grains of 4831 powder in handloads.

Tactical rifles have been built in .308, .30-06, and even .223, but these cartridges present too many additional trajectory problems, especially for initially unpracticed users. On the other end of the spectrum, we are currently working on a .30/.378 tactical rifle. It is made to use .378 Weatherby Magnum cases necked to .30 caliber. This may be overkill rather than underkill, as is true with the smaller family of cartridges.

The cost to barrel and cut a chamber is about $400, depending on whether it is fluted, has a removable muzzle brake, or deviates from the standard 1:10 twist. Our fluted, barreled rifles have not shot better than plain barrels, even when shot very hot, which should never happen in real life with tactical rifles. Even if the rounds are delivered over a matter of hours, the maximum rounds from one position�even in a combat situation�is always three! After that your position will be dangerously exposed.

Longer, heavier 26-inch barrels, measuring .90 inches at the muzzle tapered back to 1 25 inches at the breech, with a tactical rifle recessed crown cut in them, are very important to the success of the project. These larger, heavier barreled action sets absorb heat and recoil to great advantage.

The next task is bluing. Mel Doyles usually does this work for me. His dull-black ranch finish is especially practical for tactical rifles. These finishes don�t glare or shine. The cost for a polished �in the white� action and barrel is about $50.

Securing a proper military/tactical stock correctly fitted to a Sako barreled action is not particularly quick, easy, cheap, or convenient. Figure on another 6 to 10 months� wait. Off-the-shelf stocks either fit poorly, are too difficult to finish-fit, are too wimpy, or lack necessary features characteristic of genuine tactical stocks.

Only two places I know of currently manufacture and fit genuine military-style/grade stocks to Sako barreled actions. Both claim to supply the U.S. Army and the Marines, but be prepared for sticker shock. Both are named McMillan and are both are located in Phoenix, Arizona. (Probably the result of a family disagreement or something.)

But not to worry. They both do excellent work, in my experience. Prices are so similar they may someday face anti-trust action from the government.

McMillan Fiberglass Stocks, Inc., 21421 N. 14th Avenue, Suite B, Phoenix, AZ 85027 and McMillan Gunworks, Inc., 302 W Melinda Lane, Phoenix, AZ 85027, both have extremely nice, fullcolor brochures listing their various styles of stocks and options available with each model. In my opinion, builders are not in the ballpark unless they order an adjustable buttplate, cheekpiece, and custom laser bedding. This will cost around $500.

It is by now close to 2 years since we embarked on this project. Expenses are up around $950 to $1,300, depending on options, and not including dozens of long-distance calls. Purchasing a suitable scope and mount is the next and last big hit. Mounting the scope has traditionally been tougher and more expensive than it should be. On my last tactical rifle completed 3 or 4 months ago, I had to go back and spend an extra $250 for more suitable, workable mounts. Even after acquiring great amounts of experience, opportunities to do it wrong are still great.

Part of the difficulty involves the fact that true tactical scopes are virtually always made up on 30mm tubes. Differences in field of vision, clarity, and utility between 25mm hunting scopes (1 inch) and 30;mm ones are dramatic. Very few people understand the nuances of a 30mm tube versus a 25mm tube until they start to practice with them.

Mounting a nontactical hunting-type scope on a first-class sniper rifle is almost always an error. Hunting scopes are not sufficiently rugged and they lack easy rear read-and-adjust dials that make use of previously prepared �come-up� or trajectory cards possible. These cards are used to preprogram the rifle to shoot accurately from 350 to 1,000 yards by simply setting the dials to predetermined readings. My choice of scope is the same one used by the U.S. Marines, many police SWAT teams, and Navy SEAL teams. It is a 16-power Leupold Mark 4 MI. These scopes are tremendously popular and often sold out. Because of their great expense ($810 each at press time), they are carried by relatively few dealers. Contact Leupold & Stevens, Inc., PO box 688, Beaverton, OR 97075-0688, to find out which dealers currently have these scopes in inventory

Attaching 30mm scopes to a rattail Sako action has become incrementally easier and a bit more certain with advent of 30mm Leupold rings made especially for Sako actions. Medium�or more often high�mounts must be used to clear the tactical scope�s huge objective lens.

Like country survivors, city types will quickly discover that sighting in a tactical rifle is a chore. City or country, there just ain�t very many 1,000-yard rages. To make matters worse, it is necessary to be able to drive between the shooting bench and the target. Using spotting scopes at 1,000 yards on relatively small, .30-caliber bullet holes, is a complete nonstarter.

After the rifle is sighted in, come-up cards can be developed listing exact scope settings for 350, 450, 600, 800, and 1,000-yard shots. Windage deflection is 4 inches per knot at 1,000 yards. Three-knot winds are common, which effectively put rounds outside most targets.

Practice-shooting these big, heavy rifles is enjoyable, but keep in mind that gilt-edge barrel life is only from 5,000 to 10,000 rounds!

Although vast experience and common sense suggest that shrewd city survivors looking for the best chance of survival should not get involved in combat actions around them, they should own at least one military-type semiauto assault rifle per family. Virtually any rifle will work in a pinch, but military designs are sturdier in long service, easier to repair, and, of course, use universal ammunition. Military .45-.70 rounds developed around 1872, for instance, are still popular in the United States!

Implementing this assault rifle acquisition philosophy is dramatically easier than it was 20 years ago. Currently dozens of firms manufacture all manner of parts sets, barrels, stocks, receiver types, and accessories for AR-15 type rifles. Personally I still prefer longer ranged, more powerful FN assault rifles in .308 NATO, but as a practical matter it�s got to be an AR-15-type weapon, because FNs are pretty much unavailable.

In my lifetime I have encountered scores of guns�mostly pistols�that were about worthless because no magazine or too few magazines were available for them. Stock up on magazines and, of course, ammo. Ten high-capacity magazines per rifle plus 1,000 rounds of ammo is a figure experts frequently cite. At this level you will at least be �in the game� with sufficient firepower to appropriate additional weapons and ammunition, should this become expedient. With 10 extra mags, loss of one or even two will not be catastrophic.

Successfully surviving in built-up areas is about deep hiding. City survivors must always keep their presence secret, which is often a difficult task when there are wild edibles to be taken or intruders to be quietly dealt with. As mentioned, this will require a good, familiar .22 rimfire rifle or a near equivalent and a silencer or a near equivalent.

Again, my dinosaurism may be showing, but I prefer a good old rugged .22 caliber bolt-action rifle to any other kind. Autos use too much ammo and seem more subject to malfunction. Levers and pumps are far too complicated in dirty, desperate circumstances. Keep in mind that .22s are for surreptitious duty, not primarily for defense, although there is that element as well. Slow reliable, long-lived bolts or even single-shots are OK.

Rifles set aside for duty around the retreat should be very quiet. Quietness can be accomplished with a silencer, low-velocity ammunition, subcaliber devices, or a combination of all of these. I prefer subcaliber devices, which currently are legal and can be just as quiet as illegal silencers. Many work well in existing rifles or shotguns without modification. My .308/.32 ACP subcaliber device in a Remington Number Seven rifle will drill a phone book at 200 yards without changing the scope�s setting!

Subcaliber devices are little gizmos that slip into standard rifles or shotguns, allowing them to fire smaller rifle or pistol ammunition. There are two types. One has its own short barrel, the other uses the barrel of the rifle in which it is operated.

I first encountered these devices in the Philippines on the Island of Mindanao in the hands of insurgents. They used a device allowing captured .223 or 9mm pistol ammo to be fairly accurately fired in 12- and 20-gauge shotguns. In this case, the device itself provided a short, rifled barrel that stabilized the bullets. They got about 9-inch groups at 150 to 200 meters�close enough for military work.

Subcaliber devices are made to convert a large number of rifle cartridges and calibers. In addition to ones allowing .223 and 9mm to be fired in a 12 gauge, I use models providing for .22 LRs to be fired in a .223; .32 ACP in a .308; and .22 LRs in a .30-06. Use of .32 ACPs in a .308 is very quiet. Virtually as quiet as conventional silenced rounds. Accuracy out of long guns is good to extremely good. We consistently place rounds in a 10-inch-square phone book at 200 yards with one of these devices. Fifteen years� experience indicates that, when shot in the head or neck at that range, deer-sized critters are efficiently reduced to possession.

During this era of suppression-fire philosophies, subcaliber devices are not particularly common or popular. Single-shot people like them, but to those who enjoy turning ammunition into a hail of fire, they are just a curiosity. Several national manufacturers produced these devices at one time. Currently MCA Sports and the Ace Bullet Co., 2800 West 33rd Road, Anchorage, AK 99517, are the only game in town. The price is about $25 each.

Nothing significant�except possibly the advent of supercompact carbines firing rifle rounds�has occurred that changes my mind regarding use of pistols in city survival situations. Truth is, most people do not use conventional pistols with sufficient skill to make them practical. Accuracy with a pistol at any range is really tough. True proficiency only comes by constant practice over a period of 6 to 8 years and, in my opinion, from being around someone who is a really good pistol shot. Apparently this association with an outstanding pistolero leads to personal confidence that one can really hit targets at extended ranges (more than 5 to 7 yards).

The display of a pistol on the belt leads to less crime and more civilized behavior; there�s no question about that. But to say this is also true in a tough city survival situation is difficult.

But, assuming that getting hits on target with a sufficiently powerful single hand weapon to make a lasting impression is important, I would choose an AR-15 pistol with a 40-round magazine. Currently these either must be built from parts or from a kit offered by AR-15 component manufacturers. With a shorty stock they are marvelously effective weapons out to about 100 yards. Why they are not much more popular is a mystery. Probably because it is not easy to assemble one of these pistols and have it function reliably.

Yet, most city survivors will feel they must have some sort of handgun. This is understandable even if the idea is less than practically defensible. When funds are limited for both guns and ammo, it would seem wise to first lay in something common, reliable, and simple, such as a .22 LR. A rugged, reliable Ruger standard auto comes immediately to mind. Three important goals are accomplished. Owners of .22 handguns can learn to shoot at minimum cost and with minimum disruption. Also, they have a gun for which they should already have a ton of ammo.

Next, when it seems terribly important, I would purchase a high-quality, military-grade 9mm pistol. This will give you more options, because 9mm universal ammo is more likely purchased as surplus, scrounged, or captured. Military pistol designs are important because these guns have the ruggedness and reparability vital for city survivors.

My choice is still a high-capacity Browning Hi-Power or a Beretta Model 92. Certainly there are others just as good, but�like women�it�s all in the eye of the beholder.

No city survivor I talked with used shotguns of any type, in spite of the fact that shotguns are almost always the last guns to be demonized by governments. Perhaps this is because shotguns are so far removed from being military weapons. The fellow from Beirut simply said he wouldn�t be able to get one because the military didn�t use them.

Perhaps the military use of shotguns isn�t widespread because they have limited range, make a great deal of noise, ammo is tough to resupply and cumbersome to carry in any quantity, and very few shotguns are of sufficient strength to stand up to military/survival duty. Under some specific circumstances, some shotguns may be acceptable military weapons in built-up areas, but keep in mind that we are going to keep our heads down and survive, not engage in military actions unless absolutely forced into it.

Word is that Mossberg 500 pumps are the most rugged, reliable shotguns ever built. These may be good weapons for those in cities. Mossberg 500s are also some of the least expensive weapons�but before embarking on this path, be sure sufficient funds are available for both a gun and a pile of ammo. Also understand that this weapon may never be put to good use by the survivor. Five hundred dollars will purchase the gun and 1,000 rounds of 12-gauge ammunition; but in this day and age, $500 may not be much of a problem, even if it is money spent with some inefficiency.

Other strictly military-type shotguns such as a SPAS 12, a Beretta 1201 FP, and the Benelli Black Eagle, have mostly disappeared from U.S. markets. Some of these shotguns were quite good, but some, like the SPAS 12, were far too complicated to be of great value. Military shotguns available today are prohibitively expensive, probably precluding purchase of more important sniper rifles, .22 rifles, assault rifles, and ammunition, except in the case of very well-heeled folks.

What do our been there, done that folks pick for guns? A longer range, optically sighted rifle, a simple .22 rifle with silencer or other quiet capability, an assault rifle, and an absolute trailerload of ammunition and magazines are all equally important, they claim.

But keep in mind that no foreigners, even those who have served in the military, know guns and ammo like Americans.

We can say absolutely that possession of personal firearms will be vital for survival. Few, if any, city survivors will make it without guns and lots of ammunition. No one can provide any evidence to the contrary. Does this also mean that antigun Easterners inhabiting one-third of the United States and most of the big built-up areas in our country are in for tough times in the future?

Better in this case to worry about ourselves, allowing whatever foolishness is being sown to establish itself at harvest.

Nursing in a survival context seldom receives much interest and attention. Pity, since this single activity can save or�as more frequently occurs�lose significant numbers of lives. Especially when undertaken by uninformed, unprepared survivors.

Nursing in any form is defined as the act of providing skilled, appropriate, long-term sheltering care leading to successful convalescence and recovery from accidents, sickness, or wounds. Nursing for city survivors is especially critical because initial care provided by some persons who are less than skilled and trained may be borderline at best. In an emergency, we may be sewed up by nurses, dentists, pharmacists, farmers, veterinarians, dental assistants, chiropractors, and even at times common private citizens.

That all of these people are extremely well-intentioned and correspondingly anxious to do the right thing is little consolation. In a survival situation, even medical doctors will be constrained by a lack of proper drugs, instruments, and facilities. Placing an untrained or borderline amateur in these circumstances is definitely not ideal, but will be necessary if any lives are to be saved.

City survivors are also faced with the fact that because of the large number of people they may encounter in cities, they will also come across some who require long-term nursing care. We should understand that because of the nature of our existence, we will be called on to nurse many friends, family members, and close acquaintances found around us in cities who have also received less than ideal or even adequate initial care.

Standards of cleanliness were still primitive by today�s standards, but during our own Civil War, it was received truth that patients quickly evacuated from central hospitals into private homes had the best chance of survival. Often it was not the shot-off legs or shattered ribs that killed patients, but rather horrible, raging, epidemic infections. Hospitals and central receiving areas for the wounded were notorious pest houses, which was intensified by the fact that no one in the medical profession knew what caused infections. In that regard alone, modern city survivors are at great advantage.

Patients allowed to remain even a few days at these central medical. areas were virtually 100-percent certain of acquiring an infectious disease for which there was little hope. Two lines on the graph crossed creating this horror: the native strength of wounded men lying in bed ebbed while infections spread and raged.

Some knowledgeable folks still maintain that even today there is great risk of infection in our modern hospitals. Perhaps this is an overstatement, but only because rigorous measures are taken to minimize infectious conditions in hospitals. To a certain extent these measures are also available to city survivors.

Along with modern miracle disinfectants for both the patient and the room, modern hospitals have crews that do little but scrub, scrub, and scrub all day long. Even within the past 10 or 12 years, remarkable new technologies have come on the scene that give disease-causing germs less chance to hide and prosper. These include disease abatement, construction techniques, new and remarkable construction materials, special paints, sealers, and finishes that really keep dirt, filth, and infection in check and, of course, disinfectants that�by Civil War standards�are nothing short of miraculous.

One of the keys to survival nursing is getting your friend or loved one out of any central medical treatment area into a nursing retreat as quickly as possible. Then it is vital that the retreat not become a hospital. That is, treat this one patient or, at most a small batch of two or three patients, and then quit. Most nurses recommend waiting 3 or 4 months after the retreat is cleaned and disinfected before starting with the next batch of patients! The overlap of patients quickly leads to great concentrations of uncontrollable disease and infection.

City survivors have some dramatic modern disinfectants available to them. For patients themselves, we have Betadine, gentle iodine and hydrogen peroxide, among others. These materials are generally used to clean and treat personal wounds, but other especially good disinfectant materials useful on floors, walls, and ceilings are available from veterinary or farm supply stores. These are Bioguard X-185 containing 30 percent cresylic acid, Roccal D, 1 Stroke Environ, and even raw formaldehyde.

Because disinfecting barns and pig stalls is much tougher than disinfecting most bedrooms or tents, these materials are high powered, highly concentrated, state of the art, and extremely effective. They are certainly as good as anything in local hospitals.

Flies and lice may be a problem for survivors left too long in central receiving areas or in dirty, filthy retreats used by numbers of different people. At Stalingrad lice were epidemic among German soldiers. Lice just show up and prosper in those sorts of conditions. Again, some effective materials are available over the counter from your friendly vet supply store. These will give you the upper hand over flies and lice. Look for treatments with high concentrations of lindane and pyrethrins. These materials may also be used to help sterilize bedding, clothes, draperies, rugs, and tent bottoms. As a practical matter, survival nursing quarters should be on stone, cement, or finished wood. Avoid rugs or other porous materials.

Modern hospitals use mostly throwaway plastic kits for their procedures. Specialized kits, some of which are breathtakingly expensive, exist for virtually everything. They range from simple little packets designed to facilitate intravenous medications to great, elaborate affairs required for complete laparoscopic surgery. We won�t have these pre-sterilized kits. Even if we did we couldn�t afford to throw them out after just one use. Reportedly, some of these kits are presently recycled to some extent, but one wonders.

Survival nurses will have to make provisions to sterilize all of their instruments that will be used repeatedly. Boil for at least 20 minutes all gear, including needles, hemostats, scalpels, and the like. In a survival context most of these tools are irreplaceable. All must be cleaned up and resterilized. In cases where boiling vigorously in a shallow, open container will either ruin the apparatus or may not clean and sterilize it, strong disinfectants can be used as a wash. Many times we do both. To an extent, infections are treatable with modern veterinary-grade antibiotics, but in a survival context these materials will be scarce. Why ask for additional trouble?

Likely we won�t think of it now, but provision should be made to thoroughly incinerate bandages, cotton, infected clothes, bedding, and other miscellaneous contaminated items. Thorough burning will consume even more of our scarce energy supplies and could conceivably compromise our position, but it may be necessary to limit the chances of spreading disease.

Other disinfecting of bedding, clothes, and linens can be undertaken at the retreat in a kind of homemade, temporary autoclave. This device can be as simple as an old-fashioned covered cooker with a coarse rack in the bottom into which a pint of clean water is placed. When the water is boiled, steam penetrates upward into the clothes, doing a job on growies and little critters. Hopefully, it is obvious that clothes and bedding so treated are first thoroughly washed, using up yet more of our precious water supplies and time.

Place the covered container with cloth to be sterilized inside, over a gentle fire. Heat till the water is long gone, virtually scorching the clothes inside. During our Civil War, women working as nurses who were sufficiently fastidious to hot-iron all their laundry basically accomplished similar effects. Private people could do this work for individual patients, but on an areawide basis after a major battle it was unthinkable. Ironing clothes is easier today but not as widely done in our wash-and-wear society. At any rate, few clothes irons will be working after a collapse.

Good, sound shelters are necessary if our patients are to recover. These must be secure places that can be kept warm and dry, where meals can be provided and where waste disposal doesn�t become an issue. Patients kept comfortable, without undue stress, for extended periods obviously are more likely to make it.

In cases of nursing situations, it may be necessary to pull way, way back, away from the conflict to a place of really deep seclusion. Great amounts of convenience, including accessibility to vital supplies, may need to be sacrificed for the sake of the patient and his recovery.

City survivors who take up nursing should also be aware that down through history this has been a very dangerous undertaking. Getting caught by the enemy is easier when mobility is sacrificed, and the penalty for getting caught is often summary execution. During our Civil War, the woman who did nothing more than rent a sleeping room to John Wilkes Booth was actually hanged by our military for her part in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln!

City survivors in general must engage in some pretty deep hiding. Those who also go into nursing will have to become absolutely paranoid. Witness the World War II Nazi treatment of Polish, Ukrainian, and Russian peasants who even thought about sheltering Jews.

Survival nursing will require prodigious quantities of energy for heating and hot water, Jackie, a nurse with long experience and now living in Chicago, told me. I asked what �prodigious� meant. She said it will take lots and lots of energy to heat water and the retreat, sterilize medical tools and bandages, cook food, and accomplish other tasks she couldn�t presently think of to run any kind of a successful nursing program. Perhaps more than double what is needed for normal, day-to-day survival activities.

I then asked Betty Lou, who in the past 60 years has nursed scores of people back to health under incredibly primitive circumstances, about energy. �I buy wood from the people and I have 55-gallon barrels of kerosene delivered in, and of course any woman nurse should know how to run a chain saw.�

�Run a chain saw?� I questioned.

�Yup, and here are the things women need to know,� Betty Lou said. They sound practical for men as well. I repeat verbatim.

1.��Always use a Stihl-brand chain saw,� she stated. �Others are too heavy, not sufficiently well made, and too hard to start. Women can�t yank their shoulders out of joint pulling starter ropes on stupid, slowstarting chain saws, and they can�t continually play around with petty maintenance,� she continued.

2.�Use a smaller, lighter Stihl model OV 28 or thereabouts, weighing at most 7 to 9 pounds. Use at most a 20-inch bar (assembly on which the cutting chain runs). This will still cut through a 4-foot diameter tree, but won�t pull smaller built women�s arms out of joint during operations.

3.�Pay great care to keeping the chain lubricated by refilling the chain lubrication reservoir with special oil at least every 30 minutes of operation. Women tend to forget this step. Chain oil is available from hardware or chain saw stores.

4.�Never allow the chain to touch the ground, even when the saw is not running. A single, small nail in scrap lumber or a pebble can easily cause damage, requiring an hour of refiling the chain.

5.�Learn to sharpen the chain and keep it very sharp.

This last item seemed like being told, �Win the lottery and live happily ever after.� I asked Betty Lou to explain.

�Buy several chain saw files from the dealer of exactly the correct size,� she explained. �These will probably be 7/32-inch size. Also, purchase a chain saw filer�s guide, which holds the file high enough on the teeth so they are not hooked while providing guide marks so that the correct file angles are maintained.

�Tighten the chain on the bar so that it can be pulled up about half a tooth section on the guide bar and then begin to sharpen.

�File only from inside out, cutting only on the outstroke. Don�t ever draw the file back across the tooth. Only push out. File one side completely and then turn the saw around to do all the teeth on the other side the same way�

Betty Lou pitches the file after six or eight uses. �My hands are not as strong as some men�s hands. I don�t like to keep using a dull, slow-cutting file,� she says. She also cuts up lots of old building material, boards, beams, and wood siding. Often these have some small nails or screws. �Hi: one and its another 60 minutes resharpening the chain,� she says. �These smaller, lighter, less powerful saws work poorly when their chains are dull,� she says.

�Aren�t there easier ways of securing energy?� I asked.

�Yes,� she says, �but they are seldom convenient and survival nursing takes so much time and energy that we always have to be ready to use whatever is close at hand.�

Water is another critical element of survival nursing. Great quantities of pure, wholesome water are required to hydrate patients, clean the retreat, and cook. Much of this must be hot water, suggesting yet another use for our already dwindling energy supplies.

Betty Lou developed a spring outside the city in which she usually works, but this technology is probably outside the scope of this book. But by whatever means, water supplies in a survival nursing situation must be dramatically expanded. It also calls for expansion of water-purifying systems.

It is best to plan for a bigger, better sand filtration rack, more bleach, and perhaps ever. some of the more expensive, faster acting water purification chemicals. Upping bleach use to 3 ounces per gallon, and/or allowing the mixture to sit 24 hours rather than 12 is workable. If survival nursing seems a possibility, lay in some 35-percent food-grade peroxide (which also stores relatively poorly). Have a supply of tetracycline hydroperiodide and titratable iodine tablets or even some plain old iodine tablets from your local pharmacy Check local pharmacies, mail-order preparedness people, or backpack supply outlets for these chemicals. All are quite expensive, limiting use to nursing candidates.

Using one of the popular little 1-quart-per-minute 2-micron backpack filters is also a possibility. They range in price from $60 to about $150. From 200 to 300 gallons of water can be purified before another $50 filter must be installed. Most retreaters run their water through the sand filter first. Cost, speed, and service life usually limit these devices to producing water for patients.

What is the most important nursing element for patients recovering from burns, breaks, and gunshot trauma?

Most people are surprised to discover it is nutrition. My first guess was a good supply of antibiotics. I was skeptical, so I asked several experts. I heard the same story time after time. When survival nursing is likely, lay in a huge supply of high-quality multiple vitamins and minerals, I was repeatedly told. Along with antibiotics, some of these are available from the vet supply counter.

Plan to feed quality meals, they said. A surgeon suggested that I bone up on the five basic food groups. And they are not nicotine, caffeine, sugar, fat, and alcohol, he half-scolded with a twinkle in his eye.

Chicken soup�s restorative powers are apparently no myth. Patients respond mightily to nutrition, adding yet another dimension to our storage needs and requirements. Basically, good nutrition depends on lots of clean water, fruit, fresh vegetables, meat, and grains daily We are told to pay special attention that everything is prepared and served in the most sanitary manner possible. Improper food preparation can lead to a destruction of food value or, on the other end of the scale, to possible food poisoning.

We are to select one main course providing an adequate serving of meat. Bread or some sort of cereal should also be provided. Fruit and/or vegetables as available should be served at least once a day. Recovering patients may eat like hogs or they may eat like birds, including as many as five meals daily. A nurse�s duty is to keep the patient clean, happy, and full of good, nutritious food. Not an altogether easy task, especially in primitive conditions. This simple-sounding philosophical concept is often about as important as storage, diagnosis, and then deployment of pharmaceutical drugs.

As mentioned in Chapter 10, initial care is a complex issue about which a bit has already been written. Those interested in medical matters not directly having to do with long-term nursing might look at Survivalist�s Medicine Chest and Do-It-Yourself Medicine.

It is my firm conviction that survivors, including those in cities. are faced with three general categories of medical conditions. First of these are medical situations brought on by age, heredity, or general deterioration, over which we have little or no control and for which cures and effective treatments, in the hands of specialists, buy a few years at best.

Second are conditions directly caused by personal behavior which are completely avoidable. AIDS and lung cancer (for smokers) jump to mind as examples in this category. This is not to suggest that there are personal choices we should not make. Only that there are personal choices that all individuals must make knowing full well that the when they choose wrong, the consequences are severe.

Third are medical emergencies brought on by accidents, warfare, or environmental conditions that are definitely treatable by skilled, dedicated amateurs. These are the type of conditions where nursing is most effective. Obviously there is overlap. The challenge lies not in taking foolish, unrewarding risks. while still continuing at the same time to enjoy life to its fullest. Detonations and gunfire are an adrenaline rush for me, for instance. I already know I may not die in bed.

These last people who have consciously elected to get into the battle and are now hurt, who have contracted some awful disease or condition as a result of a filthy, unhealthy environment, or who have been abused by their fellow man are ones we can realistically expect to nurse back to life in our survival retreats.

I hope this brief introduction has sensitized all potential city survivors to the understanding that they will likely be faced with a survival nursing chore, what it will cost to undertake this chore, and how to proceed.