Useful prepper skills to learn before SHTF

Some of these skills are necessary, some not, all are useful

NOT IN ANY SPECIFIC ORDER

* backpacking, hiking, camping
- wilderness survival skills
- endurance
- carrying necessities with you
- hiking and hiking related problems
- camping

* shelter
- build a temporary shelter
- portable shelter – tents, ponchos, tarps
- build a house
- construct all the necessary small buildings at your homestead, from rabbit coops to silos
- without powertools
- making everything you need yourself, from planks to nails, from cellars to roofs
- maintaining this

* water skills
- finding water
- well engineering and care
- water purification
- collecting and storing water
- greywater
- hygiene/sanitation without water
- saving water
- dealing with drought and flood
- filtration weir
- rain barrels work
- building a still

* fire
- 101 ways to start a fire in all circumstances and environments
- how to extinguish fire; fire fighting, wildfires, home fires
- making charcoal and briquettes
- making wastepaper logs
- charcloth
- making firemaking tools, like matchsticks

* energy
 - sun, wind, water as power source (don't forget steam!)
- harnessing man- and animal power
- making man-powered machines
- making clockwork-powered machines
- alternative fuels. Learn to make biofuel. Biodiesel?
- lubrication?
- making oil of plastic! That would be really handy.
- how to deal with power outage
- generators
- heating, light alternatives
- making batteries, how can you make a battery rechargeable by sunlight

* light
- making candles and candlewicks
- making lamps and lamp fuel
- lanterns

* beekeeping
- beeswax processing and crafts
- honey processing

* hunting and trapping - knowing the local game, their lifestyle
- tracking
- how to kill an animal
- how to prepare, butcher, cut and clean an animal
- how to preserve the meat
- hot to prepare all parts of an animal for use and how to use them
-- hide tanning
-- leather work
-- scrimshaw
- hunting using quiet weapons like bows, slingshots, knives, and spears
- hunting with dogs, hawks?

* fishing
- different fishing methods and tools
- cleaning the catch
- preparing the catch
- preserving the catch
- don't forget fish leather!
- don't forget amphibians and reptiles
* insects, amphibians and reptiles- edible insects, amphibians and reptiles
- poisonous insects, amphibians and reptiles
- preparing and cooking
- what to do with the inedible things - things like snake skin and bones and insect wings - is there any use for these things? Can you use them to make for example fishing lures?


* foraging - the act of searching for provisions of any kind
- food, wild food, gathering
- maple and birch syrup and sugar - collecting and processing
- obtainium, urban foraging
- reusing, recycling, upcycling, repairing and repurposing things
- ways to use common garbage, like cans, glass, paper

Hackett is great with urban foraging

* herbalism
- all the uses of the local plants
-- food
-- medicine
-- flavoring
-- fibers
-- dyeing
-- basketry
-- construction material
-- other uses

* gardening
- permaculture
- aquaponics
- windowsill garden (you can grow coffee beans, some spices and exotic fruits like lemons in your home)
- container gardening
- vertical gardening
- hanging gardens
- organic gardening
- composting
- seed saving
- tobacco plant and how to prepare it for smoking
- sugar beets and how to process them into sugar (you can also grow sorghum for sorghum syrup and stevia)

* animal husbandry
- rabbits and other small meat animals
- goats
- sheep and other fiber producers (There are rabbits and goats that produce fibers, too)
- horses and other pack and draft animals
- chicken and other poultry
- shelter, feeding, health care, proper care
- preparing and using the resources; eggs, milk, meat, leather, workpower...
- training
- breeding

* cooking
- with and without electricity
- in home and outdoors
- urban and wilderness
- alternative cooking methods
- extract salt from salt water
- how to make gelatine and what can be used to replace it

* food preservation
 - canning, both in glass and tin (learn to make tincans and seal them)
- charkuterie (salting, smoking, curing, drying, sausagemaking)
- dehydrating
- salting
- preserving in sugar or honey
- smoking
- pickling
- canning (learn both the canning in glass and the canning in tins)
- jellying
- jugging
- fermenting (you can make pretty good tea substitute by fermenting raspberry leaves!)
- other ways like lye and burying
- learn to make vinegar

* baking
- especially bread
- milling
- baking without electricity
- how to make sourdough

* dairy
- butter
- cheese
- other milk products, like yoghurt, sourcream etc.

* home brewing
- beer
- ale
- mead
- cider
- wine
- distillation of spirits

* security
- how to protect your home, land, crop, animals, family, yourself and everything you have
- against other people, wild animals, weather, catastrophes and accidents
- learn to use, maintain and store weapons
- learn martial arts
- learn hand-to-hand combat and self-defence
- mantraps, snares, pepper spray and security dog training? Mace, stun-gun, club? swords?
- evasion
- hiding
- defence
- prevention
- alarm, securing the perimeter, watch
- ability to improvise weapons

* archery
- hunting
- making bow and arrows, arrow points and bowstrings

* firearm skills
- proper care of guns
- marksmanship
- knowing guns and ammunition
- gunsmithy;
- being able to make ammunition and reload it
- making weapon cleaning equipment, lubricants, holsters etc.
- making gunpowder
(additional skills here; making explosives and fireworks)

* blade skills
- using knife
- using axe
- using tomahawk?
- making blades; tools and weapons
- maintaining, repairing, restoring blades

* medical skills
- first aid, CPR, trauma
- preparing the first aid equipment 
- home and wilderness pharmacy
- emergency medic
- nurse
- midwife
- broken bones and open wounds
- allergies
- army medic skills
- EMT (emergency medical technician)
- preventive health care
- antibiotics
- veterinary skills
- dentist skills
- pharmacy skills

* hygiene and sanitation
- how to clean everything without water
- how to make soap, detergents, cleaning supplies, shampoo, toothpaste, deodorant...
- human waste management
- what to use in stead of toilet paper
- "Learning how to build a composting toilet, a solar hot water heater, or a sewer drainage system is important."
- soap making
- making other cleaning substances agents and equipment
- learn to shave with a straight razor (also other people - I bet people will appreciate a good shave - as they did 100 years ago...)
- how to make feminine hygiene products
- how to make and use cloth diapers
- learn to make cosmetics and make-up - can be used in trading, as luxury items, that make people feel normality. Don't underestimate people's need of luxuries and normality!
- another luxury item that isn't that hard to learn to do if you learn to do cosmetics and cleaning agents - it's just simple chemistry - is perfumes

* navigation - orienteering
- map reading
- using compass
- wayfinding

* communication
- HAM radio
- electrics, small appliances, technician skills, broadcasting skills, signalling, antennas...
- morse code
- backup communication – CB, walkie-talkie, ham radio
- smoke signals
- how to talk to anyone
- non-violent crowd control methods
- how to handle and calm down people
- how to stop a fight before it begins, and how to stop it after it had began
- negotiation
- languages
- coding and decoding

* transport
- ability to drive any vehicle, from bicycles and horses to planes and helicopters. Cars, trucks, motorcycles and tractor, of course
- hotwiring
- maintenance, fixing things, repairs, mechanics
- how to harness an animal, shoeing a horse etc.
- water transport, like sailing, canoeing, boating
- physical transport - climbing, running, walking, swimming, parkour

* fitness skills
- strength, flexibility, endurance
- callisthenics and using what can be found as exercise equipment
- correct ways of running, climbing, swimming, lifting
- how to save your energy and spare your body

* handyman, jack-of-all-trades
- ability to use tools
- ability to improvise tools
- ability to make tools
- repairing, restoring and maintaining tools (you can start collecting old tools from garage sails etc. and restore them, to have something to sell when SHTF)
- fix-it
- fencing; making fencing and fencing equipment
- plumbing
- electrical skills
- woodworking, carpentry, whittling
- woodturning
- making barrels, vats, buckets of wood
- basket weaving
- pottery
- paper crafts, paper making, paper mache. cardboard constructions
- making glass, blowing glass, cutting glass, setting glass, melting glass
- making glues and adhesives for different uses

* metal skills
- precious metals
- coin collecting
- collecting gold, silver and copper
- melting and casting metal
- blacksmithy
- welding
- tinning, tinsmithing - making household items, like buckets
- how to melt and form aluminium - how to make water canteens and cooking pots of aluminium?
- drawing wire
- wirework
- learn to make hardware like nuts, bolts and nails

* fiber crafts
- mending, patching, fixing clothing and textiles
- making clothes
- making underwear like bras and jockstraps (items often forgotten but very important)
- making accessories, like bags, hats and shoes
- making home textiles like covers, cushions, curtains and towels
- rag crafts, rag weaving, patchwork
- quilting
- waxing and oiling fabric (for example coats and tarps)
- preparing plant and animal fibers for use
- different methods of preparing cloth
- plant dyeing and printing
- other ways of decorating
- making, maintaining, repairing the sewing equipment
- using and maintaining the sewing machine

* leather work
- preparing the hides for use
- shoemaking

* rope and string skills
- knotting
- braiding
- twining
- making string, twine, rope, cords

* entertainment
- storytelling
- music; instruments and singing
- circus, varietée, carnival skills
- games, board games, card games, ball games, party games, games that don't need any equipment
- sports
- toys - mechanical toys use a lot of physics that can be used in making other things. The basic mechanics, like levers and pulleys, clockwork and steam power are useful elsewhere as well

* teaching

* writing
- mainly for you to be able to put knowledge on paper, so that you can store it, collect it, sell it
- making writing supplies; pens and pencils, ink, paper

Things that sound interesting, but might need too much work for it to work

* how to turn plastic into oil
A Japanese man has invented a machine that turns plastic into oil that then can be refined into gasoline and other such oil derivates, and they say it should be commercially purchasable within years.

* lens making, optician skills
- a lot of use for this - like binoculars and glasses

* cutting and storing ice

Yes, I know it's Disney. And? 

It's quite ok presentation of ice harvesting and entertaining as well.