Tag Archives: bioweapon

Link – Apocalyptic Dog Food

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Originally published at Notes From The Bunker. You can comment here or there.

I love my dog. He’s a handful, and often a troublemaker, but I will, without remorse or compunction, instantly put my fist through the head of anyone that tries to hurt him. One thing I’ve neglected to do, though, for my little buddy is to set up his doggy bugout-bag and set back some food for him.

A doggy BOB isn’t a silly idea. Think about it..if we have to beat feet and take Mr. Furman with us what are we going to need to make things conducive to travelling with him? First off, we’re gonna need a leash (or two or three), spare collar, copies of his vaccinations, a couple muzzles, water bowls, food bowls, and a few other goodies. If we wind up having to stay in a crowded friends house or something, last thing we need is puppy being unwelcome because he wants to eat someone’s four-year-old….hence, some muzzles. And, really, if I can swing it, get the vet to prescribe some tranquilizers…in a high-stress environment some doggie-downers might come in handy for keeping him calm when we need him to be.

Food, though…I hadn’t really given it much thought. I figured that he’s a dog so he’ll pretty much eat anything we eat (and a lot of stuff we won’t.)  In retrospect, that’s really not a good idea. After all, that means our supply of people food for two has become a supply of people food for two-and-a-half…turning a 12 month supply into a 9.5 month supply.

Here’s a great post about borrowing the canner from the LDS cannery and putting away some premium kibble. Certainly some #10 cans are gonna last quite a while but I think most dogs, when theyre hungry, aren’t really going to turn their noses up at their dog food because it’s stale. There are, after all, critters that are designed to eat roadkill. However, from a storage standpoint, if youre going to store a bulk amount of food you want it stored in a manner that does not promote vermin, insects and other pests. Just heaving a 50# bag of kibble onto the shelf and expecting it to sit there for a few years might not be a terribly good idea unless you like the idea of some really well fed and happy mice setting up shop in that bag. I think I might just go the mylar bag route. I have a stack of them from the cannery and they should hold about the same as a #10 can. I also have quite a few 5-gallon buckets sitting around with GammaSeal lids on them so that might be a way to go as well.

Of course, borrowing the canning machine from the cannery opens up a few other possibilites since I could can..well…anything.

Regardless, I’ve been neglecting Nuke’s post-apocalyptic needs and need to get him squared away.

Bioweapon hits the big oh-two

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Originally published at Notes From The Bunker. You can comment here or there.

Last year’s birthday ‘cake’ – Prosciutto and stew beef. A traditinal dog birthday favorite.

Eighty pounds, jaws of steel, and tougher than Chinese arithmetic……the Bioweapon Mk I is two years old as of yesterday.

It’s pretty much a standard in most preparedness literature that, at some point, a well-trained dog should be acquired as a bit of a force-multiplier. (We’re still working on the ‘well-trained’ part). One idea is that, since you have to go to sleep sometime, the dog provides an early-warning system if someone or something creeps too close to your slumbering form. There is some merit to this…Nuke obviously has better hearing than me and, since he’s usually laying on the floor or otherwise in close contact with it, can sense the vibrations of people coming to the door. He is more useful at night when we’re out walking. He may stop and stare intently off into the distance and let me know that there’s someone (or something) wandering around the street that I didn’t see.

Unfortunately, he can also be caught unawares….and his lack of situational awareness in some cases leads to him being caught by surprise when someone walks along the sidewalk and comes up behind us. At this point, to validate his existence, he starts lunging and barking. Always an exciting moment. But he’s getting better at that sort of thing.Still need to get him acclimated to little kids. He hasn’t quite figured out if they are simply miniature humans or prey.

Is he an asset, from a preparedness standpoint? I’d say it’s pretty neutral. There’s nothing he does that cannot be replicated through technology or gear…early warning, seismic intrusion, intimidation, night vision, etc. On the other hand, he does provide all these features into a fairly compact form that requires only moderate upkeep. The major drawback, of course, is the unreliable nature of his willingness to do what he’s told. Again…a work in progress. So far we’ve pretty much got a handle on sit, go (as in ‘you can range ahead of us if you want’), stay, come, down, and up (either stand up or jump up onto an object). All commands come with matching hand motions. What I should have done when I started this was incorporating whistles into the commands as well so I’d have three options – voice, hands and whistles.

Probably his most useful function is as an early warning detection system against visitors. That may not sound terribly exciting or dramatic, but it is probably the most practical and useful feature he offers. I can take a nap with the doors unlocked and the windows open and not worry about waking up to find some stranger standing over me with a baseball bat.Passively, he probably promotes people keeping their distance from us when we’re out and about.

So today he is two years old. We’ll go pick him up a big bunch of meat scraps and give him a nice dinner. No gifts, though…he’s spoiled enough already.