It seems some people are activly or preparing to raise some critters , planting gardens of not only eat when ripe veggies but storable stuff like beans , squash , potatos , corn , onions ect. Others seem to be more like squirrels just hording nuts. My question of sorts I guess is for the squirrels.  

What happens when you run out of supplies?
Do you have a contingency plan?
Do you guys have the tools , seed and ground broken to impliment a farming  or garden stratigy if somthing real long term happens?  
Now I understand not everyone can have a garden because of their location or situation.  Others who are renters might try taling to their land lords about doing somthing low impact with areas of wasted space.

2 of our tenants have gardens. One woman is philiphino and I swear she grows more food in an area 3ft by 25 foot then Ive ever seen somone grow!!!  We got her set up on a piece of dirt between the parking spaces and a wooden stockade fence. Pretty soon she added wire fence along the stockade fence with thoose push in the ground 6ft stake things and planted everything kind of by height from back to front. In summer its a MASS production of food. Beans and cumbers up the fencing then a row of tomatos infront of that then a row of peppers. On the ends and mixed in she has a few other things but MAN she really does well. In that small area!

Pile

It is insainly cheap to stock food, there is no way I can even think of growing #25 of any grain for 1-2 hours of work.
as for when it runs out hopefully I will have time to figure something out before that happens.

It is insainly cheap to stock food, there is no way I can even think of growing #25 of any grain for 1-2 hours of work.
as for when it runs out hopefully I will have time to figure something out before that happens.

No need to tell us twice.
We do hear what the Ladies say the first time.

Why do they think they need to repeat things when talking to us?

Because they're used to PMS(Putting up with Men's $hit).

The standard answere applys, Do Both..

Stocking drys goods is cheap and easy, no reason not to.

A garden can be anything from 10 acres to a few five gallon buckets filled with dirt, no reason not to.

Getting off your ass is the first step.

I couldn't agree more. I think fresh vegetables are important to stay healthy and provides a lot of nutrients that stock piled dried grain in a bucket cant even come close to.  I was trying to be motivational in my questions and not argumentative about picking 1 way of the other but discussing how people who may only be stock piling plan to make the cross over if and when they need to do so.

I'm planting my first garden this year. Approx 800sq feet. I'm stoked. I allready have tomatoes, onions, artichokes, peppers and okra started indoors. Next week am scheduled to start some others. Then time to tranfer outside once no more frost is expected. I need to figure out how exactly I want to deliver the water.

We do both. We live in a suburb without a very large yard (it's about 2000 square feet of usable ground for growing things).
AS was mentioned, grain and rice and beans are very cheap, so we have a couple hundred pounds of them. We have a garden, but
are not that serious about it; i need to put in fencing this year to keep the rabbits out, for example. It would be supplementary for
fresh vegetables, there is no way we could produce enough calories on it to fully feed the family, except for a few weeks in the peak of the growing season.

Some storables for winter to consider are Butternut squash (fiber, vitamin C, manganese, magnesium, potassium and vitamin A. Turnips are pretty high in vitamin C.  Bolth winter well when wrapped from bitter cold and stored in a cool dry place.



Ive never pickeled anything before except but want to try it so if anyone has any 1st hand information on pickling that would be cool

beat me to it by a long shot. big +1. K.

Unless we're talking nearly an acre of square gardening, the most we should expect gardens to produce is supplements to our pantry.

The sad reality is....without a continent wide logistics network hauling fuel, fertilizer, and food from rural to suburb to city...America could only sustain a tenth the number of people it currently does. If CT were 'cut off' by EMP or collapse of the dollar, Greenwich would have eaten all their dogs before a good harvest comes in to adequately meet the needs of the local population.

Now, fortunately, Connecticut has ALOT of wild life. When I lived in the New Haven/Orange/Hamden area I saw deer and wild turkey all over the place. Not enough to sustain the state's current population, but probably enough to sustain a town or two. Then you have the LI sound and open access to the sea....

But the rest of us...if the dollar goes into hyperinflation (as a result of various factors, not the least being the previous bankruptcy of major food producers in the period of deflation) and Obama's idiot savants ruin the private enterprise system leaving only corrupt and useless government logistics and lean but illegal black marketeers.... we will see hunger again. Hunger that'll be alleviated by back yard gardens - (at least we'll have more manpower what with millions of unemployed manufacturing workers), but hunger will not be entirely solved by them.

I have black berry bushes, a peach tree, 3 apples and 2 pear trees, and 2500 sq. feet of garden out back. I'm thinking of getting chickens,  and learning how to trap wild game. But at the same time for $100 at Costco I can pick up enough staples to last my family about 1 or 2 months. That's hard to do with a garden even when you can it.

Still, if everyone had 2-4 months of food in their pantry and 1-2 months worth of basic edibles growing out back, (as well as a deer rifle, a shotgun, and 1000 rounds and shells....) we as a whole nation would be so much more robust and disaster proof. Sadly, America, like Rome, never prepared for the threat that's facing us right now with bared teeth.

Ahhhh, so you are part of my problem!  For the first time ever my seed order came in with some items listed as out of stock.  It seems that record numbers of people are buying seeds this year.  I think its awesome that so many people are getting the message and starting gardens.  I am still eating potatoes and winter squash from last years garden!

My bug out location is a farm. That in itself does not mean that they are prepared to grow a garden, but several people that will be there do have a huge amount of gardening experience that I will endeavor to learn from. I have stocked extra shovels, hoes, rakes, and those neato claw hoe thingys that are so nice for loosening soil between the rows.  

We can disk up a 1acre garden in about 5 mins.

If infrastructure collapses, you only need to survive until the lack of food and lack of medical care and increased violent crime kills off 90% of the population, then you can live off the land again. I think that will take less than 1 year, but who knows.

garden without stores = fail
stores without garden = fail

garden plus stores = chance of making it, also a chance of fail

Being an all-around Professional Professional, I understand that time is money and that I am better off Professionally making money and paying other people to do the menial chores of growing food, repairing wiring, fixing plumbing, etc.

... but what happens when people decide they no longer need Turnip Twaddlers, and my importing business goes bust?  What happens when your services are no longer in demand?

Learn how to do shit now, before failure means starvation (or an electrical fire (or a flooded basement)).

Stock because if the SHTF during late fall/winter, you're screwed until you can get the garden planted in spring and wait for harvest. You absolutely have to have stocks to get you through and get you accustomed to your new life.

It isn't a binary equation "either/or", it is the way people had to live before the 1950's, for the most part. You need to grow some food, buy some food, store some food, and, if you can, hunt some food down or trap it.

We live in the only age in human history where you can literally supply every need, or want, from a conveniently located store, and every other unimaginable luxury from the internet. Prior to 1994, people did not have the last option, and prior to the 1980's really, people did not have the vast variety of fresh vegetables available YEAR ROUND. Prior to the 1950's, they did not have the common supermarket.

If we don't know to live as they did prior to the Eisenhower Administration, forget survival TEOTWAWKI - we are doomed outside of a current technology and availability scenario. It never ceases to amaze me that we have people who post (nothing bad said about the people, just the circumstance of lack of basic knowledge), who don't have clue 1, about how to wash their clothes in a SHTF scenario. What happens when the clothing begins to wear out? How many of us can darn our own socks, or patch a pair of jeans with needle and thread?

just remember that pickling stuff is great, but you need to have A LOT of vinegar on hand if you plan to store a significant amount.  But then again, vinegar is cheap!  So children, what do we do?

Say it with me "Buy it cheap, Stack it deep!"

Of course, one can pickle with just salt (ie pickles, sourkraut, kimchi, etc).  Salt is dirt cheap.  I really don't know how cheap, while I buy 50 lb and 300 lb salt blocks, I get all the food grade salt I want from a resturant or two I do work for (SS Welding).  But if you have a the space a couple of 5 gallon buckets are cheap.

VInigar also kills the skunk smell from dogs getting sprayed

Well I have the stockpile part down and Im trying to learn from a dozen sources about growing things. My question for the learned folk (wish i had the Filipino lady's #! I now know the difference between hybrid vs heirloom seeds. So I have bought a lot of seed this year - both kinds. How do I grow so that I dont get cross-pollinated tomato/cucumbers or potato/ radishes?

Getting my pile larger as much as I can. Started a garden 50x60 this year as well.

I have the growing part down pretty good.  I need to worry about the stockpiling part.  Staring to convince the wife that it is a good idea especially with 4 young and always hungry boys.  This year I plan on growing enough veggies to get some in the canner.

vinegar is also used to make cheese.  Vinegar, and Black HIlls ammunition.  Link somewhere here in SF to a "how to."