Wood is a renewable resource and one of the very few fuels that you can harvest from nature on your own. Cutting and hauling wood may be difficult, but it’s nowhere near as difficult as drilling for oil and then distilling that petroleum down to usable products.

But believe it or not, you can’t just burn any wood in a fire. Oh, it might burn just fine; but that doesn’t mean that you’re going to be satisfied with the results. Some woods can be extremely dangerous to burn, as they can be dangerous, giving off toxic fumes.

For that matter, there are many other things that people put in a fire, which can also give off toxic fumes.

Many types of plastics, color printed materials, chemicals, Styrofoam, corrugated cardboard (cardboard boxes), dryer lint (which has been touted as a fire starter), and wood that has been treated with chemicals.

We need to be aware of what we are burning and make sure that we have a good source of wood to burn.

So, what are some of the types of wood that we shouldn’t burn?

Green Wood

Freshly cut trees are said to be “green wood.” The biggest problem with this, assuming that you can get it to ignite, is that it will produce a lot of smoke.

While the smoke may not be considered to be poisonous, breathing in smoke can be harmful to your lungs. On top of that, the smoke will signal anyone within visual range that you have a fire going, not something that you really want to advertise in a survival situation.

In times past, people would cut wood and split it, stacking it for the next year. That would provide the wood plenty of time to “season,” drying out to a safe point for burning. This normally takes six to nine months.

Driftwood

People like to collect driftwood and burn it in a campfire when camping on the beach.

They don’t recognize the danger they are putting themselves in by burning what seems to be a great and readily available fuel for their fires. Any driftwood is likely to contain high concentrations of salt and other minerals that it absorbs while afloat.

Even if the wood has dried, it will still contain that salt, which will burn as the wood does, giving off toxic fumes.

Engineered Wood Products

The term engineered wood products refers to any of a number of products that we can usually buy at the lumberyard, such as plywood, particle board, chipboard, MDF, or OSB.

These products are made by using a combination of wood and a resinous adhesive. But many of those adhesives contain formaldehyde. When the wood burns and it burns rapidly, toxic chemicals are released.

Pallet Wood

Wood pallets may seem like an ideal, cheap, source of wood for the fire, especially if the pallets have been made of oak. However, the wood used in most pallets has been chemically treated to keep wood fungus and wood-eating insects from attacking it.

This can produce toxic chemicals when burning, depending on what chemicals they use to treat the wood.

Pressure-treated Wood

Like pallet wood, pressure-treated wood has been chemically treated to prevent decay. If anything, it is worse than the pallet wood, as there is generally a higher concentration of chemicals.

Those chemicals are often injected right into the wood. When wood is burned, arsenic is released in such concentrations that the EPA considers hazardous waste.

Wood That Has Been Painted or Stained

While we’re talking about man-made products, avoid using any wood that has been painted, stained, varnished, or lacquered, regardless of the wood species.

Movies show people burning furniture in survival scenarios, but the directors and producers of those movies don’t know how dangerous that is. While wood furniture is perfectly safe to use, many of the finishes produce toxic gases when they burn.

Pine and Other Softwoods

Pine may seem like a useful wood to burn, especially in areas where there is an abundance of pine growing. But pine is one of the worst woods to use in a fire. This means that the construction wood used in framing houses is bad for burning as well, as it is mostly some sort of pine.

There are two problems with pine. The first is that it doesn’t hold much potential heat energy. When you burn pine, it burns rapidly, giving the appearance of giving off a lot of heat. But compared to other woods, you’re getting very little heat. The coals of the fire produce the most heat, not the flames. Pine doesn’t produce much in the way of coals, hence the lack of heat.

The other problem with pine and other similar softwoods is that they are resinous woods. While the rosin itself is not dangerous, it tends to pop, when burning.

This causes large sparks to fly out of the fire, where they can cause the fire to spread. You don’t want a pine rosin spark falling on your floor or your tent, spreading the fire.

Any Wood with “Poison” in the Name

There are several different types of wood that contain the word “poison” in the name of the plant, tree, or wood. Things like poison oak, poisonwood, poison sumac, and even poison ivy will give off toxic fumes when burning. At the least, it will be an eye irritant, but it could also cause serious respiratory problems.

Oleander

Oleander can grow as either a shrub or a small tree. Either way, the wood from the oleander produces a toxic chemical when burning, which is serious enough to put you in the hospital.

Learn to recognize this plant, so that you will avoid it. It grows in a wide variety of climates, mostly as an ornamental landscaping plant.

The Yew Tree

The Yew is another attractive tree, commonly used for landscaping. Yet it is one of the most poisonous trees in the world, with all parts of the tree being poisonous to humans.

The specific poison is called “taxine,” which is capable of causing cardiac arrest. You shouldn’t even touch this wood, without wearing gloves as protection for your hands.

Mexican or Brazilian Pepper

We’re not talking about chili peppers here, but a tree that contains the word “pepper” in its name. This tree is known by both the name Mexican Pepper and Brazilian Pepper.

It contains a toxin named urushiol, which can cause rashes and other allergic reactions. Like the yew, gloves should be worn if you ever have to handle it. But don’t let that be to put it in the fire.

Any Rotten or Moldy Wood

Rotten and moldy wood might seem like an ideal thing to burn, as it lights easily and burns quickly. Even so, all rotted wood has fungi in it, which might be spread by the fire.

The rotting process will tend to increase the amount of moisture in the wood, increasing the smoke produced, giving you that much more of a chance of inhaling the smoke, along with any toxic substances produced by the fire.

Be Prepared

The people who are most likely to burn any of the woods mentioned above are those who don’t have a good stock of firewood, stored up for the emergency. Your best protection is to build a good stockpile of seasoned hardwood firewood, before a disaster strikes.

Just how much wood do you need? If you have to heat your home through an entire winter, using a wood-burning stove, you’ll go through four to six full cords (not face cords) of firewood. That’s a lot of wood.

Keep in mind too, that if we’re talking about a TEOTWAWKI event, you’ll need that much wood each and every winter; so you need a plan for cutting and hauling the wood that you’ll need to have for the next winter.

That’s going to be a challenge, without gasoline for your truck.

This article first appeared here.

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The post 12 Types of Wood You Should Never Burn first appeared on Self Sufficient Projects.

It’s only amongst the human population that some people think they have the right to deny others the ability to defend themselves against the two-legged predators in our midst. The gun control debate is an old one, even going back to the time when the British ruled the original 13 colonies, before the Revolutionary War.

We aren’t alone in this, as conquerors and oppressive regimes throughout history have worked to disarm populations under their control. When all the weapons are in the hands of the government, it’s hard for the population to rebel… or even to defend themselves against oppressive government overlords.

But disarming the population doesn’t make them any safer, regardless of the statistics that gun control groups manage to put together. The funny thing about those statistics is that both sides can dig up statistics to back up their point of view, pretty much negating the value of statistics in the argument.

The truth is, you can always back up your point of view with statistics; all it takes is cherry-picking the data and statistics you use. Unfortunately, that doesn’t stop people from using them.

Related: Native American Skills for the Modern Homesteader

The theory behind gun control is that taking guns out of circulation and/or making them harder to buy will stop criminals from buying them. That’s a noble sentiment… if it worked. But according to a report from the U. S. Department of Justice, 89.9% of the firearms used in crimes aren’t purchased in retail establishments.

So no matter how much effort is put into passing laws which make it harder to buy and own guns, the only difference those laws can possibly make is to make it harder for law-abiding citizens to buy guns, making them more vulnerable to criminals.

Criminals are criminals because they break laws; that’s the simple truth. No number of laws is going to stop them from doing that.

All that any gun control laws can do, in the fight against crime, is to give the DA’s office additional charges to bring against criminals who are already being tried for committing more serious offenses. Fortunately, we have the Second Amendment as the ultimate legal protection against the loss of our right to keep and bear arms.

The gun control crowd is constantly attacking that right, trying to chip away at it at both the state and federal levels; but overall they are not very successful.

It is only at the state level and in states where Democrats historically have majority control of the government, that more and more restrictive gun control laws are enacted. This makes those states worse ones to live in when it comes to defending home and family.

Worst States For Gun Control Laws

One of the most useful ways of looking at gun control laws, from the viewpoint of being able to defend yourself and your family is to look at how restrictive that state’s gun control laws are.

While some gun control laws may seem trivial or mere inconveniences, they add up to making it more difficult to defend your home, when the time becomes necessary.

A good example of this is magazine restrictions. In reality, you can defend yourself effectively with 10-round magazines; you just need more of them and need to practice magazine change-outs. But adding that restriction to others reduces your effectiveness in a prolonged shootout.

California – the left’s testing ground for new restrictive laws of all types.

It has a murder rate of 8.5 gun deaths per 100,000 residents. They are actively seeking to invent more gun laws to pass.

Hawaii – one of only five states that limits the same of all guns to those 21 and older, rather than 18 and older; they have a gun death rate of 3.4 per 100,000 residents.

New York – the first state to adopt gun industry liability laws, helping encourage gun manufacturers to move to other states. They have 5.3 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

Related: Is It Legal To Go Off The Grid In Your State?

Massachusetts – one of only two states that require locked storage of any firearm not under the immediate control of the owner.

This is helping them achieve the second lowest rate of gun ownership, yet they still have 3.7 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

Connecticut – has pushed gun control heavily since the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012. They are one of the only states to institute bans on “assault rifles” and “high capacity magazines,” both of which have received strong resistance from the general population. Even with their illegal gun removal program, they still have 6 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

Illinois – home of some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation, but has a real problem with gun deaths, at 14.1 gun deaths per 100,000 residents, mostly due to gang activity.

Maryland – has repealed its Law Enforcement Bill of Rights, eliminating protections for police officers.

Their restrictive gun laws have resulted in 65% of the firearms recovered from crimes having been bought out-of-state. They still have 13.5 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

New Jersey – requires criminal background checks and permits to even own a firearm, which hasn’t stopped them from having 5 gun-related deaths per 100,000 residents.

Washington – has recently enacted laws requiring more stringent background checks than federal law requires, yet still has 10.9 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

Colorado – once a conservative stronghold, with lots of gun owners and hunters, Colorado has largely been taken over by former residents of California.

Related: When Did Independence Become Illegal?

They have pushed for more restrictive gun control laws since the Aurora movie theatre shooting, increasing background check requirements and requiring that domestic abusers relinquish guns if there is a restraining order against them.

Yet they top this list with 15.4 gun deaths per 100,000 residents.

Obviously, any of these states would be difficult places to defend yourself in court, if you managed to navigate through their gun control laws, but were put in a position where you would have to use a gun to defend your home and family.

Generally speaking, the more restrictive the laws, the more firmly the courts come down on those who defend themselves.

States Without A Castle Doctrine

One of the most useful legal tools for those who need to defend their home and family is what’s known as the “Castle Doctrine,” also referred to as “Stand Your Ground” laws.

The basic idea here comes from Exodus 22:2 in the Bible, where it says that if you strike a thief who has broken into your home and he dies, you are not guilty of his blood.

Yet even with it being in the Bible, there are 11 states who officially disagree with God and have passed laws requiring that the residents of a house retreat, abandoning their home, rather than defending themselves or their property. These states are Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island.

Generally speaking, these “duty to retreat” laws don’t give any leeway for self-defense, even though their basic intent is to restrict the ability to defend the home, rather than defending yourself and your family. That minor difference ends up translating into a lack of right to defend yourself in your home, even if you are under attack.

Concealed Carry Laws

The final area we’re going to look at involves concealed carry laws. Over the last couple of decades, there has been a very real trend towards more and more states granting more and more liberty to their law-abiding citizens in their right to both carry concealed firearms and carry openly.

There are two actual legal principles that take part in this: that concealed carry and of constitutional carry.

The first laws that are important here are those that restrict or allow concealed carry. Not too many years ago, it was extremely hard to receive a concealed carry permit anywhere in the country, without the ability to demonstrate extremely good cause for needing it.

Store owners who made large cash deposits at night might be able to get them, but the average person who wanted the ability to defend themselves from criminals couldn’t.

This has been changing through the last couple of decades, with more and more states shifting from a “may-issue” policy to a “shall-issue” policy. The difference is that in shall-issue states, a license to carry concealed will be issued, as long as the person applying for it meets the requirements.

Those requirements vary from state to state but generally include a background check, no criminal history, not having been adjured as mentally incompetent, and being of sufficient age to be granted the license.

Related: 6 Best Guns To Have Around Your Homestead

May issue states also have a series of requirements to get a concealed carry permit, but that’s not all. Meeting those requirements only means that the appropriate department of the state’s government will consider issuing that permit. Whether or not they actually issue one is totally dependent on the officials making those decisions.

More often than not, they will decide that there is no reason to issue the permit. May issue states include: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island.

A couple of decades ago, the only state which had constitutional carry, the right to carry a firearm based upon the Second Amendment to the Constitution was Vermont, the only state to never restrict firearm ownership.

Changed in 2002, with Alaska joining its ranks. Since then, there has been an acceleration in the rate of states which have adopted some form of constitutional carry, especially since 2015. As of this writing, 25 of the states have some form of constitutional carry embodied in law.

What this means is that the 25 states which have not embodied constitutional carry into law are no longer the “norm” and are in fact restricting the ability of their citizens to defend themselves. Other states have legislation in the works, which will reduce the number of states without constitutional carry laws on the books even further.

Final Thoughts

You may have noticed that the same states keep showing up over and over again in those lists. That’s not surprising, as these are the three main areas in which those who don’t want us to have the ability to defend themselves try and restrict those rights.

Considering the violence that the nation has seen in the last couple of years, specifically mass shootings and demonstrations that turned into riots, it seems clear that we need that ability to defend ourselves. That’s a good reason to avoid living in those states if you can.

This article first appeared here.

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The post Worst States To Live In If You Have To Defend Your Property first appeared on Self Sufficient Projects.

This is fairly easy to do, all it takes is placing a raw egg in the bottom of the hole you dig or putting it in the bottom of your pot, on top of a thin layer of soil. Some people break the egg, but most don’t bother. Either way, the egg is going to decompose, returning nutrients back to the soil. Another option is to put an egg and a banana together in the hole, adding even more nutrients to the soil.

Any gardener will tell you that the soil is the most important part of any garden, and what makes the soil important is the nutrients that it holds. Plants leech the nutrients out of the soil through their roots, absorbing them and using them as the basic building blocks to form new cells. If the soil doesn’t have enough of the right sorts of nutrients, it stunts plant growth and reduces the amount of product that your garden can produce.

This is why gardeners spend so much time and money on fertilizing their gardens. But most commercial fertilizers provide only the three macronutrients of nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorous. Serious gardeners augment this by composting, as well as using other fertilizers, like fish emulsion, bone meal, and blood meal. These decompose to provide a much more complete diet for the plants.

What Do Eggs Provide?

So what about eggs? What do they provide? Adding eggs to your garden provides calcium, an important micronutrient. Calcium in humans and animals is important for bone formation. In plants, it is important for the formation of cell walls. Plants can’t grow without enough calcium in the soil.

But calcium is only found in the eggshells, not the inside of the eggs. The inside of the eggs will add other nutrients, but only a small amount. The big benefit comes from the shells.

Something similar happens with bananas. People add those to put potassium into the soil; and the potassium is found in the banana peel, not the fruit inside. You can accomplish just as much, by planting a banana peel, as you can a whole banana.

Actually, you can do much better chopping up the eggshells and banana peels, either with a blender or a food processor, adding them directly to the soil or to your compost pile.

Grinding them up helps them to decompose more rapidly, getting the nutrients into the soil and from there into the plants that much faster.

Related: Can You Plant a Grocery Store Cucumber?

Doing it this way, you get to eat the eggs and the bananas, giving the part you don’t eat to your garden. That’s a double win for you and helps convert the parts you can’t eat into usable food.

Since the nutrients from the eggshells and banana peels end up being used by the plants in your garden, at least some of them will end up in the fruit and vegetables that your garden produces.

The other advantage of doing it this way is that you don’t have eggs rotting in your garden. Rotten eggs don’t produce a very enjoyable fragrance. While that won’t hurt your plants any, it might hurt your nose when you are working in the garden.

It’s also going to attract raccoons and rodents to your garden, which will see those rotten eggs as a source of food, digging up your garden to eat them.

Another Use for Eggshells

There’s more that you can do with eggshells; use them to protect your plants. Crushed eggshells, not ground-up eggshells are a great protection for your plants, keeping slugs away from them.

All you need to do is crush dry eggshells with your fingers and put the small crushed pieces around the base of your plants.

Those sharp edges will work as a major deterrent to the slugs, which can get cut by them. It will probably do a pretty good job protecting your plants from caterpillars as well.

Lots of Other Additives

It’s simple; if you want a healthy garden, which provides you with a great harvest, you’re going to have to spend time on the soil. Eggshells are a great start for this, but there are a lot of other things you can do to improve the quality of your soil.

To start with, it’s always a great idea to be composting. You are not going to be eating everything that comes out of your garden; there will always be cuttings, scraps, weeds other scraps. In addition, you’ll have table scraps that aren’t used. All of these break down naturally, providing nutrients to put back into the soil. By composting, you’re actually doing what happens in nature, recycling those nutrients.

Compost can be added to your garden anytime, but the best time to add it is in the fall when you finish your harvest. That allows the nutrients the whole winter to work their way into the garden’s soil. Granted, the colder weather will slow the decomposition process, but the water from the melting snow will help the nutrients soak in.

Final Thoughts

The pH of the garden soil is important for growth as well. Some plants need slightly acidic soil, even though most require a neutral pH.  Adding ash from the fireplace (or wood-burning grille) is a great way to boost the pH. One of the best soil additives I’ve found for gardening is mycorrhizal fungi. These subterraneous fungi attach themselves to the roots of plants, forming a symbiotic relationship with the plant.

The fungi act as an extension to the plant’s roots, bringing nutrients to them while feeding off the roots of the plants. Adding this fungus to your garden can do amazing things to increase the yield you get from your plants.  It is also a great addition where roots are short and plants aren’t getting enough nutrients.

I had a burned-over area of lawn once, which wouldn’t grow back for two years until I added mycorrhizal fungi. Once the fungi took hold, the grass was growing green again, within two months.

This article first appeared on Ask A Prepper.

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Homeowners also have room to work with, even those with a small backyard. Apartment dwellers have to try and prepare, without that space.

So, what are you doing with all that space you have? Has it become part of your efforts towards self-sufficiency, perhaps in turning your home into a homestead; or is your backyard no different than any of your neighbors? Granted, we don’t want to be too obvious about what we’re doing, but there are ways of explaining away most projects we would undertake.

As a homeowner myself, I’ve enjoyed the opportunity to make use of the large backyard I have.

While I can’t come anywhere near being able to claim that I’ve turned it into a homestead, give me enough time and that might just happen. At least… I’ve got plans for the project which will make it that way.

In the meantime, here are some projects that I’ve done or am planning on doing. Perhaps you might like to do some of them yourself, and join me on the way to becoming more prepared.

Set up Rainwater Catchment

Perhaps one of the easiest prepper projects you can do on your property is to install rainwater catchment. If you already have gutters on your home, then all you need to do is build stands for rain barrels and redirect your downspouts into them. Depending on the size of your roof and how much rain you receive where you live, you could harvest enough rainwater to take care of all your survival water needs.

Of course, if you don’t already have gutters on your home, you’re going to have to add them. But that’s really not all that hard to do, especially if you have a one-story home. Your local home improvement center sells preformed sections of gutter, with splices to put them together. I’d highly recommend spending the extra money for the leaf catchers, to help keep your gutters free of dead leaves and the bacteria that will break them down.

One key in maximizing the effectiveness of your rainwater catchment system is to use multiple barrels in for each downspout, increasing your water retention capability. There are several ways of doing this, all of which involve plumbing the barrels together.

Start Gardening

If you don’t already have a vegetable garden and have enough land to grow one, why don’t you? Gardening is a great way to augment your grocery purchase, as well as prepare for a long-term disaster. Should we ever be faced with something that shuts down the grid or our supply chain in general, being able to grow your own food will be essential.

Two things about that: it takes time to learn how to garden effectively. There’s more to it than just scattering some seed and watering it every once in a while. You need to know how to get the most out of your garden and how to deal with problems that will arise.

The other thing is that you’re going to need a much bigger garden to survive, than what most people think. Forget about the idea of the four-foot garden, you want something more like the 1,200-foot garden. You’ve probably seen articles about people who grew their own food; in every case, they converted their entire backyard into a garden to do so.

Let’s get Some Fruit Trees in There

One thing that surprises me in the prepping community is how few people bother to plant fruit trees. We all talk about growing vegetables, but we don’t talk about growing fruit. Yet fruit trees require much less maintenance than a vegetable garden does, and once grown they provide a considerable amount of food.

I’ve got over a dozen fruit trees in my backyard, almost all of which we’ve planted since buying the home.

Between them, I get several wheelbarrows worth of fruit each year, saving me having to buy that fruit. While not all that much by the standards of fruit trees, as they grow larger, I’ll get even more.

You Should be Composting

If you’re gardening at all, then you should have a compost heap or bin as well. Having had a composting bin for a couple of years now, I’d recommend putting it on the back edge of your lot, far from anyone’s home. I started out with mine right next to my garden, for convenience. That was a big mistake.

Composting provides an ongoing source of natural fertilizer for your garden, helping increase the size of your harvests. It also gives you something to do with all those tables and kitchen scraps, besides throwing them in the trash.

Build a Chicken Coop

Vegetable gardens are great, but they don’t do much for providing animal protein. For that, you’re going to need some sort of animal. The question is… what can you raise where you live?

Many communities allow you to raise fowl, limiting you as to how many you can raise. With that being the case, it makes more sense to raise chickens for eggs, than to raise them to eat.

You’ll get more animal protein out of six layers giving you an average of four eggs per day than you will out of raising six fryers, which need to grow for a minimum of six weeks, before they reach a minimum size for cooking.

The other advantage of those layers is that they will produce eggs for a number of years. But they’ll need to be six months old, before they give you their first eggs. So you’ll want to start early, not waiting until the disaster strikes.

Dig a Pond and Raise Fish

Another good source of animal protein is fish. Many nutritionists will even tell you that it’s healthier to eat. By and large, fish are easier to grow than most animals, especially if you raise something like tilapia, which doesn’t require a whole lot of room.

Making a pond is actually much easier than you might imagine. The trick is to start out with a plastic pond liner, essentially a thick piece of plastic sheeting. That solves the whole problem of making your pond waterproof, simplifying the job considerably.

With that, all you have to do is dig the hole, put in the water circulating system, and install the liner, weighting it down around the edges. Your water circulating system will filter the water and aerate it, just like in an aquarium.

The other problem you’ll have to deal with is feeding the fish. While you can buy commercial food for them, an easier solution is to start a worm farm. Buy 10,000 worms and put them in a big plastic bin with plenty of compost to eat. Then all you’ve got to do is grab a handful, any time you need to feed your fish.

Add a Vehicle Gate in Your Fence

If your backyard fence doesn’t already have it, I’d highly recommend adding a vehicle gate beside your home. This is a simple project that you can complete in one day. While not a necessity in normal times, it will give you the ability to move your cars into the backyard in a time of crisis. If your garage is as full as mine is, that’s the only way you’re going to hide your cars from marauding gangs in a time of social unrest.

Plant a Hedge for Self-defense

As I was just referring to, your backyard probably has a fence around it. Most yards today do. Hopefully you’ve got a privacy fence, if not something better. Your neighbors don’t need an open window into what you’re doing. But if you’re like most people, your front yard doesn’t have a fence.

Related: Do you know why you should never put a tall fence around your house? (Video)

Although most people don’t like having a fence around their front yard, it’s a great way of increasing your home’s security. But not just any fence will do. It needs to be something that people can’t just jump over so that it controls how people gain access to your property. The idea isn’t so much to keep them out altogether but to have them come onto your property by controlled access. This allows you time to see them and to mount a defense, if necessary.

Few fences will do this, at least a few that aren’t so obvious as to make your home look like a protected government installation. However, a good hedge, grown from a plant that has thorns and with the branches interwoven, will ensure that nobody can get through in any way, except for your front gate. Grow it up to about four feet in height and three feet thick and you’ve got a great barrier.

Use Vines to Help Keep Your Home Cooler

We talk a lot about heating our homes, in the event of a grid-down situation, but you hardly hear anyone talk about keeping your home cool. That may not be important to people living in the northern part of the country, but for those who live in the south, cooling is important.

The shade is an important part of keeping cool, without using electricity. People who live in hot climates appreciate the value of shade. But your home itself really isn’t shade, as the sunlight striking it tends to warm it up inside. So what can you do?

If you happen to have shade trees, you’re fortunate, especially if they’re planted on the south side of your home. But it can take years to grow trees tall enough to use them for shade. Vines grow much faster and can be grown to help keep the sun from striking the walls of your home. While not a perfect solution, it can help.

The trick here is to build a trellis that’s set out away from the house far enough so that air can pass between the trellis and the home. A foot or so is usually enough. One way to do this is to anchor a pressure-treated 4”x 4” at ground level and use a heavy fishing line to weave a diagonal diamond pattern between there and the eaves of the home. This will provide an inexpensive trellis for vines to grow on, that’s not intrusive in its own right. Pick a type of vine that has twisting tendrils, as they will hold well to the fishing line.

Grab the Shovel and Build a Root Cellar

With all the food you’re going to be growing, you’re going to need a lot of storage space; preferably storage space that doesn’t require electricity. Our ancestors solved this problem long ago, by digging root cellars behind their homes. A root cellar is a belowground room, used primarily for storing root vegetables. They will usually hold a temperature of 55°F.

The best way to build a root cellar is to dig a big enough hole that you can make an actual room, whether from cement blocks or earthbags. You’ll need some sort of staircase to get down into it, as well as a pump to remove any water so your root cellar can’t flood.

If you don’t have the time or inclination to make such a structure, then you might want to consider burying an old refrigerator on its back, with the doors at ground level. That will work as a smaller root cellar, especially if you have it in the shade so that the sun doesn’t shine on it.

This article first appeared on Ask A Prepper.

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The post Survival DIY Projects You Can Start on Your Property Right Now first appeared on Self Sufficient Projects.

The year 2020 gone down in history as one of the most difficult years that our combined generations have lived through. We have yet to see what the final death toll from COVID-19 is going to be. But there’s another toll that will have to be tallied as well; that’s the effect that months of a shutdown are going to have on the national and global economy. Are we going to end up in a global depression?

But probably the most memorable thing that 2020 will be known for, more than even the pandemic, is as the year of the Great American Toilet Paper Shortage.

For some unknown reason, the panic associated with the COVID-19 pandemic has sparked a run on toilet paper, even though it is a respiratory disease and not a gastrointestinal one.

We may never know what has caused the Great American Toilet Paper Shortage; but we’re going to have to live with it.

That either means getting up at a ridiculous hour of the morning, in order to stand in line outside the grocery store, watching the sun rise and hoping that the store will have received some toilet paper overnight. If luck is with you, you’ll only have to do that once; but if not, you may have to do it several days in a row, in order to get your hands on some of those precious rolls.

That almost sounds a bit like a craps game; you pay your money and you take your chances. On the other hand, you can go with one of the other options out there. Some people are touting the idea of using cloth and leaves, in place of toilet paper. After all, we haven’t always had toilet paper to use and people had to use something.

Too bad Sears isn’t still putting out their “big book” like they did for so many years.

Those adorned many an outhouse, alongside a burlap sack of corn cobs, once the new catalog came out. But we can’t count on Sears for that one anymore. If we want paper for our bums and can’t find it elsewhere, we’ll just have to make our own.

Actually, our own will probably be a whole lot better than the Sears catalogue anyway… and who wants to use a corn cob? Sounds scratchy!

If you want to just watch how it is done, here is a clip of it:

Full text description and extra things to know below.

What’s it Going to Take?

If you’re someone who collects newspapers for recycling, you’re in great shape. You already have the number one ingredient you need, so that you can make your own toilet paper. While you can use other kinds of paper to make your TP, newsprint will break down easier and produce a softer paper.

Besides newspapers, you’re going to need:

• More newspapers
• Water
• Bucket
• Paper shredder
• Electric mixer
• Plastic storage bin
• Frame to fit in the storage bin
• Screen material
• Staple gun
• Putty knife
• Something to cut your TP with
• Something to roll your TP on

Making Your Own Toilet Paper

The first thing we need to do, in order to turn that newspaper into toilet paper, is to break the newspaper down. This can be easily done with water, especially if you give that water a little mechanical help.

•  Shred the newspaper with a paper shredder. The smaller your paper shredder shreds the paper, the better. If you don’t have a paper shredder, you can cut or tear the newspaper into strips; but it might need to soak in water longer.

• Place your shredded newspaper in the bucket and cover it with water. You only need enough water to barely cover the shredded newspaper. Any more is a waste.
• Allow the newspaper to sit in the water for 24 hours.
• Using an electric mixer, chop up the wet newspaper, making it into pulp.

While your newspaper is soaking, it’s a good time to make your screen frame. It needs to be as big as possible, but still sit in the bottom of your plastic storage bin. I used 1”x 2” pine for this, but you can use wider boards if you want to. There are a number of different ways you can assemble this frame, but the easiest way is to make butt joints in the corners and pin them with dowels, as I show in the video.

The reason I chose to dowel the corners of the frame was that glue doesn’t stick well to end grain.

This frame is going to sit in water and I don’t want the joint to loosen up. Screws don’t work well into end grain either, although nails do. So you could choose to nail it, but it’s just as easy to use dowel pins.

To dowel a joint of this type, first clamp the two parts making the corner of the frame, so that they are positioned properly, with the edges flush.

Then drill two holes of the appropriate size for the dowel being used. I used 3/8” dowels, so I drilled my holes with a 23/64” drill bit, drilling through the lap board, into the end grain of the other board. I made sure to drill the holes deeper than the length of the dowels.

With the holes drilled, I spread glue into the splines cut into the sides of the dowel pins with my finger. I then placed them in the holes and drove them flush with a wood mallet. Once all the corners were properly pinned together, I set the frame aside to dry.

Finally, staple screening material onto one side of the frame, working from the center outwards.

It doesn’t need to be as tight as what you would do for a window, but it should be flat and smooth. If your staples don’t go all the way in, hammer them flush with the top of the wood, so that they will grip the screening properly.

Now that your newspaper pulp and your frame are ready, it’s time to make the toilet paper.

• Place your frame into the bin and fill it with water. Ideally, the water should come to just below the top of the frame.
• Scoop up a portion of the newspaper pulp, roughly equal to two cups (the quantity isn’t exact, as your bin might be a different size than mine) and put it in the water, mixing it with the water and spreading it out to fill the entire area.

• Slowly lift the frame out of the water, looking to see, as the water drains out, that the shredded newspaper pulp is evenly spread across the entire are of the screening.
• Allow as much water as possible to drain out of the newspaper pulp.

Now we need to dry the pulp, allowing it to bond back together and turn into paper.

• Set up an ironing board and cover it with a piece of absorbent cloth. An old towel will work. Place the frame, screen side down, on top of this cloth.

• Place another absorbent, but smooth cloth on top of the newspaper pulp inside the frame. An old T-shirt will work.
• Using a clothes iron, set for ironing cotton, iron the cloth, heating the newspaper pulp and drawing the moisture out of it. You’re trying to do two things here; one is to draw the moisture out, and the other is to flatten the surface of the paper. If you don’t iron it, you’re going to end up with some rather scratchy paper.
• Place the frame in the sun to finish drying. You could try drying it all the way with the iron, but that will take a long time.

With the paper dry, we’re ready to make it usable in the bathroom.

• Take a wide putty knife, preferably a plastic one, and use it to break your sheet of toilet paper free of the frame around the edges. Be careful not to cut through the screen, so that you can reuse it.

• Flip the frame over so that the screen side is up and push down gently on the screen, all around the edges. This should break the paper free from the screen. Continue through the middle of the paper as well.
• Flip the frame back over, paper side up and work one corner of your paper free, then pull up the rest, taking care not to tear it.

• Measure the paper, marking it to the width of a toilet paper roll. If you don’ t have any toilet paper rolls to put your homemade TP on, you can cut paper towel or wrapping paper rolls down to four-inch segments.
• Roll the paper onto the cardboard tube, overlapping pieces over each other.

Your finished toilet paper is going to be thicker than store-bought, even though it is only one single ply.

That means you can use less of it, which I’d recommend, considering that it’s a bit harder to make than just going to the store and buying a four-pack of Charmin. But then, if you could do that, you wouldn’t need to make your own.

This article first appeared on AskAPrepper.

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That’s why we need soap. Yes, something as simple as soap is actually important to our survival. It’s one of the biggest and best defenses we have against disease. Soap not only helps us to clean dirt and germs off of our hands, but it is a fairly good antibacterial as well.

But what do you do when there’s no soap to be found? One option is to use the root of the yucca plant.

Yucca grows throughout the Midwest and Southwest, from Texas up to Alberta, Canada, although it is found mostly in warmer climates. This amazing plant is useful for a lot of things, with the roots being edible. The root of the plant is a tuber, like a potato; with the liquid pressed out of it is also usable as soap and shampoo.

Related: How to Properly Harvest Seeds

Digging Up The Yucca

Yucca are fairly easy to dig up, as the tuber is the only real root of any size. The rest of the roots are hair size and break easily. But the tuber itself can go quite deep, especially on a large plant like the one shown above. If you’re going to dig up a yucca, I’d recommend using a smaller plant, like the one I’m digging up below.

Before going any farther, I need to mention that it is not legal to dig up yucca in all places. I was able to dig this plant up, because it was on private property and the owner wanted to get rid of it.

The plant shown in this photo was found in the wild and would have been illegal for me to harvest. So before you do this, make sure you’re doing it someplace where it is legal; unless, of course, you’re in a survival situation.

As I’m doing this for survival purposes, I decided to try digging it up with a machete, rather than a shovel, under the assumption that I might not have a full-sized shovel available to me.

I wouldn’t want to try and dig up a yucca with the small folding shovel I have in my bug out bag, because the ends of the leaves are all thorns. Digging it up with that small a shovel would probably see my hands scratched up pretty badly.

As you can see in the photo, I’m holding the leaves aside, while I dig with my machete. What I did was insert my arm under the leaves, and then lift it up, pushing the stiff leaves up with my arm. I was then able to turn my hand around and grasp them, getting them out of my way.

Once the leaves are out of the way, it’s a simple matter to stab the machete into the ground, all around the root. I made a circle about eight inches in diameter, which was enough. Then, grasping the plant’s stalk, near the root, I simply wiggled it back and forth, breaking the root free and was able to lift the plant out of the ground.

The leaves of the yucca can be used for other things, like making some pretty good sandals; but for now, all we need is the root, so I cut it off at ground level, with one swipe of my machete. Once cleaned, the root looks like this.

Cutting Up The Root

As you can see in the picture above, the root is covered by a thick skin or husk. We’re going to need to cut that off, much like cutting the outside off of a pineapple. It is hard, but not all that difficult to cut. In order to make it easier, I cut the root in half, allowing me to put the flat, cut end on my cutting board. The skin of the root cuts off fairly easy, if you have a good, sharp knife. I had no problem, but I’m using a very high quality knife with a really sharp edge. Notice the red around the edges of the pieces in the foreground. This all needs to be cut off, as well as the dark lines you can see in the piece I’m cutting.

The peeled root is then sliced and diced. I did about ½” cubes. You can do smaller, but I wouldn’t recommend any larger. The ½” cubes worked well for my needs.These cubes of yucca root then need to be broken down. Even though I’m working in my kitchen at this point, I didn’t use a food processor or blender for this. We’re doing this for survival soap and I doubt that any of us keep a food processor in our bug out bags or survival kits. We need something that’s more on the order of what we’d use in such a situation.

I used a Mexican molcajete, which is a traditional mortar and pestile. Rather than being made out of ceramic, they are usually made out of lava rock, which is very porous. Mine is made out of granite, which isn’t as porous, making it grind less, but is much easier to clean. Traditionally, the Mexicans use these for making salsa and guacamole.The root is hard enough that I found it necessary to beat it with the pestile, breaking it down, before grinding it. You want to get it as fine as you can, ending up with a fibrous mush. Actually, the finer you grind it, the more usable soap you’ll get out of it.

The molcajete isn’t the only way you can grind up the yucca root for use. The same thing can be done with the type of grinding stone that the Indians used for grinding corn. However, I don’t happen to have one of those and it would have been expensive to buy. In the wild, I would look for a flat stone I could use to grind on, with a rounded rock out of a river or stream as my pestile.

Now The Soap

With the root thoroughly ground, you’re ready to extract the soap. All that’s needed it to take the ground root in your hands and squeeze it. The liquid that comes out is usable as soap or shampoo.

If you need to really scrub something, such as a greasy pan, you can use the ground up root as soap. In this case, the fiber in the root will act as a scouring pad, helping you to clean the surface.

But you’ll need to use a fair amount of pressure with it, so as to press the soap out of the fiber as you go.

Even after we’ve gotten a lot of liquid out of the ground root, it is still useful for cleaning. We can dry the root in the sun and save it.

Then, when we need more soap, we can reconstitute it with water, which will draw more of the chemicals we need out of the ground up root, giving us more soap.

It is best, when doing this, to not have pressed out all of the liquid from the ground root, as you will get better soap from it the next time around, if there is still some liquid in it when it is dried.

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The post If You Have This Plant in Your Backyard, You Will Never Run Out of Soap first appeared on Self Sufficient Projects.

Granted, some dogs love the outdoors and their coats help keep them warm when the weather starts getting chilly. Even so, sometimes the temperature drops faster than we expect, leaving our furry friends and guardians stranded and cold. It would be nice for them to have someplace to go into, just to keep warm.

How To Build a DIY Winter Doghouse

There are a few basic things to do, as part of making a good DIY winter doghouse that will keep your friend warm, those times when they have to be outdoors and need a safe refuge.

• Insulate it – Most doghouses are simple wood walls, without any insulation. Even adding one inch of Styrofoam insulation can do wonders in keeping your dog warm. We’re going to add two layers of ¾” thick insulation, giving a total R-value of 7.5. That’s not as good as a house, but a whole lot better than windows and doors.
• Put in an insulated floor – Getting ‘Fido’ up off the ground can make a huge difference, as the ground is often colder than the ambient air. Since you’re going to put in a floor anyway, why not insulate that floor?
• Make two rooms – This is the one hardly anyone thinks about. If you make a two-room doghouse, with an entry room and a bedroom, arranged so that the doorway to the bedroom is 90 degrees from the entry door, your dog will be a whole lot warmer. Any wind coming in the front door won’t be able to just go directly into their sleeping room.
• Make a hinged roof – When your pet is in their home, comfy and warm, they might not be all that willing to come out. Making the roof hinged, so that you can lift it up, makes it possible for you to get to your dog, even if they’re not in a hurry to come out. Of course, if that doghouse is kept on the back porch, instead of out in the yard, you can use a flat roof, which is a whole lot easier to hinge.

The Start (The Foundation)

Start building your dog’s house by constructing a sturdy frame. You’ll add the siding and insulation later. Decide how big to make it based on your dog’s size.

Measure your dog’s length and standing height to determine the dimensions. Make the bedroom roughly square, with each wall as long as your dog is lying down. Remember to account for the ½” thick OSB (oriented strand board) layer you’ll add to the inside walls. Build the framework slightly larger to fit this layer. Ensure the doghouse is at least four inches taller than the doorway for enough headroom.

Design the entry room like a hallway—just wide enough for your dog to enter comfortably. If it’s too narrow, your dog might hesitate to use it. Making the entry room about half the width of the bedroom usually works well.

To make the frame, use 2”x 2” dimensional lumber. The basic idea is a box, with a patrician to divide it into the two rooms. So start out by making the outline of the floor, using the dimension you measured for your door laying down, plus one inch, for the bedroom, and the width you need for the door for the other room. You’ll actually need three identical pieces, one for the bottom, one for the top, and one for the lid.

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Use metal angle brackets on the inside corners to easily connect the pieces. As shown in the photo, this method works better than gluing and nailing because end grain doesn’t hold glue well. Joints with end grain often fail when glued or nailed.

Avoid using screws, as their threads tear the wood grain, which can weaken the joint over time. Instead, choose inexpensive metal angle brackets for strong, durable connections. These brackets help your pet’s house last longer.

After assembling the top and bottom, cut six identical 2”x 2” pieces for the vertical frame. Place these pieces at the four corners and at both ends of the dividing wall. Frame the doorway in the dividing wall by adding one more vertical piece and a horizontal beam across the top of the door frame. As shown in the picture, leave several inches of space above the doorway.

The Flooring And Insulation For Winter

Install the flooring and insulation once the frame is ready. Cut a piece of OSB large enough to cover the entire bottom of the frame, reaching all the edges. Secure it to the bottom using glue and nails or screws. Align the corners carefully, as this piece will keep the DIY winter doghouse square.

Flip the doghouse over, so it rests on the bottom piece. Cut fiberglass batts or Styrofoam sheets to fit snugly inside the floor. Place the insulation, then cover it with another layer of OSB. Notch the top OSB layer to fit between the vertical structural elements.

The Walls Of The Winter Doghouse

With the floor in place, the interior walls can be added. Notice in the photo below, that the piece of OSB being used for the wall is notched to go around the horizontal structural elements. It only goes halfway across the vertical elements, leaving wood for the other panel to attach to as well.

Finish covering the interior of the doghouse by attaching OSB to all the walls. Notice in the picture below a 2”x 2” block nailed above the flooring on the left side (the wall the dog leans against).

Add these blocks where needed. In this case, the block was necessary because the floor covered the frame element, leaving no place to secure the interior wall. Install similar blocks around the base, except for the doorway area.

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Notice in the photo that only the end piece (next to the dog) connects to the vertical corner brace. The wall the dog leans against does not attach, but this isn’t an issue.

Attach the OSB panel at the top and bottom. The DIY winter doghouse doesn’t require the full structural strength of a home. Your dog won’t push this wall down or hang anything heavy on it. As long as the board stays stable, it works just fine.

With the interior walls in place, it’s time to install the insulation and put the siding on the house. The same fiberglass batts or Styrofoam sheets that were used on the floor can be used on the exterior walls. Glue or staple them in place, so that they are not a problem as the siding is installed.

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You have several options for exterior siding. In this example, we used leftover beaded planking from another project. This material would normally be an expensive choice for a winter doghouse, but it worked perfectly as surplus.

For a more budget-friendly option, consider T-111 siding. It’s one of the least expensive siding materials available and works well for this purpose.

Finish the doghouse by building the top. Use the third frame for this, following the same process as the rest of the DIY winter doghouse. Start by attaching a piece of OSB to the inside and squaring up the frame. Ensure it aligns properly with the doghouse before fastening everything securely. Add the insulation next, and then attach the exterior siding to complete the top.

Attach the top to the doghouse with hinges. This lets you lift it to access the inside or clean the doghouse easily. For convenience, add a handle to the front to lift the lid more easily. While we skipped this step, you could install a prop rod to hold the lid open. However, make sure it’s stable since a falling rod could scare the dog.

Related: What The Pioneers Did To Survive Harsh Winters

DIY Winter Doghouse – Final Thoughts

Your finished DIY winter doghouse is best sitting in the corner of the patio, where it has some protection from the weather. That will help keep it from getting cold inside, as well as protect the wood from damage.

A DIY winter doghouse is essential, even for dogs that live indoors. Building one provides a warm, safe space for your dog when they’re outside. Make it insulated to shield them from the cold. This ensures your furry friend stays comfortable while waiting for you. When built correctly, the dog’s body heat will naturally warm the interior, creating a cozy shelter.

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The post Easy DIY Winter Doghouse first appeared on Self Sufficient Projects.