Monday, August 29, 2011

SAAVYSURVIVOR.COM: SURVIVOR'S SUPPLY CACHE

A friend of mine wants some business so I'm drumming some up for him; look over to the right column he's right at the top and he's got some very good stuff for sale.

He was one of those high-end government security people, high speed low drag and he knows his stuff.  Best of all he's a Patriot; below is a article on supply caching out of a 5 gallon pail.  Nothing you can't do.

Survivor's Supply Cache
Survival How-to
A subject that seems to be coming up a lot on the survival related forums is the cache.    A cache is a small amount of goods and supplies that a survivor would keep hidden, usually along a planned bugout route or in an area that the survivor might go to, but is not in control of the area and lacks the resources to secure pre-positioned goods.   A hidden cache along the same route or in the same area will provide items and supplies that the survivor can determine ahead of time as opposed to the unpredictable nature of foraging.   Pre-positioning items is one way to make sure you will have access to them if you end up in that place after traveling light.   In practice, a cache is hidden, but not secured.   That reduces the need for additional resources to secure the goods or the unwanted spread of news about the location and nature of supplies.   Figure that the average night in a halfway decent motel is going to cost you $50 per person, and a campground with rudimentary bathrooms and showers is at least $10 per person.   Food on the road is going to be at around $5 per meal if you are eating off the bargain menus at the fast food joints, or around $7 per meal at the truck stops.   Spending $100 to set up a one or  two day cache that makes it tolerable to live in the bush is not at all out of line or an extravagance, it is simply looking out for these things ahead of time.   Again, $300 to $500 total on some supplies decent camping gear that you might be leaving in a stash vs a week of hotel and campground fees is a realistic consideration.    
You will generally prepare items for a cache with a focus on the time frame that the items will be cached.   A hasty cache may be as simple as dropping boxes of supplies off the side of a road somewhere while a complex long term cache might involve a sealed room in a pre-stocked bunker beneath an innocuous looking remote cabin.   For most of us, it is going to be the basic mid-term "bucket stash" that is designed to last three to five years.  
The bucket cache is fairly simple and easy to prepare, with a basic cost being fairly reasonable.   Being limited by the size of a standard five gallon pail, the stash will not contain more goods than what a person would normally be expected to carry if they move on farther, but if they are going to stay in one location for a few days, it will provide enough minimal comforts for a person to get clean, some sleep, a few good meals and some clean water.   I personally would limit the cost and contents of most bucket caches to around $100 in supplies, but obviously the caches that contain specific weapons, tools or equipment will end up costing more.   Limit those caches to ones that are near the start of a bugout route.  
The fully loaded bucket cache has enough to keep a person going for a couple days without further resupply.   In a pinch, this could last a week or longer if the survivor is able to forage for some local food and supplies, but one should not get overconfident in the amount of supplies provided in a cache.   Once you retrieve a cache, you need to immediately take stock of your estimated travel time and resources for replenishing your supplies, realizing that it would take about 100 such supply caches for one person to survive one year.   Note also that storage weight of a cache is pretty much a non-issue.   Your highest priority is preserving the integrity of the supplies in the cache.   Then of course there is the consideration of your limits set by the size and shape of your container.   In the case of the five gallon buckets, they are all usually about the same size, but that is not to say you cannot use other containers that would accommodate other items.   Pelican cases are used by well funded special operations types because they seal up airtight and come in some larger sizes that can hold most weapons.   The Browning travel vault is a long wide gun case that is airtight and can be buried with little preparation or modification.   Again, such containers are so costly, that only the best funded operations would consider them cost effective even in the face of standard bucket caches occasionally failing or being found.  
This is a good basic bucket stash with some extras.  It should sustain one person for two days of moderate activity and that is usually enough time for a survivor to either move on to the next cache, or get started foraging for food and supplies.   As an option, I designated this as a #1 cache, so it has a few basic survival items I might not have on me if I have to bugout in a "come as you are" situation.  Since I don't always have a fixed blade knife and pistol on me, I put them in the stash along with a moderate supply of ammo.   I opted for a fairly standard mini-mag lite because the AA batteries can be bought and stored in bulk, but a better cache would have one of the improved LED flashlights with the little built-in generator.    It is likely that I will include one of those kinds of lights in other caches along the bugout route.   It is logical that the various caches along a bugout would have different, but complimentary survival items that I would look forward to recovering as I travel along the route.   I would assume that I would have some fairly common items on me before reaching the stash, this would include some sort of large bag or backpack, a full set of clothes, a folding pocketknife or leatherman tool, a hat of some sort, and probably something to use as a blanket or sleeping bag.  
Items:
The bucket - has many uses, not the least of which is holding all of the other stuff in a watertight and nearly airtight environment for at least two years.    It can be used to haul water, as a wash basin, or even as a toilet.   In foraging activities, a clean bucket is good for carrying berries, mushrooms and various other edible plants back to camp.   I can also be used for storing food out of reach of hungry animals.   Fresh meat placed in the bucket and then secured in a stream is a sort of "frontiersmen's fridge".   A few empty buckets secured to a few stout poles can be the basis for a usable raft.   
The Poncho - There are a lot of uses for the standard military poncho, this one has some bungee cord attached to the corners to facilitate use as a fast shelter.   The poncho is good for a lot of things, but not really so great as a foul weather garment, still better than nothing.   Even if I am already carrying or using a shelter, the poncho might be useful in making that shelter better camouflaged or more comfortable.  
The Pistol and Ammo - I picked a .45 that I had gotten in a trade deal where I got the gun fairly cheap but it needed some repairs.  After the repairs, it shoots well but still looks fairly rough.   For the $250 everyone tells me it is worth, It is better to stash than to sell, so it gets stashed with a spare mag and some ammo.   100 rounds of ammo is plenty for basic self defense and foraging in a non-combat environment.   In a combat environment, the handgun is probably just a backup weapon and the rather light ammo load (or even less) would be appropriate.   More ammo would be picked up along the bugout route.   Prepping the pistol for long term storage means cleaning and oiling it then sealing it in plastic.   I use regular motor oil since cosmoline can be harder to clean off under primitive conditions.   The ammo was too bulky in the store packaging, not to mention the store packaging was not moisture resistant.  I opted to repack the ammo in sealed plastic bags using a seal-a meal.   Even better would be to use one of the newer vacuum sealers for the gun and ammo, but pack them separately to keep oil away from the ammo.   In the long term, the oil breaks down and releases a gas that seeps into the ammo and can neutralize the primers, which kills the ammo.    I did include one small bottle of lube for cleaning and re-lubing the pistol when I recover the cache.   Again, just regular motor oil is good enough for the job.  
Knife - I had a spare Cold Steel SRK on hand.   It is well used and with a nice Kydex sheath, but lacks the original sheath and is not in good enough "original" condition to have any significant collector value.   It is still an excellent utility knife and very sharp.   I would expect to be carrying a pocket knife all the time and when I recover the cache, but may not have a good sharp fixed blade knife on hand, so it would not hurt to have one in the cache, thus, I included one.   

rest at the link:  http://www.savvysurvivor.com/supplycache.htm

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