{"id":132943,"date":"2025-08-09T23:36:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T23:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/132943\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T23:36:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T23:36:14","slug":"do-i-need-to-purchase-camels-australian-preppers-have-found-their-voice-since-covid-but-tough-questions-remain-australia-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/132943\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Do I need to purchase camels?\u2019 Australian preppers have found their voice since Covid, but tough questions remain | Australia news"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shortly after Israel announced its attack on Iran<\/a> in June, Trevor Andrei sent a message to some of his fellow Australian preppers telling them to stock up on petrol and buy a few hundred dollars\u2019 worth of groceries.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was like, OK, this is super significant, there\u2019s going to be a response \u2026 shit\u2019s going to go down,\u201d Andrei says. \u201cMost years, [Australia is] lucky if we\u2019ve got 28 days [of petrol reserve] so \u2026 if anything hits the world\u2019s oil supply, we can be out of petrol in a month.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andrei describes himself as Australia\u2019s most famous prepper and is one of the few happy to speak publicly about a famously secretive subculture.<\/p>\n

The survivalist runs bushcraft courses (two hours for $299), makes and sells soap with his daughter, makes his own jerky, and has a property with fruit trees and a dam full of rainbow trout. He has great relationships with his farmer neighbours, he says \u2013 he\u2019ll process lambs mutilated by foxes so that the meat can be shared around the community for pet food, and when a tree comes down on one of their properties, Andrei will chop it up in exchange for some of the haul. He has formerly worked as a landscaper specialising in edible gardens and a tour guide in the outback.<\/p>\n

In short, when shit hits the fan (SHTF, in prepper parlance), Andrei is going to be all right.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s not so sure about the rest of us.<\/p>\n

Ready or not \u2026 prepper Trevor Andrei. Photograph: Steve Womersley\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cShit hits the fan every day,\u201d he says. \u201cIt just matters how close you are to the fan and whether or not it splattered on you, right? But the real shit hits the fan is what we call a fire sale, right? And that\u2019s where it\u2019s literally everything that could go wrong has gone wrong \u2026 So the pointy end of the scale is, you imagine like a cyberwar: there\u2019s no gas, there\u2019s no water, there\u2019s no electricity, you can\u2019t flush your toilet, there\u2019s no radio.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery single day of your life you have expected to \u2026 put some food on a plate and stick it in your mouth. So why would you not prepare for that ahead of time? There are so many people who don\u2019t do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

And yet increasingly, it seems, there are more and more people across Australia who do.<\/p>\n

Global instability and the abrupt arrival of AI are among the factors that have pushed prepping towards the mainstream. But the biggest driver was the pandemic, when people experienced empty supermarket shelves and the pain of disrupted global supply chains \u2013 some for the first time in their lives.<\/p>\n

For preppers such as Andrei, who see how most urban Australians live, this move towards preparedness cannot come soon enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cPrepping is becoming super super super popular. I\u2019ve got schools that want me to teach it,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019d be mad, anybody would be mad if they\u2019re not sitting there going, all right, what\u2019s going on? And what should we do?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018In cities there\u2019s so many fragile people\u2019<\/p>\n

Sam and Candice Johnson are not preppers, but they deal with preppers almost daily.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just country-prepared, as we say,\u201d Candice says. \u201cWe\u2019ve always got that little bit of extra in case you get flooded in or you have to leave home quickly in case of fires, but other than that I wouldn\u2019t consider ourselves preppers.\u201d<\/p>\n

The couple run a camping store in Beaudesert, Queensland, an hour west of the Gold Coast. A little over a decade ago, they saw a gap in the market and began stocking emergency kits \u2013 containing items such as wind-up radios, torches, batteries and glowsticks \u2013 to have on hand in the event of natural disasters.<\/p>\n

But over the years, customers began asking if they could stock more serious survival supplies. Now the store supplies most of the country with everything from freeze-dried foods to mylar bags, fire-starting kits, camouflage netting, snares and traps.<\/p>\n

Creating a little elasticity in your existence so you can deal with crisis is a very healthy thing<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bradley Garrett<\/p>\n

\u201cThe majority of our customers are those who want to be long-term prepared, so they\u2019re the people who\u2019ve got, you know, a couple of months\u2019 worth of food stored away, or they\u2019ve got emergency water filters,\u201d Candice says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we started \u2026 [prepping] was a really underground, quiet kind of thing. But that\u2019s increased 10-fold, twentyfold, thirtyfold.\u201d<\/p>\n

Covid was a big factor, she says. \u201cPeople who didn\u2019t understand what the whole thing was about previously, now had some kind of context as to why other people were doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

That removed some of the stigma as well. \u201cPeople are seeming less quiet about it. Before we\u2019d get lots of customers who wouldn\u2019t give us their name and they\u2019d only pay cash and all this sort of stuff, but now, people are much more open and accepting of it and willing to admit that it\u2019s something that they do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bradley Garrett, a geographer who has researched preppers around the world, interviewing more than a hundred of them for his book, Bunker<\/a>, says there is a distinct difference between Australian preppers and those in the US, that seems to stem from a different level of trust in the government.<\/p>\n

Bradley Garrett says Donald Trump\u2019s return to the US presidency has driven a rise in prepping in that country<\/p>\n

\u201cMy experience talking to preppers in Australia is they\u2019re much more concerned with practical prepping, as we call it \u2013 prepping for a wildfire or a blackout for three days or a week, or the taps turning off, or whatever. It seems to me like there is an expectation that help is going to arrive at some point \u2026 whereas with American preppers, they\u2019re much more concerned that help is not going to arrive and you\u2019re on your own. And that\u2019s certainly become exacerbated under the second Trump administration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Garrett says there is a lot more openness towards prepping in Australia than in the US, largely because of a culture \u201cof loading up your overland vehicle and going out to campsites and staying out for multiple days\u201d. But there is also a huge split between the preparedness and resilience of people in cities and those in rural areas.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn cities, God, there\u2019s so many fragile people that are totally dependent upon the next paycheque and systems being in working order \u2026 There are a lot of people who really would not fare well in a dire emergency.\u201d<\/p>\n

Garrett says when he started researching prepper culture he was one of these typical, fragile, middle-class Sydneysiders.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I had my position at the University of Sydney and I had a steady paycheque and we went to the gym and we did all the things that you do as a middle-class Sydney person, it was fine, there was nothing wrong with it, but the more I talked to these people, the more I realised, if something went wrong with this, I couldn\u2019t deal with it. Like we had no reserves, we had no resiliency.\u201d<\/p>\n

Garrett eventually adopted some prepper practices: he came up with a plan for what to do if he turned the taps on one day and no water came out.<\/p>\n

He had a Jeep packed with camping gear and a \u201cmental map\u201d of his surroundings and a plan for where he could go if his city home became unsafe (drive his Jeep south into the national park) as well as a backup plan \u2013 a few kayaks tied up on a nearby beach, so he and his wife could \u201ctake to the water\u201d and get out of the city that way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started thinking more about how much money do we have in the bank, and what resources do we have if suddenly the grocery stores weren\u2019t open, you know?<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople don\u2019t necessarily need to move, but creating a little elasticity in your existence so you can deal with crisis is a very healthy thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Bug in\u2019 or \u2018bug out\u2019?<\/p>\n

On one of Australia\u2019s most popular prepper Facebook pages the discussion bounces from the mundane (\u201cDoes anyone have any recommendations for good quality but affordable Mylar bags and oxygen absorbers?\u201d) to the portentous: \u201cWhen China spits the dummy with Australia, the sea lanes will be cut and our imported food will stop. Stock up on all you can.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In between posts offering advice on the best storage of rice (white apparently stores much better than brown \u2013 \u201cthe lesser of two weevils,\u201d a commenter quips) \u2013 and the discussion about the battery life of the Nokia 3210, there are questions about the best mode of transport. \u201cWhen the lights go out \u2026 do I need to purchase horses? Camels?\u201d<\/p>\n

When someone, for the first time in their life, creates a fire out of two sticks, the way their face lights up is phenomenal<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Holly Robertson<\/p>\n

Others present detailed plans of how people would or should survive should the worst happen.<\/p>\n

One user posts an ominous checklist of what to do on \u201cday one \u2026 immediately after the collapse\u201d. The list runs: secure your perimeter, fill bathtubs and bowls with water while it\u2019s still running, radio check your crew and decide whether to \u201cbug in or bug out\u201d, but make that decision early, as \u201ctraffic jams and gunfire don\u2019t mix\u201d.<\/p>\n

Whether to \u201cbug in\u201d or \u201cbug out\u201d is a key question for hardcore preppers. Bugging in means people plan to stay put in their home, which should be well stocked with supplies, well hidden and whose existence should not be disclosed to anyone, lest marauders come.<\/p>\n

Bugging out means leaving, with either a \u201cbug out bag\u201d \u2013 a short-term emergency kit \u2013 or an Inch (I\u2019m never coming home) bag with supplies to enable indefinite survival.<\/p>\n

Andrei forages for edible greens near his home in Victoria. Photograph: Steve Womersley\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Andrei plans to bug in, but thinks building a bespoke bunker full of supplies is quite stupid. That would make them a \u201csoft, high-yield target\u201d for \u201cwolves\u201d \u2013 his term for marauders who would seek out a bunker, smoke out the occupants and steal their supplies.<\/p>\n

Holly Robertson, who identifies as a \u201cbush survivalist\u201d rather than a prepper, agrees.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, I don\u2019t identify with prepper culture, but I do see myself as someone who\u2019s prepared. When people know that you have a stockpile, that\u2019s where they\u2019re going to go first. But if you\u2019re someone who can literally take a knife or a machete and go into the bush and make your own fire friction kit and make your cordage and make your traps, that\u2019s powerful. Like, that\u2019s a skill set that people really value. They\u2019re not going to try and steal from you, they want to have you in their space. So for me, leading with skill set and knowledge is far more powerful than having a stockpile of things.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Bush survivalist\u2019 Holly Robertson demonstrates how to start a fire. Photograph: Charlie Sambrook<\/p>\n

Robertson stands out from many in the bush survivalist community for a few reasons: she is 25, female and has an Instagram account<\/a> with nearly 55,000 followers.<\/p>\n

She became interested in this world a few years ago when she was holidaying near Byron Bay. She went to a bush survival school run by a man known as Cockatoo Paul, who would eventually become both her life and business partner.<\/p>\n

Paul died a year ago, and Robertson now runs the Australian Bush Survival School as a mobile business, travelling all over Australia to run everything from children\u2019s workshops to corporate retreats, teaching skills such as trapping, tracking, spear throwing, knot-tying, skin tanning, friction fires, water purification and basic navigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, the majority of the skills I teach people, they\u2019re probably never going to use again in their life. I hope they\u2019re never in a survival situation. But what I do see is a sense of empowerment and confidence through capability. When someone, for the first time in their life, creates a fire out of two sticks, the way their face lights up is phenomenal.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people \u2026 in my generation \u2026 they don\u2019t know how to light a fire. And if the power went out, they would have literally no idea what to do whatsoever. A lot of our grandparents, they\u2019ve lived in the bush and they\u2019re super capable \u2026 so what I really want to see for my generation is how we can really step up and become more self-reliant.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HollyHolly Robertson, who runs Australian Bush Survival School, wants her generation to become more self-reliant. Photograph: Charlie Sambrook\/Holly Robertson\u2018It\u2019s not fine to obsess\u2019<\/p>\n

While many interviewees stress the importance of resilience, capability and community, some also warn there can be a dangerous element to prepper culture.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately some very vulnerable people fall into that demographic and they find a lot of serious consequences down the line,\u201d says John Scarinci, the secretary general of the Australian Peoples Survival League (formerly the Australian Preppers Survival League).<\/p>\n

Scarinci says for some people, prepping can become a \u201clife-overtaking exercise\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey find themselves in trouble later in life because they\u2019ve just spent their life savings [and] years roll on, decades \u2026 and they\u2019ve amassed a huge amount of preparatory items and they\u2019ve forgotten about their own health and wellbeing, and the world has not collapsed and they find themselves in a spot of bother.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some find they have spent decades preparing for the end of the world, but not for retirement or aged care. For others, prepping comes at huge cost to relationships.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir partners may potentially leave them because they\u2019re so fixated with their preparations, where they\u2019re preparing for the doomsday occurrence and it just engulfs them. They\u2019re unable to work, because how are you going to fit in \u2026 a career whilst being fixated on preparing your jars of food and your freeze-dried items?\u201d<\/p>\n

Garrett says he has also seen people who started prepping on a \u201clow level\u201d, dedicating more and more of their resources and mental energy to it.<\/p>\n

\u201cEventually families start to get frustrated [and ask] \u2018What are we doing here? We\u2019re spending more time anxious about the future than we are worrying about the present, or enjoying the present.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt happens a lot, because prepping is a thought experiment, so once you start to think, \u2018How do we escape from a bushfire?\u2019 then you start thinking, well, what if there was a nuclear attack? What if all the cyber systems are down and we have to flee? What if AI turns on us? It can become a bridge to conspiracy theory and the guardrails you have to put in place are just understand that, yeah, it\u2019s fine to think about these things, but it\u2019s not fine to obsess over them.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Garrett says becoming more prepared has made him far more peaceful, rather than anxious.<\/p>\n

He eventually moved away from his middle-class Sydney life, returning to his native US, where he lives on a five-acre property in rural California. He and his wife grow their own food, have horses and are gradually taking the property off-grid.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings can definitely go wrong in our lives and I\u2019m totally capable of dealing with them \u2026 It\u2019s given me a sense of solace that not only do we have the resources we need to get through something, but I\u2019ve spent years now upskilling in various things \u2026 I just learned how to lay pipes in the yard \u2026 or I learned how to put in an electrical socket or fix our breaker if it goes out. All those sort of DIY practical skills. Every time I learn something, then I think, \u2018Oh this is fantastic\u2019 because if something goes wrong, I don\u2019t have to call someone to deal with this \u2013 I can deal with it.\u201d<\/p>\n