Gunner Quinn
(Continued from Part 2. This concludes the article.)
The Final Answer: How Reliable Are Freezer Bags For Storing Food?
The most important questions these experiments were trying to answer is how reliable freezer bags are as a food-storage method? Do they work for the short term? And how well will they work for the long term?
Thinner sandwich bags are definitely a bad way to go. Pests had chewed through the plastic in just a few months. Pantry moths in my cupboard also had no trouble chewing through the foil packets of hot chocolate or getting under the lid of a container of raisins.
During these experiments, pests hadn’t chewed through the thick walls of any of the freezer bags over a six-month period. The bags will be checked again time a year after the packing date to see if they can keep pests out for a full year which would be the minimum time a JIT freezer-bag food-storage system would have to endure. That’s assuming a SHTF event occurred right after bagging beans and grains.
So, based on these experiments, the most-important question of whether or not pests can chew through the heavy-plastic walls of freezer bags still remained unanswered.
Heritage Seed Collection – My heritage seed collection finally settled the issue. When I harvest and store seeds, I write the harvest date in the form of “for 2025,” meaning they were harvested in the fall of 2024. If the seeds were freeze treated it’s written on the outside of the bag. I store seeds in freezer bags, sandwich bags, and DIY paper seed envelopes. Some of the original mylar bags of seeds I had purchased were unopened, some had been opened and then taped shut again.
There were some pests inside one of the totes, including a few adult pantry moths. A small amount (two tablespoons) of yard-long bean seeds were stored in a sandwich bag and were contaminated with frass, three dead larva, and pieces of adult parts such as legs and heads which were most likely weevils. The bag had been chewed through and was possible the original source of weevils in the tote. There were no live pests still inside the sandwich bag.
A mylar bag of wheat seeds had been opened, then taped shut with 2” clear packing tape. Two live larvae were underneath a small section of tape that had looped up when being applied but the rest of the tape was in full contact with the mylar, completely sealing the folded-over opening. No pests were inside the bag.
A quart freezer bag of Cherokee Trail of Tears black beans, as well as a quart freezer bag of Hog Brains cowpeas were “for 2023,” meaning they had been bagged 2½ years before this article was written. Both bags had been chewed through and had frass and live larvae inside. The Trail of Tears bag had nine holes, larva, cocoons, and a lot of frass.
So yes, with enough time, pests can chew through freezer bags. I also noticed in the heritage-seed totes that most of the seeds were pest-free. None of the flower or herb seeds had been freeze treated and only some of the cucurbits. The flower-seed tote had a strong spicy smell, mostly from a large bag of marigold seeds still in the heads, and perhaps this had an effect on keeping it pest free. All of the turnip and beet seeds were bought in bulk and left in their original paper packaging. All were pest free. Pests can be pretty choosy about their food sources but we know for certain that weevils, pantry moths, and flour beetles among others, love our most common food-storage items: corn, beans, wheat, and rice.
Food stored in freezer bags for JIT food-storage, and then freeze treated should remain pest free at least for the short term. Even weevil-infested corn from the feed store (the least expensive food we can buy for storing) can be stored in freezer bags if freeze treated. For those who don’t have the space to freeze treat 400 pounds of beans and grains (100 bags), or who cut their timing too close to the SHTF date when the grid will be lost and freezing is no longer an option, freezer bags can still be used under one condition. But most will find it disagreeable.
The Yuck Factor
There is a topic with many aspects so the details will be covered in more depth in a soon-forthcoming article entitled: “The Yuck Factor.”
In a post-SHTF world, food will be at a premium and we won’t have the option of being the picky eaters we are now. “Yuck” will need to become a quaint word of the past when it comes to many aspects of food consumption. As for the insect infestations discussed in this article, none of the “yuck” things are toxic: whole weevils and other insects and mites, live larva, cocoons, frass, insect parts, or webbing. All of these can be sifted out of our food before consumption. Since frass is a polite way to say insect feces, and since it can’t all be sifted out 100% no matter how hard we try, this may not appeal to some. Mold will be discussed in the next article.
Again, none of these particles of frass or insects are toxic or harmful if eaten. The corny old saying in this case is true: it’s just extra protein. Some online articles claim frass and insects are toxic, but it’s not the case. Frass and insects are yucky perhaps, but not toxic. Stay tuned, in the Yuck Factor article I’ll discuss the results of my experiments of adding frass, weevils, and other yummies to recipes, as well as eating teaspoons of raw frass, weevils, and larvae after sifting them out of infested food. The article also discusses other yucky things like garden produce which looks spoiled, etc.
Before modern food-processing, packing, and storage methods, our ancestors had no choice but to sift pests out from grains and other foodstuffs. We’ve become spoiled in modern times and if we’re blown back to the technology of 1850 after a SHTF event, we’ll have to learn to suck it up until weevils and pests become a normal part of daily life we no longer think twice about. At some point in a TEOTWAWKI world, all the oxygen absorbers, dry ice, mylar bags, freezer bags, and other commercially-bought preservation supplies preppers use will run out. Alternate methods will need to be looked at such as freeze-treating grains during the wintertime. Still, unless we have gasketed food-storage buckets, pests will get back into our food just as they did in the not-so-distant past with our ancestors.
If using freezer bags to store food, be prepared for the possibility of eating frass, eggs, larva, cocoons, and assorted pieces and/or whole tiny insects such as weevils and flour beetles.
Conclusion
For a JIT food-storage program, I would make the following recommendations.
Don’t have a JIT food-storage program – Be a real prepper and store food ahead of time.
Mylar Bags – For JIT, mylar bags with oxygen absorbers are unquestionably the way to go since they’re already an approved long-term food storage method. As with freezer bags, unused mylar bags take up very little space and can be tucked away on a shelf until we decide the time has arrived to beat the mobs to Walmart. The big downside is the procrastination aspect of it. JIT itself is risky so if our timing is off and we miss the window of opportunity, or if we don’t have enough money set aside to buy a year’s worth of food all at once after we decide its go time, problems will occur.
For those who already have a clothes iron, the expense for mylar packaging can be fairly minimal. At 4 lbs of food per bag, 100 bags would hold a total of 400 lbs of rice, beans, flour, oats, and corn needed to supply enough calories for one person for one year. Total cost for packaging 400 lbs of food storage: $41 for 100 1-gallon bags plus $9 for 100 400-cc oxygen absorbers. Assuming you already have a clothes iron, no other costs would be incurred. Thus, the 100 bags can be filled with food for a total of $50. Together, the package of mylar bags and oxygen absorbers take up a minimal amount of space, similar in size to a ream of paper. Since food isn’t the only thing we’ll need to survive a major SHTF event, $50 is a pittance compared to the amount of money we’ll need to be spending on other prepping necessities if we’re really prepping for the long haul. If you’re still convinced at this point you want to go JIT with your food storage, it would be foolish to use freezer bags when mylar bags are readily available, easy to use, and not that expensive.
Freezer Bags – Freezer bags are the cheapest option but only minimally so compared to the total cost of the JIT food being bought and stored in addition to other necessary post-SHTF supplies. But while inexpensive, they’re the riskiest option. If stocked up on ahead of time, freezer bags won’t actually incur any cost since they can be used at some future date anyway if the Schumer never does its thing. Since oxygen absorbers don’t work with freezer bags, the bags are all that’s needed. Using two bags per 4 lbs of food, 200 bags will cost a total of $16 to bag 400 lbs of beans and grains.
While not exactly standard operating procedure, using freezer bags is better than nothing. The likelihood you’ll have to suck it up and experience the yuck factor face-to-face is increased.
Skip the freezer bags and order some mylar bags and oxygen absorbers as soon as you finish your coffee and reading all your blogs this morning.
Be a Real Prepper – Finally, it can’t be stressed enough that just-in-time prepping isn’t really prepping at all. “Just-in-time” and “prepping” are mutually exclusive terms. The big reason for prepping in the first place is to be ready for an uncertain future so if everything goes south, we’ll be way ahead of the mobs when it’s suddenly evident that life as we know it is about to change in a big way.
But, if for whatever reason you still feel like you can’t prep food-wise until the last minute, JIT food prepping will have to be good enough. Just be sure you can read the signs of the times well enough to beat the mobs to Walmart before the “we’re all gonna die!” brawls begin.
In closing, one last thought. Come Black Friday this November, go to Walmart at 6:00 a.m. and be standing in the long line with the rest of the crazed mob waiting for the doors to open. Once the doors open and the frenzied crowd presses forward, spend three hours in the mayhem to get an inkling of what the food brawls will be like when the masses wake up after the SHTF. Multiply Black Friday x 100, then weigh the probabilities of TEOTWAWKI happening vs the consequences of not being prepared if it does.
Then, after the Black Friday dust clears and you’re no longer in the fetal position whimpering and sucking your thumb, your nose has quit bleeding, your knuckles have quit hurting, your voice is returning to normal and you’ve recovered from the trauma, start doing some real prepping.
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