Feeding Dogs in an Emergency Situation

The situation in Japan after the earthquake, tsunami, and resulting nuclear issues woke me up to how unprepared I am to feed the dogs in a LONG-term emergency situation. We’d be fine for a few days for sure, maybe even a couple of weeks, but longer than that? I just don’t know.

It’s shaping up to be a TERRIBLE wildfire season here. We’ve seen almost no significant snow all winter (on our side of the Continental Divide). Tom went to a wildland meeting / training recently where fire officials predict LOW precipitation and HIGH temps through at least July.

IN FACT, we’ve had a wildfire burning nearby since Sunday. You can see updates and some photos on our Champion of My Heart Facebook Fan Page, but  I’ll try to tell that whole story next week here on the blog.

For now, let’s just continue with this stuck-at-home-in-an-emergency scenario.

Our Evacuation Kit

I’ve posted before about what’s in our dog evacuation kit, but I probably need to update that for this summer just to be sure we have everything we need now that the dogs are older and such.

I never did get around to making an evacuation kit for the people here at Chez Champion of My Heart, so I suppose I need to do that too. I think I might include a tent and sleeping bags … just in case we ended up at some emergency shelter that didn’t allow dogs. We could make do with the car, the crates, and a tent, I think.

When I bought a much smaller, more fuel-efficient car in 2009, we kept my old, old 4Runner (which I adore). In the winter, we use it to plow our driveway, and … as needed … we use it to drive Ginko to the veterinarian because while he can fit into my car, it’s not as comfortable or easy for any of us.

There is no way, however, to transport both dogs  — in crates — in there. I mean, if I had to make a break for it, and it was my only option, I’d do it, of course. BUT …

If we had to evacuate and had at least a little time to react, I would load up the 4Runner because it can:

  • Hold both dog crates
  • Fit any supplies we need for them and for us
  • Drive across any good or bad road around here, if our main road was closed for some reason

dog blog, emergency preparedness tips, food storage, dog food storageBUT, What if We Had to “Shelter in Place”

I’m not one of those the-end-is-near types. Truly, I’m not. But, if some unforeseen event left us stuck on the mountain for a long while, without any access to supplies, I’m fairly sure I could feed us people for an extended period of time (lots of rice and beans, if necessary), but I worry about the dogs.

Sure, they could eat rice with us, but I cannot imagine them doing really well on only vegetarian sources of protein.

I buy a month’s worth of kibble at a time, but what if something happened when our bag was low? I suppose I could stash a couple cases of a good canned dog food. But, if we were looking at something truly long term, I think the dogs would have to eat what we eat … which is fine, I know … I just did a series of Q&A’s for my Dog Food Dish blog on homemade dog food.

All this wondering (and likely unnecessarily worrying) makes me want to stock up on canned meats (chicken in a can creeps me out the least … and Ginko can’t have canned fish anyway because of a weird intolerance for it).

One of my new favorite blogs, Attainable Sustainable, posted these emergency preparedness tips, including food options, and also linked to this piece on stocking up for serious food storage.

I’ll have to see about how such advice can be adapted to include dogs.

How about you? Do you have a plan for feeding yourself and your pups in the event of a long-term emergency?

I’ll report back on our emergency plan efforts here, but I’d love to hear more about what you have in place too.