There are millions of individuals that have had the unfortunate circumstance of being found guilty and charged with a crime.  So they do their time and pay the debt to society. Unfortunately, in our world,  if one is incarcerated as a felon, there are certain rights one forfeits. One of those most important rights lost is gun ownership.

Whether right or wrong you still want to figure out how to defend you and your family within the law. So looking for a weapon you can have for protection is extremely important.  Your search as a legal alternative for self-defense is difficult. After checking around for a good weapon, among the limited alternatives, a crossbow comes to mind.

However, the question arises; can a felon own a crossbow?  According to a decision in a US Supreme Court case, yes a crossbow can be owned by a felon because federal authorities stated it was not considered a firearm whereas gun ownership by a felon is prohibited by federal law.  Even though the federal government allows crossbows, one still has to be informed of state or local restrictions on the transport, use, and ownership of crossbows (even if not a felon).

Here is the Case in a Nutshell

A former US border patrol officer was charged with possession of an illegal substance and served a six-month prison sentence. At the time of his arrest, authorities removed several weapons from the officer including a crossbow. Once free, Henderson attempted to retrieve possession of his various weapons and handguns.  Denied, he took his case all the way to the US Supreme Court.

The law 18 U.S.C. 922(g)  prohibits anyone convicted of a felony to ever possess a firearm both inside or outside of a felon’s home. However, during the proceeding, the FBI willingly returned a number of Henderson’s weapons, namely a self-made muzzle-loading rifle and crossbow. Federal agents, along with the court, concluded those particular items were not classified as firearms.

Not So Fast

Although the federal government allows the ownership of crossbows, each state may set its own rules and regulations. There are definitely laws restricting the use of crossbows for hunting but it is unclear on the use of bows in self-defense.

There are, however, court cases whereby crossbows were used to fend off a personal attack or injury. In the cases I researched, the users were protected under “stand your ground” laws.  that is why it is extremely important to check with both state and local agencies to get the facts. Make sure you get a copy of the rules and laws governing crossbow ownership and use from these entities.

Why Crossbow Over Other Choices?

Outside of a gun, there are few other weapons that are as useful and powerful to use for protection and hunting. The crossbow stands above other alternatives.

It is one of the few weapons that is allowed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). As long as it is packed away as checked baggage and unloaded you are good to go. So, it is possible to have one of the best self-protection devices with you while traveling. Remember,  though it is allowed, the TSA authorities still have the right to prevent its transport by plane. It is advisable to check ahead with your airline to know the cost and required handling of your bow.

The crossbow has some unique qualities that make it a highly desirable weapon to own. According to experts, these weapons tend to be highly accurate more so than guns because they have less recoil. Although not as powerful as a gun, they still have a powerful enough force which if a target is within its range can pierce through many types of materials such as flesh, wood and even some metal objects.

Additionally advantageous, is its range of use. Unlike a knife or stun gun, you do not need to be close to the attacker or assailant to fend them off. A typical bow’s range is 25 to 50 yards; thus putting plenty of distance between you and your would-be attacker.  Most importantly, while a gun makes a noise, crossbows are extremely silent. This stealth-like quality can make it so you can hit your target without giving up your exact location.

I think this weapon stands out most because of its easy handling, loading, and firing and thus a favorite by those with physical disabilities, children, and women. It tends to be lightweight and these users are able to aim the bow with much accuracy and precision with little difficulty. One has to take into consideration the reasons stated above as serious factors in selecting this weapon of choice without reservations.

One of the best rated crossbows is available on Amazon. Click here to get the latest pricing.

Which Crossbow Is Best for Me?

Besides the type of crossbow, the weight of your crossbow will most likely be the factor that determines which one to get. Basically, the weight is attributed to the force you need to pull on the bowstring. The lower the weight in pounds the less force needed to pull it. It appears that crossbows between 50 to 80 lbs. are low enough to be handled by youngsters and older enthusiasts.

Be aware that the lower weight will not have as much power and works best at shorter distances for accuracy. Nevertheless, it will still be enough to penetrate flesh and bone.

What Are the Different Type of Crossbows?

Basically, crossbows are mounted on a stock (imagine a bow and arrow mounted on top of a pistol or rifle like contraption). So crossbows shoot out projectile-like arrows called bolts or quarrels. There a variety of crossbows to choose from and price range. In addition, some of these varieties work well with scopes. There are mainly six types ;

• Rifle Crossbow
  One of the most popular, this kind of bow provides great accuracy for the user. It can shoot and hot a target as far as 250 feet dead on. However, to use this one, you need to have a fair amount of strength to pull back on the string and shoot your bolt. So it may not be the best suited for young users and those with disabilities. Here is one that may be right for you.
• Pistol Crossbow
  This type is very compact and easier to use. Though small, it can shoot a bolt with enough force to penetrate a target at least 75 feet with ease. Probably a good choice for home defense and with those young and old alike. If you are curious to see one, I have one you can check out here.
• Recurve Crossbow
  It is the favorite for most advanced shooters, hunters and archers. It has a longer bow and draw length. These allow for more acceleration of a bolt. You can check one out here One major downside for a recurve is it tends to be noisy and may thus need the use of a bowstring silencer.
• Bullet Crossbow
  As its name suggests, the bullet crossbow “shoots’out various types of projectiles such as clay, stone, and lead.  Some models are double stringed while others are designed with a string slot and barrel. Unfortunately, searching on an online retailer like Amazon illustrates that this type of crossbow is hard to come by.
• Compound Crossbow
  The one visible difference of the compound crossbow to the others are the pulleys and cables. As one is ready to shoot, the string is pulled back, the cables and pulleys move accordingly. This allows for greater velocity, power, and accuracy of the projectile. Although maintenance may be an issue, it is a favorite among hunters. I got one that is recommended on Amazon.
• Repeating Crossbow 
  You probably have guessed it right. It is a crossbow where a magazine loaded with bolts or quarrels without fletches (feathers) on the top of the weapon, shoots out one bolt after another.  Because it does not have a fletching, it only has accuracy at close range. This is another crossbow type that is difficult to find on an online outlet.

These examples illustrate the vast choices one truly has available. In most cases, these can be found and bought online, at your local department stores or sporting goods. Although you should be able to get them with little to no restrictions, you need to check ahead of time to know if any local or state requirements.

Final Thoughts

I know owning a firearm is one of the most treasured right a citizen is guaranteed under our US Constitution.  And whether it is right or wrong for a person who has served a criminal sentence to be denied gun ownership, the fact remains that federal law currently forbids it. As mentioned above, you still have viable options that will make you and loved ones protected against anyone who would do harm to them.

Because of the relative ease of legal ownership of crossbows, especially for those limited to owning other types of self-protection weapons, it makes sense for one to have a crossbow at home to use just in case. These weapons are also relatively easy to maintain for those young, old or with physical limitations. With the variety of crossbows available, you have the opportunity to select one that will best work for you in self-defense.

If you are ready to move forward on crossbow ownership, one of the highest rated crossbows is available on Amazon. Click here to get the latest pricing on this superbly designed weapon.

The other day I was watching a television program where after a deer is shot and killed, the hunters cut open the area of the deer’s heart and consumed a piece of the heart and drank a cup of its blood. After watching this seemingly primitive ritual, it made me start thinking about blood.

Blood is an extremely important part of the human body. Without it, the end is inevitable. I should know, I almost died after losing 3 pints of blood. My death would have been a tragedy for my newlywed bride.

Luckily, I was convinced by my wife to go to the hospital. I was so ill, I stayed hospitalized for 5 days, got the necessary blood transfusions and survived. After 25 years since this occurred, you might ask yourself why is this relevant?

Since I started to focus on various emergency preparedness scenarios, I realize there is a slight but real possibility you might be stranded alone in a desperate and critical situation. Can you drink blood in a survival situation? According to various sources, blood itself does not have enough nutritional value to sustain the necessary daily caloric intake your body needs and most importantly can give you hemochromatosis, a serious and fatal illness.

Blood Feast

I do not want to scare you away thinking that any and all blood is bad. When it comes to the use of animal not human blood as a food source, I think there needs to be some clarification. Animal blood in food is not necessarily dangerous.

It is used in many culinary kitchens around the world. However, it is most commonly used as an additive to another food product. because blood contains albumin, it coagulates when heated to 167 degrees Fahrenheit.   Because it gives food a savory taste, it is popularly found in many dishes.

In France, blood is used in making sauces and braises. It is used in pork, beef, lamb and chicken stews in Vietnam, Philippines, and India.  Poland, Philippines, Korea, and Sweden add this ingredient with duck, lamb or ox to make blood soup.

Blood sausage, blood mixed into a pork based casing, and black pudding are eaten in places like North America, Western, and Eastern Europe. Some places in Asia serve coagulated blood from poultry, pork, and beef cutting them into blocks to make blood tofu.

So as you can see, blood sourced from animals is not something to be of serious concern. As long as it is added to other foodstuffs, it is not really bad to eat .The only time this type of blood becomes a threat is if comes from a diseased animal.

For example, the World Health Organization released a report warning about the eating of poultry and blood-based dishes from Asia fearing the spread of the H1N5 Avian flu to other parts of the globe. We do, however, need to remember drinking blood from animals especially the blood of humans, exclusively would be a cause for serious health issues.

Got Blood?

Many prepper and survivalists have thoroughly and extensively researched the specific elements one needs for long-term survival.  These findings helped develop what experts call  The Survival Rule of Threes;

The Bloody Truth

One might get the impression that because blood (especially as it takes about 10 minutes for blood to coagulate at room temperature) looks thick like ketchup or tomato sauce, it is richly packed with vitamins and minerals.  But according to information gathered from the Mayo Clinic and Red Cross, there are only about 100 calories in one pint of blood. The following is the nutritional information on blood;

• Sodium (trace)
• Total Fat 0 g
• Potassium 0 mg
• Saturated Fat 0 g
• Total Carbs 0 g
• Polyunsaturated 0 g
• Dietary Fiber 0 g
• Monounsaturated 0 g
• Sugars (trace)
• Trans 0 g
• Protein 6-8 %
• Cholesterol 0 mg
• Vitamin A 0%
• Calcium 0%
• Vitamin C 0%
• Iron 250 mg.

Although the above info suggests, there is little to no nutrition whatsoever in blood, the reality is there are different components like plasma that have traces of nutritional value.  In fact, plasma is a mixture of water, sugar, fat, protein and salt which makes up the liquid portion of blood.

But still, you have to know, there is not enough blood you can drink that would satisfy all the minerals and vitamins your body requires.  It may make your stomach feel full but as you read on, this need to fill yourself may be dangerous.

Can Drinking Blood Kill You?

A pint of blood you drink would be extremely rich in iron, around 3500 to 4000 mg of iron is found in the average person. So consuming an extreme amount of blood to maintain the needed caloric intake to sustain one’s life (if that were even possible) leads to various health issues.  Because the body has a problem excreting access iron, drinking too much blood can be toxic.

This toxicity is called hemochromatosis. Hemochromatosis is basically an iron overload. It causes the body to absorb too much iron and this slowly builds up in the body causing tissue and organ damage especially the liver. Symptoms of hemochromatosis include;

• fatigue
• weight loss
• joint pain
• weakness
• irregular menstrual cycles
• erectile dysfunction

If this isn’t enough to discourage you from using blood as a survival food source, the use of unsourced blood should make you really nervous. Unless you know without a doubt where the blood comes from, you cannot negate the chance of contracting blood-borne diseases. Not to mention the possibility of contracting some kind of virus or bacteria from animal blood sources (see Blood in Food), is very possible.

The more common ones such as HIV or hepatitis B and C are transmitted through blood contact or ingestion. To make matters worse, drinking more than a few drops of blood may actually make you nauseous or even vomit.

There are however some benefits of using one’s own blood. Studies have shown that using your own blood for platelet-rich plasma therapy (PRP) may help with healing wounds and certain sports injuries. But PRP treatment is administered through injections. Drinking blood won’t have the same therapeutic effect.

Final Thoughts

Strange as it may seem, but when one is prepping it is important to know the options one has if and when a crisis presents itself. Most times, you may find yourself in an unusual circumstance and may not know how to respond to it. It is highly unlikely you would only have blood available as the only source of food available.  If that is the case, you probably have more serious issues you need to address immediately.  Knowing you can go for at least 3 weeks, even though it may hurt to be hungry, eating can wait.

Now since we are getting real, You know you don’t want to depend on drinking blood in a survival situation. So what options do you have? If you drive, you might want to carry some kind of bug out bag stashed in your car. Click here for the bag that I would highly recommend available on Amazon. If you do consider a bug out bag, remember to check your bag twice a year and replace any items that might expire.

If you carry a small school bag, it doesn’t hurt to throw in at least a bottle of water and a couple of protein bars. I would highly suggest to place these items in a sealed baggie so if the contents spill, it will not do any damage to your other items in your bag. You might also want to carry what is called a small pocket sized emergency kit. These kits usually have all the basic tools and gear you might need in a pinch. One I have is available on Amazon. Click here to get  this great compact kit.

In our present time, anything can happen on a dime. To be prepared, as best as you can, may be the difference between life or death. Hopefully you will never need to drink or eat horrific things but if you are prepared ahead of time, you will have something on hand to get you through this difficult time.

It is highly probable, with a few exceptions,  you will experience some level of significant snow precipitation where you live this year. In fact, some of the heaviest snowfall occur in many of the regions of the US and Canada. There are major cities in the US that you would not suspect receive a tremendous amount of accumulation. Cities like Rochester, New York or Quebec City, Quebec on average get one hundred or more inches of snowfall a year!

So, it is not out of the realm of possibilities you may one day find yourself stranded in a car and walking knee deep in snow too far away to walk to the nearest town or village. After a few hours, you begin to be concerned. Besides finding a source of heat,  securing some water may become a matter of life or death for you and your loved ones.

Under these circumstances, can you eat snow to stay alive?  Without drinking water for more than three days, you will eventually die of dehydration.  According to Jeff Gaffney, PhD., snow, for the most part, can be consumed with little risk to your health. It is basically distilled water and thus will keep you alive. You must be aware, however, that eating snow long term may lead towards serious medical issues.

How Much Water from Snow

Snow begins when precipitation occurring high in the atmosphere reaches a temperature of 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 Celsius) or below.  If snow falls towards the ground and the ground temperature is above 32 degrees, the snow becomes rain. So the ambient air temperature must be thirty-two degrees or colder for us to experience the powdery flakes.

According to NOAA, on average, thirteen inches of snow equals one inch of rain in the US, although this ratio can vary from two inches for sleet to nearly fifty inches for very dry, powdery snow under certain conditions. So to obtain an eight-ounce glass of water you would need to collect (and melt) about 27 inches of wet snow.

It is this yearly accumulation that is a vital and significant part of our planet’s hydrologic cycle. The snow that melts each spring feed into our streams, ponds and other water reservoirs replenishing our groundwater reserves that provide our water demands.

How Much Water Do You Need to Stay Alive

According to various sources, the amount of water consumption you need for survival varies. The National Academy of Science findings state the following water intake as required for one to sustain healthy bodily function:

• About 15.5 cups or 124 ounces (3.7 liters) of fluids for men
• About 11.5 cups or  92 ounces (2.7 liters) of fluids a day for women

And generally speaking, one normally ingest these stated water levels through daily food (20 percent of water intake on average) and beverage consumption.

It should also be noted, in a British medical study on hunger strike individuals, doctors concluded a person only needed 1.5 liters (6.3 cups or 50 ounces) of water to maintain fluid levels in the body. Of course, the person on hunger strikes typically is not engaged in physical activity and thus would lose a minimal amount of fluid. Being in the cold takes a lot of energy and water to keep the body from freezing. So it is logical to assume your water needs would be closer to those stated by the National Academy of Science.

But also be cautious.  Drinking too much water may be fatal.  There have been reports of marathon runners, overnight partiers or hot weather hikers who after being over-exposed to the hot sun or inebriated, dying from over hydrating also called hyponatremia.  Therefore, you need to monitor and spread out your water intake throughout your stranded period of time.

Importance of Water for Your Survival

There is an axiom among preppers and survivalist. It is called, The Survival Rule of Threes;

Is Snow Clean to Eat/Drink 

Importantly, snow falling from the sky is not exactly “pure.”  As the snow falls, any particulates blowing in the air are captured within each snowflake. Traces of soil, pesticides, mercury, sulfates, and many other pollutants are commonly found within the snow.  However, according to experts, these are mostly within safe limits.

To get the cleanest snow, they recommend waiting a while, if it has been snowing, and capture the latest accumulation. It is this source that would have the least amount of particles.  These experts also say to avoid eating urban snow if at all possible.  This snow tends to contain elements of chemicals from gasoline exhaust in the air, like toluene, xylenes and benzene, a known carcinogen.

Snow as Distilled Water

As mentioned, snow is basically distilled water. The professionals say that even though there might be impurities (ambient pollutants), it is purified and safe to drink. The problem with distilled water is in its chemical composition and the effect it has on humans drinking it over a period of time.

First, snow lacks essential minerals (calcium, sodium, magnesium., etc…) necessary for normal organ and tissue function.  During the time you are stranded, your body is naturally releasing these minerals through your sweat and urination. Thus a deficit in these minerals occurs until your organs begin to not work normally and show signs of stress and breakdown. This can cause heartbeat irregularities, high blood pressure and a significant increase in toxicity due to the body not releasing all of the necessary waste products from the body.

Secondly, drinking distilled over a period of time increases acidity within your body. The human body must maintain an acid pH level between 7.35-7.45.   Distilled water lowers the level in the blood to a pH of  7.00. Acidosis sets in.  Acidosis may lead to the following health complications:

• Kidney failure
• Bone disease
• Cancer
• Death

How long can you go eating or drinking snow before it becomes an issue?  It all depends on one’s overall health. Although there might be more immediate threats to your survival situation (staying warm, protecting yourself against any potential animal attacks), you need to find other sources of food or electrolyte additives (ex. Gatorade or lemonade powder) within before your health becomes compromised.

Last Thoughts

In a AAA report, there were over 32 million vehicles in one year stranded and need roadside assistance. It, therefore, makes sense to constantly keep up with the upkeep of your vehicle. Check the air pressure of your tires (including the spare), car battery and scheduled car maintenance constantly. Before taking your trip, identify the route and alternates. Try to identify places or stops along the way where you can find food, water, and auto repair facilities.

AAA also reported 40 percent of car owners lacked any type of emergency car kits or provisions kept in their car in case of an unforeseen car mishap. Knowing the possibility of being stranded without help nearby is there, it makes sense to always carry some sort of emergency kit or supplies. This can be as compact as an everyday pocket size kit you have in your pants, jacket or book bag to having an emergency car kit stored away in the trunk of your vehicle.   It might not be a bad idea to include cups, plates, and utensils among your emergency supplies.

As you pack your gear, take time to identify those items that will expire and replace them as needed. Maybe a time to keep in mind to do a review is during the fall and spring when most people change out old batteries from their smoke alarms or fire extinguishers.  Above all, always keep a loved one not traveling with you informed on your travel plans. Their awareness might just save your life.

After reviewing the article, I am sure you are now aware more than ever the need to keep some emergency items in your trunk or vehicle storage area just in case your family gets stranded. One emergency car kit I recommend can be purchased at Amazon click here for the latest pricing.