Free Preparedness E-Books

Camp loom, for making mats and mattresses from the 1911 edition of the Boy Scout Handbook Through a circuitous bit of aimless interweb searching I came across a huge list of downloadable urban homesteading/gardening/survivalist manuals on a site called hardcorepreppers.com. Unfortunately, this site is so popular that it seems to be down every time I’ve checked. But thanks to Google’s caching feature I was able to access a li...

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EDC Part I: Multi-tool and Knife

...o clean. And the hollow hilt can accept a stick to turn the knife into a spear should you need to “harvest” a feral pig for lunch, let’s say. But the Bushman is too bulky and sinister for my EDC, at least in urban areas. I wore it around the house one day, but Mrs. Homegrown said she thought I was acting like a preschooler and, frankly, what do I need a big knife like this for blogging, answering emails and trips to the post off...

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Saturday Linkages: From Plastic Bottle Kayaks to Canine Staircases

...Stings. – http://www. backyardecosystem.com/backwards-beek eeping/happy-bees-equals-happy-beekeeper-how-treat-bee-stings/  … Whatever happened to common sense?  Not to be outdone by Canada, another city wants to ruin an urban garden. Please help! http:// chn.ge/RimMiZ   What do USDA inspectors do? Undercover video shutters another dairy cull slaughterhouse in Calif. | barfblog http:// barfblog.foodsafety.ksu.edu/blog/155879/12 /08/21/what-d...

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Heavy-duty disinfecting the non-toxic way with hydrogen peroxide and vinegar

...es a fine job. But I admit there are times, like when you’re cleaning chicken juice off a cutting board, where you might want something stronger. Here’s a safe, super-strong way to disinfect. We covered it in The Urban Homestead, and it floats around the interwebs, too, so it may be review for some of you. 1) Take a bottle of hydrogen peroxide (3% solution, the kind you buy in the drugstore). Leave it in the  brown bottle it comes in...

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Backwoods Home Magazine

Imagine Martha Stewart as a gun-toting radical libertarian and you’ll have some idea what the always informative and entertaining Backwoods Home Magazine is like. Even though its primary emphasis is rural off-grid living, every issue has something to offer for the urban homesteader. The current January/February issue features a detailed article on how city dwellers can maximize their vegetable production in small spaces. Even the article on runn...

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Update on the Food and Flowers Freedom Act

Some thirty people showed up today for a Planning Commission meeting in support of the Food and Flowers Freedom Act. The commissioners loved us and approved the Planning Departments suggestions that the code be amended to allow “truck gardening” and off-site resale of produce and flowers grown in residential zones in the City of Los Angeles. The tide is turning. Once the poster child for urban blight and bad planning, Los Angeles ma...

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Five Lessons We Learned About Lead in Soil

As regular followers of this blog may recall, we did some soil tests last year that revealed elevated levels of lead and zinc in our backyard. The cause? Most likely, paint from our 92 year old house and nearly a hundred years of auto exhaust and dust from brake linings. Applying a little alchemy to turn lead to gold, I think the most productive thing I can do is to help get the word out about lead soil and how common this problem is in urban a...

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The Survivor

We interrupt this dull series of articles about rainwater harvesting for important breaking news at our urban homestead–the development of the SurviveLA signature cocktail–the Survivor. For a long time we’ve cursed the previous owners of our compound for their useless, inedible landscaping. One of the plants they left us that we’ve lived with for all these years is an ornamental pomegranate tree (Punica granatum) that, wh...

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Street Signs and Solar Ovens

...also contributed two improvised solar ovens, one made out of a discarded pizza box. Other highlights include a functioning still by Alison Wiese, the stunning knitted clothing of Lisa Auerbach, items from the Path to Freedom urban homestead and contributions from the fine folks at C.I.C.L.E. So, get on your bike, head down to the Craft and Folk Art Museum, and see this provocative show! Craft and Folk Art Museum Hours:Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday...

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