You Can't Get Anything at Alice's Restaurant
6 hours ago
Friday, August 4, 2017
Your Garden Won't Feed You
Don't count on your garden feeding you in a collapse situation. I don't care if you are a really good gardener and are currently growing a lot of your food now. In a collapse situation that food might go to someone else.
Gardens are easy to raid. I bet you have a good idea about who has a garden in your neighborhood and who doesn't. If you have a garden, people know. If food is in short supply everyone will be thinking a lot about your garden. Unless it's fenced in and under 24/7 guard it will become a target.
Right now in “normal” times, I know people who have problems with their gardens being raided. A friend has neighbors who are all upper middle class to outright rich. He isn't and depends on the food he grows. His neighbors think nothing of walking off with veggies. Imagine how it will be when times get bad.
When times are truly tight, people won't even wait for the food to grow. They will come in the night and dig up your seed potatoes right out of the ground. Weeks later you will wonder why your potato crop never came up. It's happened in the past. It will happen in the future.
So what can you do? Store a lot of stored food and write off the garden, at least for the first year. If you are in a rural off the the beaten path place, your garden might stand a chance -if guarded. Having hidden garden patches can work. The trick is that they have to be plant them and forget them crops, like sunchokes. If you have to hike out to your secret plots every couple of days it won't work. Every time you leave your homestead, you are in a higher danger situation. You could be followed to those plots. Going there all the time will make trails for others to follow. Remember to bring a guard to watch your back as your work.
Hungry people are desperate people. Your garden does not stand a chance against the human locusts.
-Sixbears
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That is only true if you are unwilling to decorate the landscape with dead humans. Shit dipped Punji traps, land mines, and crucifixion all tend to discourage the unwanted. Make a pile of heads 1000 yards out with a sign " beyond this point lays death" and even the most desperate will turn away. It's all in how you "word" "NO".
ReplyDeleteCan you grow enough food to feed the troops needed to protect the food? Do you end up with too many acres to defend for the number of defenders? The math gets interesting.
DeleteThe invaders may be numerous, feeding off the MREs of a more prosperous time. They know they need your land for the long term. In the short term, they can overwhelm you.
I'd rather eat pine bark and beetles.
I have to agree - desperate people go to extreme measures to feed themselves and / or their families. Having a garden will make you a target, whether you already share or not.
ReplyDeleteOne possibility - know how to identify what grows naturally in your area and how to process it into food. Identify areas of where it grows and have the means to transport it from there to your location. Any food raids that occur will likely happen 'out there'.
Sobering topic. Have a good weekend.
People in remote locations with low population density have a better chance of foraging wild foods. There are still security issues, but I'm sure some will survive using that method.
DeleteI feel sorry for the people who bought the "Can of Seeds" thinking they have a years worth of food in that can. That's simply not possible except for the highly skilled gardener and then they fall into the "How Do You Defend Your Garden" while it's growing.
ReplyDeleteBest thing is to have a reserve of foods for a year or more. Just look at Venezuela and all those hungry people, if they know you have a garden it will be bare by the morning.
Another consideration is that Venezuela is just one country in serious trouble. There is food and supplies in abundance outside the country. People with means can still spend their way out of trouble.
DeleteIf the whole world is going under, it's a different can of worms entirely.
You bring up a good point that those seeds will only be of use to those with the skill set. There is a lot more to gardening than putting seeds in a hole.
I remember the story of the farmer who grew watermelons. Once they started to ripen he would be missing one every day so he put out a sign saying "one of these is poisoned" hoping to deter theft. The next morning when he went out there was another sign that said "now there are two".
ReplyDeleteOuch! Cruel, yet clever.
DeleteYikes. I've been kinda lax in the prep department. Some stuff done, but thanks to my son, our family had a meaningful discussion about being more prepared just this weekend. Your blog today just drives the point home more than ever and given me food for thought regarding open gardens, food supplies etc. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteYou are welcome. A little food insurance is a good thing. Could be interesting times ahead.
DeleteWe have several years worth of staples such as wheat , beans , rice and sugar etc.
ReplyDeleteKnowing that after a couple years the time for farming will become more possible. Once the competition thins.
Thinking that two years minimum before it is safe enough to start planting.
So at a minimum you need here years storage food and five might be better !
Here in Florida, a person can subsist entirely by foraging. With knowledge !!
My wife and I have been taking classes for several years now with a local foraging expert. " Eat the weeds " with Green Dean.
Look him up he has a web site under that name and puts out a monthly news letter with info and class schedule.
Much of his info applies elsewhere in the country too.
Plan ahead , so that you aren't forced to eat long pork !!!!
Long pork is not my thing. Filthy animals with high toxin loads and diseases.
DeleteForaging in FL is a whole different thing. I have to travel miles to gather the same food value you can get in hundreds of feet.
I should brush up on my FL foraging skills since I'll be down again this winter. Thanks for the Green Dean info.
Yes, eat the weeds and landscape with edibles. We know of at least a dozen things that can be grown and won't be recognized by the general public as food.
ReplyDeleteI've actually lived by foraging to see what it's like. Generally pretty time consuming and you eat some weird things.
DeleteFishing can be a pretty efficient way of getting a lot of quality food. I happen to live on a lake, so that helps.
We live a half mile from the Red River and people here eat catfish. I'm not able to eat them. But we have lots of wild hogs, squirrels, deer and wild turkeys. Older people are going to have a time digesting what is available I'm afraid.
ReplyDeleteI'm told that during the depression all the game disappeared from the woods around here. I bet it won't take long for the game to disappear again.
DeleteYes , when folks tell me they're going to hunt in order to survive...don't look back on their record of success vs time spent. Plus as you stated, back in the depression the game darn near went extinct. Just think what will happen with three times more people now than then eh. Same with fish stocks will deplete very quickly...
DeleteYet foraging , hardly anyone knows what is edible now days. So will remain fairly plentiful.
I'm willing to eat a lot of weird stuff like rock tripe and the inner bark of pine trees.
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ReplyDeleteTexas and Oklahoma are plagued by THOUSANDS & THOUSANDS of feral hogs. In Oklahoma alone, they are over a million strong. While I am sure they aren't the only answer to having food available, maybe it will take a while to kill them all (I hope). There are so many hogs, Texas passed a law last February saying they were going to poison them. They rescinded it when all the hunters kicked up a fuss.
ReplyDeleteI don't put my eggs all in one basket, but look at all the options we have available in our region. Some people even eat the rattlesnakes around here and there all a lot of savvy Choctaw and Cherokee Indians hanging out around the river.
Every area is different. I'd much rather eat wild hog than long pig.
DeleteA stupid question on my part. What is long pig?
ReplyDeleteWhat your unprepared neighbor will be eating....or become buwahaha !
DeleteGot that right Spud.
DeleteLong pig is human flesh. Ugly topic, I know.