Today on The Survival Podcast the expert council answers your questions on the military, running, fodder trees, hot water recirculation systems, vehicles, gardening and more.
Make sure if you submit content for an expert council show you do the following….
Email it to me at jack @ thesurvivalpodcast.com
Put TSPC Expert in the subject line
Ask you question and state the expert you have the question for in one coherent sentence
Hit the return key a few times and then give all the details you think are necessary `
Following that procedure makes it about 100X more likely your question will get though screening and sent on to one of our experts. All expert council members can be found on the Meet the Expert Council Page.
Join Me Today to Discuss…
Our military should be for the defense of America only – Dr. Ron Paul & Dan McAdams
Training with running in rural environments where traffic safety is a concern – Andy McCann
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon.
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Today’s Item of the day comes from Vevor and you guys are going to love these. They are Collapsable Storage Bins and they are available in both 65 Liter (17 Gallon) and 45 Liter (12 Gallon) sizes. Note when you see the pricing these come in sets of three, not individually so they end up costing about 19 dollars a piece.
For a better indication of size when expanded lets look at the dimensions of the expanded crates…
In other words big enough to carry a lot of gear and keep that gear organized. The best part is when not in use for storage they take up almost no space. When collapsed they are just a hair over 2 inches thick. And breaking them down or setting them up takes just a couple seconds to do. Anyone can do it, even me.
So what can you do with these, might be better to ask what they can’t do but here are some thoughts. First for general prepping they are great but honestly for heavy long term storage (full all the time) you don’t really need collapsable bins. I like bins of this style for things you need to move from one place to another.
When I used to camp a lot this style of bin was my go to. I don’t just keep all camping gear ready to go in bins because each trip can be different. Some trips I am going to fish, some trips not, just one example. So being able to load up gear on the fly is great and having the bins out of the way when not in use is ideal.
I also know a lot of folks that use bins like this for taking things to say the farmer’s market. They don’t want space taken up all week long, just the ability to move product for days at the market. And if you have a good day at a market and have very little to come home with, folding the empty bins flat makes tear down (worst part of the day, as you just want to be done) so much faster.
Another use, the grocery store of stocking up on supplies at Costco. Don’t you love the way the people at Costco act like those scrap boxes are gold or something? “Would you like a box sir”? I always want to say “um know I would prefer these 27 items to roll around in the back of my truck”.
Boxes like these keep everything organized and they don’t get squashed when another one slides into it during your trip home. Then when you get home, just fold them up and put them back in your vehicle and they will always be there. Beats those stupid plastic bags groceries use that carry very little and end up flapping in our trees and clogging our creeks. And way better with a nice flat bottom then the “cloth bags” they sell you which seem instantly fall over in your trunk or truck bed no matter how you turn them or use them to prop each other up.
Basically for anything you want to store and move these are a great option. They are even a great camping/fishing/ table that will collapse down on the trip there and back. Or like for those kids events (soccer, baseball, etc.) when you are sitting there for hours waiting for that never ending game to end.
Now other than size alone there is one more difference between the 45L crates and 65L crates that may be more important to some of you than others. The lids. In addition to the 65L crates being clearly larger, it also has a removable lid. The beauty of that is for carrying things that stick out of the box, you just leave the lid off.
The 45L crates have lids that are two sided and stay attached like flaps (see image on the left). The good part of that is you won’t ever lose or forget them, the bad part is if you have things sticking above a crate they are kind of like deployed flaps and can be in the way.
All in I personally prefer the lager big with removable lid since they are only a few dollars more a set and give me more flexibility. The choice is personal though, so pick what works for you. Either way check out the Vevor 45L and/or Vevor 65L collapsible crates today and remember to use my code, VVPROMO to get any additional 5% off when you order.
P.S.– If you prefer to order via Amazon both the 45L Bins and 65L Bins are available that way, but you will pay more and you won’t get the additional 5% off with my discount either. Still some prefer to order from Amazon so I am providing these links as well. Also if you check you will see that they have great reviews there.
Join me at 12:00 CST as for a discussion with TSPC community member Jason Adkins. Jason discovered TSPC in “the Jetta days”, became a prepper and then a series of “more mundane disasters” knocked him down. He will tell us about that and how he rebuilt after them and is currently on track to reestablish a homestead with his two daughters.
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon.
Join the MSB Today
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Remember in addition to discounts to over 80 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
This is not a full review and it is an item that likely will soon be gone so I am just letting you know about it while you can get it. The Soundcore Spirit X2, True Wireless Earbuds are available “refurbished” which simply means returned and brand new for only 34.99 a pair until inventory is gone.
I just got them and here is why, first you guys and gals know I LOVE Anker they are my favorite discount electronics brand. Top quality stuff from a company that stands by their products for half the price, yes please. What you likely don’t know is for lack of a better term I have “weird ears”. I have never found a pair of ear buds that do not simply fall out of my ear while I am walking, working out, gardening, taking care of the birds etc.
I mean I have lost some in some weird places. Deep grass, into a garden pond, who the hell knows what “artifacts” might be found on my small farm in the distant future? So when these popped up this cheap I figured what the hell and ordered a pair.
This is it, this is what I am doing from now own. No more lost buds and no more big bulky over the ear muffs when working out side, that just sucks. So again, these seem to be discontinued and they are dumbing the remaining inventory. In fact I am betting even though they are marked as “refurbished” they are not even returns, just a discontinued item they are selling the last of. So if this deal works for you, get the Soundcore Spirit X2, True Wireless Earbuds today.
I am often asked for specific business advice and consulting. Things like “can we hire you to assess our business” which I don’t do because I simply don’t have the time to do that type of consulting. I am far more often though asked about business ideas. Like what do you think of this product or this service as a business. I almost always say, “sorry but I don’t do this type of thing”.
The reason is simple, what I think about your idea is meaningless to your success with it.
The truth is I really believe that the most important part of building a business is just getting busy getting shit done. Planning, talking, thinking, brain storming all have their place but up front, hustle is the key.
I have been wary of giving specific business advice to folks because…
Many who want to hear about starting a business are more interested in intellectual masturbation than actually doing it, I have no interest in that!
I cringe at the thought of someone not pursuing an idea just because I don’t personally think it is a good idea. There are plenty of successful businesses out there that I would have said were not a good idea before they existed.
I cringe even more at someone going after an idea just because I think it is a good idea. Ideas are not businesses, at all, in anyway, shape or form. The execution is the key, not the idea itself.
Most of you refuse to accept these two things, a tax attorney and a CPA. Every time I bring up business it leads to tax and legal questions, to be blunt, I DON’T Fing KNOW WHAT YOUR INDIVIDUAL ISSUES ARE. I can’t and won’t give this advice. Stop asking!!!
The truth is what I think of your business doesn’t matter, what you do with it is what matters. I try to stick to principles, concepts and methods over ideas because that makes them universal.
Join Me Today to Discuss...
There are rules to business, some of them are
Your market is more important than your desires
Passion is great, but passion in absence of substance equals stupidity
It is always more work than you thought it would be
No one will ever do it as good as you, EVER, EVER, EVER, got it?
Focusing on your competition is most often really stupid
No business can survive with out sales AND marketing
My thoughts on modern businesses
Part time first for MOST
If you go full time up front, don’t get comfortable
You will have one boss, and he/she needs to be an asshole!
Nothing beats just telling people in the beginning
Thoughts on successful websites
Sites need to initiate a process
Sites need to make it clear how to do business with you
Sites should be “active”, brochures are dead! Fing dead! Do you get that?
A business is its customer base, an email list is a customer base
Your site is not designed to please people who won’t buy from you
In the end it comes down to abilities
MarketABILITY – the ability to tell your story
ReferABILITY – the ability for others to tell your story
ProfitABILITY – the ability to yield a surplus
RepeatABILITY – the ability to sell to a customer many times
AdaptABILITY – the ability to evolve and be sustained
ScaleABILITY – the ability to grow sufficiently
Simple basics
Have a core product/service
Get moving fast, long product development isn’t business
Listen to your customers (trends not individuals)
Excel never lies, you will lie to yourself, don’t
No marketing will every beat pure hustle in the beginning
Everything I say could be both right and wrong at the same time
Just do it, seek not my approval, seek the approval of paying customers `
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon.
Join the MSB Today
Want all the Early TSP Episodes?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 80 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
Take a look at the above image. These are both suck cuttings of a plant knowns as Longevity Spinach and it is very easy to root as a cutting. Since it dies below freezing I take cuttings from my garden in fall and grow a few plants indoors for set out in the following spring.
Which one of these plants would you want to plant in your garden? If you were buying plants at a store or nursery and they were sitting next to one another which would you buy? Not even a hard question is it? The one on the left!
Well, they were both stuck on the same day, they have both been watered exactly the same and they both grew about 4 inches apart. There are actually 6 of these plants, three of each and it is the same story with all of them.
Guess which one was stuck into my bioreactor compost. Again the one on the left.
But, did I stack the deck? What is the one on the right stuck into? The answer is Fox Farms Happy Frog Potting Soil. Now look if you had to buy a potting soil that or Fox Farms Ocean Forest is what I would recommend. These two soils are used by micro green growers, organic plant propagators, the cannabis industry and may others. Why? Because it is an outstanding soil for something you can buy off the shelf.
It is why I used it for the control in my experiment. And why the night and day difference is so dang impressive. Note that the total size of the leaves is not the only thing to look at. Look at the new growth specifically. There is about double the mass of new growth on the compost plant vs. the potting soil plant. Neither have been given any fertilizer and the Fox Farms soil definitely has more NPK then my compost. The difference maker is biology and the fungi to bacterial ratio.
On my segment of today’s show I talk about this further but if you want to know how to do this the first thing to learn is how to make biologically active and fungal dominant compost. This is why my first course at Home Food Systems is the Bioreactor Compost Course. This type of compost takes two real thing, knowledge and time. Hence now is the time to gain the knowledge.
Nicole “Awesome-Sauce” is at it again. She has put together a five-day, FREE webinar revisiting past sessions from the Self Reliance Festival. It’s packed with knowledge to help you along your journey toward building a durable life.
From March 17-21, for an hour each evening, you can learn about homesteading, building soil, finding community, and more. You won’t become an expert overnight, but you’ll get great tips and ideas to start with. And here is the special “Sauce” – Nicole and a special guest will live host this each evening with Q&A and active discussions!
Grab your spot to learn with others who want to see systematic change just like you.”
Plus, this webinar gives you a great taste of what happens at the Self Reliance Festival from the comfort of your screen.
This isn’t just another boring online class. It’s a chance to hear from people who’ve walked the walk. They’re living the life: growing their own food, building their communities, and making a future while our economy transitions. And they’re going to show you how you can start doing the same.
Learn from the Legends: Each day, a new expert will share how they succeed in living a life that’s true to their values. They’re the real deal, and they’re here to teach you.
Homestead Tsunami: Don’t miss the session from Joel Salatin called “Homestead Tsunami.” It’s all about getting back to basics and opting out of the “Rat Race” through homesteading.
Get Connected: It’s not just about listening; you’ll get to ask questions, interact, and maybe even win some cool stuff. Plus, everyone who joins in gets access to bonus content, exclusive offers, and insider tips.
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This webinar series is completely free, and it’s an opportunity you don’t want to miss. Mark your calendars for March 17-21, and get ready to kickstart your journey to self-reliance.
Today’s Item of the day is Galvanized Raised Garden Beds by Vevor. There are many options here but the two I feel TSP’rs will be most interested in are standard 4×8 dimensions at two different depths…
Today we have a brand new type of item of the day. Up until now all Item of the Day reviews have been for items you can get on Amazon. Recently Vevor reached out to me about working with them and we came to an agreement. I will be receiving some free products in this agreement for review for disclosure I will tell you when ever that is the case. It is the case here but this item is so great I also bought one myself because I want two for my coming project.
Here is the best part, this product is awesome and I am going to save you a lot of money on it. Retail on this product is 140 bucks, but if you use my links you can get it for a LOT LESS. Just by registering as a customer with Vevor through my link before you buy and your cost will go down to only 99.99 then at check out just enter code VVPROMO for an additional 5% off.
Now let me tell you about this product and why I love it. First I love raised beds for gardening and we all know why. You get space to build new perfect soil and things like ducks and dogs tend to stay out of beds at least 20 inches high and these are just a hair under 2 feet high.
Next last year I sold a metric ton of this product by Frezone. They are awesome and were costing you guys between 120 – 160 plus dollars a pop. Here we have what I consider a better product for less money. Why do I say it is better?
Painted – mostly aesthetics but they do look great
Rectangle vs. Oval – simply put this gives you more total square feet to plant
Horizontal Reenforcement – There are six reenforcing straps that prevent bulging
Heavy Steel – Most beds of this type are made with .01 thick steel, these are made with .04 thick steel
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Now in general since this form of garden bed showed up, all steel, shipped in panels so they can ship cost effectively I have been all in on them. You are talking a garden bed that will stand up to the test of time better than anything built from pressure treated lumber. And let’s look at the cost of building a 4′ wide x 8′ long x 2′ deep bed with lumber that will rot in time to one of these.
For each bed you would require…
16 2x6x8 pressure treated boards (at my local Lowes that is 120 dollars)
A box of good stainless or deck screws about 12 bucks
Likely some coroner reenforcing lumber we can call it 10 bucks
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All in building a 2 foot high bed with 4×8 dimensions with lumber at todays prices is about 140 ish bucks or for just under a hundred bucks, a box will show up at your house with every thing you need, bolt it all together and fill it up and just start growing.
And folks NOW is the time, spring is springing as we speak. You know those beds you were going to build but didn’t this winter, order today and by the weekend you can be assembling all the beds you want for the coming season. And the best part is these beds will LAST. I am not going to say forever but certainly 3-5X longer than a wood based bed that costs about 40% more to build along with a trip to box store hell on your weekend.
Yea look at it that way, you want to build your beds next weekend right? So you can get up early, go to the box store, blow 1-2 hours of your time, come home, then get to work. Or you can assemble one of these in about 30 minutes with simple hand tools while spending less money and getting a better product.
Remember you can get this deal in two different sizes depending on the depth you want. I went with 2 foot deep beds but they are pretty massive. I do this because it is a nice working height and because it keeps the ducks out of my gardens. The tradeoff is fill volume, a 4x8x2 box will hold just about 1 cubic yard. If you don’t want the higher working height or are not worried about animals the 1 foot tall option may be bette for you. Again the options are…
4Wx8Lx1D 65.99 less 5% with my special code VVPROMO
4Wx8Lx2D 99.99 super deal and you still get 5% more off with code VVPROMO
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So get registered as a Vevor Customer today and get this great deal and just know I will be bringing you a ton more or personally selected awesome products from Vevor as we move forward. But there is a reason I am leading off with these awesome garden beds, now is the time and this is one of the best deals I could find for you on the Vevor website.
Video Review of These Awesome Beds
Two questions were common when this video was released. They were about the supports and their location. To that one there are a total of 6, only two are installed here as we are going to reconfigure the beds as described. `
Next was is the top of the bed sharp? No it is rolled but there are edges on the corners so right where they panels connect you have some potential for scratches. Vevor does provide a top cover of thin material to cap the box with. We didn’t use it and have no plans to, but you may want to or to do something with the sharp corners.
P.S. – With this new partnership I will be expanding TspAz.com to include products from both Amazon and Vevor and will continue to recommend the best options regardless of source. As always anything I would not spend my own money on, I will never recommend to you. I will always continue to disclose any products I am given as samples, etc. Integrity is why you know you can trust my recommendations and that will never change.
* Note – This Item is available on Amazon but you will pay about 20 dollars more for it if you order it there. Still I wanted you to know about this in case you simply prefer to buy from that channel.
Join me at 13:00 CST as we continue our multi part series on redefining education. I thought about calling this series “redefining childhood education” and while we will come at it a lot from what we should teach our kids, I am betting most adults may have to learn over half of the things we will talk about in this series as well.
The truth is education is failing out children in so many ways. Kids are subjected to learning thousands of functionally useless facts, regurgitating them on tests and then 90% or more is fully forgotten in time. And I am not talking about stupid people here. Honestly many professionals that are highly successful in careers would fail to pass a 10th grade exam on many subjects. Why? Most of the things we force upon our kid are again, functionally useless.
Education should indeed focus on primary academic skills, the core being
Communication (reading, writing, speaking)
Mathematics (basic arithmetic, basic algebra and basic geometry)
Science (primary how the scientific method works and general awareness of scientific principles)
History (to understand context of our current world)
Basic Geography (where nations, people, things, are and how it has changed over time)
Logic and Reason (how to determine what is likely about what you don’t know from what you do know)
`
Let’s be honest if you have that down in 2024 you can learn anything else you need to learn on the fly or chose to specialize in what interests you and take a path of intensive learning on that. But what is most missing here? A general knowledge of the world around you (local) and what we used to simply call life skills. You know cooking your own food, paying bills, doing laundry, etc.
Think about the fact that a child today will set in a desk 180 plus days a year, for 13 years, be told that what they are learning is “important” and the following things will be true after they graduate from K-12 education….
They will not know how to cook a meal
They will not know how to grow a plant
They will not know how to use hand and power tools
They will not know how to mend a sock with needle and thread
They will not know how to form a well reasoned and logical argument
They will not know how to identify a logical fallacy
They will not understand that there are thousands and thousands of career options
They will not know how to do taxes
They will not know how to actually fact check a claim by government, media, etc.
They will not know how to do a basic design and cost estimate for a project
They will not know how to design a decent natural diet
They will not know how to do about 1000 other things people in general could do just a few decades ago `
So what is the solution? Changing the educational system to make it better? Well you may as well plan on going to Washington, DC and talking senators and representatives out of taking lobbyist money and fixing our problems, because your chances of success are about equal.
Home school has taught me that the common argument in response to talk like this which is of course….
“Teachers work really hard, they are underpaid and we don’t have the time and money to teach all these other things.”
It’s a complete pile of bullshit and frankly a few logical fallacies put together to avoid the discussion. My grandkids are excelling as homeschool students. They do 1-2.5 hours of school work a day, my grandson is at an age where he’d be bringing that much work home by now after spending 8-9 hours a day “going to school”.
When we started homeschool and I saw this, my first question was, “what the hell is school really doing with our kids when 2 hours a day is sufficient for all the learning and work? The answer was of course “training them to obey the rules of the state and society and to not question authority”. Turns out when you get rid of that and simply require basic good behaviour while learning you have a metric ton of time to do other things.
In return for good behaviour and work ethics we give our kids a ton of daily freedom. They can play outside, do games, watch videos, etc. But we add in a ton of real world learning and that is where most of these things in this series come from.
Join Me Today to Discuss…
Remember – “The purpose of a system is what it does, not what it claims to do”. ~ Stafford Beer
Also Remember – “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” ~ Buckminster Fuller
And One More – “You can’t get a child to learn a thing they refuse to learn nor prevent them from learning a thing they want to know”. ~ Sue Laprise
10 Skills to Teach Kids and Adults Alike
How to do a basic take off (estimate) using Excel
Basic small livestock husbandry (rabbits, quail or chickens)
How to intelligently debate both sides of an issue
How to identify logical fallacies
Basic first aid
How to use Bitcoin (buy, sell, hold, self custody, pay, receive)
How to write a “sales pitch” for anything, to sell a product, to pitch an idea, etc.
How to make plants with cuttings (start with things that are easy)
How to plan a trip (pricing, travel, budget, where to visit, etc)
How to properly apologize when you are wrong, and accept an apology when you are right
The current system will only change if it is literally starved do death, it is how you kill a parasite `
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon.
Join the MSB Today
Want all the Early TSP Episodes?
Remember in addition to discounts to over 80 vendors who supply stuff you are likely buying anyway, tons of free ebooks and video content, MSB Members also get every edition of The Survival Podcast ever produced in convenient zip files in blocks of 24. More info on the MSB can be found here.
John Bush is at it again with a massive line up of amazing speakers for his Annual Exit and Build conference in Bastrop Texas which will run from May 17-19. This year you can meet me and folks like….
Nicole Sauce
Joel Salatin
Matt Powers
Of Course John Bush
And a ton more
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I don’t do a lot of events, you guys know that. I don’t really like to travel much but I love meeting folks. The reasons I do E&B every time John asks is that Bastrop is only a 4 hour drive for me and bluntly John just does an amazing job with events.
I really also really encourage you to consider upgrading your tickets to get access to things like awesome after hours meals and the amazing networking it provides. Along with things like the Farm tours on the 16th and 20th.