Let's talk about meat, dairy, eggs, hunting, and cooking on the homestead

[Britesea]

Ferfal, another survivor of an actual SHTF situation (the financial crash in Argentina) has posted that he feels the safest place to be is a small town. One small enough that the residents mostly know each other and will be able to muster a decent defense. The problem with isolated homesteads is that, if the bad guys show up and you were unable to chase them off, for whatever reason (what if you are asleep? Are you already taking turn standing guard all night?), anyway, when they were attacking people in isolated areas, they knew no one would be showing up anytime soon, so they took their time- torture, rape, searching the household for food and valuables, more rape, more torture. In some cases, when the authorities found the bodies, it was evident that it had gone on for a couple of weeks.

If you have ANY kind of trail leading to your place, THEY WILL FIND YOU.

 

[BarredBuff]

I guess you could call this a game in a way, but I really wanted think it through what it would look like to be as self-reliant as possible with what you do for the minimum. I have copied my earlier post, and then added what this would realistically look like right now.

Poultry & Eggs: I think I could easily raise a mixed flock of chickens and turkeys and be fairly self reliant. I think a mix of White Rocks, Rhode Island Reds, and Buff Orpington would easily provide all of your eggs and some meat to add to the pantry. Ideally, I would want a White Rock and Buff Orpington rooster to be the breeders. White Rocks and Buff Orpington add quite a bit of size to a flock. Buff Orpingtons are also reliable brooders and mothers. 25 hens and 2 roosters with 6 turkey hens and 2 toms would be sufficient in the poultry category. I have always wanted to raise Narragansett turkeys. I think between roosters, turkeys, and old laying hens you could can quite a bit of poultry from this flock. I would house them together in a fenced acre lot for the best protection from varmints and to keep them out of the yard. If you had a small pond, you could also easily raise geese for meat as well. If you had a small grassy area with your orchard and a small pond, two trios of geese would easily raise extra meat for the table. I would not house them with my chickens and turkeys though.

Right now, I am not too far from this scenario. I have a mixed flock that already does most of the needs mentioned here. I would probably cull more aggressively and can any extras that I had. I do not have turkeys right now, but could probably add them quickly if I needed to do it. I would not add the geese right now. I don't have a good place to separate them out. They are too aggressive to be kept with chickens and turkeys, and I don't have a sustainable water source for them to bathe in.

Dairy: I would prefer to raise a cow. The butter is the biggest draw for me compared to a goat. That's a great fat to use in cooking and I love butter. Cows also give a higher quantity of milk and you could make plenty of butter, buttermilk, sour cream, yogurt, ice cream, and cheese. Extra and old milk could be clabbered and fed to the chickens and hogs. You also would have an abundance to sell or trade too which could be an advantage. They also are not the escape artists that goats tend to be either. The calf could be sold or fed out to be a beef as well. I would be comfortable raising any of the main dairy breeds except Holsteins. They can temperamental and they do not have as high butterfat or protein content.

There's no way I could raise a milk cow right now. I lack the pasture, and infrastructure to successfully raise my own dairy. I'd also have to significantly change my work schedule for it to be feasible as well. We'd have to go without dairy.

Beef & Pork: I do not think I would raise a beef every year or at all. I think I could make up with deer. I would want to kill 2 or 3 hogs a year. You could cure the hams, and bacon. I would can the sausage, and if possible freeze the chops. You'd have a great source of cooking fat with the lard you could render. If you could raise them in a wooded area with plenty of suitable foraging sites, you could minimize the grain needs. You could feed garden waste, and old milk as well. Hogs would definitely be the biggest consumer of feed. If you raised a few sows, you could sell the feeder pigs early and keep a few to kill later. That could help with feed costs. I think hogs would be essential for meat self reliance because you can preserve the meat a variety of ways and you can get plenty of lard.

I could not do this at the house immediately. We have two spots that could be cleared for food production. I could definitely fix a hog pen up to use if I needed to do it. However, I am working to be able to raise a calf and hogs at my Dad's farm. It's 25 minutes away, but is feasible for meat production right now. I am actually just trying to find some pigs, and I'll be setup. However, it would be off site which is not the best setup.

Hunting & Fishing: If I could kill three or four deer in the fall, I would never want or need to raise a beef. That would be ideal. If you had reliably cold temperatures, you could keep the carcass store in a cold barn and cut what you needed from it. I would be more inclined to can the majority of it as ground meat and chunks. I think another overlooked piece to the puzzle is to take advantage of small game seasons. Kill your limit on squirrels, rabbits, turkeys, grouse, etc. to supplement the table. You probably won't preserve any, but it would be fresh meat in it's season which would be an advantage too. The same can be said with fishing as well. Catch and supplement as you go. If you can do it, freeze and can some fish as you go for later.

I have not done this consistently, but could right now. I have the guns, ammunition, and "learning" to be able to hunt and fish until my heart is content.

Feeding: I think you would have to develop productive pasture spaces for all of your livestock. Lush grass and legumes for the cattle during the spring, summer and fall. Grass and clover for the geese. Create an ideal environment for weeds, bugs, and worms to feed your chickens and turkeys. Be sure to provide any garden waste, milk, slaughter scraps, table scraps to the hogs and chickens. I think for your dairy cattle, you'd have to grow and cut alfalfa hay to keep the protein available in the winter. Raise or buy some grain to keep your cattle, sow, and chickens through the winter months. I am not an expert at all, but I think you always need to look for ways to interconnect your projects. Waste nothing.

My chickens forage all day long, and I feed them garden waste and table scraps. I could not provide all of their feed, but could definitely provide a majority of it. I don't have the space to raise enough grain for them to eat. My garden is barely big enough for me. I have the resources and tools to cut hay for the rabbits by hand if I needed to do so. I also regularly feed them greens and garden waste throughout the season.

Cooking: Ideally, I would have a gas cook stove in the main kitchen and a wooden range for the winter months. A good fire pit and a grill would also be handy in the summer to utilize for preparing meals and to assist in keeping the house cooler and conserving fuel.

I currently have a propane stove on the screened in porch to can on. However, everything in the main house is electric. We have gas hookups, but propane was not available when the house was built. I do have a good fire pit on the porch and a few other ways to cook outside.

Preservation: I would depend primarily on canning and curing. I would can all of the poultry, fish and venison. I would smoke, and cure the majority of the pork. We could go back to the old days and build a smokehouse. If freezing was an option, I would freeze the best steaks, chops, roasts, and a few whole birds and fish to eat. If refrigeration was not available, you would have to build a spring house or similar structure to keep milk, and butter chilled. Luckily, eggs will keep for a little while unwashed in a cool, dark area.

This is not too far from what I would ideally do. I freeze some meat, and can some meat. I do not have a method or way to smoke or cure meat at home, but could learn to do it if I needed to nor do I have an alternative method for refrigeration.

I agree with @baymule it would be imperative to build a strong community of friends and family if this was a serious situation. A network of trading and bartering would go a long way.

Ultimately, no one can build a closed system of true self sufficiency. It is actually impossible. In this scenario, I have assumed that I already possess all of the infrastructure, tools, etc to begin with. I am also operating with the assumption that I could attain salt, canning lids//jars, and grain with little trouble.

I think now is a good time to assess how we are doing and where we are at. The time is coming, I think, when we won't just want to do these things, but will need to do them. Get ready while we can.

 

[Britesea]

The main thing we are still working on is getting a pump for the well that will work without electricity. I really wanted the Simple Pump, but it appears that won't fit in our well alongside the current electric-powered pump. Now we are looking at a dual-power pump (electric/solar). It's gonna cost a few thousand dollars, so that will probably be our big push this year.

 

[Britesea]

Our well is 170' deep, but they found water at 22'. I don't know why they kept going- don't know much about wells. We are not very far from the river, which would be good except we have chronic problems in hot weather with blue green algae bloom; very toxic, and the only way to remove the toxins is with activated charcoal and even that isn't a guarantee. I'm not willing to risk my liver. I'm not sure if it's even safe to water crops with, because if any of it splashes onto the crops.....

 

[TexasLisa]

I have been looking at Dexters. (Small, like me!) In our area they are $1000 up for 1-2 year olds.

 

[baymule]

Selco Begovic has some excellent things to say about survival in a SHTF situation. He survived the Balkan War, in a city that was besieged for over a year. One thing he mentioned was that nobody that tried to go it alone survived. For instance, if you are trying to get water out of the well, you need someone else with you (or preferably more than one) armed and keeping an eye on what's going on around you, because you only have 2 eyes.
If you have not read his blog, here is a lot of it. Unfortunately some of his original posts are no longer available. https://geroldblog.com/2018/11/28/selcos-shtf-survival-lessons-part-1-a-to-b/

I have often read his blog, thanks to you posting about it years ago. A real eye opener!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

WOW, look at you go! No shortage of beef in your future. Congrats!

 

[baymule]

Wow! Way to go! Next question, do you have a slaughter date? LOL

 

[BarredBuff]

Wow! Way to go! Next question, do you have a slaughter date? LOL

I don't yet, but I am not slaughtering for another year. I want to get a good sized animal finished out. I'll sell the rest directly or through the market. I am excited for it.

 

[farmerjan]

Sorry, but I must be dense.... what is EW facilities? I must've missed something or my brain just can't compute.