The Survival Garden

[BarredBuff]

Okay, lets imagine a situation. We have to eat and live off of only what we produce this is excluding poultry, eggs, meat, milk, game, etc. Just fruit and vegetable wise.

Lets organize our thoughts and come to a consensus.

1. What would you raise?
2. How big of a space would you need?
3. What skills should you have?
4. At your current level of skill, resources, and experience, do you think you could grow the Survival Garden?

Here are my answers:

1. What would you raise?
I would focus on large producers and staple crops like winter squash, tomatoes, beans, potatoes, carrots, sweet potatoes, onions, and sweet corn. I would also of course raise house crops like spinach, lettuce, melons, cabbage, broccoli, peppers, summer squash, celery, herbs, cucumbers, okra, garlic, and peas. Plus perennials like berries, rhubarb, mushrooms, and asparagus.
2. How big of a space would you need?
Based on my experience I'd say at least a half acre per person. So for our family 2.5 acres. Ideally three acres for extra to preserve, barter, etc.
3. What skills should you have?
You'd need to be able to conserve resources like mulch, land, water, and fertilize. Be able to defend your crops from pests, varmints, and two legged varmints. Be able to understand and apply soil science, seed saving, and food preservation.
4. At your current level of skill, resources, and experience, do you think you could grow the Survival Garden?
I don't have the space needed. However, I think I have the skills, physical ability, and most resources to do so. With the exception of organic pest control.

What do you think?

 

[Denim Deb]

Something else you need to take into consideration, how are you going to preserve the harvest? Are you looking into dehydration only, or would you can part of it or freeze it?

 

[BarredBuff]

I mean this as a question to all. How would you answer DD?

I would store fresh, can, or dehydrate all of my harvest.

 

[baymule]

I only have a small lot in town. But I am able to raise potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, zuchinni, yellow squash, onions, peppers, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, garlic, basil, cucumbers, eggplant, rosemary, green beans, mustard greens, turnips and collard greens.

I have planted cabbage from purchased plants. I have not tried to save seed from them. I also FINALLY got a few carrots to grow last fall and we ate them through the winter, but I did not try to save seed from them.

This year I planted English peas, which are winding down now because of heat, but I consider them a success because they gave us fresh peas when not much was producing in the garden. I have also planted corn to make cornmeal and the corn is about 8" tall right now. When the corn reaches 12" I will plant climbing butterbeans on the corn. I have a small patch of hull less oats, but they have not yet made oats. We'll see. I have chard seed to plant soon because when the tomatoes are making by the bucketfulls, the lettuce is dead and gone. It only grows here in the winter. Hopefully, the chard will give us a good lettuce substitute.

I planted 4 blueberry bushes in the back yard and a pear tree in the front yard. I wish I had room for a pecan tree. In your survival garden assessment, you left out fruit trees and nut trees which I feel to be equally important. Plant them once and eat off them for a looooong time.

I have the skills to raise the survival garden. I know how to fertilize, and use mulch and conserve water. I know how to defend it against garden pests, insects and varmits. In my present situation, I could not defend the front yard against 2-legged varmits, it is wide open to anyone who walks down the street.

I know how to save seed. I know how to can and dehydrate. If there is no electricity, then no freezer. If no electricity, then I could not use the dehydrator, but I sure could take the screens off the windows and place the vegetables I wanted to dehydrate between them and place them in the sun.

I just planted amaranth seeds to see how that goes. I have wheat and quinoa stored in buckets. I have quinoa seed, but I don't think I will have room to plant it this year. I am trying some new things this year and what doesn't work, I will discard and try something else. What does work will be a keeper. Even though I have small beds and can only have a few of this and a few of that, I have been able to can soup, dehydrate tomatoes and freeze squash. Oh, and make pickles too. We eat all year out of the garden and while it doesn't take care of all our needs, it sure keeps the grocery bill down.

I am concentrating on heritage seed, that I can save and plant again the next year.

If I had the room, I would like to raise pumpkins, winter squashes, melons of several kinds, mangel beets (for small livestock) peas-crowder, purple hull or blackeye- beans of different varieties and lots of herbs.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

Okay, I like all your choices of vegetables and fruits and mine would be very similar, but considering I live in zone 10 and have pretty much a year long growing season, I'm wondering if I could manage on much less property. I do have plenty room, but most of it is wooded and away from my house, so I can't exactly plant on it, but can use it for foraging of wild plants/animals.
I'm currently trying to decrease my yard and increase my garden.
I normally have tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, squash, egg plant, asparagus and green beans.
This year we are trying to do more and are trying melons, corn and a bunch of herbs.

 

[BarredBuff]

Okay, I like all your choices of vegetables and fruits and mine would be very similar, but considering I live in zone 10 and have pretty much a year long growing season, I'm wondering if I could manage on much less property. I do have plenty room, but most of it is wooded and away from my house, so I can't exactly plant on it, but can use it for foraging of wild plants/animals.
I'm currently trying to decrease my yard and increase my garden.
I normally have tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, squash, egg plant, asparagus and green beans.
This year we are trying to do more and are trying melons, corn and a bunch of herbs.

Me too. This year we added 2000 square feet to our food production area. We have a 7000 square foot garden now. Something else we should all consider is intercropping, anyone with suggestions?

 

[Denim Deb]

My garden-not including the asparagus patch and the rhubarb is 28x32. And, I grow a lot in that small of a space. But, I also can plant a 3 season garden, use companion and square foot gardening, and this year, I'm experimenting on growing more things vertically. I'm not sure how much more I'd need if I was planting things like wheat, oats, etc.

A lot depends too, on where you are. As Rhonda said, she lives in zone 10, so she can have a garden basically year round. I live in zone 7, so I can have a 3 season garden. But, those that live way north are going to need a bigger garden in order to grow as much as they can in a shorter growing season.

 

[Marianne]

Just fruits and veggies, eh?

We would have starved a couple winters ago. Lousy garden results due to bugs, extreme hot weather and who knows. Even last year I planted more potatoes than what I got in the so-called harvest.

In my area, the main source of vitamin C would be tomatoes and cabbage. I would probably aim for more of the standard fruits and veggies that could be stored in a root cellar. Hard squash, pumpkin, cabbage, carrots, onions, garlic, potatoes, apples. etc. I would also concentrate on more canning and dehydrating than freezing for earlier veggies like peas, green beans.

I don't mess with lettuce and spinach anymore. Most years it gets too hot too fast to get much of a crop and DH is an iceberg lettuce fan (I can get by mixing greens, but that's about it). I got one crop of peas out of the three years I planted. One good crop out of the four years I planted green beans.

I planted sunchokes. They're okay raw, but we don't like them cooked, but that would be a good repeating crop. Asperagus is just coming up now, another repeating crop. I am learning about some of the edible weeds around here. They always repeat. Oh, and multiplier onions.

BUT! I generally have more tomatoes than most of my friends. I also plant a couple fruit trees every year, or some kind of edible landscaping. Raspberries, grapes, blackberries, cherry, apple, peach. We have two mulberry trees, one I planted. Half the time a late frosts zaps the fruit trees, but there's always hope.

Wheat definitely would be the grain. I have volunteer wheat growing in my back two acres now.

We have the skills. We don't have the seeds anymore. We have the ammo, but I'd probably invite 'em in for pie. We have a total of maybe three acres that we could easily plant, four acres if you push it. Weather and bugs are my biggest enemies. I don't see how the pioneers did it out here. Must have been really rough.

 

[BarredBuff]

I forgot to mention we put in a large berry patch too. Plus I'm establishing an orchard....

 

[FarmerJamie]

Interesting intellectual exercise.

Okay, lets imagine a situation. We have to eat and live off of only what we produce this is excluding poultry, eggs, meat, milk, game, etc. Just fruit and vegetable wise.

Lets organize our thoughts and come to a consensus.

1. What would you raise?

Everything I could. Luxury-type items and excess would be a great barter source. I agree with Marianne, prolific self-propagating crops would be a must.

2. How big of a space would you need?

At lease an acre for a garden. More of a concern for me would be food storage. Not sure about the growing grains, etc, if you are excluding critters.

3. What skills should you have?

Total gardening skills, herbal medicine skills, food prep and storage, equipment repair, negotiation skills, discipline and perseverance

4. At your current level of skill, resources, and experience, do you think you could grow the Survival Garden?

Skills - completely by myself, no. If I paired up with my sister's family, yes. Resources, no. Don't have the tools/equipment for being 100% self-sufficient. Having three acres near a large population of potential hungry mouths, any food source would be overrun fairly quickly. Experience, yes, for what I know I can do. Could I do it realistically, no, not in my present situation. I *would* *have* to find a good coffee substitute. My fruit trees and berry bushes have been zapped by a late frost 3 of the last 5 years. I would have to move. LOL