Is anyone here prepping in West Virginia? Do you know many others in that area prepping? Feel free to meet other local preppers here to discuss local preps/news etc.
ricewiki - Another Mountaineer here. Probably not too many of us. I’m in Morgantown, where are you located?
ricewiki - just checked your profile, sorry for the incorrect assumption.
Let’s Gooooo Mountaineers! (Another prepper in Mgtn)
Prepping here is very undercover. Lots of people doing it, but nobody wants to talk about it.
Nice to “meet” you Hodge Podge!
I live in a rural community about 15 miles outside of Mo’town. Most people who have lived there for a long time have a certain level of readiness for problems, by that I mean they have a stock of food and maybe a generator. It is the elderly on fixed incomes that I worry about.
Been to WVirginia, though, Hillbilly… absolutely beautiful!
I’m in WV, about 30 miles north of Charleston. I used to live in Cumberland MD, so not too far from you all in Morgantown. The only time I’ve ever been there was to go to Ruby, never once made it to a Mountaineers game.
I don’t know what to think of prepping here. On one hand, I think lots of people around here will do pretty well, lots of small farms, decent neighbors and every other house has a garden. But there are lots (around here anyway) that rely on that government check everymonth, and meth use is rampant.
PineRidge - at 12:33 “I’m in WV, about 30 miles north of Charleston. I used to live in Cumberland MD, so not too far from you all in Morgantown. The only time I’ve ever been there was to go to Ruby, never once made it to a Mountaineers game……”
Don’t worry about missing The Ears play. You didn’t miss much.
GO HERD !!!!!
ricewiki - Thanks for the compliment, I’m sorta partial to it myself.
I’m in Roane County, WV ! There are a few preppers here, but 99% of the population has never heard of birdflu !!
worrywart: I live in Preston County and work in Morgantown. Some people aware here, but not nearly enough
Herd Chemist I went to MU long time ago. Check the Htgn paper each day and still follow the HERD. My family still lives in the area and are nuts about the teams.
We are all looking forward to the movie this fall. “WE ARE MARSHALL”
NJ Jeeper and Herd Chemist: I’m also looking forward to this fall…for some redemption on the football field !!
My mohter says that she is concerned that those bigs guys from WV will run over the MU guys. We will see. Quite honestly I think there is some envy and inferiority complex in the town about the offical University up North. Even when I was there we always wanted to somehow show up the official state U. I really got a kick a few years ago going thru Morgantown and seeing the billboard on I60. Don’t remeber what it said, but since the MU coach paid for it, I think it was a dig at WVU.
Anyway Universities are what keeps the towns alive and vital. All in fun.
NJ Jeeper: I couldn’t agree more, and a good inter-state rivalry keeps things hoppin’.
Hey Worry wart, I’m in Roane cty too! I never thought there would be anyone else so close prepping. It makes me feel better (I don’t know why) I wsa going to post a link to the mid ohio valley flu info, but the site now just gives me an error message. It might still be on the net somewhere, I just don’t have time to look right now.
How are the preps going for everyone? Hillbilly Bill, I read your posts and you are so far ahead of me it isn’t funny :) I am still stocking up on food and water containers. Putting up some missing gutters to catch water, and working on the garden. I will probably be buying some ammo soon, more for hunting than protection from zombie hordes of city people, lol. I’m also trying to make nice with the neighbors and get to know them better.
pine ridge – at 08:58
My advice, keep plugging. I felt hopelessly behind for months, now I feel better about my situation. As dire as things look, you will have time. This is more about staying the course rather than sprinting to the finish line.
Bill, I try, and is it trying :) I’ve got most of the basics squared away, it’s those “nice to haves” that I want. I have four kids, so anything to break up monotony will help with them. My biggest fear is to hear “I don’t want to eat this!” every meal for 18 mos, lol.
Worrywart, I’m posting again to bump the thread. I saw under the “Tom DVM” post that you have milking goats (alpines?) I am working on clearing an area for goats, probably won’t have fencing up until next year, but would love to talk to someone “local” about raising and milking them. And possibly buy some milk, not for human comsumption of course….if you are interested post and I’ll give you my email addy.
PineRidge I’m willing to help you any way I can with your goat venture, if you ‘d like. About clearing land-goats are not grassers like sheep, they are browsers, mostly eat the tops of things. This means they need to have good quality hay all year around -good hayis hard to find in our state-. Our goats are penned -the bucks all the time, I take the girls out for a walk for a snack. -just thought I’d mention it. a lot of people think that milking stock is easy and cheap to keep, just the opposite.dairy goats are very labor intensive also, more than any other farm animals, because they need to be milked every 12 hours , no matter what. I’m not trying to talk you out of it, but I think you should know what will be exspected of you if you wanwt healthy, good producing does. I’m in Roane county by the way. Hope to hear back from you! Then we could continue in private.
Thanks, you can e mail me at tallpines -at- hughes -dot- net
We are hoping to keep sheep in with the goats, so half was cleared the other half is still wooded. Since we don’t have any animals yet, we wanted to cover all bases with what we could keep while the dozer was here. I know what you mean about the hay! I can’t believe the price. We just asked around this spring for old hay to cover grass seed, and it wasn’t worth it to us…of course we have mostly bare areas now beacuse of it. Oh well, it’s filling in with weeds nicely.
Any one near Charles Town?
Another Morgantown one here although I grew up in Fairmont. Just discovered this site today. Glad to know there are some kindred spirits here in the Mountain State.
Just had to come visit the WV site to see who was named WVtreehanger. Gotta be a deer hunter. I always joke about hugging trees. I hug them as I climb up to my deer stand.
If I am wrong, then please forgive me. Don’t mean to offend. Just ignore the Okie who has wandered off his thread.
Good guess Okie but actually the moniker comes from being a hammock camper. Looks like I need to add email address like the folks above so WVtreehanger at adelphia dot net. I suspect I’ll be stopping by here quite often.
WVtreehanger – at 21:07
Nice to have you on the site! I live in Preston County but work in Morgantown. I think you will find a lot of value here. My email is in my profile if you are interested.
Montani Semper Liberi
HillBilly Bill;
You live and work in one of the most beautiful areas in the world. My DW and I checked out the area in the spring in regards to moving there. We now live in the flatlands near Ocean City MD, but we miss the mountains that we grew up in! If the universities in your area needed a hydroponic and aquaculture specialist, we would move tomorrow even though we have a great SIP site here.
Please enjoy the hills and dales for us, perhaps someday we will get out your way.
Hey treehanger :) How long have you been following BF, and what are your preps like? Any info on your local area prepping? Just being curious, lol, feel free to ignore.
Strider, you don’t want to move near Morgantown, I went through there in October and they had SNOW! Let HillBilly Bill and WV treehanger live there, you just go visit :)
LMWatBullRun, have you checked out the MD or VA prep threads? Maybe someone will be closer to you there. Do you know what Jefferson and/or Berkeley counties are doing? I have family there, but the are not preppers.
What I like about WV is that we have four very distinct seasons, and you may get 2 or 3 of them in any given day….
pine ridge – at 15:24 “ Strider, you don’t want to move near Morgantown, I went through there in October and they had SNOW! Let HillBilly Bill and WV treehanger live there, you just go visit :)”
Ahh, SNOW. That beautiful white stuff that makes everything look clean and new (at least until the dog goes out…
Actually I miss the stuff. Down here on Eastern Shore all we get is ice, the snow line is 35 miles to the north. Lots of ice. Ice that breaks the power lines. Ice that slides the cars off the road. Ice that freezes the locks and windows shut in the car, while you are IN the car. Snow is SO much nicer, can shovel it away, don’t need a flame thrower or libral application of high explosives to clear way to car. Now I want to go to Morgantown even more! (Plus my contract ran out at my University, the grant money shifted to a different priority.) I guess its time to get my toxic mold sniffing dog business “Sherlock Bones, Mold Detection Agency” going.
Actually spent the day in Charles Town today. The local Homeland Security and Health Department sound like they are frequent visitors to this site, and they actually have an accurate perception of the threat we face. They are still trying to get everyone on board, but at least they are trying to move in the right direction.
If we get six months Jefferson County might actually do OK. I’m not sure that we will, but even so.
pine ridge - Been following BF concern for about a year or so. Been a prepper for a lonnng time (since my first tour in Korea in the mid-70′s) but got much smarter about it once I happened upon prep sites on the internet pre-Y2K. We have food for a number of months and having a stocked pantry sure helps keep food costs down since we can now shop sales instead of going after this and that on an as-needed basis. I experiment with solar stuff (have a solar sizzler parabolic cooker and homemade solar ovens), have a few solar panels (I used to be an electronics technician a long time ago), run my pellet stove off the panels in the winter, try to garden (not too good at it), read as much as I can while trying to separate fact from conjecture, and talk prep stuff to select neighbors (just loaned one neighbor my copy of Alas Babylon). I’ve made contact with the local office of emergency management and offered to volunteer but have yet to get a response. They did give me some good books on emergency prep though and seem enthusiastic about their mission. After meeting face to face with Hillbilly Bill, I took a look at a billboard near our local mall mentioning Bird Flu (sponsor was the local emergency management office). My job involves interviewing people. I interviewed the city manager of a fair-sized city (by WV standards) in a nearby county. He also happens to be the local LDS bishop for that area. BF is definitely on his screen. So, some folks here are keeping it on the radar. Besides we need something to do other than play in the snow, enjoy nature, and cheer on WVU or Marshall. Oh, and Strider, that October snow caused power failures for about a week or so in part of my neighborhood. My portion did not lose power. Too bad, I was prepped for it and would have enjoyed the opportunity to fine tune from lessons learned. I ended up loaning my genny to some folks who did not have power. Neighborhood came together though, to take care of our own. A walk though the neighborhood showed extension cords going from one house to another across the roads (cords covered by carpet remnants to keep cars from pulling the cords out of the outlets). Folks checked on elderly neighbors and those with children. Community will be a powerful force if infrastructure falters during BF or any other problems.
That October snow took out our power for a week. I was trying to get ready for the pumpkin drop by candle light! (My pumpkin did not win. ) Our power goes out about once a week, where I am, so that gives me lots of opportunities to ‘practice’ for whatever may come.
Local station WAJR is playing a rock and roll type “are you ready for pandemic flu” tune. Heard it today. Sponsor was the local emergency services office.
WVtreehanger – at 20:33 18 July 2006 Been a prepper for a lonnng time (since my first tour in Korea in the mid-70′s)
Where were you stationed in Korea? I was at Camp Ames (Tajon) in ‘73, MP
Strider, Kunsan AB twice, Suwon AB once, Osan AB once spanning 1975 to 1994. Never got over to Taejon but watch their shows free on the internet on occasion. We watch the station from my wife’s hometown (Yosu) more as the resolution is much better. If you were at Camp Ames during that time, you already have some experience at “making do” with whatever resources are available. Hopefully you don’t have to put that experience to use but it’s good to have, eh?
Here is a link to the “bird flu song” WVtreehanger mentioned. It’s on the wvflu.org site, top left corner. I think it says “local health depts promote awareness” (just incase my link doesn’t work, having bad luck there)
I couldn’t get anything on the page to open, kept getting an error with my media player, so let me know if it works for you all. If not I’ll email them and complain ;)
So far it only has listing for Monongolia (hope I spelled that right!)county and the Mid Ohio Valley area.
Hey! the link works. I guess it just takes me a while.
pine ridge – at 09:29
Thanks for the link! Next time I drive by the Pandemic Flu bulletin board I’ll try to get a picture.
BTW, it is Monongalia County. The river that flows through Morgantown is named the Monongahela which causes some confusion.
Included with my dad’s property tax bill was a one page (double-sided) glossy pamphlet entitled “Pandemic Flu and Other Emergencies” put out by the Marion County Health Department and other county organizations. One section was “Items to Have on Hand in Case of an Emergency.” Other sections covered how to protect self and family from catching the flu. Another portion had “Pandemic Influenza Facts.” Within this section was an interesting part called “Pandemic Influenza Potential WV Statistics” with the following four bullets: 1,808,344 million residents (hard to believe that number-could be a typo), 542,503 sick, 271,252 will need care, 10,850 deaths. Pretty straight-forward pamphlet. Perhaps some recipients will read it. I was going to throw it away without reading but wondered why a pamphlet printed on slick paper would be included in a tax bill. This is the first time I’ve seen projections for WV.
Hey Mountaineers—You got a hellava football team! I smell a championship coming your way. I’ll be following your team this year!
WVTreehanger, now that is interesting. All I got was a bill ;) I’m jealous. But, yeah, WV has under 2 million people. Those are different stats than what I’ve read on either wvpanflu or wvdhhr (or maybe mid ohio valley dhhr) sites. I remember one figure only stated possible deaths at 1,100 people or so. I’ll look for it again, and check out Marion counties website to compare them.
Incase anyone is interested, Dr Osterholme will be in Charleston on Oct 18, for a pandemic flu speech. I posted the information on the “upcoming pandemic confrences” thread. I’m going to try and go provided it’s not just for “professionals”, if I do I will post about it on the wiki.
Since the kids went to bed I had some time to dig around. The numbers in WVTreehangers pamphlet come from the WV draft pandemic plans. In the plans they round the numbers off, but the “10,850 deaths” is ± 4% of 271,252 that they are expecting to need outpatient medical care. I thought it was interesting that in the plans they assume *only* 4558 people will need ventilators. I wonder how many there are in the state? Even in this optomistic outlook, I doubt there are 500 available.
I forgot how lacking our state plan is. Maybe it should be called the “non-plan” since WV clearly doesn’t have one.
I was heartened to see that the flyers were included in tax bills, although not in my county (Preston). Also, I have heard of them being distributed at grocery stores. I emailed the Director of the Preston County Health Dept. after a front-page story in the Dominion Post gave her contact info. I got no response which was disappointing.
WVU has people looking at the situation, but I’m afraid they are no farther than plans on paper. I can’t get any answer on what workers would be “required” to stay on the job and what ones would be sent home. Neither can I get an answer about how, if at all, payrolls will be continued. More than likely their plans are focused more on limiting the legal liability concerning students.
Morgantown’s newspaper, Dominion Post, is running a three day series on emergency preparedness and promises to cover bird flu, terrorist attacks, weather emergencies, etc. Too bad I don’t get the paper. My neighbor told me about it and let me read hers. Very basic stuff and recommends only three days stuff buy at least it’s a start. Looks like the Mon County office of emergency management is doing its job of getting the info out. Sometimes it pays to talk to selected neighbors about preparedness. The same neighbor who told me about the newspaper articles just returned the copy of “Alas Babylon” I loaned to her. She told me she has a capped well on her property about fifteen yards from property. She also offered to give us her canned goods (she cans, what a girl!) if for some reason she and her spouse are away during an emergency and can’t make it back or worse. Told me exactly where to find them and noted it takes a community effort to survive emergencies. Just what I wanted to hear. I told her to feel the same about our preps and where to find them. We’ll shelter in place and I believe they will also but it’s nice to know where you stand. And, for those alarmists among us, she and her spouse can be trusted in terms of security. Plus, most homes here in WV have weapons and owners who know how to use them. We fall into that category.
Was at Buckhannon city hall in Upshur county today. They have refrigerator magnets noting where to find info on pandemic flu. Fluwiki is one of the three urls on the magnet.
WVtreehanger – at 19:25
I was pleased to see the Dominion Post running the articles, although as you say it is really very basic info.
I’m all in favor of having my neighbors watching my back because we helped them out, instead of worrying about them trying to take our supplies.
WVtreehanger – at 20:50 14 Aug (maybe I’m a slow reader? No, just hadn’t read the WV threadd for a while.) “If you were at Camp Ames during that time, you already have some experience at “making do” with whatever resources are available. Hopefully you don’t have to put that experience to use but it’s good to have, eh?”
Well, it WAS an eye opener. I signed up to go to ‘Nam in 72, had my orders in hand and home on leave when new orders arrived saying “Korea”. OK, drug out little map of the world, found Korea. Only an inch or two from Nam. OK. WRONG! Landed at Kempo airfield Jan 13 to two feet of snow, and me with issue jungle fatigues and boots with screened holes to let the water out. Beginning of a “learning experience.”
They often fed us using the term losly) C-Rats (pre MRI type of food in little cans, with 4 cigarettes per Rat. I got to find out what “out of date” food tastes like, the cans were labeled 1952 (this was ‘73.) I guess it was poetic justice, after all, I WAS in Korea, which still hasn’t signed to end the Korean war, and these were MADE during the Korean war, so I guess the military thought it was still OK food, there’s a war on!
But it was, and is, a beautiful country!
I saw this on the news this morning on WOWK TV, about Jackson county. Link here http://tinyurl.com/g833p
<snip>
The Jackson County Health Department says its not a matter of if the Avian Flu will come to America, but when.
Monday health officials started preparing for the worst case scenario by having a Pandemic Flu Planning meeting.
and <snip> There are some things you can do at home to prepare..
The Jackson County Health Department suggests coming up with a 72-hour kit in case you have to shelter in place. <end>
At least they are doing something. But still recomending only three days of food.
“At least they are doing something. But still recomending only three days of food.”
Which generally causes people to do nothing because they already have that at home. I have been having really disappointing results trying to raise awareness in my town and with local churches. I can see why some, who have been at this longer than I, have given up trying.
I have not been able to get a single person to prep and the few folks I sent e-mails to , don’t write me any more. I stopped given out info on a personal level, but I’m still trying to talk to people at the county. Not much success there either though. Strider-My DH remembers the c-rats. He just mentioned that they also had a Hershey candy bar:-)
Has anybody contacted local utility companies? I have hesitated to do this mainly because it’s all I can do to get somebody to understand what I am saying when I have a problem with my bill.
WVU just announced their Influenza website. Maybe it’s just me, but I found actual information to be sorely lacking. I like where they talk about how they are making plans to feed and house students during a pandemic. Please…the legal liability is unthinkable. The students will be locked out of the dorms as quickly as possible.
To use my grandfather’s decriptive language, this site is p*ss poor, but at least they have something.
At least they’re doing something. The most apparent flaw I see is that they will depend on the internet a lot. What if it goes down?
WVtreehanger – at 17:05
I doubt they have thought about that, and of course the power and water will stay on too.
I was in the Roane county health dept. today and asked about any pandemic plans or preparations. Well, I knew the answer from the look the woman gave me, so it seems Roane county is still not doing anything. The woman did see the same news story about Jackson county, so at least she didn’t think I was insane ;)
Pine Ridge- I’ll be darn !! I know each county got a certain amount of money-what are they doing , paying someone to scratch their head hours at end. as you can tell I’m more aggravated than usual about the county. I wish they would at least print something out for our residents.- I’m going to town tomorrow, will try to step in there myself !!The more the better !!
lol worrywart. I think it would be great if you went in too. The lady I talked to wasn’t very “into” pandemic flu, but when I mentioned the news report about Jackson county that she also saw, she acted friendlier. I told her I had emailed the board of ed and was told that they would be sending out information in Sept. So far I have heard nothing from the schools. I also emailed a man at Mid Ohio Valley Health Dept, I can’t remember his name, but he was the contact for epidemiology, who said the counties were working on it. That was last month.
So I guess what ever plans the Mid Ohio group is working on aren’t being passed down to the individual counties. Maybe if we bother them about it, they will start. (?)
Just a heads-up for those who go to the VA hospital in Clarksburg: got a flier in the mail. They will have their drive-through flu clinic on 4 Nov and 18 Nov from 0900 to 1400 (signs and security will direct you to the proper place). Walk-in flu clinic will be on 8 and 9 Nov from 0900 to 1500 at the Women’s Clinic area.
Just looked at poll results from the WBOY (Clarksburg) website conducted last week. Question (not exact wording) was are you ready for a pandemic? Over 70% were not. Conversely 14% thought they were. Gee what happened to that famous West Virginia value of self-sufficiency?