RURAL PROPERTY PATROLS REVISITED

WHY YOU SHOULD BE DOING THEM NOW AND IN SHTF

NOBODY DOES MORE PROPERTY PATROLS THAN THE SURVIVORMETALMAN ABOVE.

Property patrols are mostly for Rural Minuteman that have property, but a neighborhood patrol for Urban/ Suburban are just as needed IMO.

The point of both is to know how and where people might get “into the wire” so to speak, in SHTF.

In the city, that might be knowing all the entrances to your gated community, block or apartment building.

Avenues of approach need to be identified be it in Urban/Suburban/Rural environments, so you are not caught off guard when the time comes to defend your AO, especially with limited resources.

If you can identify these approach paths before things get bad, you can develop a plan to cover them when things go to hell in a hand basket, or at the very least, have an awareness of them.

You can’t be everywhere so the more likely the approach avenue, the more effort should be made to protect or monitor it so as not to waste resources.

You won’t be going to work post SHTF, but you will be spending a lot of your time learning to supplement your storage food with gardening which in my AO is hard even now with access to fertilizer and other soil amendments easily purchased at the local co-op. Doing it with local natural resources will be near impossible if you have not already richened your soil for a few years.

When things get bad enough, working out in the field unprotected could easily be the last thing you do. People don’t want to think about how easy it is for someone bent on taking what you have to just shoot you from 100 yards away with a deer rifle, but the possibility is very real.

Working in the open is a huge risk when anarchy is the norm without having at least an overwatch providing some form of security for you.

Picture the scenario of your neighbors out of food and they see your garden, or chickens, or livestock. The average household even in the countryside is likely to be barren of food within a month to three months’ time. Yet here you are six months into a collapse, and you are well fed and growing food?

“Gimme Dat!” Is a real thing.

Better have a plan to bring the community onto the island or you are just setting yourself up for eviction. People are not going to just leave you alone because you prepared and they didn’t, they are going to take what is yours by force if they can.

HANDRAIL AREAS

Freeways, highways, train tracks and well used roads in general that run parallel to your AO (Area of Operation) are a natural avenue of approach. If cars are not running due to supply chain issues of fuel, economic collapse, or CMP/EMP, these paved paths are the ones of least resistance and likely to be followed.

They need to be surveyed from the perspective of a traveler on foot, taking note of what might draw them off the paved path to head in your direction.

Natural draws, flat fields, etc., the next time you are traveling down these avenues, take a look at the terrain and imagine what is it about it that might draw someone off the beaten path and toward your AO in SHTF.

GAME TRAILS

In the Rural environment I live in, game trails are their own “highways” through the underbrush of my area.

While it’s tempting to use them, unless you have no other choice, they should be avoided if possible. Most times you can consider them a definite approach path for the OPFOR as they are quick and easy to navigate, making them most worthy of monitoring.

For this reason, I concentrate on setting tripwire devices to alert me of intruders approaching on them. The outer layers being trip wires in the form of IR LEDs visible by NODs only and the inner layers being shotgun primer noise makers when a WROL scenario is in place, in addition to the normal trail cams and Off-Grid CCTV in place now that are checked every month or so while making property patrols.

When using a game trail, I’m always conscious of my own signs being left behind, walking off to one side where footprints are not as obvious in an attempt to leave the trail looking undisturbed.

OP/LP LOCATIONS

Another item I look for is potential Observation and Listening Posts while patrolling, seeking to identify the most advantageous locations that allow me to monitor the most terrain possible while remaining hidden.

These are marked with flaggers tape, so they are easy to find again, but only stand out if you know the slight twist of color used to distinguish them from the normal tree markings of my surroundings.

My homestead is backed up to a 600-acre parcel of harvest timber for a local lumber company, flaggers tape is used to delineate clear cuts and boundary lines as well as thinning candidates, so it’s very common to see flagger’s tape in the area.

REPEATER LOCATIONS

Because of the terrain, I am forced to use a cross band repeater to provide beyond LOS comms and am always looking for locations that I can pre-rig with 550 cord to hoist the repeater quickly into a tree on the ridgeline of the obstructing hill that is to one side of my homestead.

Putting a line in a tree is not a tactical task and is more akin to a monkey and a football even for experienced HAMs, the more pre-set locations for hoisting a repeater, the better.

I recently left my repeater in a low position (10ft up) on a tree during hunting season only to have it stolen.

Got lazy and paid the price. I’m not sure which part hurt the most, losing the $100 repeater setup, or having to create all new channel freqs and reprogram all my radios because I had them ALL programmed into the repeater.

PRO TIP: Don’t program your repeater, leave it in VFO mode and enter the freqs manually so if found; you only loose one repeater freq pair. If the battery dies there is nothing at all lost as the freqs are lost when it’s powered back up.

A better option (and what I’m doing now) is Digital Modes via HF NVIS using JS8Call, but it’s a much steeper learning curve and more equipment to haul to the field.

It does allow comms over several mountains and out to 300+ miles were a VHF repeater gets you over one mountain then another is needed to get over the next mountain, etc. etc.

ANIMAL ACTIVITY

It’s always a good idea to keep track of four legged predators in the area. Having chickens and sheep, they are living breathing dinner bells for Cougars, Bobcats, Coyotes and in SHTF, wild packs of dogs.

Bears tend to mind their own business, but I’d rather pick up on signs of their presence than assume they will stay out of the way. Bears do not care about your dogs. My Great Pyrenees is formidable but many times I’ve had bears in the field at night foraging while he barked his fool head off at them. Fortunately, he’s smart enough not to tangle with them.

In SHTF, the increase in signs can be a warning that an increase in those hunting might follow, or a decrease might indicate they have been hunted out and people are about to start hurting for food.

Knowing what “normal” looks like only happens with regular patrols.

NEIGHBORS

Monitoring neighboring properties is important also.

What’s new at the Jones’?

You can tell a lot about them by what they are doing with their properties.

Part of an area study is to mark resources, abilities, affiliations and learn of those things around you for future use.

TRAIN HOW YOU INTEND TO FIGHT

You can do all this by walking your dog and remaining low key without risk.

Or you can patrol how you intend to in SHTF to shake out your gear and learn the nuances of running kit and a carbine in the “woods” if Rural or concealed if Sub/Urban.

The biggest challenge to patrolling is always “not to be seen” by anyone.

This is easier said than done in the woods even during normal times when they are not full of poachers. The woods will be a lot more crowded when everyone is out looking to put meat on their tables in a collapse.

You can either learn to do it now in normal times when the only consequence of being discovered might be an uncomfortable conversation with the authorities or wait to do so until SHTF, meaning your first “test” will be when you need to do it for real and the consequences are much higher if caught.

Let that sink in…

Patrolling during hunting season allows you to have many “adversaries” (people scoping for deer that know how to move quietly and have patience) in the field to avoid as a true test of your skills. Remember those bow hunters like to sit in stands, don’t forget to look up while moving!

GET OUT AND GET GOOD IN THE WOODS!

Unless you are a skilled Hunter, it’s most likely that you are not good in the woods. Even then, there is a major difference between moving in fear of spooking game verses spooking someone with the means to kill you.

Every time I go out, I learn something new about the area, my gear, or myself.

I encourage you to do the same.