Self sufficiency, how much land???

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Self sufficiency, how much land???
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tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 2:41 pm Post subject:

Bugs wrote:

hils wrote:

What have you got up your sleeve Tahir (other than your watch!)?

A nasty surprise for one of his children (or missus) for starters:

Quote:

Family of four

Hypothetical scenario babe

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 2:43 pm Post subject:

Judith wrote:

"if we can't grow it, we won't eat it".

What about oil for cooking?

Absolutely, on the second point there are nuts and grains that can be grown in the UK for oil.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 2:46 pm Post subject:

Judith wrote:

Do they want to keep breeding stock or would they buy in or barter for young stock to grow on?
Far too many questions to give a straightforward answer.

Let's say they can barter in new stock

Blue Peter

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 2400
Location: Milton Keynes

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 2:56 pm Post subject:

tahir wrote:

Bugs wrote:

hils wrote:

What have you got up your sleeve Tahir (other than your watch!)?

A nasty surprise for one of his children (or missus) for starters:

Quote:

Family of four

Hypothetical scenario babe

He could be doing the honourable thing, of course.

"We've only got 8 acres (or whatever figure we come up with). I'm going outside. I may be gone for some time."

Peter.

Blue Peter

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 2400
Location: Milton Keynes

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:02 pm Post subject:

tahir wrote:

I think we've got to disregard personal ethics (vegan/veggie etc) and just look at making the most effective use of the land.

I know that this caused a bit of a ruck last time it was brought up, but, depending on the land, aren't animals "just" more mouths to feed. If you've got a nice trading economy going, it perhaps makes things as a whole more productive (goats, sheep on the scrub, etc.), but if it were a practical choice between crops and pasture, then aren't crops "more effective"?

Peter.

P.S. Of course, you might want your sheep for wool. Clothes are part of self-sufficiency too.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:05 pm Post subject:

Blue Peter wrote:

aren't animals "just" more mouths to feed.

Absolutely not, there is land that's unusable for planting, there are crops that don't mind being undergrazed by animals, in my opinion you'd be silly not to.

judith

Joined: 16 Dec 2004
Posts: 22789
Location: Montgomeryshire

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:06 pm Post subject:

Still too vague. We need to know what this family deems essential.

Say they want one egg per day per family member, that is just a tad under 1500 eggs per year. For the sake of the argument, let's say that an average chook lays 200 eggs per year, then they would need 7.5

laying hens. In fact, let's call it 10 to take account of broodies out of action to replace the layers after 2 years, reduced egg numbers because you aren't feeding high-protein feed. 10 chooks would need at least 25 kg feed per month, which means 300 kg per year.

Then we have the meat birds - presumably they would want to raise their own. How many chickens would they get through in a year? Two per week? Then they would need to raise 50 birds for 20 or so weeks. Call it 75 to account for any losses. 75 birds for 20 weeks? Say each bird would eat 5 kg grain in that time, plus veggies plus grass, then we would need another 375 kg wheat to add to our total.

How much breadstuff would the family need for a year? One 1 kg loaf per day? That's another 365 kg wheat they would need.
We are now up to 1 tonne of wheat per year. Anyone know how much wheat you would need to grow to yield 1 tonne of grain? And how much space that will take?

And where are they going to put the salt mine?

Blue Peter

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 2400
Location: Milton Keynes

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:09 pm Post subject:

tahir wrote:

Blue Peter wrote:

aren't animals "just" more mouths to feed.

Absolutely not, there is land that's unusable for planting, there are crops that don't mind being undergrazed by animals, in my opinion you'd be silly not to.

What crops are those?

Peter.

Blue Peter

Joined: 21 Mar 2005
Posts: 2400
Location: Milton Keynes

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:14 pm Post subject:

Judith wrote:

Still too vague. We need to know what this family deems essential.

Could you match the vagueness of the question by doing it in terms of calories - for a rough figure? A family of 4, say, 10,000 calories per day. So, 3,650,000 calories per year, which is in terms of food...?

Peter.

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:15 pm Post subject:

Judith wrote:

And where are they going to put the salt mine?

But salt gives you high blood pressure...

OK

Family of four eating own raised meat (pork and chicken let's say) 2-3 times a week, additional protein from nuts, pulses, grains (including protein rich amaranth, fat hen, millet, various other seeds). Wheat is not essential, when my mum and dad had to leave India they weren't able to harvest enough wheat to eat for at least a couple of years, survived on maize, millet and some other grains that I have no idea of the English names of. Plants such as fat hen, millet etc were used extensively as animal feeds in the past.

Of course we haven't touched on water supply either yet

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:18 pm Post subject:

Blue Peter wrote:

tahir wrote:

Blue Peter wrote:

aren't animals "just" more mouths to feed.

Absolutely not, there is land that's unusable for planting, there are crops that don't mind being undergrazed by animals, in my opinion you'd be silly not to.

What crops are those?

Most trees don't mind being undergrazed, there are experiments in keeping free range chickens in juvenile woodlands in the UK, pigs have been used to clear up windfall fruits and acorns for a very long time, ducks and geese won't interfere with trees.

judith

Joined: 16 Dec 2004
Posts: 22789
Location: Montgomeryshire

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:19 pm Post subject:
I don't know if calories alone would work - unless the family were prepared to live on just cabbage and potatoes, or some such. As soon as you start introducing variety, then I would say that the space requirement increases. Are they prepared to be slightly undernourished subsistence farmers? If not, then we need to know what their bottom-line food needs are.

sean
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 42219
Location: North Devon

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:21 pm Post subject:

tahir wrote:

But salt gives you high blood pressure...

Not exactly true.

judith

Joined: 16 Dec 2004
Posts: 22789
Location: Montgomeryshire

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:21 pm Post subject:

tahir wrote:

millet

Where is this farm?

tahir

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 45674
Location: Essex

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 05 3:22 pm Post subject:

Judith wrote:

we need to know what their bottom-line food needs are.

How exactly can we establish those? Especially when it comes to variety.

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