Product Information

From the Manufacture

The Bega Factory began production in 1900.  Demand grew for the rich, creamy products made in the traditional way.  Bega Cheese has been a dominant brand in the Australian market for over 30 years in both processed and natural cheddar cheese products, regularly selling at the rate of over 1 million packs of cheese per day across all brands and customers, from its two manufacturing sites at Bega NSW and Strathmerton in Victoria.

Source Article from http://getreadyportland.com/2011/12/31/bega-canned-cheese/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bega-canned-cheese

Added on Dec 31, 2011 in Alpine Aire Foods, By Brand, Food, Gluten Free, Meat

Lean Beef, Diced, Cooked, Freeze-dried – 1 lb. 0 oz.

Product Information

Lean Beef, Diced, Cooked, Freeze-dried – 1 lb. 0 oz.

Source Article from http://getreadyportland.com/2011/12/31/beef-diced-cooked-freeze-dried-gf/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=beef-diced-cooked-freeze-dried-gf

Source Article from http://getreadyportland.com/2011/12/31/camp-cooking-a-practical-handbook/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=camp-cooking-a-practical-handbook

Source Article from http://getreadyportland.com/2011/12/31/happy-prepper-new-year/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=happy-prepper-new-year

Product Information

 

3 Person Kit ($84.95)

Source Article from http://getreadyportland.com/2011/12/31/basic-starter-emergency-supply-packs/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=basic-starter-emergency-supply-packs

I was attending a Xmas party and during a conversation, I asked a woman that expressed her distain for BO, about the NDAA and Fast and Furious. She and her husband along with 6 others never even heard about the National Defense Authorization Act or FF. I briefly described what these were about. They were astonished and asked what could they do. I got their emails and said that I would forward materials that would keep them informed.

I am now compiling all email addresses from the past 4 years of emails I have received from folks that have forwarded and forwarded info, jokes etc to their friends and me.

Some of the info that will be contained will include:
The BO Deception HQ Full length version – over 9,689,335 views.
See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAaQNACwaLw

Concerning BO’s rule of law, even Rachel Maddow gets into it with BO talking about prolonged detention, preventive incarceration and legal regime. The following video is an interesting liberal newscast that not only propagandizes the “illegal Bush legacy” but the potential anti-constitutional plan of BO who may want “prolonged detention” of personnel for preventive measures. This BO speech is exactly the preparatory brainwashing that AH used to justify his future legal actions that enslaved Germany. I am all for stopping terrorists. What scares me is BO who creates a “legal regime” to construct a detention network outside of the legal system. If AH wasn’t a lesson in history, the speech would be sloughed off as rhetoric. But with AH’s process of installing totalitarianism as a comparison, BO IS laying the psychological groundwork for his overthrow of the country. Wild theory, you say? Remember his “private army”? Remember the FEMA camps? Connect the dots. Private army – detention law – detention camps – installation of tyranny. Better that we are safe than sorry. Impeach now.
See: http://conservativebyte.com/2011/12/stunning-video-national-guard-ad-for-fema-resettlementprison-camp-positions/

BO and EH Have Subverted American Freedoms.
See: http://www.westernjournalism.com/author/caleb/

When it hits the fan, don’t say we didn’t warn you.
Montanans Organize to Remove Senators Who Voted For Traitorous Detainment Bill
See: http://www.shtfplan.com/

BO to fill Gitmo with Americans as NDAA law passes

See: http://www.naturalnews.com/034414_NDAA_military_detention_Bill_of_Rights.html#ixzz1hlTF0BNq

Excerpts from BO’s Christmas gift to Americans: Complete nullification of the Bill of Rights
Under the NDAA:

• You may be arrested and indefinitely detained merely for being “suspected” of any involvement whatsoever with “terrorism” — a term that can be twisted to mean almost anything, including protesting against animal testing laboratories or chaining yourself to a tree as an environmental protester.
• You no longer have a right to legal representation.

• You can be held for life without ever being charged for any crime.

• You no longer have a right to a trial by a jury of your peers.

• You can be murdered by the government — legally! — without ever being charged with a crime.

• The government does not have to present ANY evidence against you to take all these actions. The government merely has to assert that you are “suspected” of being involved in “terrorism.” Such suspicion, of course, could be dreamed up against anyone! Political opponents, Free Speech proponents, protesters, dissenters… anyone at all.
283 traitorous, criminal members of the House voted YES
The complete list of the traitorous, criminal members of the House who voted YES on this bill — all of which must now be arrested and prosecuted under the laws of the U.S. Constitution — is available here:
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/rol...

Read these names well, because they will go down in history as the seditious elitists who betrayed the American people in their most desperate hour, unleashing total police state tyranny against the innocent.
That these people in Congress somehow think they have the right to strip away the very freedoms GUARANTEED the American people under the U.S. Constitution is an outright violation of their own sworn oaths to protect that Constitution.
It is also a deeply spiritual violation of natural law and a fundamental betrayal of the very principles upon which this country is founded.

Merry Christmas From BO, Congress, Legalized Martial Law?
December 14, 2011By LBG1

At the writing of this post the MSM reports the White House had signaled it won’t veto the National Defense Authorization Act which is expected to make its way out of Congress Wednesday night over to BO’s desk by Thursday.

A bill which, in the words of Congressman Ron Paul,”We have now institutionalized and codified martial law”. A bill which should be a litmus test for all presidential contenders including the President up for reelection. So far, Barack Obama plans on signing the bill into law on Thursday. Ron Paul is vehemently against the bill. Mitt Romney was caught clueless at a New Hampshire Town Hall while, to date, Newt Gingrich,has kept mum on whether he supports this travesty to civil liberties of American citizens, a bill which would allow the military to detain American citizens on American soil, the new McCarthy Era ushered in by Barack Obama as President.
Over at the ACLU website the report, White House Backs Away from Defense Bill Veto Threat.
“The president should more carefully consider the consequences of allowing this bill to become law,” Laura W. Murphy, director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. “If President Obama signs this bill, it will damage both his legacy and American’s reputation for upholding the rule of law. The last time Congress passed indefinite detention legislation was during the McCarthy era and President Truman had the courage to veto that bill. We hope that the president will consider the long view of history before codifying indefinite detention without charge or trial.”
The indefinite detention legislation enacted during the McCarthy Era, the Emergency Detention Act of 1950.
From the law review article, THE DANGEROUS WORLD OF INDEFINITE DETENTIONS: VIETNAM TO ABU GHRAIB by Jennifer Van Bergen and Douglas Valentine. An article written during the Bush presidency in response to Section 412 of the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001, known as the Patriot Act.
The JBV Line:
In enacting Section 412, Congress forgot its own teaching from only thirty years earlier when, in 1971, it repealed the Emergency Detention Act of 1950 (a law enacted in reaction to the hysteria of the Communist scare of the infamous McCarthy era) and enacted the Non-Detention Act, prohibiting the detention of United States citizens “except pursuant to an Act of Congress.” The Emergency Detention Act (“EDA”) was modeled on the detention laws used to incarcerate people of Japanese descent during World War II and passed by Congress over President Truman’s veto. The EDA provided for administrative detentions of persons whom the Attorney General believed might commit espionage or sabotage, if the President de-clared the existence of an “internal security emergency.”
The EDA was never invoked and ultimately was repealed because it came widely to be viewed as dangerous to civil liberties. Truman, in unsuccessfully attempting to veto it, had noted that it “would make a mockery of our Bill of Rights [and] would actually weaken our internal security measures.”
[Ron Paul,"Everybody in this country is a potential terrorist"]
Against the about-to-be-signed-by-Obama National Defense Authorization Act, Republican presidential contender Congressman Ron Paul (TX) who appeared Wednesday at Joey’s Diner in Amherst, New Hampshire.
Ron Paul: “This last week the US Congress passed a bill which repeals Posse Comitatus which means we have now institutionalized and codified martial law. Right now the battle against terrorism involves all of us. Everybody in this country is a potential terrorist and the words they use in there to bring everybody in as a potential terrorist is any associated forces, which means if you happen to visit a website, happen to attend a meeting, happen to do one association you can be accused of being a terrorist and the bill says you have no right to a lawyer. They’ve been abusive of this for many years but now it’s been codified. And this president, about a year ago, announced that some of these bad people, even though they’re American citizens, don’t deserve even charges, that they can now be assassinated. We should be consciously aware of terrorism and deal with it but to say that we’re at war with the world and we can send a drone missile and send our troops anyplace that we want is very, very dangerous. Endless wars, attacking civil liberties, this Patriot Act is not very patriotic. Let me tell you, it’s an invasion of your privacy and I’ve been wondering, how many members of Congress would have voted for the Patriot Act if it would have been called the Repeal of the Fourth Amendment Act? Big government is alive and well but the grassroots are waking up.”
[Romney, Caught Clueless in New Hampshire]
On December 11, at Town Hall meeting in Hudson, New Hampshire, Mitt Romney, when questioned about the National Defense Authorization Act, seemed caught off guard and clueless.
Voter: “I’m concerned about the loss of freedoms in name of the so-called war on terror. In light of that, I thought you were going to speak to it, it was an amendment to a defense authorization bill last week that would allow the detention of Americans arrested in the United States and to allow the military to hold them indefinitely without charging them or trying them which I think is pretty dangerous and I’m wondering what you think of that?”
Romney: “Let me look at the particular authorization, ah, and, and, and I’ll make sure on our website we’ll describe our reaction to that particular amendment. I can tell you this, which is that there is an effort on the part of violent, radical jihadis to destroy America. They’re at war, they declared war against us and whether we like it or not, we are in wartime with that entity. The radical, violent jihadist, al Qaeda and their affiliates around the world are attacking us and will attack us and will use weapons of mass destruction if someday they get them. And so, in my view, we have to recognize that in our effort to pursue that conflict that the provisions that were associated with war are provisions we may need to protect ourself. At the same time we have very great need not to infringe upon the rights of our citizens and so it’s going to take a person of sobriety and stability and judgment and capacity to make sure that we not abuse the war time provisions in a way that would harm the rights of our citizens.”
To date, Newt Gingrich has yet to make any statements about the National Defense Authorization Act.

This will open the eyes of many as this is passed on and on and on.

Y’all Beware!

The dollar is losing value, but this fact is not just some recent phenomenon. In case you missed the charts comparing the decline of the US dollar to the Roman silver denarius, what they show is that the US dollar has, over the course of the last one hundred years, experienced a steady decline amounting to about a 95% loss in purchasing power, closely mimicking the fall of the world’s reserve currency circa the 2nd and 3rd centuries.

Every single day our central bank and the US government utilize the stealth tax known as inflation to make you poorer by increasing your cost of living. It’s so subtle that most Americans don’t even notice – or care.

In just the last decade alone, Brits have lost about 43% of their purchasing power for the most essential of all goods – food and energy.

Ordinary families have been crippled by the rocketing cost of essential goods over the past decade, a report has found.

The price of basic purchases, such as food and fuel, soared by 43 per cent over the decade from 2000.

These rising costs – far above general inflation – have already wiped out most of the gains in living standards made by families on low and modest incomes in the early 2000s, before the downturn began, according to research.

The statistics in the United States don’t fair any better. According to the inflation calculator, an item costing $100 in 2000 would now cost you $126, destroying some 26% of your purchasing power in just ten years. And, these calculations are based on the official statistics. Utilizing the actual, alternative data, prices have soared over 50% for essentials like food and gas in the last ten years.

Had you kept your money in cash since 2000, half of your wealth would have been wiped out by inflation (not including investment losses).

Despite what we’re told about our monetary policy and efforts to maintain a strong dollar, the evidence clearly shows that the dollar is moving in exactly the opposite direction over time, and it’s not done yet.

You can fully expect costs to rise going forward, as reported by the LA Times:

Get ready for more high food prices going into 2012 –- the USDA is projecting that next year will bring an overall spike of 2.5% to 3.5%.

…

Grocery store shoppers this year watched prices rise as much as 4.75% while diners in restaurants saw menu prices go up as much as 2.5%, with a surge near the end of the year.

As of last month, beef prices were up 9.8% compared with the same month last year. Pork prices were up 6.9% and poultry was 3% higher.

These predictions, of course, are based on the official projections. As we’ve learned from past experience, whatever the government projects, you can triple it. In this case, we’ll likely see another ten percent plus increase in prices, and thus, even more erosion in your standard of living.

In normal times the price inflation could be ignored, as wages would adjust somewhat accordingly and employment would be plentiful. But the last decade has been anything but normal, and what’s actually happening is that our wealth is being deliberately and progressively transferred into the hands of government and the corporate elite.

Recent data reiterate this point, with some 100 million Americans in poverty or right on the edge. We are, by all accounts, becoming poorer and inflation has played a huge role.

The thing is, the historical perspective on inflation isn’t even the scary part.

What’s scary is that the US dollar’s domination as the world’s reserve currency may very well be coming to an end over the next few years. As that happens the dollar will lose even more value, likely more rapidly than ever before. So, what was once just a subtle and easily ignored effect on personal wealth and finances, will become a major crisis area for most American families.

And that doesn’t even consider the real possibility of a waterfall event, in which major US creditors and private sector investors lose complete confidence in the US central bank and Treasury department, and choose to take their credit investments elsewhere. If and when this happens the poverty rate in this country will sky rocket – and fully 90% or more of the population would, almost overnight, become as impoverished as those living in any third world nation.

It can happen, and the way things have gone historically, and the multitude of problems we face on an economic, financial, social and political scale, it is becoming increasingly probable the this will be the eventual result.

The only way to protect yourself in an atmosphere where wealth is being destroyed by the powers that be is to put as much of it into assets that completely take you out of their game. As we wrote in January of 2010 in Buy Commodities at Today’s Lower Prices, Consume at Tomorrow’s Higher Prices. It is our view that, even though we’re two years hence since we first made that recommendation, the advice is still as timely today as it was then. Consider those things that become money when the traditional mechanism of exchange is wiped out. Most essential assets like food, firearms and tools will not only retain their value, but increase it – and if stored and maintained properly, they’ll be available for use many years down the road.

So, while most Americans are scrambling to the perceived safety of things like cash, blue chip stocks and US Treasury bonds, leaving themselves at risk because those assets are denominated in dollars and require exchanges to operate, you can become your own central bank and commodities warehouse by investing in assets such as the 11 foods that last a lifetime and other post-collapse barter items and trade skills that will maintain their inherent value when other traditional assets become worthless.

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SHTFplan/~3/_1FrIOM-QHA/weve-been-impoverished-and-its-only-going-to-get-a-whole-lot-worse_12302011

James,
Many people in North America wonder how they would survive in a world without caffeine [since coffee and cocoa are both imported].  An alternative to coffee could be Yaupon holly tea.  The Yaupon holly is used as a tea by various Indian tribes, and it has been studied as a commercial herbal tea drink.

According to my local colonial history book, colonists also raised Yaupon tea leaves for trade. It is related to yerba mate, a holly used to make a caffeinated tea in South America.
 
The Wikipedia article is rather confused on this point, but it is believed that the holly leaves need to cure and turn black to use for tea.  Curing the leaves is supposed to prevent the leaves from causing nausea (Yaupon’s Latin name is Ilex vomitoria). 
 
Yaupon holly is a small native evergreen tree that will grow anywhere from Climate Zone 7 all the way to southern Texas. It has small smooth leaves, tiny red berries that attract songbirds, and it can handle extreme heat and drought. Yaupon holly comes in dwarf, regular, and weeping varieties. The most common cultivar is “Pride of Houston,” which becomes a coarse open tree about 12 feet tall with small red berries in the winter.

It will thrive in areas where ornamentals like dogwood would be scorched, but it will also grow in swamps or sand dunes. Because they are so tough, you may see Yaupon holly trees used to landscape ugly industrial areas or as a screen, but it is also attractive enough be the centerpiece of a small landscape. – HC

Why Keep Honey Bees?

Wandering into the woods and staying lost for months is something I love to do. I have been an Urban Guerrilla Survivalist for 24 years, and have been keeping bees for more than 10 of those years. With these experiences under my belt, I have begun to teach people how to be a survivalist, and one subject I focus on is the art of beekeeping.

Before I tell you the benefits of having bees and some cheap ways to keep them, I suggest that you find a book about beekeeping to help you understand the terms I use and show you more details on how to keep bees for the long haul. One of the best books I have read is The ABC XYZ of Bee Culture: An Encyclopedia Pertaining to the Scientific and Practical Culture of Honey Bees
by A. I. Root. I also suggest that you try to find some beekeeping courses in your area—not only to learn more about it, but to connect with peers and mentors.

For my disclaimer: You should also research your local and state laws on beekeeping.

Apis mellifera, more commonly referred to as the honey bee, is one of the most beneficial insects in the world. Did you know that we have the honey bee to thank for one third of all the food we eat? Why, without the honey bee, we would mostly eat rice, wheat, and corn instead of the wonderful variety of fruits, vegetables, and nuts we enjoy every day. Not only do honey bees help make more food from pollination, they make a wide variety of products as well.

The most recognizable product, honey, is a sweet food made by bees from the nectar of flowers. Aside from its common use in sweetening teas, honey is used to treat burns, alleviate allergies and use in IVs for blood transfusions. It is also well known as a key ingredient in king’s mead, honey wine and man’s first alcoholic beverage. It is great for cooking in place of sugar, and has more nutritional value than cane or corn sugar. Honey has an endless shelf life when stored at room temperature in a sealed container. Most raw natural honey crystallizes, providing the survivalist with an endless supply of sugar that never goes bad.

Bee pollen, or pollen from flowers that is collected by bees during pollination, is harvested and used to fight allergies and treating mild cases of hay fever. Medications that use pollen include Claritin (loratadine), Benadryl (diphenhydramine), and chlorphenamine. Pollen is a great source of carbohydrates and is used to provide athletes energy boots.

Propolis, a resinous mixture that honey bees collect, relieves inflammation, viral diseases, ulcers, and superficial burns or scalds. It is also believed to promote heart health, strengthen the immune system, and reduce the chances of cataracts. Old beekeepers recommend that a piece of propolis be kept in the mouth as a remedy for a sore throat.

Beeswax, a natural wax produced in the hive, has long been called the ancient man’s plastic, and is used as such today. Common products you see beeswax used in include body creams, coating for cheeses, cosmetics, fine candles, furniture and shoe polishes, modeling materials to create jewelry and sculptures, pharmaceuticals, among hundreds of other items. It is often mixed with other ingredients such as olive oil (sweet oil) and sometimes paraffin. For hundreds of years, beeswax was used as a sealant or lubricant for bullets in cap and ball firearms that use black powder. Beeswax was also used to stabilize the military explosive Torpex, before it was replaced by a petroleum-based product.

Apitherapy is the medical use of bee products—most commonly associated with bee venom therapy, which uses bee venom in the use of health conditions. The active component of bee venom is melittin, which has a powerful anti-inflammatory action. Bee venom is a complex mix of a variety of peptides and proteins, some of which have strong neurotoxic and immunogenic effects. The most well-known bee venom therapy is for autoimmune diseases and multiple sclerosis. Bee venom therapy is also used to treat arthritis, bursitis, tendonitis, dissolving scar tissue (keloids), and herpes zoster, among other illnesses.

As you have just read, the benefits of keeping honey bees for products and pollination is infinite. Not only can you use these products yourself, you can sell them to make money at local farmers markets or boutiques, or barter with clans around the woods. I recommend keeping three to five hives at your home or survival camp. The benefits of the honey bee can not be matched for the survivalist.

How to Get Started

Now that I have told you some of the many the benefits of having bees, I am going to tell you the basic style of beekeeping and some cheap ways to keep bees. Again, my focus is on survival beekeeping, or “off the grid” beekeeping. I will give you a list of what you need, and then tell you how to make some of the items, or find them cheap. Once again, I suggest that you find a book about beekeeping to help you understand the terms I use and the different kinds of hives available for beekeeping. You can find books everywhere—used book stores and yard sales are the cheapest, and you may even find used equipment there as well.

As a beekeeper you must have protection. Beekeepers suits can be expensive—cost of protective gear ranges from $100-$200, depending on what you get (hoods and gloves, full body suits, etc.). Suits can be found online, in beekeeping stores, swap meets, or yard sales. However, if you’d like to take a thrifty approach you need to have:

• High rubber boots, which can be found at farm supply stores or retail centers such as Wal-Mart. Make sure you own a pair that you can get in and out of quickly and can go over your pants.
• Pants that can be tucked into your boots. I like to use duck tape to take the boots onto the pants so your legs and feet are completely protected.
• Long-sleeve shirts than can bed tucked in to your pants.
• Hooded jackets, which can be cinched tightly around your face, so only your face shows.
• A ball cap worn under the hood—the starting point of a screened hood. To make this, stitch screen over the top of the hooded jacket and then use duck tape all around the screen to keep the bees out. The cap pushes the screen away from your face.
• Welding gloves that you duck tape the ends to the jacket sleeves so you’re all sealed up.

Another inexpensive way is to use a rain suit that you can duck tape your gloves, boots, waist, and stitch a screen over the face.

Now that you are protected from head to toe, let’s focus on where you will keep the bees, or the bee hive. The most commonly used hive is called a Langstroth hive. It is made as an open top hive and holds frames that can be removed to inspect brood (aka baby bees or larva) and to pull honey out of the hive. You can order a pre-built hive or find plans to build your own hive from the internet. There are also many books on how build and use the Langstroth hive. I will repeat myself again: find a book and use it as a resource. And take any classes you can find in your area. I have been keeping bees for more than 10 years, and have lost hives over my learning experience. But just like any thing, you never know until you try.

The hive I am going to show you is calling a Robo’s barrel top drum hive. It is made with a plastic 55 gallon drum. From one barrel you can make two hives. These drums can be found at car washes, dumps, and food centers. Always wash the drum out first to make sure it is clean. He started by marking the barrel lengthwise to cut it in half. Although the barrel had a seam that would make it easy to cut it in half; he wanted to use the bung holes for entrances, so he ended up marking his own lines. It is possible to cut the barrel with a handsaw, but for the sake of time, use an electric saber saw. Once the barrel was cut in two,
                                                             
build a box out of 2 inch by 3 inch lumber, to fit snugly around the barrel. This frame acts as a stiffener, preventing the barrel from warping out of shape. It also acts as the support for the top bars. This will also keep the top of you hive even so when you get your lid ready it will fit snug. Before the barrel half could be slid into the wooden frame, a portion on the barrel rim had to be cut off so that the barrel would fit squarely into the frame. Once this was done, the barrel and frame were put together and decking screws were used to secure the barrel to the frame. Counter sink the screws a little so the comb will not stick to the sides. The bees will make comb around the screws and it will be hard to get the top bars out with them stuck to the sides.

Next a set of legs were added. Try to keep the legs from extending out too far from the barrel and becoming a trip hazard while working on the hive. Also try to avoid covering the bung hole so that there is an entrance for the bees. When making the top bars out of 3/4 inch rough-cut pine (1 inch thickness) and made them long enough to extend to the outside edges of the support frame. The lid will cover the whole top so you want it even all the way around.
Robo uses corrugated metal for roofing. This will get hot but you do not have to paint it or stain it every other year. Make sure you drill two holes in the front and back of the hive to help with air flow. In the winter time you can place a cork in the holes to help keep the bees warm. In colder places you can place spray foam in the holes to keep the cold air out. You can either tie down the corrugated metal with rope or just set a couple of rocks on top. Since it is corrugated, there is plenty of ventilation as well. One sheet from The Home Depot is big enough to make covers for both hives. (In Robo’s demonstration, he built a stand to hold up the top bar so you can look at the comb—the bees comb mimicked the shape of the drum half.)
                            
You need to put a little bit of wax on the top bar so the bee know where to start building comb, but other than that you have just made a hive from stuff that is commonly throw way. This is a great way to save drums, even metal ones, and use for something other than a trash can. It’s a great home for your bees, and keeps the dump free of landfill.
Note: Information and all pictures are taken from an article, Barrel Top Bar Hive, on Robo’s World web site.

Getting Your Bees

Now that you have your protective gear, a hive for the bees, and a book to reference, you are ready for the bees. There are nearly 20,000 species of bees—honey bees represent a small fraction of the species with between seven and 11 species and 44 subspecies—and they come from all around the globe. Bees can be ordered online, and from local bee clubs—most are shipped via UPS.  A package of bees can cost around $80-$200, depending on the species that you decide to purchase. The package weighs between three to four pounds, and has around 10 to 20 thousand bees inside, which is a good number to start building your hive. Bees can be installed into the hive in a manner of minutes—and if you take your time, you can watch them get to work in the hive immediately.

Naturally, my favorite bee is the free bee. Free bees can be found when bees swarm, which happens when the queen bee leaves a colony with a group of worker bees in search of a new hive. They often gather in trees or the eves of houses, which leave them in harms way by people who do not want them around. By offering to collect swarms, you can get free bees for your hive. Put an advertisement in the newspaper, or local listing, that you are willing to remove swarms. When the swarm first settles down and forms a cluster, it is fairly simple to capture. Swarms normally last no more than 24 hours, so you must be ready. To capture a swarm, you’ll need: 

• A box or a bucket with a lid. I use five gallon buckets that have a hole in the top laced with screen so the bees are able to breathe until you can put them into a hive.
• A soft brush and a wide scraper. These help to move the bees, if needed.
• A ladder to climb on to get to the bees so you are not reaching up in the air swatting at them—sometimes they are  high in the trees, or the roof of the house.
• Your protective gear—you do not want to get stung when collecting a swarm of bees for your hive.

When collecting a swarm of bees in a bush or tree, put the bucket below the area the swarm is in and give the branch a good shake. Let the nest fall into the bucket. Use the brush to sweep the remaining bees into the bucket, and then place the lid on the bucket. If the swarm is on something that you cannot shake, take the wide scraper and place it so you can scoop the bees and place them into the bucket. Use your brush to sweep the bees on the scraper and drop them in the bucket as well. When you have nearly 90 percent of the bees in the bucket, place the lid on your bucket and look to see if the remaining bees start landing on the lid. They will start to land on the bucket and fan, which tells the bees that the queen is inside the bucket and they are moving. Let the bucket set for 30 minutes and let the bees inside and outside of the bucket collect on the lid. Then pop the top of the bucket so all the bees drop to the bottom of the bucket and take the lid off. Flip the lid and brush the bees on the lid into the bucket. Then replace the lid and take the bees to their new hive.

When you get to the hive you’re going to place the bees in, open it and remove four to five frames, or top bars, out of your way. Pop the bucket on the lid once more so the bees fall to the bottom of the bucket and open the lid. Then shake bees in the bucket into the hive. Once you have the swarm in the hive, replace the frames or top bars and cover the hive. You have successfully placed your bees into the hive. Be sure to check the bees in one week to see if they are building comb.

Now you have your bee hive. Read your book and if you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me at ABEEFriendlyCompany@gmail.com. I would enjoy reading about your experiences and looking at photos of your work.

As I said, I am a survivalist and love the outdoors and keeping bees will get you outdoors more. Like gardening, the work you put in yields great rewards.

Article source: http://www.survivalblog.com/2011/12/keeping_honey_bees_for_surviva_1.html

The past year sure didn’t seem like it was dominated by Google and Apple news. We followed hundreds of stories in 2011, and the vast majority of them had neither Google nor Apple in their headlines.

But now, as we survey the stories that captured Gadget Lab’s attention the most, it’s clear the highest-impact events swirled around the two California mega-companies in Mountain View and Cupertino. With market-swaying power that would seem to rival that of full-fledged nation states, Google and Apple have an ability to influence news cycles unlike any other tech companies.

So, yes, AppGoo — or should that be Goople? — have formed a high-impact nexus of newsworthiness. But that doesn’t mean other companies haven’t snuck into our list of the most important tech news stories of 2011. If only for nefarious reasons.

Enjoy our list, and if we missed any important news stories, let us know in the comments section of this article.

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April 20: PlayStation Network Is Hacked

Though its violation wasn’t revealed to the outside world for three days, Sony’s PlayStation Network was compromised on April 20 by what the company called an “illegal intrusion.” At risk: the account details, passwords, and credit card information of some 77 million users.

Sony later confirmed that user email addresses and birth dates were stolen, and stated in a blog post, “While there is no evidence at this time that credit card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility.”

So who did it? Our own Threat Level blog handicapped possible culprits, including the merry pranksters of Anonymous, Chinese hackers, “recreational” hackers, and for-profit cyber thieves.

Congress launched an inquiry into the hack, spurring Sony to release more details about what happened. Most interesting: According to Sony, the hackers planted a file named “Anonymous” that included the tagline “We are Legion” on Sony’s servers. Anonymous spokesman Barret Brown then denied any involvement by Anonymous — a highly decentralized group with no real leader — in a Guardian op-ed piece.

Bottom line: Whoever pulled off the Sony network intrusion earns twisted kudos for pulling off the Hack of the Year.