fallout

I got my radiation detector out and fixed it up (currently displaying the one min. count)

I was considering what fallout would do to my crops,
so I found a book on the topic: Radioactive fallout in soils, crops and food
read it here
http://www.fao.org/docrep/T0228E/T0228E00.htm

I am not down wind of a reactor, so I have not much to worry about here, so I printed it out and will read it if I need it, will read it this winter when I have nothing to do.

the general idea is that fallout settles on plant leaves first thing,
so leafy crops are not so good (like spinach),
things like milk are worse because the cows eat the grass and then the radiation gets concentrated into the milk...
after the radiation has a while to sink into the soil, then it is the root crops that are not so safe,
and later is sucked up by things like apple trees,
according to the info I read from the 1960's the corn and wheat in the field will be just fine as the winnowing will blow all the radioactive dust off, but I suspect the book I linked to has way more updated and detailed info.

one of the big things to think about is that you will likely want a root cellar anyway, and not hard at all to make a root cellar that is also a fallout shelter
here is a neat PDF that also has instructions for how to build fallout shelters, and a few look like they would make great root cellars
http://www.ki4u.com/nwss.pdf (30mb)

just another reason to store lots of water and have a huge diversity of crops.

the kitties are so cute