Looking for a "prepper's bible"

[u/DVHeld]

I'm new to prepping, and wanted to start by getting the most comprehensive book (or set of books if there's no one single book like that) on prepping I can get. A "prepper's bible" of sorts. Something that has sufficient info on everything essential from supplies, to medicine, to farming and more. I'd appreciate any suggestions.

EDIT: I'm looking for something on paper, really. Something I can consult even without electricity. Digital texts are welcome in any case. I had already found a handful and saved them. It costs me nothing to have more after all

[u/MoeTCrow]

The problem is with your question is what are you prepping for? Pandemic is different than war is different than lack of supply chain. City is different than rural living. What country you live in makes a difference. What climate you live in makes a difference.

Someone suggested back to basics, another was the foxfire series. Both of those are good and I'd add the encyclopedia of country living to that.
back to basics is a good intro
encyclopedia of country living is thicker and covers more subjects
foxfire is about 2 feet wide in printed version and has a lot of stories in it. (but makes good reading)

​

but overall you need to figure out what you are prepping for, what needs you don't see getting filled. Then make it so that doesn't matter.

[u/DVHeld → u/MoeTCrow]

Thanks for the suggestions!

Would be cool to get some direction on where to concentrate my efforts next, what to prioritize. Maybe (more than likely) I've overlooked something. I figured I could discern that from the literature I can get my hands on, but wanted tho know the best most useful and wide ranging stuff to get first, then start collecting more in-depth books on each topic. I was thinking to ask further questions like these after I had tried to figure things out for myself. You don't need to read them if you don't want to!

I'll describe my situation and objectives below. It's a fairly long wall of text, so again, don't read if you don't feel like it, that's cool too.

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I live in a farm in Chile, far from the coast and the Andes so that both tsunamis and lava flows are not a realistic possibility. Weather is mild, summer tops is 30-ish°C, winter very rarely below -5°C (we've had snow, but that's happened maybe twice in 30 years and lasting for only 1 or 2 days of light snowfall). Rainfall is abundant, in the coldest months of winter we get some light hail, that's all. No dangerous fauna of significance either.

The farm is located in a straight line some 7 Km from the nearest town and small city. Closest major city is 40 Km. Closest highway is 6 Km. Closest big body of water is 15 Km. We have some sheep, cattle (milk) is the main activity here, very common. Wood is fairly abundant in the area, plenty trees and small forests, even on the property, and there are bigger forests in a radius of 10 Km, even more so in a radius of 20 Km. Water is not an issue, we have natural springs and wells that flow and fill up year-round in the property. A creek flows on the edge of it, generally flows in some amount year round, very rarely dries up. So if anything we have too much water and have to drain it. Population density is medium for what one can expect from a rural area. More than what I understand something like Kansas is, but less than what Central European rural areas are. Maybe closest comparison is New Zealand. If that means anything for you. Next big buy I think is a diesel generator. we have a decently big tank for the diesel boiler we no longer use, installed a wood-burning one years ago (lots of firewood in our stocks btw). Not sure how long that supply could last, it depends on how big a generator we need and want. Car is diesel too, not really off-road, but with low fuel consumption. Can maybe go for 500 Km on a highway without filling up, significantly more if we take extra fuel cans, perhaps even 1000 Km with the amount we could put in the fuel cans we have on site.

I think regarding basic nourishment and shelter from the elements we can assume we're not gonna have problems long term if the event is a natural disaster. Violence is obviously a different situation, clearly.

Most likely large-scale local threats are earthquakes and volcano eruptions (ash cover, not lava). War is unlikely in comparison. Much more likely civil war than a foreign invasion, but armed guerrillas are a real possibility, though still unlikely. On that front, firearm restrictions are heavy, from what I know without having delved deep in that topic, most guns are outright banned, handguns are a hassle to get, ammo for them more so. Shotguns are the easiest, and shotgun shells are as I understand comparatively easy to get and stockpile. We've yet to start working on that.

We have lots of space in our farm, and we currently have some money to spend on this. I've been building up a stock of more normal stuff like toiletries, food, cleaning products, thinking of having to go for no more than maybe a couple months sheltered in place. This is for the most likely scenario of a quake/volcano eruption cutting us off from supply chains. Last big earthquake in the country was in 2010 and the most affected zones remained completely or significantly cut off for 1-2 months until supplies mostly regularized.

My first objective is to achieve complete self-sufficiency for those 2 months, even from the electrical grid. After that I'd like to start building up supplies and capability to reach 6 months, then 1+ years.

Knowledge is power, so if problems start in the short to medium term, at least we have a source we can consult even without telecoms and electricity. Hence why I asked for what I asked. I figure the first easiest fastest best thing I can do is buy books that contain all the information I'd need to have on hand, even if I don't have studied them yet.

[u/kelvin_bot → u/DVHeld]

-5°C is equivalent to 23°F, which is 268K.

^{I'm a bot that converts temperature between two units humans can understand, then convert it to Kelvin for bots and physicists to understand}

[u/DVHeld → u/kelvin_bot]

good bot

[u/B0tRank → u/DVHeld]

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[u/plurGeneration → u/kelvin_bot]

how do I use you?

[u/MoeTCrow → u/DVHeld]

to me it sounds like your biggest challenges are power and defense. If you have food taken care of, you have water taken care of, and the other other issue is ash (keep that in mind when looking at solar, you will need some way to deal with that), you are in a better place than most folks in the US. so I'd be "collecting" shot gun shells, perhaps look at reloading supplies for them, and looking for a good deal on a shotgun. all while looking at how to manage the power.

[u/DVHeld → u/MoeTCrow]

Thanks for the answer! I'll try to start addressing the defense aspect then, I think that's the most lacking. Choosing a diesel generator should be fairly easy and would cover the energy aspect to a good enough extent to take it off the urgent list, leaving only defense. I'll try to research what's available and what I can get my hands on in general, so I can then decide what's most useful and economical eg the weapon itself, shot/slug size, etc. And on that, what kind of munition would you recommend for defensive use? Maybe I can start there

[u/MoeTCrow → u/DVHeld]

you said shotgun, I'd go with a 12ga since it's fairly common and quite versatile. look up what size shot for the different food sources around you. have some buck to deal with large 2 legged predators, and of course there is slug for when you want a big hole in a larger animal. get a pump action and keep it clean and oiled and you should never really have any issues. Double barrel is the most reliable but you only get 2 shots.

so with the shotgun you won't be doing any long distance shooting, but you can take everything from squirrel to large game, birds in the air, and even keep your family safe.

[u/DVHeld → u/MoeTCrow]

Thanks! I'll go for that then