hi folks im putting together a basic diaster-preparedness kit for my home.

in doug's article he recommends at least one gallon per person per day. now im not familiar with gallons but according to onlineconversion.com 1 gallon = 3.785 litres (there are actually several types of gallons!)

anyway, considering my household has 12 mouths to feed (6 human, 2 canine, 4 feline), that works out to 12*3*3.785 = 136.26litres for 72hours!!!!! thats an insane amount of water!!

granted, cats wouldnt need that much but still even if i round down to a 100litres its still a huge amount of space to occupy beneath the stairs...

is one gallon fairly conservative or am i just wholly ignorant of the true amount of water i consume a day? in fact doug actually recommends FIVE gallons, but i dont think that would be practical for my situation.

i havent even counted the many koi fish in my pond. poor guys if shtf i really dont know what i could do for them (animal lover as u can tell:)

another thing: what type of foods do you recommend? since complex carbs are recommended, will simple dry biscuits and some cans of baked beans be alright? i dont really want to spend much on specialized MREs and such.

thanks for help!