El Nino advice and food

[Maz]

I see there has been government advice, and suggestions on a few other sites relating to El Nino, to keep a store of food in just in case of power cuts lasting days, or problems with supply chains during floods etc. I'm assuming this might include hamster food as well!

Hopefully none of it will be necessary. We generally don't keep a store of supplies due to limited kitchen cupboard space, and just buy food week by week as needed. So I decided to get a few tins and packets to keep in another cupboard for emergencies! I was going to stock up the freezer more but then thought - well if there are power cuts lasting a few days, that won't help much as all the food will go off! So I'm sticking with tins and packets of pasta!

Not looking forward to extreme weather though so hopefully it won't happen! The last time we had a power cut for four days (Storm Arwen) everything was down, including mobile masts. Thankfully we have a coal fireplace so could light a fire and I ended up cooking over it as well! Which completely messed up two pans The only thing that worked was a little battery powered short wave radio. Must get new batteries for it!

I have also bought a wind up torch which acts as a phone power bank as well - but charging a phone up doesn't help much unless there's a mobile signal. Last time we had to get in the car and drive somewhere to find a mobile signal just to find out what was going on!

Anyway maybe we should ensure we're not too low on hamster food over the winter, just in case. On the other hand if we did run out of hamster food, the hamsters can eat some of our human food in an emergency - but not ideal!

Stock up on food to prepare for extreme El Niño weather, minister says

Dame Angela Eagle warns the weather event could lead to extreme storms this winter.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Socks' Mum]

Thank you for the heads up. Yes, I need to get hay and pellets in case things go wrong. As you say, fresh and frozen food might not last long The cold could also be a challenge

 

[Maz]

Thank you for the heads up. Yes, I need to get hay and pellets in case things go wrong. As you say, fresh and frozen food might not last long The cold could also be a challenge

Yes I was worried about that. If no power then the rooms would be cold for the hamster. We do have the coal fire for emergencies but that tends to only heat the immediate area. And wouldn't be able to warm snugglesafe's in the microwave if no electricity. So it will need insulating enclosures and maybe even moving them I think. I assume this is why people have bottled gas heaters for emergencies. We don't have one.

Our main issue would be water! It's a spring water supply and the uv treatment thing cuts off if there's no electricity for safety reasons. We do have bottled water as well but if the gov is telling people to stock up with that, or saying there could be supply chain issues, it could be hard to get hold of. So we'll have to get some emergency supplies now. I suppose we could always drive to a hotel to get a couple of bottles filled up!

 

[Lovelyness]

I’d be interested to know where you got your wind up torch /powerbank. I did see one report saying we should stock up in the event of invasion by a foreign power. I did think that if Russia were to invade, say, I’m not sure a tin of beans would be all that helpful

 

[Maz]

I can't see they'd want to invade if we had no food and no electricity I got the wind up torch/powerbank on Amazon. It's also - a radio and can charge either by solar power or wind up crank, has an SOS button and is quite small! I like it Intended for camping. The radio is AM/FM so it might work after a storm. After our last storm, there were no FM signals but AM should be ok. It was the only entertainment we had, listening to the radio!

Wind up solar torch/radio/powerbank

 

[Lovelyness]

Thanks, that's really useful being 3 in one

 

[Maz]

I thought so! It's a bit expensive at about £25 maybe - you can get torches and powerbanks cheaper, but it is all in one. The reviews all seemed very positive.