I am curious about how much land you all think is necessary to feed yourself? How much land if all you bought was salt, coffee, sugar etc...?

Little Bit Farm

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brightok.net), July 15, 2003

Answers

John Seymour says you can do it on 5 acres if you really work at it and you may have to purchase some hay. I'm not near that organized. Frankly, I don't think I'd be able to physically do what all it would take anymore. I'm starting to feel the years coming on. I'm getting better at organizing my time and effort, but I'll never get that together. One has to really want to more than I do.

If you were able to and had the time - I think 10 good acres would be enough. Room for pasture, woodlot, orchard, gardens, grains for stock and people. It would be a full time job for more than 1 person.

-- John in S. IN (jdoofus@hotmail.com), July 16, 2003.

I agree with John, 10 acres would be a good amount. We are getting up there in years and finding the making of hay etc. more and more difficult. Although we feel quite confident we could do it if we were both here full time, gracefully it would not be!!! Back in the pioneer days the game was much more plentiful and we were not constantly hindered by thousands of laws governing what you could hunt, when you could hunt, and how you could hunt.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), July 19, 2003.

That sounds about right to me. I live on 4 acres. I think I can feed myself on it, however, I don't think I can feed my animals too without buying out. I think John Seymore meant feed everybody. That is more difficult. Eventually I want to try some of the ideas he puts forward. I actually just ordered the first book I read of his. I can't wait to receive it. I would like to fence off a portion of my pasture for row crops, and try having some of my animals harvest part of it themselves. One thing I am trying to master right now is weed control on a larger scale. Since moving to Oklahoma I am learning some hard lessons on weeds. Coming from California, I can tell you weeds here remind me of the Little Shop of Horrors! Mulching only makes sense when you have enough mulch. Getting enough mulch for the number of square feet I am dealing with is not an easy deal. To make matters worse this year I went away at just the wrong moment. The garden poem I wrote (further down the main page), discribes exactly my problem for my upper garden this year. Lack of rain this last two weeks is also making my life difficult.

Little Bit Farm

-- Little Bit Farm (littlebit@brighterok.net), July 19, 2003.

Getting enough mulch has turned out to be a bigger problem than I imagined when I moved out of town. I had a couple of people who bag their lawn clippings and leaves in the fall then, along w/ a couple of friends who work for the city that would sweep up the leaves and they would drop a big load of those leaves each fall for me. That was a great resource that I don't have now. With the crappy yellow clay and the weeds I have here, I need the organic stuff more than ever. I'm looking for a dependable horse person that I can get stall cleanouts from, but haven't had much luck. My son hit a gatepost and broke it at the only good place I did have. Even after replacing the post and all, they didn't want to trust a repeat performance and I lost that one. Bummer. May have to get my own, or board a couple here. I should get some more Rabbits to replace the ones killed by the neighbors dogs last Fall. A half dozen rabbits make a pretty fair amount of good fertilizer. Gotta go get ready for work. Have a good ady y'all.

-- John in S. IN (jdoofus@hotmale.com), July 19, 2003.