Am I wrong to stock food right now?

Despite my wife thinking I am being ultra-paranoid, my first response to the major crash today was buying $500.00 of dried food, bulk flour, bulk sugar, bulk oil. I want to buy more, but she is kind of Leary that things are OK, and no reason to stock up on food.

With a global food shortage, a financial meltdown, it feels like if there was any time to think stocking up was a good idea, today was it for me. Even if it sits for a year or two, it's not going bad any time soon.

reply to post by YouAreDreaming


No one can judge you for what's right and wrong. You can only judge yourself.

With that said, I started stocking two weeks ago and have been encouraging everyone to do the same. Most people laugh at me and think I'm crazy. I could care less about public perception. Once you connect all the dots, it's quite apparant what's truly going on.

Nobody is wrong to stock-pile supplies. Not now, not ever. "It is better to be safe than sorry."

For me, if SHTF, I need nearly nothing. I am blessed to be in a land abundant in EVERYTHING I need to survive. Even to provide for multiple people.

You'd be surprised at what you can find within the very room you are in right now that will help you live out many-a-moon. Ever eaten a grasshopper? Very nutritious.

reply to post by YouAreDreaming


I don't think you would've been wrong to do so six months or a year ago. If you have supplies and a plan, some skills, water or water source, you have options, and those options can change your very sense of well-being, not to mention augment your survival if things don't turn out as well as we all hope they do.

I suggest you mark dates on the containers of food, and rotate your stocks. Buy the foods you two like to eat, and learn how to cook them in different ways and in combination with other foods. If from this point, you get a little extra each week, always use the oldest goods, your worst case is you might save a little money. Not so bad, huh?

If you live in a warm/hot area, you may have to take steps to keep flour weevils from taking over. Their eggs are shipped with the flour, and some pasta/rice as well. It is what it is. We don't see it, and we don't have to know. If you freeze the dried goods inside a ziplock freezer bag for 24 hours, that will help prevent flour weevils from growing in it.

Cheers, and nice to meet you!

look through the survival forum, you'll see that many members here entertain if not directly participate in stockpiling to an extent. In the current state of the world, preparedness be it for two days or two months is a prudent thing.

Thanks Universal Light and JR... I feel better, I just know in my gut its the right thing to do.

And I'd eat all sorts of insect based protein if needed. I mean, ant larva, grasshoppers, earth worms. I've been there before... McDonalds.

I'm just concerned that we are approaching some kind of catastrophic event, I just have a really bad feeling and have the extra cash to stock up a bit.

My family may just be thanking me a year from now, who knows, worse case, we eat it in rotation from now on keeping a fresh stock just in case.

OP,
You aren't crazy, ill- informed or even slightly off your rocker. I've been stockpiling since I got here, and it's well worth the peace of mind. Let your wife know that my DH thinks I am out of my mind too. She'll be grateful when the SHTF. Go with your gut.
Be Well.

For me, thanks to where *I live* I need nearly nothing next to a bunch of guaze bandage, tape, clothing, my knife, my slingshot, some basic fishing gear (including a barbless hook and some extra line for stitching wounds), my snakebite kit (which doubles as a remedy for all poisonous stings/bites), a couple of magnezium sticks, iodine tablets lasting me long enough to find a clean water-source and about 100 foldgers coffee singles (nothing beats coffee over a camp fire.)

But yeah, stockpiling food is a good thing.

If I could throw in some extras, it would be 10lbs worth of processed meats and enough canned veggies I could carry. Other than that, I'm fine.

Editing to add: I would also like a big bunch of superglue. You can help stitch wounds with it and it can help with all sorts of other things. Hand-made rope sealers semi-permanent shelters, etc. I would grab as many tubes of superglue as I could.

[edit on 29-9-2008 by Jay-in-AR]

I don't plan to sit Sit-X out at my house. A generator would do me no good. I'd get good and lost in the nearest national forest. And there are a bunch of them around here.


Oh, and another thing, I would eventually have to move about. So, I would like to have the most recent USGS quadrangle maps of my immediate location.

[edit on 29-9-2008 by Jay-in-AR]

reply to post by YouAreDreaming


In my opinion, it's wise to have some extra food on-hand...just in case...but that's pretty much a personal decision. If you have the extra money to stock up on the food, I don't see the problem with it.

My husband and I have stocked up on dried beans, pasta, some canned foods such as corned beef and tuna), as well as bottled water. These foods will last for many years.

My parents stocked up to prepare for Y2K, and they're still eating some of food they bought all those years ago. The pasta and dried beans are still good, as is the flour. They just recently made some apple cobbler with that old flour (the apples were from their trees) and they said the cobbler tasted good.

In the 18 and 1900s it was normal to store food for lean times, from Victorian times right up to the advent of supermarkets in the 1960s most familes had pantries and larders that mum would keep as well stocked as possible. Mum and Gran probably remember rationing and shortages from during the two world wars and the lean times between.

We got arogant and smug in the late 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s ( cept for survivalists) We believed the food and fuel would always be in the shops 24/7/365 and easily affordable prices. Now that bubble has burst, Crazy storms like the Canadian Ice storm and a few of the huge hurricanes that hit Florida, plus various global events have shown us that people in civilised technologically advanced nations can end up going weeks without food, power or clean water. The weird weather has buggered up wheat and Rice crops again this year so for the first time in 60 years India, Vietnam, China Thailand etc are no longer exporting rice to the west. the cost of fuel is making farming in the west very expensive, and its made worse by the crap weather. Only a fool is not setting aside a bit of extra food while they can. The wise ( us ) are storing food, fuel, tools, medical supplies, extra prescription goods, specs, Glasses, Hearing aides, clothing etc while its still basicall available and affordable. Just like Gran used to.

Just throwing my 2 pennies in here too.
It's the people who don't stockpile that are crazy. But yet these same people probably have life insurance, pre-paid funerals and wills,and a nice retirement fund plan..just in case.
For some reason they can't apply the same logic to stockpiling food supplies.All it takes is to be the victim of mother natures fury to change ones attitude pretty quickly.
In my area we had a week long blackout, followed by a devastating wind storm where some had no power for two weeks, not even the banks and grocery stores.
WHAT AN EYE OPENER.
You learn fast to keep lots on hand, and most of what I keep is not required to be cooked. Yeah cold ravioli still tastes OK.
Have I ever had to use it?
Yes. When my electricity got cut off for a week. We still had lots of food to eat.
Always plan ahead.

originally posted by Northern Raider

In the 18 and 1900s it was normal to store food for lean times, from Victorian times right up to the advent of supermarkets in the 1960s most familes had pantries and larders that mum would keep as well stocked as possible. Mum and Gran probably remember rationing and shortages from during the two world wars and the lean times between.

We got arogant and smug in the late 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s ( cept for survivalists) We believed the food and fuel would always be in the shops 24/7/365 and easily affordable prices. Now that bubble has burst, Crazy storms like the Canadian Ice storm and a few of the huge hurricanes that hit Florida, plus various global events have shown us that people in civilised technologically advanced nations can end up going weeks without food, power or clean water. The weird weather has buggered up wheat and Rice crops again this year so for the first time in 60 years India, Vietnam, China Thailand etc are no longer exporting rice to the west. the cost of fuel is making farming in the west very expensive, and its made worse by the crap weather. Only a fool is not setting aside a bit of extra food while they can. The wise ( us ) are storing food, fuel, tools, medical supplies, extra prescription goods, specs, Glasses, Hearing aides, clothing etc while its still basicall available and affordable. Just like Gran used to.

Exactly. We have not gotten very smart in our evolution.