the beginning of the end.

[NorthernRaider]

Trouble is though TH is say I harvest this " wheat" from the field at the end of the road, how do identify what type of wheat it is simply from viewing it, there's multiple types of wheat with different planting requirements and planting times, and I call it wheat cos its got an ear of seed at its top. I have to be honest it could be maize, barley or god knows what.

AND we must also consider ( so I'm told) that many strains of wheat used on commercial farms are " Sterile" by design and wont take seed again next year , Something to do with big companies like Monsanto protecting their investments in specialit modern grain, they make it sterile to stop other people planting their grain instead of being forced to buy it every year.

And that as I pointed out is only one shortcoming of my own plans. My own preps will ( hopefully) sustain me for near as dammit 2 years, after that its foraging and hunting for me.

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Here is an example of my quandary on only ONE small issue

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/bo...-info2.htm

[bigpaul]

a lot of what we see around here is Maize and its used for cattle feed, also remember any land that has been used for commercial farming the "mono cropping" sort where they use huge amounts of chemicals to put the heart back into the ground, post SHTF without the chemicals this ground will be STERILE and no good for growing anything for years to come. post SHTF I see us all growing our own food on strips of land, one for each family, a bit like the "leper" strips of the middle ages.

[Tartar Horde]

I can gaurantee NR that any Wheat you come across will be modern Wheat, also known as Winter wheat, which you sow in late Summer, only specialised small scale growers will have the old school wheat so don't worry.
Confusingly a lot of farmers call wheat "corn" which is wrong but heh they've been doing that for years, Corn and Maize (same thing) are from the America's. BP, the monster that is Monsanto have engineered terminator seeds that will not grow without using their chemicals, if the end of civilisation brings one benefit it will be the end of this scumsucking, bottom feeding bunch of Nazi bastards.

[bigpaul]

couldn't agree more TH. the collapse will at least give us a chance to return to a more natural form of farming and growing, the start of all this chemical use has its base in WW2 when the farmers were commanded by the ministry to use it .

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even as late as the 1960s and early 70s the average farm(at least in Devon) was only about 100 acres and were general referred to as "family" farms, non of these "agro-businesses"(mono cropping and very heavy on chemicals) these didn't arrive until much later, most of north Devon isn't suitable for this kind of operation-still- due to the hilly nature of the ground.

[NorthernRaider]

I still do not believe a societal collapse will be a world or society ending scenario, I think it will be a cultural adaptation to a new set of environmental circumstances. We will change and adapt but society will still continue.

But nothing will convince me that cities are nothing but artificial impedances on a society, they inevitably attract every aspect of society that is bad or parasitic.

[Tartar Horde]

It will be a hard road to be honest BP but growing grain is the basis of a stable culture and without cereals life will be very hard. The two staples of Wheat and Barley are essential for agricultural life, but having to do it all by hand would be a nightmare for most people, and backbreaking work to boot. There's no wonder most medieval peasants were dead before 40, they were all knackered

[bigpaul]

NR-there will always be survivors, there always is or we all wouldn't be here. TH-yes medieval peasants had short lives, but surely with what we know now-and they didn't- we could do the same thing but differently.....more like the 1950s than the 1550s???

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I'm assuming it would be "subsistence" farming to start with.

[Steve]

We can grow a lot of grain in the UK if we want to, but cheap imports have made livestock more popular. Rising grain prices are encouraging farmers to plant grain again, my neighbour bought some fields in 1980 and planted wheat on them for the first time last year, he got over 3 tons per acre, although that was with chemical assistance - he applied pelleted fertilizer in spring and "sprayed them off" ( basically kills the plant and allows it to dry ) before harvest.

[Tartar Horde]

You're right Steve we have some of the best cereal growing land in Europe, interestingly enough one of the reasons the Romans invaded was the supply of good grain Britannia produced, along with slaves and hunting dogs. Your Farmer friend is no exception as all modern grain production is carried out this way. Chemical fertilisers and fungicides are regularly used, and the stuff they use to "spray off" the crop is in reality a poison to stop the plant growing, nice eh. I had a conversation with a Farmer mate and asked him if he could grow organically . He told me it would take at least five years to get the soil "healthy" again and it would be impossible to grow anything on the land without fertilisers. When you consider a SHTF event where people have to farm again, a lot of the land will in fact be useless and devoid of nutrients to grow crops the old fashioned way. Just think about that for a moment, all land that is now intensively farmed will fail to produce crops if the Chemical feed stops arriving.

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If we could keep the tractors running BP it would be a godsend, but without them, and without the ability to harness Horse or Oxen, ploughing by Manpower must be a nightmare. In the abscence of draft animals I don't know how to prepare the soil any other way than by using hand tools.

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Ps the Romans had a name for the natives of this island, they called us
"Brittunculi" which roughly translated means Wretched/Horrid Britts
I thought Mortblanc might like that

[NorthernRaider]

So its a fair assumption any grain we want to eat will have to come from stored grain or wild grain until the land begins to recover itself.
Perhaps if the country is to become more "resilient" and the government wishes we need to start respecting the land a lot more and stop pissing around with pseudo green tariffs.

Oh boy I did not think we as a nation could not get any more vulnerable, but if the soil on millions of hectares is not going to be able to grow anything for years I think we have even greater prep issues to discuss

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I'm starting to see why quite a few people keep foil sealed packs of various assorted " heritage" seeds, I think those of us planning on a bit of subsistence farming after TSHTF are going to need our own fertile seed stock and identify parcels of land like school field and golf courses that farmers have not chemically sterilised.