How To Store Seeds for years, survival and to save money?

   I was out in the garden bright and early this morning, planting more radishes, spinach and Blue Lake Bush beans. As I was planting, I was thinking of the show, “Revolution”, it’s a show about all power going out all over the world and different groups trying to maneuver to take control of the United States. Now hold on, I wasn't thinking about taking over the USA, I was thinking about how they planted their gardens to survive. How you could keep seeds ready at hand for years to come or even generations? I have written before about the different types of seeds, Heirlooms, Hybrids, GMO and how to collect them but I couldn't recall if I had written on How to Store seeds for years to come, for emergency gardening or just to keep those seeds where your plants did so well?

   Storing survival garden seeds... along with growing an emergency garden is very important for emergency preparedness or a food shortage crisis and also will save you lots of money in the long run! As the value of money decreases, the value of food and vegetable seeds will increase. Vegetable seeds are a major food-source, and should be considered one of the most valuable commodities of all for emergency and survival preparedness, as well!

   The conditions you will need for properly storing survival garden seeds are just the opposite of those required for good germination. Good germination occurs when water and oxygen are present at a favorable temperature. Best seed storage results are obtained when seeds are kept dry (below 8 percent moisture - 4 percent is optimal) and the temperature is kept low (40 degrees or below).

Maintaining A Healthy Rain Barrel

  It doesn't matter if you collect rain water for your own consumption or to water your garden, you still need to do a yearly maintenance to them. Why? Its to keep them in tip top shape and it keep's the water in them safe for you and your plants.You wouldn't believe the stuff that gets inside of them, especially when they aren't in much use (in the off season)! So what are the thing's you should do to your rain barrels or other rain collection systems? (Click her to learn how to make a Rain Barrel)  Also You may like Got Rain Barrel Questions?
  Take a good look at them before you even drain them and remove them from the stand you have them on. As you can see by from my pictures, the winter freezing of the ground made mine a little unlevel and some of  my connections come apart. So I will have to fix that as well!

See how the became unlevel

Check All The Hardware:
  You will want to totally drain your barrel before you get started. Then Check all your valves, connection, screens that you may have at the enter point and the overall condition of the barrel or container, replace anything that needs replaced. Look inside it, I am sure you will see lots of yucky stuff, maybe even algae but that's okay we are gonna take care of all of this shortly and even have some preventative maintenance. At this point just spray out with you garden hose as much as you can.

Clean The Inside:
  If you need to scrub the interior of the barrel a long handled brush will work well. Using a mixture of  light bleach and water solution; scrub the interior of the barrel’s walls and bottom with the brush. Then rinse your barrel again and let dry. This is something that you may not have to do if you have a constant flow of water going through your barrels. But if you forgot to drain all the water out for the winter, Yuck!


Tip: Paint your rain barrels a dark color to prevent the sunlight from directly hitting your water and promoting algae growth.

Purifying The Water For Drinking and To Maintain:
  You can add a little household bleach to your water to keep it maintained through out the year. A little won't hurt you plants either. I would put a little less in the water if you arn't gonna drink out of it and it will still keep the water cleaner!
   According to the Red Cross, “The only agent used to purify water should be household liquid bleach. Add 16 drops of bleach per gallon of water if the water is cloudy (with an eye dropper), stir and let stand for 30 minutes. (If it’s clear, only add 8 drops.)  If the water does not have a slight bleach odor [after 30 minutes], repeat the dosage and let stand another 15 minutes.”  Use household bleach (5.25% sodium hypochlorite as its only active ingredient) and yes this is for drinking!
 

How much bleach to use for purifying water for drinking (according to the Red Cross):

amount of water	clear water	cloudy water
1 quart	2 drops	4 drops
1 gallon	8 drops	16 drops
5 gallons	1/2 teaspoon	1 teaspoon
55 gallons	5 1/2 teaspoons	11 teaspoons

After I built a foundation out of railroad ties.

 Revelation 21:1"And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb."

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