Feeding Yourself and the Homestead when the SHTF

[FarmerDenise]

Icu4dzs, I totally agree. To be really prepared, you need to be able to survive without all your "stuff".
Where I live, violence is bound to happen. It is happening in an increased fashion already. I expect to have to evacuate. I have an emergency kit in my car. We have emergency kits stashed in other places. We discussed how we would move to safer grounds and what we would take. We try to educate ourselves in survival. We have liked camping, hiking and hunting and are learning more skills along those lines. We are also dehydrating food, since those take up less space and weight, when you are on the move. We have a place to go to, not too far from here, on less than one tank of gas and there is running water and it is in the hills.
We really cannot be completely prepared as such. but thinking about various scenarios and learning survival skills will go a long way to making me feel better for now and maybe, if I survive what ever causes the STHTF, I will be able to help start a new community and help others to survive better.

 

[Emerald]

Icu4dzs-I just read the book of the Road and it put me in the worst depression ever!(being a mom and gramma in menopause is the worst when it comes to sad stuff!) Everything about it was just so dismal, but it does make a person think hard about "What would you do? How far could you go?"
I also just watched a movie on cable called "Exit Speed" about a greyhound type bus with normal folks on it that gets attacked by a rouge biker gang in a very secluded area in TX and when they kill one of the group by accident and what happens after- all I could think about was the prepping that I have been doing. One scene really makes you think- a single mom who was trying to get back to her daughters having to defend herself and having to kill some one and all she could say as she was doing it is "I'm sorry, but I have to live, I'm a mom, I have to live" But she did what she had to do.
The Postman is a favorite of mine and I can't believe that it was not as well received. Better than waterworld, not as good as Dancing with wolves..
I do know how to make a water filter with what we have here and we do have a river and creek near and I am trying to talk the hubby into a few rain barrels so that even without SHTF I can water the garden without running the pump all day. But I really want a deep well hand pump but to buy one new and get it installed is almost $4000!
I also lucked out and found a hand cranked grain mill for $25 at the flea market, no one knew what it was! And while it does take a bit of fiddling the first few times you use it to figure out the grinds(fine/course etc.) and I had to double grind the wheat the first few times due to not setting it up tight enuf, it works fine.
Look for Porket grinders, they look almost like the Corona ones and work just as well.

 

[Wifezilla]

The Postman is a favorite of mine and I can't believe that it was not as well received.

Read the book. Even better than the movie.

 

[Icu4dzs]

Icu4dzs-I just read the book of the Road and it put me in the worst depression ever!(being a mom and gramma in menopause is the worst when it comes to sad stuff!) Everything about it was just so dismal, but it does make a person think hard about "What would you do? How far could you go?"
I also just watched a movie on cable called "Exit Speed" about a greyhound type bus with normal folks on it that gets attacked by a rouge biker gang in a very secluded area in TX and when they kill one of the group by accident and what happens after- all I could think about was the prepping that I have been doing. One scene really makes you think- a single mom who was trying to get back to her daughters having to defend herself and having to kill some one and all she could say as she was doing it is "I'm sorry, but I have to live, I'm a mom, I have to live" But she did what she had to do.
The Postman is a favorite of mine and I can't believe that it was not as well received. Better than waterworld, not as good as Dancing with wolves..
I do know how to make a water filter with what we have here and we do have a river and creek near and I am trying to talk the hubby into a few rain barrels so that even without SHTF I can water the garden without running the pump all day. But I really want a deep well hand pump but to buy one new and get it installed is almost $4000!
I also lucked out and found a hand cranked grain mill for $25 at the flea market, no one knew what it was! And while it does take a bit of fiddling the first few times you use it to figure out the grinds(fine/course etc.) and I had to double grind the wheat the first few times due to not setting it up tight enuf, it works fine.
Look for Porket grinders, they look almost like the Corona ones and work just as well.

Emerald et. al.,
I apologize if what I said "pushed one of your buttons" but I am glad it has helped to wake up the ability to ask many important questions.

I have been watching a number of the movies I mentioned and would add "Cast Away" with Tom Hanks to it. You might ask why that one? The reason is that I have been studying the characters of these movies for their ability and "preparedness". NEITHER was "prepared" but both had ability.

"WHere does the preparedness come from?" you ask...and my answer is simple. Do it now. If the only thing you can take with you resides in your own mind, the ability to do things is predicated on what you can imagine and create. We have an inordinate number of luxuries in this country and for what it is worth, many of the machines will be "LEFT BEHIND" in TSHTF scenario. Consult the military's survival manuals. There is a TV show on cable "man vs. wild" and that guy is really doing a wonderful job of teaching us preparedness in the most basic of manners. The SAS survival handbook and the US Army Survival handbook FM 21-76 is easily obtained. The SAS book is a bit better in my opinion. Euell Gibbons books are excellent. Learn the edible and medicinal plants of your area and the US for that matter. Some are universal. Not all we call weeds are useless or disposable. Ever eat purslane, dandylion, nasturtium, corn smut, just to name a few?

So you may ask is it important to "have things" or to be able to make things? and my answer is unequivocally "make things". Having the "stuff in your head" to be able to make things and the ability to create tools if you can't carry them or find them puts you in a much better frame of mind when you are forced to abandon all that you have spent your time up to now trying to create and store. I admit, I have been doing it too.

That list by Bee pales by comparison to what I have been working to accumulate so folks would be able to do things with hand tools after the electricity is gone. Unfortunately, the main thing I really didn't consider was "what if I have to leave all that behind?" That led me to study the characters in those movies. Neither of them had the "preparation" we all tend to think is necessary. Those of us who have either lived in the country all our lives or have been trained by the military for outdoor survival escape and evasion, have at least some fragments of preparation as to "how and what to do on the move".

Both of the characters in The Road, Castaway and The Postman and The Book of Eli and Waterworld and some others tend to rely on what is obviously there for use rather than what they could make. Unfortunately, they didn't think about the concept of security or creativity because in The Road and The Book of Eli, the two characters had to keep moving. The weakness was that they sought shelter in obvious places where "bad guys" looked. Seems a bit ineffective to me.

In The Road, he made a fire nearly everywhere he went but never seemed to lack water. He did lack food and with the consideration of the time sequence being only slightly older than the age of the little boy, you saw they were unable to find much of anything to eat as we all think of it. Still we are talking about a number of years here not just a few months. How would we do this? Can ALL plant and animal life be destroyed at once and have humans survive? I don't think that is possible; certainly not lasting that many years. the earth always seems to re-grow itself after some years. H. Sapiens can NOT live without nature for that length of time.

In The Book of Eli he had been "on the move for 30 years after the (for lack of a better term) SINGULARITY he described as the sky opening up and fire coming down to the earth destroying most of it.

Of interest to me is that he was alive "before the change" and knew what it was like as do we HERE and NOW. He mentions a war which was essentially fought over the issue of The Bible (the premise of the story) (a completely imaginable scenario given the current political status of the world and that the fire came as a result of the war. This man however survives in a most intersting way. You never know something important about him till the end and I won't spoil it here but it is worth thinking about.

So what am I advocating? Study books on HOW to do things, how to build things, how to make tools and how to construct shelter. Study edible plants, outdoor skills and survival skills in the most austere environments. Know how to use a few significant tools. Don't collect too much, but learn how to use what you have. Many folks who migrated across the prairie in search of a new life had only an adze or an axe with which to build a cabin in order to live through a winter. Study these things and store them carefully in your mind. Teach them to your children in case you become physically unable to do these things when it actually comes. I practice the principle of a carpenter who lived long ago..."If you give a man a fish he eats for a day; if you teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime." How many of you can build a fire with only wood such as a bow drill?

In Cast Away and The Road, neither character had done this. They learned only because it was the difference between staying alive and dying. Each chose to stay alive. Their skills were rudimentary and painful.

Of paramount importance is the fact that the only thing we can take with us in this world wherever we go or to the next is what we store in our minds. It is the bank we should cherish the most. Fill it and fill others minds with that knowledge and then you will be better prepared if you are chosen to be "LEFT BEHIND".

So, in fine, remember the important lesson:
"When traveling, STAY OFF THE ROAD."
Joshua 6:10
YMMV

 

[country freedom]

plant a lot of sunflowers for your chickens. Store the heads. They can pick the seeds out in the winter. High in protien

Great Idea!

 

[Emerald]

Didn't mean to get ya all up in arms there!:/
I have the knowing of how to do many, many things from scratch- including making and using a bow drill to make a fire and I can even make a usable knife out of flint.
Having been in life or death situations and me still here puts me in a better place than many when the ol' push comes to shove- I am more likely to give a big shove! lol
I tend to prefer to look for the lighter side of life, yet will never forget the dark side is always there in the shadows.
Also--Les Stroud can beat ol' bear Grylls any day!
GO SURVIVORMAN!

 

[Emerald]

The Postman is a favorite of mine and I can't believe that it was not as well received.

Read the book. Even better than the movie.

Thanks for the heads up- I had to stop reading books before going to the movies made of them--totally ruins the movie!
I guess my imagination is so much better than what ol' hollywood can do! lol
I put it on my list of books to get at the library next time I am in town!

 

[mamagoose]

Yeah gotta agree with you on that Emerald -GO LES! I saw his new show the other day.

I'd be pretty SOL if I couldn't get out to my MIL's and even then things would not be good. I've only recently come to the realization of the non permanence of the "good" life. My grandparents lived the farm life and my father knows many skills but at this point there aren't enough hours in the day for him to teach me so I've been learning on my own.

I do have what I would call a fair amount of knowledge about local herbs, plants and remedies so that is one place where I'd be ahead of the game ,but woefully ill prepared in other areas.