Protecting your Food Storage

"They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-haaa!" - song title and lyric

When a disaster happens, people may become hungry and desperate and look enviously at you with your back-up power generator and grilling steaks on the BBQ. Things can get ugly when you have food and your neighbors do not.

There are several ways to cope with this situation:

1. Share
   When the Mormon church recommends that its members store one year of food, it is generally acknowledged that families won't really need to survive for one year on food storage alone. Instead the one year buffer gives you plenty to share with others who don't have stored food. We have friends who lived in Puerto Rico when a hurricane hit the island. Neighbors came for many days with starving kids pleading for food and medicine like aspirin. Fortunately they had supplies to share.
   
2. Keep a Low Profile
   A second strategy is to use stealth. Hide your food storage in multiple locations around the house so if you get raided you only lose part of your supplies. Don't flaunt your supplies and keep it secret, especially after a disaster. Neighbors may still become suspicious if you're not spotted waiting in long food/water lines (because you don't need it).
   
3. Use Force to Defend Yourself
   Personally I don't own a gun but there are those who advocate having the means to fight back should someone try to steal your emergency supplies. If you buy a gun or rifle be sure to have a gun lock and keep it away from children. As a child playing hide and seek, I found a hunting rifle in my dad's closet. Kids will find out your hiding places.

Bottom Line
Having an emergency food storage is a wonderful accomplishment. Now take time to think about how it will be used or protected during an actual emergency. Will you share it, hide it, or defend it?

Updated Nov 8.

For another blog on self defense and your options check out Run and Hide or Blow Their Heads Off at Code Name Insight.

Also interesting: Krav Maga - Israeli Martial Arts