Tins/packets in the bin/recycling showing people that you have food

[Spaghetticarbanana]

I know this is rediculous, but whilst planning our cupboard DH and I have been wondering whether anyone is worried that (in worst case scenario obviously) the packaging from the food we have stored will show that we have stored, if you know what I mean?
We are a family of 6, so the tins would soon add up in the recycling.
I may have been watching too many of the paranoid type prepper vids
(not brexit related, I've always been interested in prepping)

use the cardboard for kindling.

open tins both ends and squash flat.

store the empty packages where you stored the food?

You could cut the tops and bottoms off your tins and flatten them to take up less space. Put a stack of them in the recycling together inside a tissue box. Or just store until you have a big batch and dispose of them elsewhere.

Or make buddy burners out of tuna tins.

You can burn paper packets but the coloured ink puts off a lot of black smoke.

You can melt folded up plastic packets so that they become a small pellet.

Or, just dispose of them off the premises if you can get out.

Ha ha ha. Worse case scenario? Recycling?

If its the apocalypse, i think its suffice to say, the bins and recycling wont be being collected. If there is a lack of food, who will be operating the bin lorries?!

This is truly truly unhinged.

If people are going to resort to burgling houses for food they will give it a go wether food is in evidence or not!

That is excellent advice! Thank you
We were wondering about a way to flatten tins, I'm obviously too sleep deprived from dc to work that one out.

Definitely the middle class prepping fear!!! Love the idea that no-one else will have any food to be making any bags of rubbish, yet the recycling will still be collected and recycling will actually matter.

they go fiarly flat with only one end open but even better if do two.

I squash tins as I hate going down to the reccling and faffing about pulling out the recycling bag and adding a few at a time... I have limited room in the flat so things get squashed.

If it's that bad, it's quite possible that bins won't be collected, so you don't need to leave then where contents can be examined by passers by.

(And you're more likely to be targeted simply because you're not acting hungry)

Haha, yes, everything will go on as normal, just with people quietly starving to death, whilst you eat your tins

You realise what you're worrying about is utterly, utterly ridiculous right? If you're worried that people, starving, desperate and fighting for food, are going to realise you have plenty because of your recycling you really have lost touch with any sense of reality. Trust me, in a post apocalyptic scenario the recycling definitely won't be collected.

Hahahahaha middle class prepping fear! Does that mean we've levelled up?
I'm not prepping for the apocalypse, or people starving to death. It's brexit, not the walking dead.

I see I caused some of the reaction with my worst case scenario comment.
To clarify, by that I definitely did not mean apocalypse, service shutdown and people starving to death. More like supply chain disruption.
Round here people break into houses to steal Dogs, bikes etc, whatever they fancy that you have so worrying about being robbed for food when people are hungry isn't actually that daft.

Wash tins out so they don't go smelly/attract rodents. Using the last of the washing up water will be fine. Flatten them, either store them in the house or drop them off at the usual supermarket carpark recycling point if safe to do so.

Likewise wash or rinse other containers.

Don't burn plastics... they give off deadly dioxins and other noxious chemicals.

Start a compost heap in the garden if you can. Even if all you can do is empty out tea bags/coffee grounds into a yoghurt pot on the draining board and distribute around you garden beds.

It's an unlikely scenario, but good practice to think through these things.

I think it's probably going a bit further than necessary, but if things really did go that bad I would
a) wash and squash all my tins (you can get a special can squashers for about £15 if you want) along with Tetrapaks, wash glass, and stick the lot (along with any paper, card etc) in the special council recycling bags in my cellar (too damp for anything else)
b) take landfill bags and put them some distance from my house at night (or potentially divide it into smelly and non-smelly rubbish and store the non-smelly in the cellar too.

... Useful thought experiment, but I really don't think it will come to that.

Dealing discreetly with rubbish is a prepper thing. It's something to think about as part of your grey man tactics.
I doubt that kind of level of prepper thinking is necessary for people putting extra aside for Brexit.
It's kind of a shame that general Preppers have to put a "this isn't about Brexit " proviso to every general prepper thread. I must take the blame because I have been sending people over to this topic for tips and it has kind of taken on a life of its own. Still, if it gets people thinking about building some resilience in and maybe a more homesteading kind of prepping "bug in"rather than "bug out" I suppose that's a good thing.

You think your home might get raided by neighbours if you put your empty baked beans tins out for the bin men? Is this an imminent concern? Where the hell do you live?

@ShatnersBassoon , it's a prepper thing. It's not a Brexit thing.
If you have nothing useful to add then I'm not sure why you have popped on.

I didn't think it was a Brexit thing

What worry requires this level of planning? What don't I know? I might be able to add something useful if I understand the context.

I now have visions of a midnight dash to dispose of squashed cans in someone elses bin

Probably some poor soul with no food who will be targeted

Ha ha ha. Worse case scenario? Recycling?

If its the apocalypse, i think its suffice to say, the bins and recycling wont be being collected. If there is a lack of food, who will be operating the bin lorries?!

This is truly truly unhinged.

Yes. Thank you OP. Haven't laughed like that for a while.

In 2017 refuse collection workers held strikes in Birmingham leading to streets filled with uncollected rubbish: thinking about how to handle your own waste in a general Prepper sense is sensible. Currently across the UK local councils are having to make millions of pounds of cuts, and some county councils are looking to merge district/borough councils to save money. This is actually happening although no one gives a toss because they are all harping on about Brexit, but it’s probably going to affect people just as much (if not more). Refuse collection has one of the highest Union memberships and if they strike it can affect everyone. Maybe if you have a lot of grounds yourself it’s not going to be an issue, but someone in a flat or house with limited outside space etc are going to struggle.

Disposing of rubbish so as not to alert others that you have stuff is probably less of a worry for most people. However in difficult times people do go through bins and rob their neighbours for food/drink: I’ve worked on estates where it happens and has done for years. As a local PC once told me: “there’s only one person more desperate than a addict, that’s a mother with kids to feed”

Quite right OP, post-brexit burglars in training, the anti-preppers, making notes on how to spot preppers and nick their stash. You cant be too careful..

Looks like the higher profile of the Preppers topic means we are going to get people popping on saying "you're mad, why are you doing this". More than usual .
I did an AMA a while ago to draw people away.
If you care that much, why not seek it out and ask me there.
Or pop on to The Litter Tray and say "cats are shit, why bother ?" Or Style and Beauty and say "why bother ".
I suppose it's a way to pass the time.

It's in active topics bellini. And tbf, it was a very silly question.

Not if you are a prepper it isn't. So, anyone popping on to the Litter Tray to tell them all cats are shit any time soon? That topic comes up in Active threads a lot.