Say you’ve spent hundreds or even thousands of dollars for food storage supplies and emergency preparedness essentials.  Excellent!  But, like so many things in life, if you don’t take care of them, they’re not going to take care of you in your time of need.  The best case scenario is that you have a basement in your home that stays in the cool range of between 40 and 60 degrees Fahrenheit.  Since that isn’t always the case for people, you may have to improvise, and find somewhere else to store food and other essentials.

A lot of folks may end up storing food in their garage.  You know, people come up with some pretty creative uses for their garage.  Did you ever hear about that guy who parked his car in his garage?  Anyway, if you must have food storage in the extra spaces in your garage, make sure it’s packaged correctly and preferably up off of the ground.  If you have field mice where you live, rats (heaven forbid!), or other pests that are a threat in the area, don’t store boxes of powdered milk or bags of wheat or oats and the like.  You’ll get critters chewing through the paper or cardboard, and worse, you’ll end up with poopage and contamination.  There’s also the risk of Hantavirus, and all because you’ve unwittingly attracted the rodents into quarters where these furry flippers don’t belong and are unwanted.

If you’ve got room in closets, cupboards, drawers, under beds, etc., why not crowd some well-packaged food storage inside the home where it is climate controlled?  This way you can stretch out the shelf life of the food because it won’t be subjected to such extreme temperatures (the highs and lows of summers and winters).

Generally, just use your noggin’ in protecting your food storage investment from pests and the elements.  Wheat and rice, and other dry foods of this nature should be stored in hard plastic buckets with the lid hammered on tightly by a rubber mallet.  The Gamma lids cost extra, but they are screw on lids that are more user friendly and give you ready access to the food product.  You should also add Ziploc Mylar bags as a liner and a couple of oxy packs to preserve the food quality and protect it from insect infestation.  If you find that the paper packaged product is cheaper than the already bucketed food item, if you can still get it cheaper when adding on the price of a bucket, go for it.  If not, try to buy it already bucketed to save yourself the labor (unless you like to do it on your own).

As much as possible, keep food products off the ground.  You should put something in between the ground and the container or wall and the container for ventilation and to keep moisture out.  And if you should find that you already have a rodent problem, I would advise mouse traps baited in a special way.  Use regular cheese, but put a small chunk in the microwave to loosen it up a bit (just for a few seconds until it is slightly moldable).  Form it around the metal part of the trap in a small ball, and then put it in the freezer for a spell (don’t freeze it, just harden it).  Then, before you set it, put a light film of Jif peanut butter over the cheese to tempt the varmit’s tummy even more.  He’ll lick the peanut butter clean, and then greedily chomp down on the cheese.  He’s history!

Remember, you didn’t buy food storage to go bad or to feed the other members of the animal kingdom besides your own offspring.  If it’s worth buying in the first place, it’s worth protecting your investment.

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