Author: Daisy Luther

The Organic Prepper

Home canning is a great way to preserve food. It’s an old-fashioned skill that has undergone a lot of research, resulting in modern updates.

Sometimes people are resistant to these updates. When I recently published my book, The Organic Canner, I can’t tell you how many emails I received telling me, for example, that a pressure canner isn’t necessary. That the reader’s grandma used a water bath canner for everything and she lived to the ripe old age of 114. That by my adherence to the guidelines set forth by the USDA, I’m “selling out” and kowtowing to the government. One person even wrote that he “used to read my website but no longer would” since my book followed the USDA recommendations for canning.   Continue reading “Washington Man Paralyzed by Botulism from Improperly Canned Food”

USA Today – by Chris Woodyard

LOS ANGELES — West Coast ports were expected to reopen to shipping Monday after a weekend shutdown that heightened labor tensions and hinted at the ongoing dispute’s potential to sap billions of dollars from the U.S. economy.

At the normally busy Port of Los Angeles, cranes sat idly perched over ships stacked high with containers during the weekend while other loaded vessels bobbed at anchor offshore. The terminal operators’ decision to shut down ship movements at 29 West Coast ports affected not only goods such as cars, clothing, building materials and electronics from Asia, but also American agricultural exports.   Continue reading “West Coast ports to reopen after weekend shutdown”

The Organic Prepper

The economic climate has a lot of people scrambling to stock up on food right now.  Add to an uncertain job market the food shortage caused by extreme weather conditions across the country, and we could be looking at a perfect storm on the horizon.

Do you read about people’s giant stockpiles of food and wonder, “Where the heck do they find those giant 50 pound bags of grains?”  or “How on earth do they afford that extra food on top of the high cost of their day-to-day groceries?”   Continue reading “Where to Buy Bulk Organic Grains for Your Stockpile”

The Organic Prepper

Here’s one of those stories that is so utterly ridiculous that you’ll be hard-pressed to believe it’s not satire.  It should be satire, an ironic tale geared to point out how ridiculous the culture of fear in America is. Unfortunately, it’s painfully, ridiculously real.

A 9 year old boy from Kermit, Texas was suspended last week for making terrorist threats. What could a 9 year old do that was so terrifying?  Did it involve guns? Knives? A plan to blow up the school?

Nope. it involved a ring. A magical one, as a matter of fact.    Continue reading “Texas School Takes “Magical Threats to Children’s Safety Seriously”; Suspends Boy Over Hobbit Ring Terrorism”

The Organic Prepper

So…after you saw last week’s infographic on the budget-friendly winter vegetables you should be eating, you decided to go for it. You went to the farmer’s market and got yourself some winter vegetables.  They’re the best bargain around this time of year, so you were very happy to see how affordable they are.

But now, you have a lumpy pile of unfamiliar produce on your cutting board.  What the heck do you do with this?   Continue reading “How to Cook Turnips, Celeriac, and Rutabagas”

The Organic Prepper

As if Froot Loops weren’t already a poor enough choice, with their sugar, dyes, and artificial flavors, (and no “froot” anywhere in sight) now, independent testing has shown that those ingredients aren’t the worst thing that Kelloggs is serving up. The cereal also contains Round-up herbicide (glyphosate) and genetically modified corn. Oh – and not just a little bit of GMO corn – it’s 100% GMO.    Continue reading “Kellogg’s Froot Loops: Now Fortified Weedkiller and GMOs!!!”

The Organic Prepper

Did you ever think about what your life would be like if the stores were closed? I’m not talking about a post-apocalyptic Mad Max scenario or a winter storm that clears the shelves. I’m talking about a long-term disruption of services caused by an economic collapse.

What if you couldn’t run to Wal-Mart to get soap?  What if the grocery store had supplies so limited that they were rationed out to people in such small amounts that the food you got was not enough to meet your needs? What if there were no diapers for your baby or aspirin to cure a headache?   Continue reading “This Is What a Real-Life Economic Collapse Looks Like”

The Organic Prepper

Ask anyone who’s not a gardener what’s in season right now.  Go ahead, I’ll wait here, because it won’t take long.

Did you get met with a blank stare and perhaps some mention of potatoes and onions? We’ve become so far removed from the land that most folks don’t even know what vegetables are in season this time of year. Because of our “food on demand” system, with food coming in from all corners of the globe, many people who don’t grow food have absolutely no idea what is growing on local farms right now.  We live in a country where it doesn’t seem outrageous to serve asparagus and pumpkin in the same meal, followed up with blueberries for dessert. The people who are slaves to the grocery store can’t even fathom what people eat when they enjoy a local, seasonal diet.   Continue reading “Infographic: 15 Winter Veggies You Should Be Eating Right Now”

The Organic Prepper

Editor’s note: Dr. Metivier wrote the book on memory. Several of them. Literally.  Did you ever stop to think about how critical your ability to memorize information is in the midst of a crisis? When he offered to write a post on memory strategies, I jumped at the chance to share this information with you. Following is an article that he wrote exclusively for readers of The Organic Prepper. Enjoy!

Guest post by Dr. Anthony Metivier of Magnetic Memory Method

There’s bad news and dark days on the horizon. But even though you may have a properly stocked pantry and more than enough know-how to keep your body alive … what about your mind?   Continue reading “How to Prep Your Memory for the Apocalypse”

The Organic Prepper

Over the past couple of years, here in America….

Contaminated water caused a complete loss of municipal services in both Ohio and West Virginia, resulting in almost a million people vying for the stock in local stores.

A freak confluence of storms caused a “Superstorm” that took out power to much of the Eastern Seaboard, including New York City and the coastal parts of New Jersey. Nearly a year later, some families were still without electricity to their homes.   Continue reading “The First 10 Things Every New Prepper Should Do (Some of Them Are Free!)”

The Organic Prepper

Stop the presses! Startling new research shows that chocolate milk does not require degrees in chemistry and engineering to make! Who knew? Certainly not the Big Food monsters like Nestle, Hershey, and all of those other purveyors of flavored chemistry projects.

Chocolate milk, that cold, creamy, decadent goodness, is one of life’s simple pleasures. But the kind that you get at the store isn’t so simple. The ingredients list sounds more like something you’d use to lubricate components on your car than wholesome things you’d want your children to consume.   Continue reading “Breaking News: Chocolate Milk Only Requires 3 Ingredients!!!!”

The Organic Prepper

Shopping malls across America are going to look a whole lot emptier soon. An exodus of giant retailers is beginning with the announcement of hundreds of store closures and thousands of people newly unemployed.

The first of January, I broke with my usual tradition and wrote not about positive resolutions, but about the impending rockslide of the US economy. And “rockslide” is an apt word: as one thing starts rolling down the mountain, it will pick up other things until a veritable avalanche of other businesses and people are affected and rolling pell-mell right alongside.   Continue reading “The US Retail Industry is Collapsing: Here’s Why You’re in Trouble”

Organic Prepper

When you think about economic collapse, you probably envision all sorts of issues: food shortages, soup lines, people living in their cars, and abject poverty.

But the reality is, many of the things that will personally affect you are those day-to-day conveniences that we take for granted.  So many things are automated in our modern way of life that we don’t even consider what our ancestors had to do to keep their homes running smoothly.   Continue reading “Preppernomics: How to do Your Laundry by Hand”

The Organic Prepper

In an everyday situation, poor vision is just an inconvenience. The modern world has provided us with lots of easy solutions: glasses and contact lenses are readily available.  Personally, I have required vision correction since I was 7 years old. I can barely remember a time when reaching for my glasses was not the first thing I did each morning.

In a disaster scenario, though, bad vision could be a terrible handicap. What if something happened to your glasses? What if you lost a contact or had no solution to rinse them? Would you be able to function without vision correction?  Have you ever stopped to consider how impaired you’d be? Could you shoot, evade, hunt, or defend yourself? How would you ever replace these items?   Continue reading “LASIK Surgery: Have You Considered Permanent Vision Correction as a Prep?”

The Organic Prepper

I really don’t like to make predictions.

I’m not Zoltan, the fortune-telling dude in the machine  – you know, the one with the turban who waves his mechanical hands dramatically over a crystal ball and tells you of your future in a heavily accented voice.

But, I think there is something coming in 2015 that we all need to be concerned about, and I wouldn’t be doing my job, writing these posts, if I didn’t warn you.   Continue reading “Preppernomics: How to Survive While the Dollar Dies”

The Organic Prepper

Is your house like an unfortunate cross between Doomsday Preppers and Hoarders?

How do you store your preps? Are they neatly organized, where you can grab what you need at a moment’s notice? Are they a jumbled mess that makes your house look like an abandoned storage facility? Perhaps they are hidden chaos, tucked away neatly in drawers and closets, but with no rhyme or reason.   Continue reading “Doomsday Hoarders: 6 OCD Hacks to Organize Your Stockpile Chaos”

The Organic Prepper

Every year around this time, it just isn’t the holiday season if you don’t end up stuck in a long line of traffic going through a mandatory DUI checkpoint.  The cops are looking for people drinking and driving, and this unconstitutional search has been upheld by the Supreme Court.

And every year around this time, when I say it is a violation of my rights, someone chimes in:   Continue reading “Police Checkpoints: I’m Not Doing Anything Wrong, But I Definitely Have Something to Worry About”

The Organic Prepper

Do you want to inspire your kids to be free and self-sufficient?  There’s nothing better than a good book to point them in the right direction.

My kids are total bookworms, so I enlisted their help to compile this list of favorites. Some folks may pooh-pooh the idea of fiction as  a teaching tool, but reading about a character who is smart, adaptable, self-reliant, and skilled can influence the way your child or teenager thinks.  These books are not all specific to kids in prepper families – many of them are just tales of kids who are put into situations in which they must rely on their wits and courage to survive, while others outline the dangers of too much government.   Continue reading “Our Top 20 Works of Fabulous Fiction to Inspire Self-Reliant, Liberty-Loving Children and Teens”

The Organic Prepper

Do you love coffee or know someone who does? ‘Tis the season for the fanciest possible version of everything, and your hot beverage is no exception.

Places like Starbucks have taken flavored coffees to  whole new level. At my local grocery store, there’s an entire refrigerated unit dedicated to decadent flavored creamers. Unfortunately, those creamers are rife with chemicals, including artificial flavors and neurotoxins like aspartame and sucralose.  You certainly aren’t giving someone a “treat” by putting that stuff in their coffee. Here’s the list of ingredients for Coffeemate’s Hazelnut Creamer:   Continue reading “25 Homemade Coffee Creamers and Syrups (without the nasty additives)”

The Organic Prepper

What is a more uncomfortable feeling than relinquishing all of the items that are normally part of your EDC kit?

Here’s one: relinquishing those items and boarding a plane to fly across the country.

For many preppers, a worst-case scenario for us would be if the SHTF while we were traveling.  If your journey is by car, you can be fairly well-prepared. However, if you are flying, the TSA has basically neutered our ability to care for ourselves in the event of a disaster situation, you know, “for the safety and security of the traveling public,” to use their own words. Didn’t these rulemakers see the movie Cast Away or the series Lost? If your plane crashed and you were stranded on a deserted island, how on earth are you supposed to open a coconut with what you’re allowed to bring along?   Continue reading “Don’t Fly Without These 20 TSA-Approved Items in Your Prepper’s Carry-on Bag”