Got me a storage container at a local facility. Literally an un-heated, un-air conditioned steel box sitting on the ground. I like it for its size and relative security.
I don't have all the food I'd like to have stored in my apartment. The container would be the ideal place to expand into, but I need to know what can survive in there. Any experience?
depend of what kind of food u will store
look at
http://survivalacres.com/shop/content/18-bulk-food-shelf-life
and
http://www.mreinfo.com/us/mre/mre-shelf-life.html
Don;t get MREs. They're awful, lack all fiber, don't like repeatedly freezing, and don't stand the test of time.
Salt and sugar can withstand temp changes without any problems, although they should be sealed against moisture.
Honey may not have a shelf life if it's well sealed. It needs to be real honey, the darker and more raw the better, but there's talk that combs may lower that. It may go to crystals or cream, but it's fine. You can heat or add warm water and it'll pop back to life for biscuits and pancakes.
Sports drink powders are pretty safe for 5 years.
Pretty much anything sealed and processed for a 25-year shelf life can be taken out to 5-15 years with fluctuating and extreme temps (FD just-add-water meals, oats, beans, rice, wheat).
You won't get the full life if they're going from 30-95 F but you can get 1/3-1/2 the life pretty easily. Sealing in Mylar inside a bucket makes a difference there. I would 100% seal those myself and pay $40-50 USD per bucket/tub rather than $60-100 to have somebody else do it, knowing the shelf life wasn't going to stretch.
Stuff like camping meals in just the pouches and some of the pre-packed buckets of packets don't start out with a 25 year life. They may be 7-15. You have to take that into account.
Some companies (Mother Earth Inc. and MRE Depot spring to mind) don't package everything with a 25 year shelf life and the shelf life isn't always easy to find without sending an email or running the Julian date.
If you're rotating, you could keep almost anything you want in there for 6-9 months. Depending on your lows and highs, some liquid-containing pop-top cans and plastic bottles may be an issue (soda, peaches, juice) but while soda explodes in the back of my truck at least annually, the cheap-o water bottle cases and the regular can-opener cans of soup handle the cold and the heat better.
If you're trying to rotate at 1-2 years, it opens up other options.
I don't think I'd keep powdered milk, cheese, yogurt, sour cream, etc in there because they already tend to start with a 4-10 year shelf life and I'd try to keep them in a constant temp to expand that as much as possible. I'd probably try to keep meds controlled, too.
It would be an excellent place for phone books (packed against silverfish), pine cleaner concentrate, bar soap, homemade or purchased fire bricks (probably there is a restriction against kerosene/lamp oil), spare slings, bunches of bandages (easy on tape if it gets too hot), spare boots, backup pruners for rocket stove fuel, matches sealed against moisture, spare firing pins and springs and rings for keeper pins, and all the other stuff we like to have backups of would be excellent out there, since you mentioned in another post that you'll be able to get in. It leaves you only trying to keep a few days or week(s) of stuff at the house, and barter/longevity stuff in the storage unit.
I would not subject ammo to real extreme heat-cold daily and annual fluctuations, although I did have a case of cheapo 20 ga trap shells floating in the back of my truck for about 2.5 years going from single digits to 125+ F with some dampness, and they seem to be fine so far. Not something I'd want to bet my life on. The .22 that lived out there in a bag for 2-3 years is just getting fired now (2-3 years later) and also seems fine, but it was a higher grade hunting ammo.
There are to extremes you have to worry about...extreme cold and extreme heat.
From what I know, every long term food storage method will be affected by heat, there just doesn't seem to be any way around it.
However, I do know that the Legacy brand of freeze dried food will survive extreme cold no problem...most likely the other brands will too.
Perhaps a way around is that you keep most of your food preps at home while your storage unit is used for you "non-food" preps? You could likely also store everyday food stuff with the understanding that your "grocery trips" in the fall months are all done out of your storage unit, then replenish with fresher stuff for the other 8-9 months out of every year.