Category: Gardening

Mid-Scale Grain Gardening in Alaska- Part 2, By Alaskan Gardeners

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We are continuing on with this article about my wife’s and my journey in mid-scale grain gardening. Yesterday, I explained our reasons for believing it was time to build self-sufficiency, and now let’s move on to the food production part, specifically our grain gardening efforts. Definition of Mid-Scale Grain Gardening Grain plots may vary in size, ranging from, at the minimum, a small plot using a rototiller or shovel and rake for soil preparation, hand sowing the grain, reaping with a scythe or sickle, threshing with a flail, and winnowing with a kitchen fan or a windy day. The small-scale …


Mid-Scale Grain Gardening in Alaska- Part 1, By Alaskan Gardeners

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Food sufficiency is a large part of self sufficiency, so my wife and I pursued mid-scale grain gardening, though our home was in Alaska. Here is our story and how we have done this. Breakdown of My Article My article will cover the following: Preamble: Why We All Should Become Increasingly Self-sufficient– The First Steps Definition of Mid-Scale Grain Gardening Crop Operations Reaping and Drying Threshing and Winnowing Scaling Up Harvesting Operations So, What To Do With All This Grain? Disclaimer Preamble: Why We Should All Become Increasingly Self-sufficient People’s outlook and actions are largely a product of their experiences, …


God’s Perfect Bounty: Our Natural Survival Garden- Part 3, by D.M.

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Today, I’m finishing my article on some of the plants God provided for our survival. I’ve written on the American beautyberry and its medicinal, culinary, and decorative uses, including recipes. Most recently, I’ve been talking about the Seminole squash (or pumpkin, as it is sometimes called), which also has many uses. I’m currently sharing about culinary uses. Seminole Squash (continued) Ways to Eat Seminole Squash Young stems, flowers, and leaves of Seminole squash can be eaten as a green vegetable or added to soups. The squash can be eaten raw, stuffed, fried, baked, mashed, roasted, steamed, boiled, or dried. The …


God’s Perfect Bounty: Our Natural Survival Garden- Part 2, by D.M.

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I have been telling you about God’s provision for our survival through nature and specifically writing about the many uses of the American beautyberry. They are edible, medicinal, and decorative berries. In part 1, I shared a recipes for insect repellent, tea for skin ailments, and more using various parts of the American beautyberry plant. I also told how I made juice with the berries. Now, let’s move on to more culinary uses for the American beautyberry and take a look at another multipurpose plant as well. American Beautyberry Jelly After much experimenting with several jelly recipes (some twice), I …


God’s Perfect Bounty: Our Natural Survival Garden- Part 1, by D.M.

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When God made the heaven and earth, he made them perfect. He provided everything we need for our survival, from nutrition to medicine for both humans and animals, from knowledge and natural instinct to even giving us beauty to behold. Knowledge of Survival Lost And Forgotten The knowledge of survival using God’s perfect bounty has been lost and forgotten over time. While gaining new knowledge with the advent of modern grocery stores and medicine we’ve forgotten God’s natural survival garden. There are many varieties of plants that grow naturally without any help from us. Many are disease-, drought-, and pest-resistant, …


Potatoes—A Staple for Food Storage With No Refrigeration, by Back Yard Gardner

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Growing and storing potatoes in the Northwest through the winter months always brought unsatisfactory long-term storage results. It didn’t matter how I stored the potatoes after digging, whether in dry sawdust, under a layer of newspaper, on a dark cool dry shelf, all had similar results of shriveling and sprouting potatoes before the stored crop was used up. An Experiment For Stored, “Fresh” Potatoes I tried an experiment with the 2016 potato crop. Once I dug the Kennebec potatoes in April of 2017, the results of wonderful plump potatoes spurred me to store the 2017 potatoes crop the same way. …


Our Family’s Garden Grain Experiment- Part 2, by Wild BillB of OR

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Our family did an experiment to see how we could grow wheat and oats in a garden setting. In part 1 of this article series, we shared that we used two different garden plots, one that was well fertilized and one that had never been fertilized or used for a garden. Additionally, I told about our seeds and how we protected our growing areas from animals. We began describing the tools that we tested to harvest wheat and how we found, for us, that the sickle worked best. Also, because the naked oats we grew dropped seed more readily, we …


Our Family’s Garden Grain Experiment- Part 1, by Wild BillB of OR

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This is an account of our family’s experience and learning while experimenting with growing oats and wheat in a garden setting. Storing food and preps are important; but, for us, the primary role of food storage is for the immediate emergency or to get us through the first year of a serious crisis. What then? No one can store sufficient food for a serious, long-term disaster. The Key Is Growing and Gathering Your Own The key is growing and gathering your own, and our favorite staples to grow are potatoes and corn. Living on the “wet” side of Oregon we …


Homestead Design from a Practical, Tactical, Agricultural Survival Perspective, by C.F

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Let’s talk about practical, tactical, and agricultural survival principles and details that pertain to developing land in a way that will facilitate agricultural productivity, sustainability, and security. Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field; and afterwards build thine house. Prov. 24:27. Assessing the Land The Land First of all, we are likely to be constrained by property boundaries. Therefore, in selecting property, what are our priorities? Not everyone has the same priorities, and priorities change as the world around us changes. For example, a property that is perfectly usable today may become untenable if …


Letter: Storing the Right Seeds for Your Climate Zone

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Hugh, I wish that seed storage recommendations touched on what agricultural climate zone they are best used. Seeds that work in Idaho might not do so well in Georgia. – R.V. HJL’s Reply: SurvivalBlog has long been a proponent of gardening now rather than waiting until TEOTWAWKI. This is a prime example of why this is important. You might live in an area where you can stick any ol’ seed into the ground and not care for it. But my guess is that you don’t. Gardening is difficult and you have to learn what works in your area and what …


The Good-Enough Cheapskate Garden, by J.D.

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Easiest, Cheapest, and Quickest Gardening Option You have some garden options that include a “good-enough cheapskate garden”. You could buy a bunch of stuff, get special ground covering, and mark it every two inches. Then you could buy poles, and notch then five feet up, and then prepare your soil by double digging. (Make sure to plant at the setting sun, and on and on.) Even if I had the time, money, strength, and patience for all the instructions I have read over the years, I’m just rebel enough to try the easiest, cheapest, and quickest way to get it …


Growing Potatoes From True Potato Seeds, by ShepherdFarmerGeek

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Take a quick look at this clever video (1:47) describing the advantages of growing potatoes from potato seed. Advantages of Growing Potatoes From Seed Using traditional cross-breeding techniques, a company in the Netherlands named Solynta (So-lynn’-ta) has developed a line of potatoes that reliably produce “true potato seed” (“TPS”). Most potato seeds have a lot of genetic diversity, which is not a bad thing for home gardeners. They produce potatoes with varying sizes and colors, so they’re unsuitable for commercial production. Less than one ounce of their seed can be planted in place of 5,500 pounds of “seed tuber” potatoes …


The Editors’ Preps for the Week of June 12th, 2017

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To be prepared for a crisis, every prepper must establish goals and make long-term and short-term plans. Steadily, we work on meeting our prepping goals. In this column, the SurvivalBlog editors share their planned prep activities for the coming week. These range from healthcare and gear purchases to gardening, property improvements, and food storage. This is something akin to our Retreat Owner Profiles, but written incrementally and in detail, throughout the year. We also welcome you to share your planned activities for increasing personal preparedness in the coming week. (Leave a Comment with your project details.) Let’s keep busy and …


Letter: Gaining Familiarity With Your Prepping Equipment

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Having basic camping supplies is a great insurance to have, just in case. It can be both camping and prepping equipment. Your tent, sleeping bag, outdoor cooking supplies, and forms of electricity-free entertainment, are all ripe for testing, as well. The last thing you want to do, in an emergency, is realize that there’s something you need and/or have overlooked. And testing your equipment doesn’t have to be a complicated ordeal. In my case, I had a friend invite me over for backyard camping, for their birthday. Great! So I brought my camping equipment in order to test it out. …


Editors’ Prepping Progress

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As preppers work to make progress to achieve prepping goals, we took some actions this week too. The SurvivalBlog editors made plans earlier in the week and now reflect upon these. At this time of year, gardening is at the top of our lists. Below, the editors share what we each accomplished. Please write to us in the comments and tell us what you did this week to get your preps in place and to be ready. JWR Dear SurvivalBlog Readers, My, what a busy, wonderful week!  We had beautiful weather during the beginning of the week and rain at …