Scavenging

Scavenging, horrible word. If scavenging becomes what you have to do, then thing have gotten really bad. I was reading an article on scavenging that listed the best places to look. Depending on your needs, the list they gave is okay:

9 Places to Scavenge After SHTF:

9 Places to Scavenge After SHTF - Ask a Prepper

They say to stay away from obvious places but I would think that distribution and trucking centers would be a magnet. I agree that business parks and small offices would be a great place to collect needed items after collapse. Most offices have general first aid and pain relievers. They have water coolers, trash bags and even the cords on the blinds could come in handy.

I was surprised that day cares, schools and retirement homes were not on the list. I think those places would be filled with items, foods and medications. Plus daycare would have diapers that could become a barter item if you didn’t need them. So where would you scavenge? And what do you think you would be scavenging? Needs, barter items ??

 

Airports, and warehousing in and around them. Gov. Offices and other centers. These will have medical, food, weps, and ammo! Post offices, city and county, State offices will also have supplies. Trucking yards, the trailers will have supplies and diesel fuel in every truck and reefer trailer. Dump trucks to haul things, and provide a little armor! Also a good scrounging rig to have handy for B.E!

 

Hospitals, clinics and Doc in the Boxes will be hit early for drugs but could yield many other useful products once the rush has passed. Scavenging is fully in our plans assuming of course we survive the initial die off. At that point I see no reason not to resupply using whatever is at hand and obviously abandoned.

 

Schools...lunch rooms and nurses office. I think most places won't be overlooked. When the hoard gets hungry, no door will go unopened.

 

First place I would think of is garden supply, farm supply, and landscaping businesses, fertilizer, seeds, gardening tools, wheelbarrows, chains and chain saws, fuel and 2 cycle oil, garden carts, fish and animal antibiotics, animal wound care products, warm clothes, water and fuel storage tanks, etc. In long run that would mean much more to me than a few more days of food to add to my long term food storage. Scavenge for today or 2 years from now? Fuel to run the genset another week or the solar sign cart with solar cells, batteries, etc and on a trailer so it is portable or strip the solar off that abandoned house or business, although it probably is grid tie so no batteries? Greenhouse plastic to recover the greenhouse, solar panels and dc water pumps for garden, extra greenhouses, chemicals and nutrients to grow food, etc? My firm belief is that most of us who prep have too many weapons and not enough supplies. I can see an almost limitless supply of weapons about 1 year into a TEOTWAWKT, but absolutely no ammo for most of them. The average soldier or police load out would last a few days and most locations have little or no backup supplies. I know as the local police have scrounged training ammo from me in past ammo shortages. I was in an antique store last week. I saw washboards, hand and firewood crosscut saws, kerosene lamps, farm lanterns, butter churn, cast iron pots and fry pans, earthenware crocks to make sauerkraut and preserve meat, earthenware jugs to store liquids, spinning wheel, niddy noddy to make yarn skeins, carding paddles, foot treadle sewing machine, some farm and garden implements, etc. I would also go to the fabric section of any large store or fabric store, get all the sheets, blankets, bulk fabrics, any and all thread, yarn, sewing notions, quilt batting, etc. At the same time I would get all the sweat shirts, sweat pants, warn underwear, warm socks, blue jeans, etc that I could. I wear sweat shirts in the winter instead of of long underwear, cost less than $10 and lasts a couple years. I know of no way to make the fleece fabric or to easily sew it. It is much warmer and more rugged than pj,s and allows you to live comfortable in your house with limited wood heat.
I think that the average unprepared sheeple is going to be looking for twinkies, and steaks at the super market, guns and ammo, fuel and batteries for his flashlight, new boom box and big screen TV and will be at Wallyworld, the sporting goods store, and the gas station. I do not intend to even think about treading in his turf. I would appreciate a little courtesy when we meet at Tractor Supply or the greenhouse supply however.
I myself intend to beat the rush and have bought and stored a lot of basic supplies, primers, powder, bullets, gun parts, gun cleaning supplies, fertilizer, etc. It may cost a little money, but you get to pick and choose exactly what you want, avoid the mobs, get courteous treatment and go home in comfort and alive.

 

Don't forget the car dealer so they can pick up that new BMW to cruise back to da 'hood in!

"I would appreciate a little courtesy when we meet at Tractor Supply or the greenhouse supply however."

No worries, we can help each other load the heavier items..

 

Well that will work out well, they will just get the rope and find a bunch of "whitey" to pull it around when the fuel runs out. Got have "respect" you know!

 

No problem, to Scavenge just means to pick up things other do not want.
Well except in the cities and then it just means what ever is not tied down then you walk away with it.

I'd not limit myself to such list.

 

Scavenging is still looting after a catastrophe. I search roadways, river banks, but houses, buildings, store, are off limits except for ones owned by government or a declared enemy. Spoils of war.

 

While I totally agree with you in the short run seacowboys, at some point the community as a whole has to work together and I hope trade and share things not take and demand things. Our history has not been good, the pilgrims survived that first winter by stealing and eating the native Americans seed corn stored for planting the next spring

 

I see scavenging more as a long term survival need, rather then right after SHTF/TEOTWAWKI! We all know we should have preps set up at our living place, but what if? What if your put up supplies only last as long as you planned, and the ongoing needs extends well beyond your capabilities? At some point your going to need to go ranging, and that I think is the crux of this thread! I also don't view it as theft or pillaging, I see it as a needed survival tactic. We all like to think we'e well stocked and prepared, but what happens after we use up what we have, a bad winter does your crops, and the game are not as plentiful, and your rabbits die off? You have to do something! By now, the people that things belong to are ether long dead, or moved on, so it's not theft, nor is it wrong to take what ever you need when there is no "owner" to claim rights! It could be water, or medical supplies, or, what ever, it dosnt matter any longer as you need, and no one is around to contest it. You may have to really work at it, or to even find "It" but that's the game we will have to play when it gets to that point! I'mm Not talking about bartering, or trading, that's a separate deal, I'm talking about ranging to find needful things to continue to survive, or to augment what you allready have!

 

I like this suggestion and the antique stores. Those are good places because they will give you the basics.

Please note: scavenging is IMO only to be done if collapse has happened and you have used up supplies. I do not plan on looting but if SHTF and 3+ years down the road I need things, I will set aside my belief of "thou shall not steal" and assume most places have been abandon. I know we have had this discussion before but when does looting become scavenging? How long does it take to declare something abandon and it would be okay to use things left behind?

 

As soon as the survivors tribe up, whatever land they can control will be reserved for their own systematic looting far into the future. Scavengers will be shot on sight or enslaved, whenever possible.

There still won't be any free lunches.

If you happen to be living in an area where a tribe takes over, you'll either join up or get exterminated.

It won't matter if you are in your pre-collapse residence, or if you are the ninth generation on the family farm, or battened down in a BOL. You'll be on tribal land by their say-so, and you'll be dealt with accordingly.

Post-collapse politics will be like a very strong laxative: fast-acting, thorough, but not even remotely gentle.

 

One of my favorite past times is wandering the so-called antique stores and plazas around here. 99.999% of the stuff is truly junk, but I keep an eye out for all the "arm-strong' tools and tube type electronics I can find. I've a very decent collection of old, but good harvest and carpentry tools, along with some Zenith AM, Am/FM/short wave receivers and the odd piece of ham gear. Even found an ice saw. The seller had no idea why a big buck saw only had one handle...
I really like you idea on the sweats - that pile type material cant be made at home.
One thing I'm trying to acquire is ammonium nitrate fertilizer without the seller recording the purchase. I've had some luck with one of my neighbors that does ornamental bush production, but farmers don't want the hassle of the feds paper work. Could be rather useful in some circumstances.

 

This is exactly why I advocate no less than 50,000 to 100,000 rds of 22lr and rifles and pistols to go with them! Any 22 rifle you can use well and have plenty of ammo for is better than any centerfire rifle with no ammo. Just for the record, today 10 April 2018 plenty of 22lr ammo is available in quantities of 1000 - 5000 and more at 4 cents a round. That works out to $400 for 10,000 rounds or $1000 for 25,000 rounds it is fairly easily acquired folks, and most places available from online with home delivery.

 

I wonder how many have consider the possibility of a tribe moving in and taking over the area that their BOL is in. hat is a circumstance that you will either stand your ground or bug out and hope you find a new place to survive.

@Asia-Off-Grid I found you another signature line.

 

I believe in the no stone unturned method

 

National guard units
Hardware store s
Fire house
Fire trucks
Ambulances
Sporting goods store
Bike shops
Road sides
Cruise ships
Police station
Prison s


Telephone poles and cables are all over enough to build cabins forts bunker shipping containers

 

Yeah....that right there. After the hoard dies off, say a year or so, it might be safe to salvage materials that got overlooked or couldn't be eaten/used immediately. But going out before the majority of the hoard is dead would likely get you killed.

 

Scavenging is a lifestyle, we just don't call it by that name nowadays. I make a weekly visit to all the nearby surplus, resale, and antique stores, I dig in the trash at car dealerships, the range, and in every dumpster I can and keep my eye's open for stuff by the roadside. We call it antiquing, picking, dumpster diving, and thrift-shopping.

Awareness and adaptability will be the scroungers best assets. You might really love the idea of hitting a burned out drugstore to look for some waxed mint dental floss, but a reasonably clean piece of plastic shopping bag, or a twig will do the job without the risk of running into others who are desperately searching for pain killers. Or more likely the dead who have already found them. Remember, they won't hurt you. Check their pockets, carefully.