Welcome to Adaptive Living! You might be wondering when you signed up for this newsletter… let me explain.
Adaptive Living started life as “Brace Yourself”.
The newsletter, recently reformatted, focuses on adapting to economic instability, food shortages, societal upheaval, and governmental indifference. Increased self-sufficiency is our goal. We look at skills that make a difference in an unstable future. We examine how we can do more for ourselves, no matter where we live. We discuss ways to be more prepared, ways to increase awareness of the world around us, and how to be less reliant on the systems that try and dictate the way we should live.
Part of the back-to-the-land dream many have had, my own mother among them, was the dream of being self-sufficient. But the path to growing all your food is rife with pitfalls and opportunities to fail. So how do you set yourself up for success? There has to be some secret to it, right?
Think realistically and plan carefully.
You may not have an acre of land for a garden and a small flock of chickens. You might only have an apartment balcony that faces west. You can still be more self-reliant, and here’s how.
Love tomatoes? Cool! Grow your own tomatoes. You can grow cherry tomatoes in pots (remember, they’ll need support as they grow!) if you love salads, or heirloom slicers if tomato sandwiches full of flavor are your passion. You can grow a wide variety of salad greens, too. There are a variety of greens to choose from. Some are heat and bolt-resistant, others grow best in cooler shady spots. Swiss chard, spinach, and kale all grow in pots and planters. Even on an apartment balcony, you could grow everything you need for a salad but the dressing. Never mind paying top-dollar for salad ingredients at the store!
Or, let’s say you’ve got a house with a bit of a yard. Maybe you’re sick of mowing, or you’re tired of looking at grass that is less than lush. Dig it up! Grow food instead of grass. If you’re getting up there in age, and your back gives out before the rest of you, leave the grass, and grow what you want in containers on top of the grass! If you’re back really can’t do bending, can you get your hands on a couple of sawhorses and a sheet of plywood? Instant plant table that you could still cut the grass around and under.
Make your yard work for YOU, instead of working to grow something you can’t eat. Does your family eat a lot of garlic? Try growing it! How much garlic do you think your family eats in a six-month period? 8 bulbs? 12? Once you know how much you’ll need, figure out the best way to store it within your own circumstances. Not everyone has the room to braid it and hang it. You might have room in your freezer though. You may have access to a dehydrator. Slice the garlic, dry the slices, and then grind them to make your own garlic powder. It is cheaper, and fresher than anything you’ll find in the stores!
Depending on how much light your yard gets, and your location, you could grow all the potatoes you need for a year. But do you really want to do that? Aim a little lower if you’ve never grown potatoes before. Grow potatoes in a plastic trash can or a 5-gallon pail. When it comes time to harvest, you simply push it over and sift through the soil to find your spuds. How much can you get this way? In 2 large trash cans, I grew approximately 10 pounds last year. The whole exercise was an experiment for me, and I’m certain I can tweak my system to yield even more spuds, but more on that later.
Maybe you don’t have the room to store a great deal, and the best you can do is to eat more seasonally. You just can’t raise all the food you and your family are going to eat over the next year. Honestly, I can’t either. But if you and I can grow even a percentage of what we eat, we’re doing better than we did last year.
Lower your expectations.
Don’t try to raise enough food for your family to eat without ever going to the store. You’re setting yourself up for failure. Set yourself up for success instead by growing what you can. Grow the herbs you use the most, grow what you’ll want for a salad, or grow peas if you eat a lot of those or tomatoes, or maybe radishes if you really love them (like I do).
Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can do all the things needed to be self-sufficient.
Do what you can, where you can, as you can.
Then you’ll have more success, enjoy growing things more, and be a happier person for it. Thanks for sharing a part of your day with me!
Carolyn
I have a lot of pine trees (acidic soil!) on my property and too much shade, so I've turned to going primarily to the Farmers Market. But? I've also let my yard to wild and, along with it, planted herbs and edible flowers and berry bushes. Right now, I've got more bush cherries than we could ever, ever eat. It's so wonderfully fun to pick a few on the way in the house. :)