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Video: AlfieAesthetics Builds a Pocket Survival Kit

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

UK-based survivalist AlfieAesthetics is one of our favorite YouTubers because of the way he integrates humor into his teaching. Let’s face it — it’s a lot less appealing to watch a dry, boring, technical presentation on any subject than one that’s fun. And if you’re setting aside free time to learn survival skills, you might as well have a good time while you’re doing it. Alfie’s uploads are infrequent at best, but we can appreciate his quality-over-quantity approach.

In his latest video, Alfie explains the rationale behind each component in his pocket survival kit. We’ve seen these built into various plastic cases and metal Altoids tins, but he chose a cylindrical capsule that can fit snugly into a pocket (or some other place where the sun don’t shine). Its contents cover the most important bases and also include some secondary resources — a cutting tool, fire-starters, water purification, navigation, cordage, tools for fishing or snaring small game, and even antiseptic.

Above: A baggie of chlorine dioxide tablets is “a very suspicious looking set of gear overall, but a real A-class solution to the issue of dehydration.”

Several of the tips he mentions are surprisingly insightful, like adhering a backup striker surface for the stormproof matches on the inside of the capsule, or finding a spool that fits the exact diameter of the capsule and also holds the knife tang in place. True to form, Alfie intersperses dry humor to make the survival skills more entertaining and memorable.

Check out the video below. Warning: there’s some not-safe-for-work language in this one.

Hopefully this provides some food for thought for your own miniature survival kit, whether it’s stowed in your pocket, pack, or prison wallet.

The Basics of Hydroponics

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

Rarely do we daydream of less-than-perfect soil. We fantasize about our rural retreat — a picturesque cabin equipped with solar panels. We own a well with pure water, a stocked trout stream just a few paces out the backdoor, and a mature woodland with excellent hunting. We have a milk cow and two stands of honeybees, and every plant in the vegetable garden is green and thriving.

In reality, few locations have garden soil that doesn’t need some adjustment. We’d be lucky if the only requirement is 100 pounds of lime to raise the pH or perhaps organic matter applied to the top. But it’s not always so simple. What if the land on our dream acreage has thin (or nonexistent) topsoil? Maybe we’re too far from a quarry to have reliable access to lime. Maybe the only affordable real estate on the market is reclaimed surface mined land. The land could be rocky, heavily compacted, and not likely to be tillable without a few years of prep work.

Hydroponic production may be the best (or only) solution for growing vegetables in scenarios like this.

According to the United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization, global food production will need to increase by 70 percent by 2050 in order to provide for a projected 9.1 billion people. Plus this growth must happen as more and more cropland is lost to urbanization and as tighter regulations are placed on farmers in regards to emissions and environmental impacts.

Hydroponics represents one method by which food production can expand into regions not historically known for their suitability to agriculture. This science can be defined on the most basic level as soilless production. Plant nutrition is delivered via water, and the plants are held in place by inert materials, wire trellising, or other means. Hydroponic growing has a place even if the soil is decent. It can extend the growing season and make protection from severe weather and wildlife more feasible. One of a gardener’s worst enemies is weeds, so an avoidance of weed pressures may be another motivator toward hydroponic production.

What Plants Crave

Above: Lettuce and tomatoes are two crops that do well in hydroponic culture.

No, it’s not Brawndo. A plant requires 16 elements for optimal growth, which can be remembered with the jingle, “C. Hopkins Café Mighty Good, Managed by Cousin Como Clark” (C HOPKNS CaFe Mg Mn B CuZn CoMo Cl). Of these, carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and oxygen (O) are supplied by air and water. Nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K), calcium (Ca), sulfur (S), and magnesium (Mg) are macronutrients that the plants require in relatively larger amounts. The remainder — iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), boron (B), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), cobalt (Co), molybdenum (Mo), and chlorine (Cl) — are micronutrients, which plants tend to access through naturally occurring organic matter or amended compost in garden soil.

Above: A float system can work well in a home-scale operation.

A conventional grower usually doesn’t have to think about all these elements. How many are represented in a bag of fertilizer? Only three: N, P, and K. Discolored leaves or other reactions will sometimes reveal a need to add some boron or magnesium, or blossom-end rot on tomatoes or peppers will signal a lack of calcium, but for the most part, a traditional gardener manages the pH, the N, P, and K, and lets nature do the rest.

A hydroponic gardener, in contrast, doesn’t enjoy that luxury and must be mindful that every needed component is present in the water. Furthermore, in systems that recycle the nutrient solution, it’s necessary to consistently monitor against salt buildup or drastic changes in pH.

Above: An investment of less than $30 can provide enough premixed fertilizer to create up to 200 gallons of nutrient solution.

The easiest way for beginners to address nutrition is through the purchase of products specifically formulated for hydroponics. These may be either dissolvable granules or liquids. Some are pre-mixed, and others will have components added in stages. Not just any liquid fertilizer will do, because fertilizers formulated for traditional gardening focus primarily on nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.

Of course, those who are preparedness-minded may eventually prefer to wean themselves from commercial nutrients in favor of “homebrewed” options. There are a lot of do-it-yourself resources online discussing the solutions that worked in various circumstances. With these as a starting point, you may want to find your own recipe through trial and error, experimenting with nutrient “teas.” Compost, Epsom salts, and various organic fertilizers are examples of ingredients that can contribute the necessary elements to your hydroponic growing. Again, though, expect to do some close monitoring to fine-tune your formula. Be mindful, too, of sanitation and the possibility of splash on your fruits, and especially if you market your produce, adhere to proper Good Agricultural Practices regarding the use of certain organic fertilizers.

Above: The Kratky non-circulating method doesn’t require a lot of equipment.

Hydroponic Myths

While this style of growing can fill a lot of gaps in home food production, it’s not a magic pill. One of the greatest disadvantages is that it requires an initial investment in time and money to construct your system and then a considerable amount of homework and monitoring to keep it functioning properly.

Some mistakenly believe that yields are greater with hydroponic crops in comparison to their conventional, soil-based counterparts, but that’s simply not true. With all things being equal, the plants in a hydroponic system will bear about the same as those in a traditional garden.

Because light requirements don’t change, it’s also untrue that you can space hydroponic vegetables closer than you can in a garden plot. (Spacing plants too closely in either scenario can be an invitation to not only poor production, but also to spread fungal diseases from plant to plant.)

Above: Net pots are useful in several different hydroponic methods.

Taste and nutrition of the final product will be similar between the two systems as well, provided that each plant has access to the required amounts of light, oxygen, nutrients, and water. For any who have been less than impressed by a hydroponic tomato or other vegetable, that could be blamed on a simple missing nutrient.

Growing hydroponically can be rewarding, but it doesn’t require less work than conventional gardening — just different work. No, you won’t have to hoe, plow, and dig, but you’ll need some basic plumbing knowhow, and you may become more of a chemist than you planned to be.

Furthermore, while the commercial hydroponic operations you may have seen are constructed in greenhouses and under artificial light, this doesn’t have to be the case. It’s possible to have a system on your patio or in a south-facing window, where growing can take advantage of natural light and temperatures, following roughly the same growing season as a conventional garden.

Above: Compost provides many micronutrients to gardens and can contribute to the richness of homemade hydroponic nutrients, too.

You can spend as much money as you want on hydroponic gardening (as with most hobbies), but it doesn’t have to be expensive. It’s possible to buy enough equipment for 25 to 30 plants nutrients included) for under $50, provided you use recycled buckets or containers, and quite a few complete kits can be found online in the $100 range.

Which Crops?

Almost any crop can be grown hydroponically, in theory, although maturity days and plant size can make some more challenging than others. For this reason, crops most often seen in hydroponic production systems include herbs, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, celery, watercress, and leaf lettuce. A brand-new hydroponic grower would do well to start with one or two of these.

Strawberries can also do very well hydroponically. The advantages include removal of the crop from exposure to soil-borne pests and the labor benefits of picking berries that are elevated above the ground. Hydroponic strawberry production has proven to be a viable method in some arid parts of the world, including desert regions of Israel.

Nutrient Deficiencies

Specific symptoms will result from nutrient deficiencies, making it possible to identify which nutrients should be added to correct these problems. Check the chart below for a primer on which nutrients your crops might need:

The Simplest Method

A technique developed by Dr. B.A. Kratky of the University of Hawaii makes hydroponic growing accessible to more people by removing pumps and electricity from the equation. The “Kratky Method” is a non-circulating system that can be housed in a plastic bucket or tote.

“The suspended pot, non-circulating hydroponic method is a convenient way to grow short-term vegetables like lettuce and pak-choi,” Dr. Kratky explains, “because a small tank containing 1 to 2 gallons per plant only needs to be filled with nutrient solution (water plus fertilizer) at transplanting time and no additional effort is needed until harvest.”

With this method, plants are placed in a “net pot” and then suspended above the nutrient solution. As the liquid is used up, the roots reach further. The humid air between the water and the pot provides for oxygen exchange in the roots. For fast-maturing crops, the water and nutrients initially loaded will be sufficient to carry the crop through to harvest.

Above: Crops grown hydroponically are physiologically no different than crops grown in soil.

The first step to employing non-circulating hydroponics is to collect containers with lids — 5-gallon buckets and storage totes are fine. Delis and bakeries often have used plastic buckets they’re willing to part with.

Net pots and some type of sterile medium will be needed to keep the plants upright and suspended in the solution. Clay pellets, gravel, rockwool, vermiculite, perlite, sand, or packing peanuts are some commonly used growing media. I recently ordered 50 2-inch net pots and a bag of clay pellets for just over $20.

Use a hole saw of the same diameter as your net pots to make one to four holes in the lid of your bucket.

Next, add water and nutrient to make a solution for your crop, but take care to leave an air gap between the water level and the bottom of the lid where your pots are placed.

Above: Crops grown in a suspended pot, non-circulating system can be quite portable.

The crop should have a short enough maturity that it’s ready for harvest by the time the solution is 10 percent of its starting level. Lettuce and bok choy, for instance, should do well in 5-gallon containers. Longer-term vegetables should be grown in larger containers, or a secondary tank can keep levels topped off with the use of a float valve.

A Kratky system can also be quite portable, allowing growers to set their buckets into a garage if a late frost is forecast, or to move them into and out of direct sunlight as needed.

Other Methods

Above: The nutrient film technique recirculates the nutrient solution so that roots sit in a constant flow.

Another growing method common in both commercial and home-scale hydroponic production is the nutrient film technique (NFT). Here, a constant flow of nutrient solution is circulated through a plastic-lined trough or enclosed channel via a pump and reservoir. The plant roots remain in the flow. The plants themselves may be supported via an overhead trellising system, or they may be held in place by net pots, rockwool, or other media. PVC pipe or guttering can work in a home system, with an ideal slope of a half inch drop every 15 feet.

Because the nutrient is recirculated, water quality can become a concern, and it’s usually necessary to completely change the solution periodically.

Above: Tobacco transplants begun in float beds.

Float systems are another type of hydroponics that are relatively simple for a home grower to grasp. In these, rafts made of Styrofoam hold the plants and float directly on the nutrient solution. Since there’s no air space between the solution and the raft, some type of bubbler is needed in the reservoir to supply oxygen to the roots.

This system is often used by tobacco farmers to start their transplants, and many of these systems have been adapted over the past decade to start other transplants, such as tomatoes, pepper, and even corn. The transplants that are started hydroponically are then grown in natural soil.

Above: Tomato seedings begun in rockwool cubes quickly extend their feeder roots into the solution when placed in a nutrient film technique system.

In the aeration method, the nutrient solution is misted onto the roots, often from within an A-framed Styrofoam structure into which the plants are placed. Excess solution runs back into a reservoir and is recycled.

Yet another style of hydroponics is bag culture, where plants are grown in polyethylene bags filled with a medium-like vermiculite or peat. Capillary tubes that run from a main nutrient supply line are inserted into each bag, delivering the nutrients. (In one university demonstration, bag culture tomato plants grew so heavy that they damaged the steel frame of the greenhouse to which they were trellised!)

What About Aquaponics?

Above: Aquaponics will require a lot of inputs to keep both plants and fish healthy.

The concept behind aquaponics is that edible tilapia (or other fish species) are grown in large tanks, and their waste water is cycled through the hydroponic vegetables. The nutrient film technique is often used in these systems. In theory, the fish waste supplies the nutrient needs of the plants, while the plants themselves filter the water before it’s recirculated back into the fish tanks. The reality is that both plants and fish will require closer monitoring than in standalone aquaculture or hydroponic systems. Root diseases can be exacerbated due to an overabundance of organic matter in the water, and plants don’t actually “clean” out all elements that can harm the fish.

Above: Aquaponics is an interesting concept, but one that can be very challenging to master.

However, people have merged the two systems, and enterprising homesteaders who want a challenge may consider taking on an aquaponics project as a means to provide both vegetables and protein. Just keep in mind that a lot more management (and patience) will be needed.

Conclusion

Above: Lettuce in an NFT system.

Hydroponic growing isn’t for everyone. It can be tricky to master the chemistry of nutrition and the nuances of plumbing for plants. But for those with poor soil, or who live in places where the deer and rabbits eat better than the people, it can be a viable option. Furthermore, employing both conventional and hydroponic growing can make a lot of sense, with your corn, beans, and potatoes in the earth, but bok choy and celery in Kratky buckets beside the garage, where you can watch them develop beyond the groundhogs’ comfort zones.

If this is a method that captures your imagination, you can start on the most basic level now to add some variety to your gardening. By next season, who knows? Perhaps a full-blown nutrient film technique system will become part of your daydreams.

About the Author

Phillip Meeks is an agriculture and natural resources educator originally from Tennessee, but now based in the mountains of Southwest Virginia. He likes to spend his weekends hiking, gardening, beekeeping, fishing, and mushroom hunting.

More From Issue 32

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Read articles from the next issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 33

Read articles from the previous issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 31

Check out our other publications on the web: Recoil | Gun Digest | Blade | RecoilTV | RECOILtv (YouTube)

Editor’s Note: This article has been modified from its original version for the web.

Option Gray: Door Considerations for Home Security

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

Nobody wants to become the victim of a burglary, so home security is something we’ve all considered to some degree. But ask yourself this: have you put more effort into your house’s security than a determined criminal would put into gaining entry? If you’re unsure, then it’s likely that a burglar could break into your home with relative ease — it happens more than a million times every year. This security camera footage shows just how easy it can be:

Even with the large glass panel that’s practically begging to be broken, the burglar doesn’t bother — he’s able to breach the front door effortlessly with a single kick.

Fortunately, there are many simple steps that can be taken to improve your home security. In the following article, Cody Martin of OptionGray.com shares a few options for reinforcing the exterior doors to your house. Consider some of these tips next time you evaluate your vulnerability to home invasion.

When it comes to home security, we can sometimes become bogged down with all the things we can do to improve the security and sanctity of our homes. This can lead to paralysis, which results in nothing being done at all. However, if we take a methodical approach and break up home security into sections which can be tackled one at a time, we are much more likely to make improvements to our current situation.

To get things started we are going to take a look at entrances, more specifically doors. For the sake of this article, we will define an entrance as anything which would allow access into our home. This can include but is not limited to doors, windows, garages, etc. All of these provide interior access and should be treated as such. It’s easy to assign importance, but when that happens, certain entrances get all the attention while others are overlooked. Let’s take a look at the basics of security in relation to entrances and hopefully you can find a few takeaways to improve your home security.

The first thing people think of in terms of entrances are doors. Doors are the most common form of gaining legal access into a dwelling and it makes sense they get the most attention. Unfortunately, very little thought is actually put into the security aspects of doors when compared to their aesthetics or how they look.

Construction
So, what is the first consideration we should look at? I would say it’s the construction of your doors. The simplest way to look at it is whether or not your door is solid wood or solid metal. Simply put, solid-core doors are harder to break and harder to kick in. Avoid hollow core doors at all cost. They are easy to defeat and offer little to no protection against a determined adversary.

Weak hollow-core doors may be a vulnerability, despite the strength of the lock and frame.

Features
You should also try to choose a door with no glass/windows in the design and you should make sure there are no windows within arms reach of the lock. You want to avoid the possibility of someone knocking out a window, reaching through, and unlocking the door. To compensate for not having a window to view visitors, invest in a wide angle peephole. It doesn’t do you any good to have a secure door if you have to open it up to see who is ringing the bell.

Reinforcement
Most exterior doors are installed to swing inwards, meaning the hinges are more than likely on the inside of the structure. This prevents easy hinge pin removal. Ideally, you should also be using Grade 1 deadbolts (Grade 2 will also work), 1” long throw bolts, and make sure your strike plates are reinforced with a minimum of 3” long wood screws. I would recommend installing a reinforced strike box and strike plate in addition to the upgraded deadbolt.

A few examples of reinforced strike plates.

For added peace of mind you can always install a complete door reinforcement kit, which reinforces the door jam, hinges, and deadbolt/doorknob areas. I have never used one of these kits, but they have received rave reviews and they look pretty good through testing.

Another area of concern is the rear door. Rear doors oftentimes contain a window which allows easy access for a burglar. One way to mitigate this concern is to use a double cylinder dead bolt which requires a key to lock/unlock on both sides of the door. A downside to this is if you are in a situation where you need to make a hasty escape out the rear door. You may not have time to locate and use a key to get out. This is something to keep in mind.

Door Access Points
Pet doors, mail slots, etc., are also weak points in your home security system. Again, you want to avoid any method of access which would allow someone to reach through, crawl through, or provide access for a burglary tool. Here is a video of a burglar crawling through a dog door to gain access to a home:

Externals
In addition, there are a couple of external features directly related to the security of your doors which you can take advantage of. Make sure you have sufficient lighting covering all of your entrance doors. Lighting can act as a great deterrent in preventing crime or at a minimum displacing crime. If they are determined to commit a burglary you might as well send them on to an easier target. In addition to the lighting, make sure all your vegetation and landscaping is cleared enough to remove any potential hiding places. If your door is easily seen from the street you can benefit from passive surveillance from general traffic passing through the area.

The reality is with very little effort you can greatly reduce the likelihood of someone gaining access through your doors. With that mind, a deliberate burglar may move on to another method of entry if the door proves too difficult. We will discuss those in a future article. In the mean time, get to work on those doors and start chipping away at your home security deficiencies.

Review: Rynoskin Total Insect Protection Clothing

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

Harsh environmental conditions such as driving rain, heat, or cold can all sap our strength when working in the outdoors, but few things have the ability to challenge our focus and health quite like stinging and biting insects. Trying to maintain a pace count while dead reckoning a course through the woods and simultaneously slapping your ears every few seconds to ward off mosquitoes is trying at best, and at worst, carries the risk of vector-borne illness transmission.

Photo: DVIDS / Petty Officer 3rd Class William Phillips

When you finally reach your destination, throw your pack down, and start to strip off some sweaty clothing only to find ticks embedded in your skin, that also has a way of immediately reducing the fun factor. Just ask survivalist Megan Hine, who we interviewed in Issue 22, how debilitating it was to battle Lyme disease. The point is that there are items out there, aside from insect repellent, which can serve as a bulwark against these clandestine creatures.

Enter the Rynoskin line of undergarments. Intended to be worn underneath clothing, it’s designed to keep mosquitoes, ticks, and other bugs off of your skin. Utilizing a superfine mesh of blended
nylon/Lycra fabrics, it remains breathable without allowing bugs like ticks, chiggers, no-see-ums, and mosquitoes to bite you through the weave — and without the use of chemicals. Conceptually, it’s similar to this author’s experience swimming or waterskiing in jellyfish-infested waters when we’d wear pantyhose to keep from getting stung. Stop laughing; Navy SEALs in Vietnam would actually sometimes wear pantyhose to prevent leeches from latching onto their skin. It also helped reduce friction and blisters.

Testing the Claims

When we first opened the boxes of Rynoskin and started reading the instructions, we had our doubts. We’re supposed to wear this stuff underneath our clothing? No bother during cooler weather, when you might be wearing insulating layers anyway. But what about in the heat and humidity? “This body suit is so comfortable that the user will forget that they’re wearing it,” claims the marketing brochure. This sounded like just one more load of marketing BS to us, and it wouldn’t be the first or the hundredth time we’ve been let down by similar claims.

With temperatures in the high 80s F and high humidity, we reluctantly stripped down and layered back up with a pair of Rynoskin leggings under our cotton BDU pants, and a Rynoskin top under our T-shirt. Then, we got to work — and that’s when the magic happened. After the first 10 to 15 minutes of feeling hyper-vigilant, trying to figure out if anything was chafing (it wasn’t), and just generally getting used to wearing undergarment layers in hot weather, we literally did forget we had them on. The material is simply as breathable and incredibly effective at wicking sweat as it claimed to be. Hell, it actually felt better with the material underneath. The hype, apparently, is real.

We weren’t in a tick-prone environment, so we can’t comment on the effectiveness of the garment with that particular bug, but we can definitely confirm it kept the mosquitos off our skin in muggy western Florida. As the marketing materials say, with the Rynoskin underneath, you can get by with just a cotton T-shirt on top. Pretty impressive, considering that we’ve had some mosquitoes able to bite us through our blue jeans.

Garments and Fitment

Besides the long-sleeve top and leggings, Rynoskin also offers a face hood, socks, and gloves to ensure nearly 100-percent coverage of your body. If you’re just dealing with mosquitoes or other flying insects, it shouldn’t be a problem to leave the socks at home, but the usefulness for areas with ticks and chiggers is obvious.

The hood, admittedly, looks a bit like a 1970s Russian cosmonaut load-out. However, if it means keeping bugs off of your neck and out of your ears, sometimes you have to sacrifice style for practicality. In a similar manner, the gloves seem a bit much, but after your first time coming back from the woods with tiny lumps and red marks all over your hands from bug bites, you might reconsider just like we did. It can be tough to just smear your hands and face with bug repellent, especially the really powerful and effective sprays. Rubbing your eyes and getting repellent in them can burn and cause you to tear up.

When we used the gloves, they didn’t seem to fit our fingers very well. We had to do a lot of pulling, and sometimes we were afraid of tearing the fabric by trying to pull the finger sleeves down over our fingers to get a tight fit. We could, however, use our smartphones, with a little bit of difficulty. We ended up having to pull the fabric around our “swiping” index finger taught by pulling with our other hand, which isn’t exactly an ideal situation, but still a functional workaround. It also helps to start by pulling the sleeves of the gloves all the way back on your forearm before starting to mess with the fingers.

If you’re going for full protection, plan to “shingle” the products from your feet up to your head. Basically, the lower layers should be lapped on top of the upper layers. In other words, tuck your face hood down into the turtleneck shirt so that the turtleneck is over the hood. Then, tuck the shirt down into the pants so that the waistband of the pants laps on top of the shirt, and so on. This way, for example, if an insect is crawling up your legs it won’t be able to crawl underneath your shirt when it gets to your waist.

Final Thoughts

We like the fact that these fabrics are chemical-free for several reasons. First, there’s nothing that’ll wash out of the clothes after 10 or 20 washes and cause the garments to lose their effectiveness over time. Second, if it means that we can carry less bug repellent and use less chemicals on our skin in the long-term, we’ll take that option all day long.

Wearing a traditional mosquito netting head cover is effective, but has downsides.

For similarly useful alternatives, we’ve also used mosquito-netting covers on our heads as well as mosquito-netting jackets. These products are inexpensive, but they’re also very effective at what they do. The main downside for us was that the head covers made it much more difficult to see what we were doing or where we were walking, especially when trying to stick to a faint trail in low-light conditions. Similarly, the netting jackets always seemed to interfere with gear, such as backpacks or rifle slings, by snagging easily or getting torn by brush.

We like the fact that the Rynoskin goes underneath our clothing, since we’re able to maintain 100-percent functionality with our existing gear and clothing systems we’re already used to wearing. The undergarment will last longer because it’s protected under your clothing, plus it’s machine-washable and dryable without shrinking (we verified this at home).

Long story short? Hot or cold, if you work in buggy environments and haven’t tried this gear yet, there’s just no reason to wait any longer. The price point is affordable for most people, the products are made in the United States, and best of all, the products actually live up to their promises. We’re sold.

Rynoskin Specifications

Colors
Various

MSRP

  • Total shirt: $46
  • Total pants: $46
  • Total hood: $23
  • Total gloves: $23
  • Total socks: $23

URL
www.rynoskin.com

About The Author

Andrew Schrader is a licensed professional engineer and serves on the State of Florida’s Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) Task Force. His company, Recon Response Engineering LLC, educates firefighters and search-and-rescue teams on the subject of urban search and rescue and building collapse. Most recently, he was deployed to the Florida Panhandle to support rescue operations following Hurricane Michael. www.reconresponse.com

More From Issue 32

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Read articles from the next issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 33

Read articles from the previous issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 31

Check out our other publications on the web: Recoil | Gun Digest | Blade | RecoilTV | RECOILtv (YouTube)

Editor’s Note: This article has been modified from its original version for the web.

New: TOPS Knives Fieldcraft 3.5

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

We recently returned from Blade Show, an event that serves as a venue for knife manufacturers to show off their newest products. One such item came from TOPS Knives — it’s new, but also familiar. The TOPS Fieldcraft 3.5 is a scaled-down version of the popular Brothers of Bushcraft (B.O.B.) Fieldcraft, an outdoor-oriented fixed blade knife we previously reviewed and have used frequently.

Top: the new Fieldcraft 3.5. Bottom: the original Fieldcraft.

The original B.O.B. Fieldcraft has been one of TOPS’ best-selling designs, as well as one of our favorites from the company. Its 4.5-inch, 1095 high-carbon steel blade features a modified Scandi grind that’s excellent for camping, hunting, bushcraft, or survival tasks. However, some users prefer a smaller and lighter knife, especially if they’re also carrying an ax or saw for heavy-duty tasks. TOPS has responded to these users by releasing the Fieldcraft 3.5.

Technically, the Fieldcraft 3.5 has a 3-5/8-inch blade, but “Fieldcraft 3.625” would’ve been a bit awkward as a name. It still has the same 1095 steel construction, modified Scandi grind, black traction coating, and canvas micarta handle scales as its big brother. The steel is slightly slimmer at 0.16 inches thick (the original was 0.19) and has a flush-ground tang instead of the hammer pommel present on the full-size model. Weight is 5.5 ounces, down from the original’s 9.6 ounces.

MSRP for the new TOPS Fieldcraft 3.5 is $145, and this includes a Kydex sheath with rotating spring steel belt clip. Unlike the original Fieldcraft, this smaller knife doesn’t come with a sheath-mounted ferro rod, but we can understand the reasoning behind this given the goal of reducing size and weight. For more information on the Fieldcraft 3.5, go to TOPSKnives.com.

Read More

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Virtual Survival: 5 Survival Video Game Reviews

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

Images courtesy of Steam and the developers

You’ ll rot your brain! That’s a waste of time. Can’t you find something better to do? If you ever played video games as a kid, you may have heard statements like these from parents or other adults who saw no value in that particular pastime. Admittedly, many games are intended solely as a source of entertainment — expertise at rescuing the Mushroom Kingdom’s princess doesn’t translate well to the real world. However, assuming that we can’t learn anything worthwhile from video games is as shortsighted as saying the same about movies, television, or books. In fact, the interactive nature of this medium can be an extremely valuable training tool, as we’ve seen from the widespread use of simulators in various technical fields.

As survivalists, we should consider all possible avenues to strengthen our minds and learn new skills. Video games can offer opportunities for both. Just as a survival-oriented novel or film — or our own What If? column — can leave you contemplating how you’d approach a disaster scenario, survival games can help us become more adept at planning, problem-solving, and organization. You might also see a tool or technique you hadn’t considered before, resulting in motivation to study it later, or hone your ability to communicate under pressure during a multiplayer session. You could even utilize video games as a form of confined environment recreation if you’re locked down and going a little stir crazy — think 10 Cloverfield Lane.

There’s no substitute for practicing survival skills in real life, but there are times when that’s not feasible. Most of us can’t afford to simulate being marooned on a desert island, stranded on a frigid mountain peak, or under attack by a hostile force in an urban wasteland. And even if we could, there’s no respawn if you’re injured or killed while living out these scenarios. Video games allow us to instantly jump into any one of these storylines, exploring and experimenting without lasting consequences.

We selected five survival-oriented games and evaluated them based on their value as training tools, as well as how this is balanced with enjoyment and replayability. Each game features varying degrees of fantasy and creative license — don’t expect a hard-core simulation of survival, because you still can’t feel the physical effects of a life-and-death situation through your controller. That said, these games can be a lot of fun and — contrary to what those cynical adults said — far from a waste of time.

Dying Light (Enhanced Edition)

Publisher
Techland

Platforms
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, Linux, PlayStation 4, XBOX One

Players
1-4

Price as Tested
$60

URL
www.dyinglightgame.com

Notes
This game takes place in Harran, a fictional Middle Eastern coastal city with terrain ranging from towering skyscrapers to claustrophobic tunnels. Harran has been quarantined after a viral outbreak turned most of its residents into zombie-like mutants, forcing the remaining survivors to go into hiding. You play as Kyle Crane, an undercover agent inserted into the city on a mission to retrieve a topsecret file for his employer, the Global Relief Effort (GRE). In addition to hordes of shambling infected filling the abandoned streets, you face fast-moving “virals” as well as heavily armed bandits. A continuous day-night cycle ramps up difficulty after sunset, when more powerful and aggressive enemies come out to hunt.

Dying Light’s free-running parkour system encourages the player to move quickly through Harran, vaulting over obstacles and scaling buildings to avoid enemies. Getting bogged down or cornered is often a death sentence. There’s also an extensive crafting mechanic in which players are encouraged to scavenge for food and resources throughout the abandoned city. Found items can be combined in a variety of ways to construct first aid kits, weapons, and weapon upgrades — for example, the Wrench Kiss is a heavy pipe wrench wrapped in barbed wire with a blade fastened to the leading edge. As the game progresses, you’ll start to obtain handguns, shotguns, and full-auto rifles, but ammo scarcity means you must use every round carefully.

Numerous downloadable updates have kept the game fresh since its release in 2015, including a large expansion called The Following (included in the Enhanced Edition) that adds new map areas, drivable vehicles, and missions. There’s also an upcoming sequel, Dying Light 2, which was announced in mid-2018 and is currently in development.

Pros:

  • Excellent co-op gameplay lets you team up with up to four friends, working together to scavenge, defend each other, and complete missions.
  • Situational awareness is critical. If you stop moving or get distracted, it’s easy to get overwhelmed, especially at night.
  • Huge variety of weapons — each must be repaired over time, and can be upgraded or modified.

Cons:

  • Using your parkour skills to make death-defying leaps like post-apocalyptic Spiderman is a lot of fun. In a real disaster, it’d leave you exhausted, injured, and/or dead.
  • If you’re looking for immersive realism, the game’s often-cheesy dialogue, sci-fi enemies, and exaggerated weapons won’t appeal to you.

Raft

Publisher
RedBeet Interactive

Platforms
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, Linux

Players
1-8 is recommended, although there’s no hard limit

Price as Tested
$20

URL
www.raft-game.com

Notes
Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink. Also, you have no food or shelter and a giant shark keeps trying to kill you.

In Raft, you’re adrift on an endless ocean with no supplies except what you find floating on the surface. The good news is that there’s no shortage of junk being carried by the current — enough
barrels, plastic jugs, wood planks, and other debris to give a Greenpeace member an aneurysm. The bad news is that you’ll need to retrieve the junk before it floats away, either by swimming out to grab it or by reeling it in using an improvised grappling hook. The former option is dangerous, since you’re likely to get attacked by the shark or drift too far from your raft. Using the grappling hook lets you retrieve supplies safely, but this takes careful timing and precision to cast it in the right spot. At first, this can be annoying, as many items slip from your grasp like prizes from an arcade claw machine. With practice, it gets easier.

The raw materials you collect from the ocean surface are used to build tools, such as a hammer to expand your raft, a spear to temporarily deter the shark, and a fishing pole. Fish you catch — and other food you find inexplicably floating in barrels, such as potatoes and beets — must be eaten periodically to keep your nutrition bar from dropping to zero. Making a fire and cooking these items increases their nutritional value. You also need to quench your thirst, but seawater predictably hurts you if you consume it, so you’ll need to build a purifier ASAP. Eventually, you can grow your raft into an expansive multi-level houseboat, and play online with friends to divide and conquer survival tasks.

Pros:

  • Water purification is surprisingly realistic. Your character boils seawater and condenses the vapor in an improvised still.
  • This “Early Access” game is affordable and receives frequent updates, one of which added large islands where you can anchor your raft and search for supplies.

Cons:

  • After a while, trying to stave off dehydration, starvation, and the irritating shark that constantly pops up to rip your raft to shreds starts feeling more tedious than fun.
  • The construction system is sometimes illogical — build a planter from planks and rope, and soil magically appears so you can grow crops.

Rust

Publisher
Facepunch Studios

Platforms
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS

Players
Up to 300, depending on the server you join

Price as Tested
$35

URL
rust.facepunch.com

Notes
Survival has a steep learning curve, and so does Rust. The game has no story, no dialogue, and no missions. Your character is an anonymous, completely naked man or woman who never speaks. You’re dropped unceremoniously into a huge, procedurally generated map with nothing but a rock and a torch, and your only goal is to thrive in the environment without starving or getting killed by exposure, predators, hostile non-player characters, or other humans. You’ll need to forage for food and fresh water, collect resources, and build your way out of the stone age. With enough time and patience, your rock can be replaced by a stone axe, then a sword and bow. Sooner or later you’ll get an improvised shotgun, explosives, machine guns, and rocket launchers. You can don armor, build a defensible compound, decorate your home, start a garden, and even pick up hobbies like playing a fully functional guitar (yes, really).

Rust is exclusively multiplayer, so you’ll be occupying the same map as dozens or hundreds of other players — each might choose to befriend you, ignore you, or hunt you down. Unsurprisingly, most choose the third play style. This probably sounds harsh, and that’s by design. The developers have said they wanted to create a world where players could behave any way they choose — a sort of a virtual Lord of the Flies. You’re free to decide to trust others and work together, or attempt to kill everyone you meet on sight before looting (or even eating) their corpses. Facepunch Studios founder Garry Newman wrote, “You should be fearful of others. That is the whole point. If you’re sick of getting killed — start a town. Build town walls… set up trip wires and alarms. Watch each other’s back.”

Pros:

  • You’ll immediately feel the punishing difficulty of survival, and understand that the responsibility to make it easier is yours alone. If you expect to survive, you’d better get to work.
  • Just like in real life, you have total freedom to help others or stab them in the back for your own gain. This brings a psychological element and makes every alliance a tentative one.

Cons:

  • Gameplay is often comical in its ruthlessness, with a learning curve that’s more like a brick wall. The first time we played, we unluckily spawned next to a wolf that ran over and killed us within 30 seconds. It didn’t take long after that to come across some of the countless hostile players with advanced gear who gleefully annihilate the defenseless.

Stranded Deep

Publisher
Beam Team Games

Platforms
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, Linux (PS4 and XBOX One releases are planned, but not available at time of publication)

Players
1

Price as Tested
$15

URL
beamteamgames.com/stranded-deep

Notes
Unlike the previous games in this article, Stranded Deep is exclusively a single-player experience. Although there’s some indication that co-op functionality might be included in a future update, we played this game solo, and we’re glad we did — it strongly emphasizes the feeling of isolation.

The game starts with a nighttime plane crash that dumps you somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, not unlike the movie Cast Away. After emerging from the wreckage, you clamber into an inflatable life raft and paddle your way to a tiny desert island. The game world is procedurally generated, meaning that every player will end up with a different environment. Throughout the game, you’ll need to monitor hunger, thirst, and tiredness via status bars on your wristwatch.

Aside from anything you find in your raft or  washed up on shore, all items must be crafted from the world around you. Start by making a stone tool from a rock fragment, combine it with cordage from fibrous leaves and a stick to make a crude axe, and chop down some palm trees. This yields wood for a campfire, fronds to make a shelter, and coconuts. You can drink coconut water to stay hydrated, but just like in real life, it’s a natural diuretic that will make you sick if you drink too much. Make a still to produce fresh water. Spear some crabs and cook the meat by holding it over a fire. There’s a huge variety of items in Stranded Deep, and each has a purpose, if not several possible uses. Eventually, you can make a raft and sail to a new island, explore shipwrecks, construct buildings, and start farming.

Pros:

  • Great sense of immersion — the environment feels both tranquil and merciless, much like it would on a real desert island.
  • Crafting system is well thought out and surprisingly realistic. Your island’s resources will soon be depleted. When that time comes, you’d better be prepared to make the dangerous voyage to a new island.

Cons:

  • We appreciate that inventory space is limited to a realistic level, but this also means you’ll constantly be picking up, dropping, and moving around items to manage that limited inventory.
  • This is an “Early Access” game that’s still in development, and its controls and gameplay mechanics often feel less polished than a retail release. Also, the future of PS4 and XBOX versions is uncertain after the sudden closure of publisher Telltale Games in 2018.

The Long Dark

Publisher
Hinterland Studio

Platforms
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, Linux, PlayStation 4, XBOX One (Nintendo Switch release TBD)

Players
1

Price as Tested
$30

URL
www.thelongdark.com

Notes
“Preparation and self-control are vital to your survival.” This lesson from The Long Dark’s first segment is reinforced through every aspect of the game. Two main modes are available, an episodic Story Mode and an open-ended Survival Mode; both are single-player only.

The story takes place in the “quiet apocalypse” following a massive geomagnetic storm that has wiped out all technology. You begin as Will McKenzie, a bush pilot whose small plane crashes in the frozen Canadian wilderness as a result of this global disaster. Dr. Astrid Greenwood, your ex-wife, had persuaded you to fly her out to treat a patient in a remote village, but she’s nowhere to be found after the crash. Injured by the hard landing and suffering from the onset of hypothermia, you must take shelter in a cave, start a fire to raise your core temperature, and treat your injuries to stop the bleeding. Your character’s vitals — thirst, hunger, fatigue, and body temperature — must be constantly monitored and maintained. Exposure is a continuous risk, with varying weather directly impacting your character as you scrounge up resources. You eventually need to leave your cave and follow clues to find out what happened to Astrid. This story has yet to be completed — two of the five episodes are currently available, with no concrete release date set for the third.

Despite its many realistic elements, The Long Dark is about more than pure survival. It’s also a cinematic experience with characters you grow close to and a story you become invested in. We only wish its story was complete and ready to play, but as in real survival situations, sometimes you have to exercise self-control and wait patiently.

Pros:

  • Beautiful, haunting soundtrack, unique art style, and compelling voice acting pull you into the story
  • Survival mechanics often surprised us — starting a fire sometimes fails, strong wind can blow out your torch, and hunting a rabbit requires you to snap its neck in a visceral manner
  • Manage your time wisely, because food can burn and water can boil away if left unattended. Stats drop as you sleep, and your fire will go out before morning if you didn’t add enough fuel.

Cons:

  • At time of publication, two of the five planned story episodes have been released. Episode Three was promised in December 2018 but got pushed back, with no precise ETA given.
  • You’re forced to melt snow and then boil the water for 20 in-game minutes before you can drink it, perpetuating the “minimum boiling time” misconception.

For a bonus survival-oriented game review, check out our recent web-exclusive article about Tom Clancy’s The Division 2.

More From Issue 32

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Editor’s Note: This article has been modified from its original version for the web.

How to Avoid Ticks and the Diseases They Carry

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0
The blacklegged tick is a potential carrier of Lyme disease. Source: Scott Bauer / USDA ARS

Hikers, campers, anglers, farmers and pretty much anyone else who routinely spends time outdoors during the summer months will eventually encounter ticks. These blood-feeding parasites can be active year-round, but it’s during the warmer months that we humans are most likely to stumble through their habitats and thereby present ourselves as their next meal.

Species of Note

An estimated 90 species of ticks are found in the United States, most of which the average person will never see. Soft ticks in the Ornithodoros genus, for instance, are typically in caves, animal dens and rodent nests. The most likely scenario for a human being bitten by one of these species is if he or she spends a night in a rodent-infested cabin.

Infected ticks, such as this blacklegged nymph, can transmit numerous harmful pathogens. Photo: Scott Bauer / USDA ARS

Other ticks are more commonly found in the spots where we’d expect them. They await a host where mammals or birds are apt to wander, including berry thickets and tall grasses. It’s a myth that ticks drop from trees onto hosts, and they’ll normally be no more than three feet off the ground, patiently waiting for a host to happen by. They’ll grab onto a passing hiker at knee level or lower and begin crawling up. They prefer to attach to areas of the body where they’re hidden, or places where clothing tightly hugs the skin: the scalp, ears, armpits, groin, waistline, ankles and the backs of knees.

Seven species of ticks are of particular concern due to their ability to transmit disease to humans:

Brown dog tick (Rhipicephalus sanguineus) is found in every state in the continental U.S.

Blacklegged tick (Ixodes scapularis), also known as a deer tick, is found in the eastern half of the country.

A blacklegged/deer tick. Photo: Flickr.com/oliverdodd (CC BY 2.0)

Western blacklegged tick (Ixodes pacificus) is found on the Pacific coast.

American dog tick (Dermacentor variabilis) is east of the Rocky Mountains and along spots of the Pacific coast.

Gulf Coast tick (Amblyomma maculatum) is found along the Atlantic coast in the southern U.S. and the Gulf of Mexico.

A prominent dot helps identify the female lone star tick. Photo: Flickr.com/ecarey (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Lone star tick (Amblyomma americanum) resides in the southeastern and eastern U.S. The adult female is possibly the most easily recognized tick, due to the white dot in the center of her back.

Rocky Mountain wood tick (Dermacentor andersoni) is indigenous to the Rocky Mountain states at elevations above 4000 feet.

The Tick Identification Guide on TickEncounter.org can help you determine the species, life cycle stage, and seasonal activity of various tick species.

Tick-Borne Illnesses

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), symptoms of many tick-borne diseases are similar, including fever, headaches, fatigue, and joint and muscle pain. There may be a rash associated with these symptoms, such as is the case with Lyme disease, Southern Tick-Associated Rash Illness (STARI), Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and rickettsiosis (which is itself another type of spotted fever).

Lyme disease gets the greatest amount of media attention of all tick-borne diseases, and for good reason. Each year, there are 30,000 cases reported to the CDC, but it’s estimated that the number of actual cases may be ten times that number. If treatment of the initial symptoms of Lyme is delayed, it will eventually spread to the heart and nervous system. Lyme disease is treated with several weeks of antibiotics. It’s only known to be spread by the blacklegged tick and the western blacklegged tick.

The blacklegged tick is a potential carrier of Lyme disease. Photo: Scott Bauer / USDA ARS

The lone star tick doesn’t transmit Lyme disease, but it does vector STARI with similar symptoms. The time from bite to symptoms is shorter with STARI, and patients who receive antibiotics recover more rapidly.

Chronic infections can result from Lyme and STARI, and while this isn’t true of Rocky Mountain spotted fever, there have been cases that have resulted in amputation of arms or legs, paralysis, hearing loss, and mental disability. It’s transmitted by the brown dog tick, the American dog tick, and the Rocky Mountain wood tick.

The American dog tick is one species that can carry Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Photo: Peggy Greb / USDA ARS

Rickettsiosis is a disease vectored by the Gulf Coast tick with symptoms similar to Rocky Mountain spotted fever, but less severe and typically with a necrotic lesion at the site of the bite.

Anaplasmosis (transmitted by blacklegged and western blacklegged ticks) and ehrlichiosis (by lone star and blacklegged ticks) are characterized by fever, chills, headaches and muscle aches. If untreated, organ failure and death can result. The antibiotic of choice for these infections is doxycycline.

Tularemia, also called rabbit fever, can be spread by ticks or contact with rodents. Photo: Flickr.com/j_benson (CC BY 2.0)

Tularemia can also be treated with antibiotics, including doxycycline. Skin ulcers and swollen lymph glands are the symptoms of the most common type of tularemia. This bacterial infection can be spread by not only dog ticks, lone star ticks and wood ticks, but also via the bites of deer flies or through skin contact with an infected rabbit or rodent.

Babesiosis results when microscopic parasites are transmitted into the bloodstream via the bite of a blacklegged tick. Sometimes, the infected person exhibits no symptoms at all, but hemolytic anemia and dark urine can appear in other cases.

A fully-fed female blacklegged tick. Photo: Scott Bauer / USDA ARS

Yet another disease transmitted by the blacklegged tick in the northeastern U.S. and Great Lakes region is the rare Powassan virus disease, of which ten percent of cases prove fatal. Furthermore, half of those infected exhibit permanent neurological symptoms such as headaches and memory loss. Early symptoms of Powassan virus are similar to other tick-borne diseases but can advance to encephalitis and meningitis.

Heartland virus and Colorado tick fever are other conditions associated with tick bites and with similar symptoms to other tick-borne diseases. Most who are infected with these recover completely. Lone star ticks may transmit the former and Rocky Mountain wood ticks the latter.

Entomologists use feeding chambers to study tick-borne disease transmission. Photo: Scott Bauer / USDA ARS

Finally, and while not a disease per se, alpha-gal syndrome is an allergy to red meat that can result when a certain molecule is passed into the bloodstream through the bite of a lone star tick.

In 2017, the Asian longhorned tick (Haemaphysalis longicornis) was found in New Jersey and has since been confirmed in eight other eastern states. In its native range, this species is known to vector several diseases, but no specimens on U.S. soil have so far shown any pathogens. However, the Asian longhorned tick is of particular concern to livestock and pet owners due to the females’ ability to reproduce without a male, so having hundreds or even thousands of these attached to one animal isn’t unusual.

Protecting Yourself

This CDC graphic shows common attachment points for ticks on humans and pets.

Ticks are out there, and there isn’t a lot we can do about that, so the goal should become keeping them off yourself. The ageless advice to thwart ticks with long pants and light-colored clothing remains relevant. It’s helpful to tuck pant legs into your socks, as well as to tuck in shirttails to lessen opportunities for crawling ticks to gain access to your skin.

Products containing 20 to 30 percent DEET are effective repellents, but some people are allergic to this compound. If such is the case, the active ingredient picaridin — derived from a pepper plant — may provide a safer, less-toxic alternative. One application of picaridin has been show to provide four to eight hours of protection.

Permethrin spray can be applied to socks, pants, and other clothing as a durable tick repellent. Photo: Sawyer

Clothing can be treated with permethrin. It’s a highly-effective ingredient that can retain its potency through several washes, but shouldn’t be applied directly to the skin.

Oil of lemon eucalyptus and citronella are botanical products that may have merit as well.

Around the Home

An entomologist using a tick sweep flag to estimate local tick population. Photo: Keith Weller / USDA ARS

A quick evaluation of the tick load on your property can be conducted with a “white flag” by attaching a three-foot-by-three-foot square of white cotton or flannel to a pole and dragging that along the grassy or brushy edges of your yard. The ticks will cling to the material and can be easily seen and removed for identification.

Ticks retrieved using the white flag method. Photo: Keith Weller / USDA ARS

A blanket chemical treatment of an entire property against ticks is rarely, if ever, recommended. However, the tick load could become heavy enough to consider treating hot spots such as areas where wildlife or pets bed down. Consult with your local Cooperative Extension Service for recommendations on products approved for your area and the timing of application. Extension can also help identify ticks that you may encounter.

Closing Thoughts

Ticks are an unavoidable fact of the outdoors, and while there’s no reason to lock oneself indoors during the warmer months, it pays to be wise. One’s choice of clothing can be a first step in avoiding tick bites. Understanding the types of habitats they’re attracted to will give an edge against inviting them onto one’s person, and a knowledge of products that effectively repel them will be another barrier. Take the time to learn which tick species are in your area and which illnesses are associated with these, and become familiar with the common symptoms of tick-borne diseases. Prevention is key, but if medical treatment becomes necessary, it’s important to begin that immediately.

For more resources, information, and tick distribution maps, go to CDC.gov/ticks.

Live Coverage: Blade Show 2019

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

This weekend, we’re on-site at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, GA for Blade Show 2019 — the world’s largest annual knife show. We’ve been attending Blade Show for several years now, and we can attest that there’s no better place to be for anyone who’s into knives, edged weapons, and EDC tools. The show started yesterday, June 7th, and continues through Sunday, June 9th.

Walking the aisles at Blade Show, you’ll find all the big-name production knife companies in the industry, such as Spyderco, CRKT, Kershaw, Zero Tolerance, Emerson, and Microtech. There are also numerous mid-tech and custom makers offering knives that range from simple and practical to ornate and exotic. Blade Show isn’t just limited to pocket knives, either — there are also countless fixed blades, swords, hatchets, pocket tools, tactical pens, flashlights, and much more. Last year, we even found a high-end handmade pizza cutter (seriously).

Unlike many of the industry-exclusive trade shows we visit, Blade Show is open to the public. This means that you can browse through the new models and buy some knives right there on the show floor. The show also caters to knifemakers, with booths full of tools and raw materials including various types of metal, wood, leather, bone, and composite. There are Blade University classes where you can learn about knifemaking and use, and a high-intensity cutting competition in the outdoor pavilion.

Show admission is $25 for one day, or $55 for the whole weekend. However, we understand that many of you won’t be able to make it to Georgia to attend, so we’ll be posting photos and videos in the gallery at the end of this post.

To see Blade Show 2019 through our eyes, follow @recoiloffgridmagazine on Instagram or check out the gallery below (you may need to click “load more” to refresh the latest posts). If you’re near Atlanta and interested in attending the show this weekend, go to BladeShow.com for ticketing info.

 

Survival Rifle Build: Tricking Out the BRN-22

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0
The stock is nice, but ultimately too heavy and weighed down with downsides for a bugout gun.

What do you really need to survive? Sure, the basics of food, water, and shelter are constants, but Maslow’s hierarchy of needs goes a bit further. This article isn’t about self-actualization or esteem, but firmly lodged in the second category of “safety.” In the ideal world, we all have M16s and the logistics surrounding those who carry them. Though 5.56mm ammunition is lighter than the precursor 7.62x51mm, it still all adds up. So what of the diminutive .22LR? Where does that round stand within Maslow’s oft-cited pyramid?

The Case for .22LR

While we’ve often heard the refrain about the baby .22LR killing more people than all other rounds combined (likely true if you dismiss the 7.62x54R), it’s not an immediate “man-stopper” round. There’s a huge difference between someone stopping right now due to a central nervous system (CNS) hit versus someone dying in a crackhouse three days later. Let’s just say you can’t always afford to wait for an attacker to die of sepsis later on down the line. However, the .22LR is likely the most underestimated and dismissed round in all of modern history.

It’s not hard to see why. The bore of the gun that shoots .22LR is well below a ¼ inch. The mass of the projectiles themselves is similarly underwhelming, with a usual range of a mere 36 to 40 grains. While heavier loadings are available, they usually are hard to find and cost more when they are. However, this article isn’t about why the .22LR sucks, but instead how it can be best utilized.

Ideally, we’d have a bug-out setup with a larger rifle and pistol caliber, with the modest .22LR caliber serving as a quick game-getter. But the world is full of ideal imaginations rather than real situations. There may come a time where a .22LR becomes a primary caliber instead of solely relegated to a secondary position, and you may be in that situation right now as you read this piece.

Also, if you have bug-out pals and friends with larger calibers on-hand, the utility of an excellent .22LR in the form of a quality long gun shouldn’t be immediately discounted. Not every situation requires the use of 7.62×51.

First and foremost is the cost and physical size of .22LR ammunition. While ammunition prices continue to climb, even in the worst of times the cost-per-trigger-pull of a .22LR is significantly less than its full-size brethren. It also takes up little space, and 500 rounds (or more!) can be comfortably carried in a cargo pocket — try that with 5.56mm!

The killing power of .22LR is also vastly underestimated. There’s no getting around the fact that your average .22LR shot causes less physical damage than something of a larger caliber, which just means that your shots have to be far more careful.

The stock is nice, but ultimately too heavy and weighed down with downsides for a bugout gun.

The Ultimate Bug-Out .22LR

That we built for this article was absolutely not everything you’d need. In fact, we went the opposite direction and decided to fully kit out a .22LR rifle in order to determine what was necessary and what wasn’t. Sparing no expense, we basically built a racecar in order to determine where your money would be best spent for a daily driver.

After all, you can dial back some capabilities, but you certainly can’t ramp them up. Here we’ll go through all of the aftermarket parts and discuss their usefulness.

Receiver & Barrel

For this build, we chose to go with a Ruger 10/22 foundation. Not only is this rifle one of the most common .22LR firearms available, but it has the most robust aftermarket support, providing a helluva lot of options.

We reached out to Brownells for this build, because not only do they specialize in aftermarket support, they also have their own versions of 10/22 actions, barrels, and parts. One of the specific improvements we liked was a model with an integral Picatinny rail versus one that had to be screwed in place. Not only do the screws represent another possible failure point, but nothing is as rigid as a rail machined in from the word “Go.”

Instead of the standard 10/22 pencil barrel, we opted for a 16-inch heavy barrel. While it weighs more, it’s also stiffer and slower to heat — both of which are advantageous to accuracy if there are more than a handful of shots taking place. Going beyond a 16-inch barrel is unnecessary with a .22LR though many (wrongly) think that it’s better.

If this were a secondary rifle, we’d forgo the heavier barrel, but in this case we find the extra weight to be worth it. Also, the barrel’s threaded so attaching a silencer is easy. We debated between a Bowers Bitty and a GSL Pill Box; while they’re both quiet, the Bowers Bitty better fit the role of a bug-out gun since no special materials are needed at all to keep it going.

Determination: Recommended.

Stock

Similarly to the heavy barrel, we went with an ultra-premium stock. And to fit that role we could find none better than the Bell & Carlson adjustable fiberglass stock. This system is absolutely top of the line, and it shows. Not only does it allow for a free-floated barrel, it’s adjustable in all the right ways. However, this stock appears to be intended for a custom fit, and quite a bit of material had to be removed via a file and a Dremel before everything fit properly.

Furthering the headache, instead of using Picatinny, MLOK, or KeyMod attachments, the Bell & Carlson opts for an Anschutz rail. Frankly, this was a very annoying way to attach a Harris Bipod to the system and required an extra adapter to be purchased.

While this stock is excellent for target shooting, we didn’t find the extra weight (over 3 pounds!) to be needed to make an accurate field gun.

Determination: Keep the B&C for the range, and go with a Boyds At-One or Magpul stock to save on weight and work for bugging out. If your 10/22 is a Takedown variant, refer to our web-exclusive stock buyer’s guide.

Optics & Ammunition

While the .22LR will never beat the pants off of a dedicated high-power competition rifle, it’s far more capable than most think. When we used Gemtech subsonic .22LR, our groups definitely fell apart beyond 100 meters. However, higher velocity rounds like CCI Stingers allowed us to hit plates at ranges just beyond 300 meters — not as tall of an order as one might think.

Regarding the efficacy of the round at that range? For small game or harassing fire it should be A-OK. Also, remember that ideally you’d have someone else on the team with a larger caliber better suited for extended ranges.

Once you find a loading your individual rifle likes, it’s just a matter of math to calculate your ballistic drops. The Vortex Optics Viper PST 1-6x24mm optic makes dialing or holding your drops a snap, allowing for fast engagement even at ranges once unheard of for .22LR. While there’s a tendency for many to over-scope, believing that more magnification is always better (it’s not), 6-power is more than enough for the ranges we’re talking about here.

We mounted the Vortex in a set of Precision Reflex Inc. rings, and while you could certainly go a little cheaper on the mount, they were rock solid.

Determination: Recommended, but find out what ammunition your individual rifle likes best.

Trigger & Controls

The standard Ruger trigger is completely full of meh. While there are N+1 options available, we went with a complete Volquartsen match trigger group. The break is perfect and the reset is short, but it’s probably a bit more than most would want to spend on a bug-out gun.

An updated trigger was a huge improvement.

If you can afford a Volquartsen or Kidd trigger group, go with one. However, if you can’t, the Ruger factory BX-25 trigger groups are the baseline of acceptable.

Like many other .22LR rifles, the controls are smaller than they could be. Adult and gloved hands can find it hard to manipulate small magazine releases and charging handles. At minimum we recommend an extended charging handle of any variety; we went with a Volquartsen in this instance. For an extended magazine release, we looked no further than Tactical Solutions.

Determination: Recommended, but shop around.

Magazines

There was a time when every extended magazine for the 10/22 was awful. Thankfully, that time has passed. While there are a still many awful magazines out there, if you stick to magazines with separate feed lips and magazine bodies (such as Butler Creek Hot Lips) or factory Ruger magazines, you should be A-OK.

Determination: Recommended

Loose Rounds

We definitely don’t expect you to make an exact clone of the rifle we’ve made. Hell, as you’ve read there are some upgrades that we would’ve skipped ourselves if we were starting over. Just like how not every racing mod will make it to the street, nor would every mod we made here make it to a bug-out build.

While we went with all premium options, there are certainly many, many available aftermarket parts. If you can wrap your mind around shooting .22LR at range and for use against two-legged and four-legged critters, you have a lot of options.

Focus on a solid action, a good trigger, and a decent barrel. Everything else will fall into place. Though many will scoff at the .22LR, the fact is it’s far more capable than most realize, and is totally appropriate for a low-key shoot-’n’-scoot bug-out plan.

Brownells BRN-22 Specifications

Caliber
.22LR

Barrel Length
16 inches

OAL
33.75 inches

Weight
10 pounds, 10 ounces

Magazine Capacity
10, 20, 30

MSRP
$899

URL
www.brownells.com

Build Specifics

Base Gun

  • BRN-22 Barreled Picatinny Receiver, 16-inch heavy barrel $160
  • Volquartsen Ruger 10/22 Match Trigger Group $273
  • Ruger 10/22 Receiver Parts Kit, Less Trigger $45
  • Volquartsen Charging Handle $47
  • Bell & Carlson Ruger 10/22 Stock Adj. Fiberglass $332

Accessories

  • Vortex 1-6x24MM PST VMR-2 MOA reticle $900
  • Precision Reflex Inc. 30mm Rings Standard Height Steel Rings $108
  • Harris Bipod $98
  • Harris No 6 Adapter Rail $12
  • Total as tested $1,975

More From Issue 32

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Read articles from the next issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 33

Read articles from the previous issue of Recoil Offgrid: Issue 31

Check out our other publications on the web: Recoil | Gun Digest | Blade | RecoilTV | RECOILtv (YouTube)

Editor’s Note: This article has been modified from its original version for the web.

Making Flour from Arrowroot

By
Patrick McCarthy
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0

In a survival situation, you won’t make it very long without a sustainable source of calories. Stockpiled MREs and dehydrated meals are great for the short-term, and can be supplemented by what you’re able to obtain from hunting, fishing, or scavenging. But for long-term situations, you’ll need to think more like our ancestors from native cultures around the world. Rather than just eating whatever you can find before it spoils, it’s beneficial to process raw substances into shelf-stable ingredients for recipes — flour is a prime example.

Flour can be made by pulverizing countless forms of starch — generally it’s dependent on whatever wild edible thrives in the region. In the west, we mostly use wheat flour; Eastern and central Europeans often use rye flour; corn flour has been an essential element of South American cuisine for thousands of years. Rice flour and nut flours are becoming more common, but they’re still just the tip of the iceberg — you can also make it from beans, bananas, cattails, mesquite pods, acorns, coconut, and much more.

In the latest video from Primitive Technology, the host shows how he produced flour from Polynesian arrowroot gathered from the forest in his home country of Australia. Kudzu — an invasive species that has spread throughout the southeastern United States — is another name for Japanese arrowroot, and can be used in a similar manner.

Kudzu (Japanese arrowroot) vines choke out local trees in Georgia and other southern states.

The rhizomes are dug up, washed, grated into water, repeatedly rinsed and drained, and dried over a fire. This arrowroot flour can then be rehydrated to make bread or pancakes. Check out the full video below:

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