how easy/hard would it be to live as self sufficient as possilbe inn the uk?

Lotus-eater

celerity wrote: »

I agree on these, although I'd like to think these could be stockpiled prior to going SS .
I'd add tea ("English", Chinese and herbal) as a matter of urgency to that list too!
Anyway, my point is, it's fair to assume a bit of hoarding allows you to take a stash of goodies into your SS phase.


You could virtually forego transport fuel provided you were happy to cycle / walk / horseride everywhere*1.
You'd need a significant amount of land and labour to keep you in crops, animal feed and wood fuel though. Even if you had a wood on your doorstep the gathering and splitting of timber is a significant task, and one which needs to be done year in, year out.


If you assume you can readily barter for flour, butter, milk, sugar etc then things become easier. Without that, even making a humble pancake becomes a major series of tasks (and no sliced banana, lemon or maple syrup either, argh! )
Actually, sugar is probably not such a big problem as honey isn't hugely labour intensive - it's the cereals that need land and work.

Honey may not be labour intensive, but I believe you need sugar solution to feed the bees often.

You can't have a significant amount of land and not need fuel to keep it, or you can, but it's more work than you would believe and then you need a work horse, which again is much more work and you need the feed to keep it.
If you have a horse to travel on, you need vets and feed.
Wood, you need a big wheelbarrow and lots of time, or transport.

Herbal tea is easy to make, English tea, we could live without easily anyway.

You can't have stuff before you started to be SS and then consider being SS, it goes against itself.

Try looking at it again ,

Itismehonest

You only have to think about it for a while to see that, unless you have a pretty large family ..... or a commune ...... & a sizeable acreage it would be almost physically impossible to be totally self-sufficient.

An acre was the amount of land one man could plough in one day using an ox. You'd need to prepare to plant every crop you needed to grow in sufficient quantity, variety & at various times in the year depending on what seasonal crop you want.

Then everything has to be planted, tended, harvested & prepared.

A hectare of woodland (2.46 acres) produces about 5 tonnes of logs per year - but you have to cut a year in advance to season before burning. A cottage uses 8-16 tonnes, a 2-3 bedroom family home 16 – 24, & a farmhouse 24–32. You may even need a felling licence but you'll definitely need plenty of time for felling, cutting & splitting.

You then have various animals & fowl (as required) most of which need feeding, sorting morning & night & most need daily cleaning. As I said before, no days off. If you want cows (or goats or sheep etc.) for milk they must be milked and/or shorn, feet trimmed, drenched, wormed ...........
If you've never lived in sheep country I can tell you everyone tries not to speak to a sheep farmer during lambing - it's knackering & they all get short-tempered.

Between all that you have to weed, mend fencing & any machinery - even if you use heavy horses there will still be machinery &, of course, the harnesses etc to be kept in good shape.
Then you'd have to spin & weave or cure skins to make clothing & then make the clothes.

We haven't even started on what you'd need to do house-wise.

Anyone still fancy the idea?

Oh, & as to the internet. We, along with many others in rural areas, can't even get a mobile signal...... &, somehow, I don't think you'd have the time or the energy left to surf the net.

rogerblack

celerity wrote: »

A second hand low energy display can be had very cheaply on eBay and similarly, a keyboard and mouse can be obtained very easily.
Combine that with a low-cost Raspberry Pi Linux computer (http://www.raspberrypi.org/) and you have all the hardware you need.

I note that this is somewhat misunderstood by most people. (I have one on order)
It is _extremely_ limited.
It has slow interface to disk, and limited RAM.
It has a CPU that is about as fast as a dozen year old laptop.
Admittedly, it does have a fast GPU - that will enable some tasks like playing video.

A 5 or so year old laptop in good condition may work considerably better for essentially all tasks, and use less energy, as the internal display is generally lower power than external ones.

celerity

Lotus-eater wrote: »

Honey may not be labour intensive, but I believe you need sugar solution to feed the bees often.

Ah, good point!

[land - horse - fuel...]
I've already agreed with you further up, by saying it's nigh on impossible to be SS.

English tea, we could live without easily anyway.

Speak for yourself!

You can't have stuff before you started to be SS and then consider being SS, it goes against itself.

Well, it depends on your scenario. If I am imagining society collapsing due to zombie outbreak for example, then I think I am entitled to stockpile .

/\dam

celerity

rogerblack wrote: »

[raspberry pi] I note that this is somewhat misunderstood by most people. (I have one on order)
It is _extremely_ limited.
[...]
A 5 or so year old laptop in good condition may work considerably better for essentially all tasks, and use less energy, as the internal display is generally lower power than external ones.

Yep, I'm waiting for my order to be processed too .
The point I am making about the Pi is that it costs £30 new, and none of us really know the speed that it will access gmail, browse the web or stream hi-def video until we use it.
I'm expecting portable screens / battery pack mods to be unveiled very shortly too.
I agree a secondhand laptop will be more suitable for some use-cases though.

/\dam

Lotus-eater

celerity wrote: »

Well, it depends on your scenario. If I am imagining society collapsing due to zombie outbreak for example, then I think I am entitled to stockpile .

/\dam

But with Zombie attack I would have no choice but to live without marmite. If it was available and I just couldn't afford it, well that's not the way I would choose to live, lets put it that way

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Been thinking about this...

we could prob be self sufficient for wood/fuel for quite a few years....

if/when we could dispatch our own chickens, then we would be self sufficient in chicken and eggs..

We are getting some pigs in the next few months... so potentially we could be self sufficient in pork susages etc.

certain veg if planned right..

Would have to sell some pork/eggs etc to be cost neutral..

rozeepozee

Hi Everyone, I've just popped over from CTC's Daydream thread. Like CTC, I've recently bought a place with a few acres, some woodland etc but I don't want to spend my life toiling in the fields, I want to enjoy what I do as much as possible.

So my take on this is to attempt to be self sufficient in the things that cost lots to buy foodwise - e.g. there's no point in growing onions when I can get a 10kg sack from the local market for £5, but things that I love like fresh salad and British fruit in season and loads of herbs... that's worth making the effort for. It would cost a small fortune to buy them in the amounts that me and my family like to eat them. Plus things that I can process and "add value" too. So I might make some chutneys or jams in due course.

I try and consume less and I think it's pretty self sufficient to use things that have already been made so most clothes for the kids and myself come from the car boot sale.

Unless there was the absolute need, I just like the idea of being on the fringe of "normal" modern life. I certainly think that total self sufficiency would look more like my idea of purgatory

paddyrg

Having grown up amidst mountain hippies in Wales, I'd make a case for being only partly self-sufficient... you still need to connect to the world (or you become very strange indeed) and have some source of real money (marmite is a necessity, not luxury).

But I totally get why you want to try simplifying everything down. I still have friend who live in yurts in the woods most of the year round, perfectly feasible, just have a bit of a sideline (fixing motorbikes/hairdressing/massage/gardening) to keep some cash flowing.

The Seymour book is quite nice, but have you tried 'Living on the Earth' by Alicia Bay Laurel? It's a hippy-era modern classic and actually has a lot of useful odds and ends... and the pictures are gorgeous, innocent and free :-) This is the cover -



It's had any number of reprints and re-issues and versions, but the original '70's editions are plenty gorgeous enough :-)

COOLTRIKERCHICK

paddyrg wrote: »

Having grown up amidst mountain hippies in Wales, I'd make a case for being only partly self-sufficient... you still need to connect to the world (or you become very strange indeed) and have some source of real money (marmite is a necessity, not luxury).

But I totally get why you want to try simplifying everything down. I still have friend who live in yurts in the woods most of the year round, perfectly feasible, just have a bit of a sideline (fixing motorbikes/hairdressing/massage/gardening) to keep some cash flowing.

The Seymour book is quite nice, but have you tried 'Living on the Earth' by Alicia Bay Laurel? It's a hippy-era modern classic and actually has a lot of useful odds and ends... and the pictures are gorgeous, innocent and free :-) This is the cover -



It's had any number of reprints and re-issues and versions, but the original '70's editions are plenty gorgeous enough :-)

was that tippee valley paddy?

will keep an eye out for that book thanks...