ZOMBIES! No, really

I've had cockroach before-and junebug and worm and grasshopper and lots of other creepy crawlies. I think I could make green grasshoppers a staple if I had to. They got the crunchy watery consistency of lettuce. To be honest the state I live in has the least amount of people per square mile of public land, especially farther north. Even living in the largest city I get a sort of remote feeling that you won't get outside of this part of the west. I can find good game without much of a problem. Not to mention the millions of open range cattle and endless potato and corn farms...
 
I live on the edge of a large rural community 15 miles away from the city. Were right next to the interstate, so in the event of an emergency the roads would be jammed. My plan is to bug in at first. A Chainsaw would make short work of the stairs denying access to the second floor. If need be the .308s will be used from the upstairs windows for long distance shots. I was thinking at first the DSA SA58 would be best suited for this role. But after considering the accuracy of my PTR 91C, the DSA will remain a backup along with the iron sights of the Springfield M1A. That reminds me the Rem 700 LTR needs some glass. To dispatch any threats quietly a Ruger 10/22 with the aid of a lawn mower muffler will not attract attention. Another quiet option would be the use of Aguila .22 Super Colibri Ammo. At only 590fps its subsonic and as loud as a pellet gun. Once the initial panic has slowed down I'll quickly load my camping gear and weapons in the Jeep. If I cannot maneuver around obstacles in the road such as abandoned cars or road blocks the 4x4 will come in handy. My destination is Madera Canyon, there are three natural springs for water so thats covered. For food there are mule deer, higher elevations hold whitetails, cottontails, doves, quail, and plenty of wild edibles. The trek is approximately 30 miles, but in the confined spaces of a Jeep Wrangler the .308 long guns may not cut it. Of course I'll have the reliable S&W 65 on my hip but I am not a great shot with a pistol. To make up for my poor pistol skills a "16 AR with a Magpul CTR collapsible stock will be right next to me. I may decide on a Khyber Pass AK or a simple under folder since they are a bit shorter. Well...off to the range to practice head shots with my pistol.
 
I do have a buddy who owns a fish farm that is about 40 minutes away from the city, in a bit of a strange area regarding - nobody seems to know it is there. He has three acres of pond stocked with yellow perch, bluegill and one large pond with rainbows plus another 15 acres of land much of it wooded. I always joke that when the SHTF, we're coming to roost at his place. In a sense, he might need the tradeoff to defend his resources, the ponds and acreage could provide sustenance for a while but that could be really extended by stocking up on storage grains like rice allowing you to conserve the protein and draw it out over time.

The other thing I like about the fish is that it doesn't draw visible attention like cattle wood. You can't hide 100 head of cattle. I might be hard to even hide chickens if they are free range - albeit chickens are probably the most efficient at producing meat from what can be scrounged on okay land. The fish - well they are normally hidden. Most people wouldn't really recognize those ponds for what they are.

For myself - the 'gone camping' wouldn't work because the decision to go camping is really a decision to abandon my home. Once I left it to the kaos, I'd have to travel far to get to wilderness and I don't think I can legitimately beat the rush unless I really preempted the crisis. So I suppose I posted my response from this morning more as a self reflection. I would leave my home, but I would head for less dense areas that I can establish security at - either the buddy at the fish farm or my fathers 6 acres lot.
 
kgd said:
I do have a buddy who owns a fish farm that is about 40 minutes away from the city, in a bit of a strange area regarding - nobody seems to know it is there. He has three acres of pond stocked with yellow perch, bluegill and one large pond with rainbows plus another 15 acres of land much of it wooded. I always joke that when the SHTF, we're coming to roost at his place. In a sense, he might need the tradeoff to defend his resources, the ponds and acreage could provide sustenance for a while but that could be really extended by stocking up on storage grains like rice allowing you to conserve the protein and draw it out over time.
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This is the sort of thing that makes a lot of sense to talk about. Nothing deeply serious, but community always wins out over going it alone. A small 5x5x5 blockhouse mostly buried in dirt, made out of cinderblock, with a REALLY strong and tightly weatherstripped door and some brush in front of it would hold a lot of grains and such. Just a cellar, right?
 
I think alot of it depends on if the zombies are infected with a virus and if you get bit, you turn into one ? I read 2 books ( dead rising & city of the dead by brian keene ). In the books, spirits from another dimension opened by scientists take control of the dead bodies. There was no virus, if you were bit by zombies, you died because you bled to death. And you killed a zombie by just dismembering it, but then that spirit went into another person OR anaimal. Definately a different take on zombiefication. I liked the books alot and makes you wonder what you would do ??? The virus thing wold be scary because if you get so much as a scratch or even rub your eyes, your going to be a zombie soon.
 
koyote said:
This is the sort of thing that makes a lot of sense to talk about. Nothing deeply serious, but community always wins out over going it alone. A small 5x5x5 blockhouse mostly buried in dirt, made out of cinderblock, with a REALLY strong and tightly weatherstripped door and some brush in front of it would hold a lot of grains and such. Just a cellar, right?
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Man cannot live on fish and rabbits alone-unless you suck out their eyes and brains. You'll get protein poisoning. The meat is too lean to make it your main diet, you need other sources of fat. IE eyes and brains. Another thing to think about.
 
nyefmaker said:
I think alot of it depends on if the zombies are infected with a virus and if you get bit, you turn into one ? I read 2 books ( dead rising & city of the dead by brian keene ). In the books, spirits from another dimension opened by scientists take control of the dead bodies. There was no virus, if you were bit by zombies, you died because you bled to death. And you killed a zombie by just dismembering it, but then that spirit went into another person OR anaimal. Definately a different take on zombiefication. I liked the books alot and makes you wonder what you would do ??? The virus thing wold be scary because if you get so much as a scratch or even rub your eyes, your going to be a zombie soon.
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good books:thumbup: I heard they are thinking about turning these books into movies. that would be awesome imo
 
I just finished reading the paper posted by Mentor. Actually it is a great little modelling article even if written in tongue and cheek fashion about zombies. A real testament to the power of mathematical models and what they can be used for in outcome simulation modelling. Even though they are ultimately flawed in the assumptions of the interactive effects i.e. linear/non-linear and stochastic outcomes, they give a basic conceptual framework on how to evaluate complex problems that supersede the types computations or guesses one can put through in your own head.

The conclusions are really interesting. You need to destroy the zombies quickly. Societies chief vulnerability is its own population size. Every living being is a potential zombie after infection. The success of humans, i.e. outmanning them, does not pose a long term advantage against the zombie nation because our growth is mirrored by their growth potential.

The chief variable being that the dead can come back to life necessitates complete eradication of all zombies to exact extinction. Yet this is only a temporary solution, as our own mortality provides the seed for new zombies. That means special care has to be taken to prevent that seed from re-occurring. In essence, the only fail safe way to drive zombies to extinction is to kill all humans. The control of our own dead can maintain a temporary dominance of humans - but it only requires a single mistake, an unobserved death or accident to initiate a new outbreak. Is it feasible to maintain a society where every future death must occur under a state of observation and control? Talk about generating the new nanny state.

Its funny, I never gave the zombie thing too much though - other than violent fantasy, until digesting the model and its predictions as presented in this cute little piece of academic literature. Its bloody well hopeless! The intriguing surprise value from the model outcome is that all the 'survival lone gunner' wannabes out there, if successful, would be forced to live in a society far more constrained in social/political rules than the one we enjoy today. How is that for irony!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Great post Mentor - I liked that paper. I'm going to use it in one of my classes!
 
zombies dont scare me

people in uniform mindlessly carrying out their orders do tho

Im a coward , Im ready to run and hide from the might of the nations law enforcement and military , its proved to be a effective survival tactic in the past for my people , the ones who stood to fight against it didnt last long .
 
crossada said:
good books:thumbup: I heard they are thinking about turning these books into movies. that would be awesome imo
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Awsome Books, If they follow the books closely, this could be the best zombie movie ever. It would be cool if sci-fi channel could do it and even make it a mini series. The books are too long and in depth to make it a 2 hour movie.
 
Does The Zombie Virus Have To Infect Everyone ???

hooter-girls-zombies-cheerleader.jpg
 
if the zombies etc come, I'm going to grab my kabar Khukuri, put on my best Italian suit paired up with combat boots, light a cigar, grab a bottle of 50 year scotch, crank up the amplifier and crank out Cradle OF Filth and start beheading things.
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YES! Damnit thats exactly the correct response, keep it classy.
 
Survival horror?

All you need is for 2 bad things to happen at the same time anywhere in the USA.

Since I live in CA, the easy scenario to discuss is a major earthquake that destroys power, transportation and communication. Something bad like that can take 1-3 months before FEMA & remaining State agencies can organize on a large enough scale to cover the entire State. Since CA is such a large place and has huge population centers, there will be a lot of starving city-dwellers fighting for scraps & meds before organized help can arrive in any scale.

Add to this, something like the Swine Flu, if it mutates, it can become much more deadly and communicable, particularly if humans are forced to congregate in tent cities and share common water & latrine facilities.

Infection, sickness, hunger and death, that is your zombie scenario.
 
CWL said:
Survival horror?

All you need is for 2 bad things to happen at the same time anywhere in the USA.

Since I live in CA, the easy scenario to discuss is a major earthquake that destroys power, transportation and communication. Something bad like that can take 1-3 months before FEMA & remaining State agencies can organize on a large enough scale to cover the entire State. Since CA is such a large place and has huge population centers, there will be a lot of starving city-dwellers fighting for scraps & meds before organized help can arrive in any scale.

Add to this, something like the Swine Flu, if it mutates, it can become much more deadly and communicable, particularly if humans are forced to congregate in tent cities and share common water & latrine facilities.

Infection, sickness, hunger and death, that is your zombie scenario.
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Unfortunately, CWL is right. It really wouldn't take much here in California (I'm in San Diego) to bring civilization to its knees, at least for awhile. What's awhile? That's anybody's guess: it would depend on what all occurs, and how widespread it is. I talked to someone at a barbecue who is an officer for the local power company. We were kicking around the scenario of what would happen if San Diego dropped off the grid for some reason: it was more than a little frightening. Then we discussed what would happen if the outage were more widespread, say several adjoining states: that scenario is really frightening. According to this person everything, including transportation and communications would shut down, and we could forget any government assistance for quite awhile. I don't know that the hordes wandering the streets would be zombies, but it would certainly be just as bad. Throw in sickness and disease, as CWL pointed out, and you're looking at a truly horrifying situation — probably worse than Katrina.
 
That's why I live in Idaho, everybody is so into outdoor sports they have the knowhow and supplies to keep on keeping on for things like power outages.
 
PayetteRucker said:
That's why I live in Idaho, everybody is so into outdoor sports they have the knowhow and supplies to keep on keeping on for things like power outages.
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That's wonderful ... for those who live in such a place. For those who happen to live in high-density urban areas (millions of people), things are not so simple. Everyone should have a stockpile of food, water, etc., to keep them going for awhile, but not everyone does. The first few days probably wouldn't be too bad. After that, who knows? It would depend on the nature of the disaster, and how long it goes on. Suddenly there are literally millions of people competing for almost no food or resources, and things would turn ugly very quickly. There would be no food available but, more importantly, there'd be no water. Here in San Diego, all our water is imported. I seriously doubt that we have more than a one week supply (if that) in the reservoirs. Even if the reservoirs did hold more, without electricity to pump it, it won't get to the populace. Truck it in? Not doable. The roads would be shut down. One could always make their way to a remote wilderness location, I suppose, in search of food and water, but they're going to have to do it on foot because, once again, the roads are closed. Imagine hundreds of thousands of people trying to walk out of a major metropolitan area: can you say disaster?

It's nice if you happen to live in an area like you're talking about but, as I said, not all of us do.
 
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