Home Depot sells Food Grade Pails and lids ... Oxygen Obsorbers can be Hand Warmers sold at any of many camping and sports stores (Canadian Tire - Home Depot) ... Berry Hill Farms in Barrie Ontario sells Mylar bags at a reasonable price or you could invest in a "Food Saver" and use their bags. I use a food saver because I vacuum seal most of my individual meals at home, becuse I buy in bulk, I save $$.
Crawford Provincial sells desi-packs in bulk ... Mississauga Tel: 905 670-7904 ... Hope this helps

It does help. Thanks a lot.

A general question, how long would you say "long term" would be at best ?
Just looking at stuff you can actually buy in food stores, I found that tin-canned tuna fish
seems to bee longest-lasting (abt. 5 years but you can probably add 3) and glassed lentils/beans etc.
which are mant to last abt. 2-3 years... all cheap and not exactly gourmet stuff
but there it is, you can just buy it and store it away.

The fish in our oceans are dying out anyway so this might even be a good investment 😉

To Alienraider:

Some foods last up to 30 years if stored correctly, but they are not "preserved" foods in cans or bottles/jars.

Most dry whole grains, dried beans/legumes, white rice, sealed in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers will last that long.

Sugar, honey, maple syrup, molasses, pure vanilla extract, and salt don't go bad ever, although the dry items needs to be stored correctly and kept dry. Don't put O2 absorbers into sugar or salt or you'll get a solid lump.

Growing a garden during your local growing season and preserving it by canning/bottling/drying/freezing, and growing salad greens and herbs in pots on your windowsills during the winter months are great ways to diversify your "food storage" diet.

You can keep fresh water fish in a pond if your winter temps don't freeze the water solid if you are worried about how long the ocean stocks will last. And other "food on the hoof" such as livestock and egg layers keep quite well if you give it adequate land, food and water 😉

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To Raysunlight:

I'd be careful of the Rona/Home Depot buckets--they don't actually state that they are "food safe", they are meant for paints and drywall compound etc. You can get buckets and other food storage supplies from http://www.bridensolutions.ca and http://www.incaseof.ca (both Alberta companies that we've dealt with and found to be excellent resources).

Buy the hand warmers from the dollar store instead of oxygen absorbers (same thing) and they are cheap. Just be sure to "activate" them. Having a hard time finding the mylar bags here in the Okanagan as well. My next option is to try the packing outlets. If you have places in Ontario where they package coffee etc. they may be able to sell you some. Also try the party supply stores.
As for the buckets, I have bought my 'food grade' buckets for 1.50 each at my local bulk food store. The ones I got were from their fancy molasses, so I also ended up with a large quantity of molasses that was still in the bottom....pretty good deal all around 😆

Good luck.

Good morning all, Just wondering, why do we need Mylar bags?. Seem pretty fancy, just wondering what they use back in the day before we had such items. I see oxygen absorbers would be good to keep dry good dry, but how does the hand warmers work. Is it just the heat they give off, how long would that last. ? Most dry whole grains, dried beans/legumes, white rice, sealed in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbers will last that long, but how much longer than with out. My thinking is spend money on the food items and not the containers or accessorize item to persevere it.
I get free buckets from any place that has a deep fryer. use oil buckets are great, just ask if they don,t cut off the lid.

Awhile back I was talking to a friend of several years, a fellow prepper. He told me a very interesting story about food storage. He had gone down to the states looking for some items (he didn't say what). In his travels he met a group of "preppers". After several visits with members of this group, over a period of about a year, they took him to their hidden compound. As they showed him around, he noticed enough guns and ordinance to fight a war. In fact, they were very well prepared. About the only thing he didn't see was a lot of food storage. When he asked them about the lack of stored food, their reply was sobering. They said "We keep an up to date list of the names and addresses of every mormon household within 500 miles, THEY have OUR food supply". My friend was very glad that he hadn't told them that he is Mormon. The lesson here -- NEVER TELL ANYONE ABOUT YOUR FOOD STORAGE!!!

Tazweiss, that is a sobering story.

Kind of makes you wonder, how many groups are out there with the same philosophy. More importantly, am I on a similar list, government or otherwise.

"Just because you're paranoid" -- You know the rest.

Hi, tazweiss

Just catching up on some posts I missed. This comment from your story is the kind of thing that just infuriates me!

"When he asked them about the lack of stored food, their reply was sobering. They said "We keep an up to date list of the names and addresses of every mormon household within 500 miles, THEY have OUR food supply"."

This makes me want to be a masked avenger, I hate people that prey upon other people so much, it makes me see red.

I can only hope that the mormons are prepared for these assholes.

Mormons have a strong sense of community, especially within their church. If the SHTF many of them would quickly pull together to form their own communities. Mormons are a peace loving church however, they are not averse to the judicious use of aggression to protect themselves and their loved ones. While you wouldn't need to fear them if TSHTF, I certainly wouldn't count them out in the long run.

I live in Brampton, Mississauga area, and I cannot find bulk suppliers of like Big bags of Sugar, spices, well I can find flour and rice but other dried goods? Does anyone know of a store or stores?

I live in Brampton, Mississauga area, and I cannot find bulk suppliers of like Big bags of Sugar, spices, well I can find flour and rice but other dried goods? Does anyone know of a store or stores?

Costco, Wholesale Club in Toronto are two places to start.... http://www.wholesaleclub.ca/LCLOnline/store_details_landing_page.jsp?storeId=348
You can also go to Bulk Barn and talk to them about whole bags of items like beans, flour, etc..
I find Costco worth the price of membership as I save enough on specific items that it can pay for itself easily in one shopping trip.
The savings on the large bags of almonds/walnuts/pecans, canisters of spices, the huge sack of sugar, the pure vanilla and the 10 kg bags of flour I buy there pay for membership in only one shopping trip.

As always, watch the unit prices...I find some items are better to stock up on when the grocery stores have them as a loss leader...like laundry detergent...Canadian Tire just had the 50 load size of Old Dutch laundry soap on for $1.77 ...Costco can't touch that price.

Also I've found ethnic grocers sometimes have ridiculously cheap spice, legumes and rice that are fresher than most grocery stores.

For prepper who are in the Glenholme Nova Scotia area. you can get food grade five gallon pails at the Double C Restraunt for $1