http://survivalacres.com/wordpress/?p=815

July 31, 2007
Where To Live And Collapse Survival

This is another prediction coming true - American’s moving to Canada in record numbers. This will only increase as the fascist police state worsens and climate change makes its impact felt on everyone.

I get a lot of questions about where to live. It’s not an easy decision and even harder to give ‘long distance advice’. There are several criteria to keep in mind however.

In a nutshell, they are -

Water - Climate change will only worsen the already limited supply of fresh water in most areas. Cities that are dependent upon an influx of fresh water will be particularly vulnerable. This also requires huge amounts of electricity, a resource that will also be declining. This applies to all of the Southwest in particular.

Abundant fresh water will be a top priority for millions and millions who scramble to avoid the parched conditions to come. Some areas have natural sources of localized water, others don’t. Pick one that does.

Climate - This is a hard one to predict due to climate change, but whatever trends are already showing now can be projected into the future (to be worse). Areas that are warming on average year-to-year will heat up even more. Areas that are flooding will probably flood again. Most areas in the U.S. seem to be drying up, which partly helps explain the immigration into Canada and the desire to flee the fascist U.S. agenda.

Population - The higher the population, the more problems an area can be expected to have during the collapse. This is a simple supply and demand issue. On the one hand, cities will receive more goods then rural areas due to their higher population, at least for a time, but their ability to do for themselves (grow their own) will be highly limited or impossible. Availability could soon be a major problem and the ability to do for yourself (grow your own) will be very limited and dangerous.

The demand for essentials, such as food, water, and usable soils will be inadequate during the crash. Cities exist now because of massive imports, this is now all threatened and will be greatly reduced in the future. The likelihood that there will simply not be enough to go around anymore is very high.

The lack of suitable soil, room, safety and water, plus the expected police state controls will make cities very dangerous places to be. Gangs, already there and new ones to be, will control everything they can. Opposing this (unsuccessfully) will be a police state, which will impose controls on only the ‘lawful’ citizens (which is how it actually works now) making things worse for them. In between will be the gray zones, the cracks where vast numbers of people will try to eke out their existence. This gray zone will expand tremendously and give rise to all type of issues - a vast black market, extortion, bribery, thievery and assault.

Distancing yourself from all this will be as essential as food. If you stay, you will eventually succumb to gangs (including work gangs), the police state controls or starvation. Those that “survive the city” will have to give up more then their freedom, they will give up their autonomy, ability to travel, self-sufficiency and most of the hours of their lives as they’re inducted into the Fatherland.

I cannot in good faith recommend staying in the city for anyone. Many are making such plans, believing that they will be better off somehow. I cannot agree, these will be the worst locations of all. Cities exist now because of the sheer number of imports required to keep them alive and functioning. They do not produce the essential goods that are needed to even feed themselves. This will be very clear during the collapse as life reduces itself down to the basics.

Soils - Usable soil for growing things and the room to grow them is key for future survival. Food storage alone won’t keep you and your family alive indefinitely (although you will certainly need this), you will need to learn to grow your own food, or participate with others that are growing food.

Food health comes from soil health. Many soils can be improved over time, but it’s best to start with good soil, you may not have the time you think. Composting and natural fertilizers, such a rabbit manure will help immensely. Start now.

Resources - The need for available local resources, particularly wood will be more and more acute. Barren areas, or areas covered with asphalt and concrete will be utterly useless. Wood is renewable and will be used for almost everything.

Water is renewable but will be affected by climate change. Locating in a river drainage will help assure you a source of water. These water sources won’t go away overnight, but remote drainage areas where the rivers run for many miles might. Avoid deep wells, power will be problematic or impossible in many locations. Water that is accessible from hand pumps or the surface will be much more reliable and does not require electricity or energy to obtain.

Local food production will be essential as global crops decline. Crop production requires suitable soils, climate and adequate water, plus the need to safeguard crops. This will include damage for pests, which are sure to change (increase) due to climate change. The latter two will be the hardest to ensure, human and non-human pests. In some areas, crops will be overrun by hordes of hungry people who will have great difficulty in restraining themselves as food runs out. This will result in widespread damage and destruction and worsen an already bad food situation.

Distribution of crops is yet another issue. Transportation will be limited and distribution of crop production and essential goods will be restricted. Cities will probably receive a higher priority then rural areas, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the food will actually arrive.

Local farmers will quite probably take care of their own, first and foremost. This makes sense as food shortages will be acute everywhere. There will also be ‘incentives’ from rural residents to ensure that they are not left out of the food production loop (armed gangs).

Ecovillages, self-sustaining homesteads and farmers will all be targets for masses of people who will lack adequate nutrition. This appears to be a hugely overlooked issue. It will be nearly impossible to protect and secure their food production when the trucks stop running. There is simply no way to do so without an ‘army’.

The need for individualized food production, cooperative farms and land share agreements is essential. Only by having a vested interest (personalized) in the outcome of the seasonal production of food will the food supply be sufficient, protected, and affordable. Maybe.

The mega farms will fail as soon as the government subsidies and protections stop. They will probably receive huge allotments of oil-based resources (fuel and fertilizers) but this is not expected to be sufficient to keep them going forever. They are also dependent upon the same needs everyone else has today - a functioning market place; a national infrastructure and distribution network; an agreeable climate; and a just in time delivery system to move ready-harvests from fields to market and all stops in between. None of these can be counted on in the future, making their viability very questionable.

Rural Areas - Rural areas offer the best collapse “steads” (crash-steads) of all. They offer lower populations, better soils, better climate, more water (in general), available forest (usually) and local resources and most of all - localized food production in the form of farms and ranches. There is also a lower police state presence, which will be a huge factor in the years to come as governments (city, state and federal) attempt to retain control (and failing).

They have their drawbacks too - inflexible (to outsiders), tight-knit, wary of ‘outsiders’, difficulty in integration, long distances to stores, jobs and other resources, limited employment opportunities and limited services (comparatively speaking). Despite these, collapse will still be more survivable in the rural areas then in the cities. Greater autonomy and freedom will exist their due to their sheer size, population numbers and opportunities for self-sufficiency. Plus the sheer need to keep the rural areas going to feed the cities will permit more flexibility there among the residents. They will likely get ‘first pick’ of the food production from crops and ranches too and will keep for themselves what they need, despite any “authority” attempting to dictate otherwise. Food shortages will make for self-imposed “authority” and rule.

Remote Areas - Crash will bring out the very worst in many people. As food supplies dry up, the anxiety and fear will explode into extreme violence and death. This is the die-off period when people will be forced to hardscrabble lives in a desperate attempt to stay alive. No place on earth will be entirely safe. The competition for essential resources will be “intense”. Make no mistake, violence will rule the day, period. This will occur at any time during the collapse period and can logically be thought to be the worst at the deepest point of collapse when lawlessness prevails.

This will be the time of “every man for himself” and will be the most difficult period of all to survive. Starvation will be acute and compounding this will be extremely ruthless people who will make life extremely difficult. Do not underestimate the violence anyone is capable of.

Remote areas are areas that are extremely limited in population and offer the best in security, privacy and ‘aloneness’ with the least amount of threat from your fellow citizens. These areas can be found all over the world and are located far away from major and small populations. They will remain small in population due to the sheer distance from others.

Remote forested retreats and tiny hamlets, cabins and sheltered outposts will be the best protected of all. Their drawbacks are many however despite these advantages. They offer no support (injuries and sickness will be a big factor), must be fully stockpiled and supplied prior to the crash and will probably remain isolated forever.

Post-crash means they will still be isolated, only more so. Whatever supplies they have is all they will have for the duration (forever). Outside trade will be limited, but probably not entirely impossible, once this resumes among the post-crash survivors.

They will also be the only places that will offer relatively safe self-sufficiency and crop production during the crash period. Their remoteness offers them the protection they need without a standing army to guard their production. On the other hand, their isolation means less hands to help, so it will be a hard life nonetheless.

Pre-Collapse, Collapse and Post-Collapse - As previously noted on this blog, the coming crash requires a unique response for the different stages of collapse. Pre-collapse, collapse and post-collapse have different effects and responses.

The danger is in assuming that everything will remain the same as it is today. The safety and security we’ve all come to expect is one primary area. Material abundance and availability of essential goods and supplies, including their distribution and transportation is another major area of concern. None of these should be ‘assumed’ as being available in the future, because all are integral to the availability of cheap energy, livable climate and abundant water supplies.

Since all of these are now threatened, the need to make preparations in advance is obvious. During the pre-collapse phase, they are still relatively affordable and available, although that is rapidly changing (daily). During collapse, their scarcity and price will make them difficult if not quite impossible to obtain. Post-collapse survivors will also find them to be absolutely ‘priceless’ as their production and manufacture will probably be long gone.

Preserving and protecting these assets becomes problematic. Right now, it’s legal to stockpile goods, but this could and probably will change rapidly. Hoarding will be outlawed as the world finds itself experiencing acute shortages. This won’t stop people from doing it however, it will just mean the government is trying to impose control and will be largely ignored.

It’s worthwhile to note that the wealthy are already moving their assets into gold, silver, euros and essentials goods. They’re not alone either. Anyone who is paying attention to the warning signs around the world is doing the same thing, but as noted on this blog, this is still a very tiny percentage of the population, which is going to make the crash even harder then it should be.

During the collapse stage, the problem of individual safety will be most pronounced. Finding a safe place to be where your neighbors don’t attack you or steal you blind will be pretty difficult. Building trusting relationships now will help, but not entirely prevent this problem. You will just never know when you’ve become a liability instead of an asset.

I know this sounds very pessimistic, but anyone that doubts this only needs to look around now at how neighbors treat each other. Reliance upon each other only works based upon mutual need and trust. When either of these are broken or determined no longer to be necessary, you will be at risk. An easily example is as follows:

Your neighbor’s extended family decides to come live with your neighbor, who can’t really refuse because they are after all, blood-relatives. Suddenly, your crash-stead preparations prepared in conjunction with your neighbor have increased demands by 400%. The extended family brings nothing other then hungry mouths - neither skills, experience or supplies. Despite your agreements not to do this, your neighbor relents to family pressures.

In time, the strain upon your crash preparations is unbearable and creates unresolvable tensions between all of you. Something or somebody snaps and suddenly, lives are in jeopardy (or already buried). Agreements are out the window as blood is thicker then any promises made.

Situations like this happen all the time even now. The reality is very few people in the general population are preparing and instead are relying upon others to keep them alive. Nor are they building trusting relationships. Right now, they are entirely reliant upon the supermarkets, farmers and national infrastructure and distribution system, all extremely depending upon cheap energy, fast disappearing. During the crash, it will be YOU that they will turn to (or on), remembering your previously shared warnings and preparations plans you told them about.

Saying “No” will be extremely difficult and will jeopardize the most carefully laid plans. Think this through now because you are certain to have to face it later.

The crash-stead will need to be prepared for many things, including situations like the above. This location will also need to stay out of sight, hidden and quiet during the the troubled times. This will be the time when hunger has forced people to act violently. It will be easier to avoid this then try to fight this, although you should fully expect that too. People who rob, steal, rape and kill are everyday kind of people, forced into extreme situations of personal survival because of extreme hardship and desperation. This is already happening now - see this link - The Death Mask of War for what is happening with American soldiers who will soon be coming home to America.

During the collapse of Argentina, carrying a handgun was very common place anytime you dealt with other people, especially when trying to travel or engage in any sort of trade. This was also common of course on the American frontier when lawlessness meant that dangerous people were about. Anyone not versed in various firearms had better immediately do so.

The crash-stead will need to be properly equipped and supplied to survive the duration of the crash. It will be unsafe except for remote areas to homestead and raise your own food during this time period. You and everyone else doing this will become a target. This is most unfortunate, because it creates several problems. Keeping your seeds viable will mean keeping at least some crop production in operation. Keeping your livestock alive will mean the same thing.

This means the crash-stead should be hidden and defended. I can see no other way to successfully ensure the essentials of seeds and livestock will be alive for the post-crash period. It’s very hard for people to envision the extreme hunger to come, but history does have examples of what this has been like. Jared Diamond points out in his book, “Collapse”, that Easter Island destroyed their entire ecological base and ate everything in sight before turning to cannibalism, and even that didn’t last long.

There is simply no way the future world without cheap, portable energy can even remotely feed 6.5+ billion people. Starvation and violence will be the result. We can pretend otherwise and wish it were not true, but we would only find out that we were horribly wrong. Population overshoot is a very real and extreme problem, only permitted by the abundance of cheap energy and a global distribution system. This is collapsing NOW.

Surviving Collapse

Those who are prepared to “go the distance” for the coming collapse stand the best chance of survival. Half-hearted measures will not work. Attempting to hang onto this present lifestyle will not work. A 3-day food supply will not work. Wishful thinking will not work. The world is about to experience what has happened many times before.

It’s very hard for people to realize just how incredibly stupid civilization has been. Building a modern society on finite resources and then failing to accept it’s finality or shortsightedness, let alone do anything about it has been suicidal. We’re committing speciescide of our own race. Worse, we destroyed the ecological base along the way where we obtain our sustenance.

The world is presently overpopulated by the billions. We obtained this surplus through sheer folly and shortsightedness, a.k.a “greed”. There is a valid reason why overpopulation of this magnitude never appeared in human history before. No other civilization before ours exploited the oil reserves that were tens of thousands of years in existence, predating all human life and converted them into agriculture and global transportation system.

But we did, and we built a overpopulated world that polluted, raped, destroyed it’s natural carrying capacity to such a degree that human life itself is now threatened. We became so accustomed to this temporary ‘abundance’ that we fooled ourselves into believing it would last forever. We were dead wrong.

Surviving the collapse will mean we must first stop lying to ourselves. And we must stop listening to the lies being spouted off by others. Neither the media nor the government will be honest enough to tell the truth, yet are making their own secret preparations without telling you. Ignoring the hype, false promises, “vaporware” and empty platitudes that everything is going to be ok is important. Everything is NOT OK and its past time we started acting like it was true.

You will need the right attitude, knowledge, skills, experience and supplies to survive the collapse. And you will also need a lot of luck, determination and sound judgment. Nobody will be unaffected and the majority of us do not have wads of cash to “throw at the problem” as some do. Those that do will survive right up until their protectors realize that they can have it all for themselves. Anyone who refuses to learn the skills necessary will last only as long as their money is considered valuable.

Beyond this, you will need to start making responsible decisions for your future today, as in right now. Delay only means you are one day closer to that period of irrecoverable and permanent loss. Time is no longer on our side, we cannot recover the days, months and years we pondered and pontificated wondering what we should do. We are now being forced to choose IF we should live, or whether we shall die.

Reality

If we do not choose, and the majority won’t, the choice has already been made for them and their fate is already signed, sealed and delivered. Denial, disbelief and argumentation will not change the outcome one iota. This is the bed humanity has made, now we will either sleep in it or stay up late at night, on watch, awake and alert and making ready.

I find myself unable to truly convey the reality of our future. Americans have not known suffering of this magnitude at any time. The death of entire planetary civilization will happen in just a few years. The scale and magnitude of this disaster of our own making is nearly incomprehensible to the human mind. We are not faced with a single calamity, which we could probably endure, but multiple, simultaneous calamities of global proportions.

Peak oil means peak civilization as global energy supplies collapse to pre-industrial levels. Oil, coal, natural gas and even renewables such as hydroelectric power will disappear entirely within the next century. The ability to recreate these sources of energy will disappear when the oil is gone.

Climate change is even bigger as it will force the relocation and starvation of hundreds of millions of people. Rising sea levels are already displacing nations such as Bangladesh. The forced relocations, diminishing food productions and dramatic temperature swings will have tremendous impacts on human populations and will also create many new emerging diseases.

Ecological disasters are already making their impacts felt worldwide. The destruction of the Amazon rain forest, deforestation, collapsing fisheries and the still rising levels of pollution which is quite literally off the charts has created untenable ecological conditions for future humans and all other forms of life. We will experience the catastrophic decline of our environment despite our futile and feeble attempts of “too little, too late”. This is the warning we have ignored for decades now, and we are about to experience the REALITY in the worst possible way. We have little time to prepare for it and have long been our own worst enemy in doing so.

Only those who are either incredibly resourceful (experienced) and lucky, or those who have made adequate preparations and obtained the skills, training and experience necessary can be considered “collapse survivors” at this point in time. The kumbaya future and collaboration some espouse is woefully misrepresenting the reality of 6.5 billion hungry starving humans looking for something to eat. They will quite literally, tear this world apart. Collaboration IS essential and necessary, but it will be short circuited by many converging events and situations.

Do everything you can now. The old saw that says “hope for the best, but prepare for the worst” has never been more true then it is right now. Don’t delay another minute. Do what is necessary and remain focused on the tasks at hand. Kill your television (I can’t say that enough) and take your future into your own hands. Only you can make the difference (and changes) that is needed.

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