They may even possess useful skillsets and be assets to your group. However, they can also be liabilities, draining your resources and offering little in return, or worse, have criminal intent. Anyone with the foresight to prepare will be faced with this dilemma and if you don’t respond accordingly, it could be the death of you and your group. It’s important that you encourage every member of your party to be vigilant enough to avoid helping the wrong people but caring enough to help the good ones. The question is, how do you know who is good and who is bad? I want to hear your take on this because the time is going to come during a disaster and SHTF world-ending event where somebody is going to come to you for help.

What are you going to do? Are you going to provide them with assistance or are you going to turn them away? That’s what we’re going to be talking about today, isn’t it buddy? So I wanted to share with you guys this experience and hopefully get your insights with respect to what you would do in this situation and we’re going to tell you how we dealt with it. Let’s talk about it. So we got a new member of the family. This guy’s name is Shadow. We bought an acreage and within the first three nights we had three dogs arrive at our door.

This guy was being pursued by two other farm dogs. We knew the two farm dogs were there in the middle of the night because they were fighting with our dogs. We didn’t discover this guy until the next morning when we seen him camping out on the back step. So we had these three dogs and I’m like, what the hell is going on here? Are we a magnet for animals? Because within the first few days of moving on to the acreage we seen elk, three moose, we seen deer everywhere and this place was looking like Jurassic Park.

And then on the fourth day there was another dog that came, okay? It got picked up by animal control. But I was torn on the issue because of course we already have two big German shepherds. Surviving off of rodents and groundhogs and rabbits and things like that. You know, the kids talked me into keeping them and I figured, you know what? Maybe I can make an exception because he’s a survivor. But at the same time I was torn because on the one hand you got to teach your kids that there’s a limit to who and what you’re able to help.

So we can’t just be taking in stray dogs. Obviously we can’t set that standard that we’re going to take in every dog that comes our way. Because he was a pup, because he practically just came in the middle of the night, sat himself down and refused to leave. We figured that the following morning we would drive away and that he would follow us to the highway and that would be the last we’d seen of him. But I seen on my surveillance cameras, he immediately wandered back, plopped himself down on the step and he hasn’t moved since.

It’s amazing how quick he just became our dog. And he’s like, hey, I’m here. I’m not leaving. I’m the new dog. And he surprisingly got along quite well with our other dogs and I think he’s wanting to depart now. So this is where we found him. We woke up in the morning and he was just chilling right here. We tried to get him out of here. Tried to give him the boot? Yeah. We said hit the road. We already have two dogs. We were going to take him to the SPCA and then me and Naomi, we somehow got this guy to keep him.

We took him to the vet and got all the ticks off him and he’s all cleaned up now. Why did we name him Shadow? Because he actually is a shadow. He will always go in the dark. He’s Bruce Wayne. Yes, I am the knight. I am Batman. He’s very elusive. He’s always kind of far away. He’s not like our dogs where they’re domesticated and they like to be around. He’s a bush dog. So we’re going to just presume that the universe sent him to us for a reason, right? Maybe he’s going to save one of our lives someday.

He’s a very smart dog. Very smart dog, yes. So what did the vet say the species was? It was a Siberian Husky. How do you say Siberian Husky in street talk? Jiberian Shepsky. Jiberian Shepsky. So he’s a Husky plus a German Shepherd. So we know he’s going to be good for the cold. He’s going to have a nice big thick coat, be good for the winter. He’s good for pest control. When you’re trying to grow food on a homestead, the gophers will completely tear up your garden. It was an interesting lesson because on the one hand, you want to teach your kids to be generous and to be helpful to people or things, life forms in need.

But at the same time, you also have to show them that you have to draw the line somewhere. And this is an important SHTF preparedness lesson because someday, you know, somebody might come to you for help. And it’s important to know where that line is going to be, how much you’re going to be able to help people. We had to draw the line the following day when another dog came into the yard. And of course, the kids wanted to keep that one too. And this is when we had to explain to them, look, we’re going to do our best.

You show generosity when you can, but there’s also a limit to it. We were considering getting another dog anyways, because our dogs are getting up there in years. We want to make sure that there’s always a dog who knows the property. It’s a bit of an ethical dilemma that is going to present itself at some point if you find yourself in a similar situation where you might have a place of hospice and you’ll be forced to either turn somebody away or hopefully lend a helping hand. And of course, it’s a mutual relationship because he immediately showed that he’s a country dog.

And our dogs are domesticated dogs. Well, they’re still good guard dogs generally. They don’t have that bush dog sense about them. There’s something about a bush dog. You know, this is all he’s ever known. And I also know that if we couldn’t feed him for some reason, he can survive off of rodents. I’m not saying he’s solely going to be able to subsist off of that or anything, but it’s just something to keep in mind. So it’s a mutual relationship. So I guess what I’m trying to say is that if people were to come to you in times of need, you also have to consider what they have to offer in terms of their services.

If we’re talking about an apocalypse situation, how you vet that individual to figure out who they are and what their intentions are and what their history was. I don’t necessarily have the recipe for that yet. That’s going to be, I guess, on a case by case basis. Anyways, that’s the moral of the story. It was difficult because you want to teach your kids that there’s a limit, but you also want to be able to teach them that, you know, when you have a surplus and to also get them to see the value in things.

So it’s not just necessarily a charity, but you’re also getting something in return because this dog is going to protect this space. It is going to keep the animals out of our orchard, and it’s already done that. The best way to support this channel is to support yourself by gearing up at CanadianPreparedness.com where you’ll find high quality survival gear at the best prices, no junk and no gimmicks. Use discount code PreppingGear for 10% off. Don’t forget the strong survive, but the prepared thrive. Stay safe. [tr:trw].

See more of Canadian Prepper on their Public Channel and the MPN Canadian Prepper channel.