farmers ... friend or foe.

[bigpaul]

the average farm back in the 60s was 100 acres, farms these days will be several hundred acres and not all in one place, farmers seem to have a few fields here and a few fields there and some a couple of miles away if the mileage that some of the farm machinery does is anything to go by.

[Lightspeed]

(16 May 2014, 22:20)Steve Wrote: After TSHTF farming will be very different. The 100 acres that Joe Farmer currently ploughs and seeds will become impossible for him to manage with no diesel. If he wants to trade produce he will need manual labour, and if that means allowing people to live on his land then he will do so. He will have to make sure his workforce is strong, so hunting and a share of the crops will be given as pay. It's been done like this before.

I have the same take on this as you Steve.

If diesel is not available large scale agriculture will be impossible.

Dray horses are few and far between, and the old ploughs and farrows made to be pulled by true horse power have also disappeared.

That only leaves manpower and hand tools. Human powered agriculture, will not be pretty.

[bigpaul]

I think farming as we know it today will not be possible post SHTF, we will be looking at smaller acreages, possibly something more akin to a market garden ,or a series of allotments, with a few animals on the side.

[Sunna]

s13 please explain /full term survival in the countryside its doable.

so your on your bit of public land , shtf so will your local farmer friends let you take his rabbits.now a £££ food source
would any members of the public be joining you on this land , will they want the rabbits as well . full term , water more food than just rabbits are you lighting fires to boil water /cook safty , security all this with a air gun.
what you living in a tent your car are you taking the kitchen sink .
what is the longest you have survived in the uk countryside before a weekend a week a month please tell...

good luck

[Scythe13]

Sunna, please do not read my posts and them make up stories outside of the boundaries of fact and what I said. Assumptions about myself will only make the person with the assumptions look stupid. There is a lot about me that you don't know, and I don't want to make you look silly, but I'll answer your questions here:

To answer your question Sunna about my survival skills, 5 weeks on a desert island (the Cook Islands, for my 21st birthday), in the UK I have done 3 weeks on Dartmoor unassisted, 2 weeks in southern France too. I have spent 2 nights in far below (meaning at least 5 or 6 degrees) sub zero temperatures in self made natural shelters. Even at one of the Dartmoor meets, I built my own shelter and slept in there when the temp was between -2 to -4 at night...no sleeping bag until about 5am when I got a little lazy and wanted a little extra padding. That was without hot-rocks or anything like that. One of the other people that came along to that meet opted to use my shelter instead of his tent, on the second night, because his tent was uncomfortable. Slept really well in my shelter apparently.

So that's part of my credentials, not that I need to justify myself. I frequently forage for a salad on my lunch break at work at the moment too. I am also able to cook and eat many different kinds of insect for their protein content.

Where did I say I planned to do long term wilderness survival? Now, for the long term survival plans...I only plan to bug out momentarily, so that I can better assess the situation around our area. Can you explain to me where I said I was planning on long term survival off the land? I said it was DOABLE. If you can't work out how to do it; if I was you and unable to work out how to survive off the land, I'd really start to panic. I have said, time and time again, that bushcraft is considered as a last resort option by myself and the wife. But long term bushcraft survival is simple enough (practice is key, just reading a book and thinking you know the skills will get you killed!), build a shelter, get a source of water, make sure you have a steady supply of firewood, then go caveman. Around our area we have a lot of deer, rabbits, pigeons, and the alike. So getting a meal shouldn't be too hard. If I can't get meat, then I can celebrate that I have taken the time and effort to no only learn about the flora but also to plant lots of different food plants around the area. Just to make it easier, if we did have to bug out. I call this prepping for a worst case scenario.

If we planned to bug out permanently, why would I be storing food, prepping the garden, sorting water storage, and the alike? Don't assume that just because I have said that something is doable, that it's my plan to do so. It's like me saying, crossing the channel in a kayak is doable. At what point did I say: I SCYTHE13 PLAN TO CROSS THE CHANNEL IN A KAYAK! I didn't did I? You just made an assumption. Sorry to say that you should probably better read what I actually said, and not what you think I said.

I'm fascinated by this statement you made:
"all this with a air gun."
Please can you explain to me where you have any knowledge about my firearms experience or shotgun experience...or ownership for that matter? Just because I don't talk about having something, doesn't mean I don't have it. Plus, let's look at something called a BOB, where you would have other equipment, more than just an air rifle.

Oh, and as for my local farmer friends...check back about my history about my farmer friend whose 90% prepper. Check about my post earlier in this thread when we speak about me working on his land in exchange for board and food. But yes, he would let me take rabbits as he runs a farm and the rabbits are not a food source for him...he has a whole farms worth of food, and the odd rabbit here and there will make zero difference to him. Otherwise he would have me pay for them now, already. Plus the fact that his soon-to-be-wife works with my wife and they're best friends. Me and the wife were around his house with his fiancé, hanging out and chatting about the world in general all of 2 evenings ago. I help him build stuff around his garden, e.g. a fruit cage earlier this morning, after a quick shoot on his land this morning (bagged 2 squirrels). I'm the back up best man incase his brother gets too drunk for his wedding. Oh and his son thinks I'm the best thing since sliced bread and I teach the little guy outdoor survival skills, trap setting, and the alike. So I severely doubt he will be driving me off from his land.

You can also read up about my plans to temporarily bug out, keep a watch of my property to make sure nothing untoward happens. Would any members of the public be joining me? Not that I plan on. But if they do, there's not a huge amount I can do to stop them. However, where I plan to be is not too easily accessible. The extra effort for other people to get there would reap zero reward for them, unless they planned to watch my property too haha. There are so many other places they could go, I doubt we'd have company.

Okay now Sunna, does that answer your questions?

[Sunna]

post 16 , full term survival in the countryside is doable.

i get the feeling that your pissed at my post it was not meant to upset you or say your not telling the truth.
my issue is i find it hard to beleve that living off the land after shtf would be a death sentence.

you and your wife would need around 10 pints of drinkerball water a day

4000 cal a day in food more if doing heavy work , choping wood to boil 10 pints a day plus cooking plus keeping warm washing you and your clothes.
thats just water rabbits are low in carbs and fat and leaves are not going to do it.
please remember this is not about you just the idea that uk bugg out is not going to work.

chinn up old chap...

[Scythe13]

Sunna, I think you are making a classic mistake that because you see something as not possible, that you assume other people cannot do it. This is now beyond the realm of whether farmers are friend or foe, so I'll start a new thread on this subject, and will provide my answer for it.

[Straight Shooter]

At first glance at this thread......I took the view has Sunna gone a bit nuts........but.....there are a lot of good point being thrown about.......its about time scale of the events to a degree but in the end the same end result All will be competing for all food sourses .....so the thread is very valid, that's why we all prepp .....giving us more time to out last the sheeple ...should make things a little bit easier for us folk.

[Sunna]

I am the mutts , baby...