RE: A system for growing 100% of your food: Part 1
Whoa, super detailed and well structured post! Thanks for all the research! Having read the "Market Gardener", I can clearly see Fortier's thinking in this system.
While we'll probably never move beyond the small single-family fruit and vegetable garden, I'd like to point out that such a "geometric structure", even if scaled down, requires a large expanse of flat and not shaded land.
To be applied on the micro-scale, like in a backyard garden, the actual garden plan will look more like watercolor blobs, flowing into one another, instead of a square grid.
Also, the crop rotation is not so rigorous. There'll always be one or two spots that are perfect for tomatoes, while cucumbers will grow well at a single spot, etc.
A major worry of mine is storage. OK, so we produced 100 kg of potatoes from a few beds. Now what?! Unless proper storage amenities are present in advance, producing a whole year's supply of a quickly perishable food like apples or potatoes can be more of a problem. We found out the hard way...
Lastly, I think the key will always be diversity. I'd rather have a smaller amount of a larger selection of foods, which, besides better eating, will allow easier barter. Because "self"-sufficiency is never really that isolated. There's always the community. Sharing the individual surplus will guarantee overall diverse abundance :)
Great points there. In order to implement this plan you will need a square acre of generally flat open land. In some states, countries, and towns this isn’t easy to come by. I personally don’t have much flat or open land. I have 18 acres but it’s almost entirely wooded. The photo up at the top is of my parents blueberry farm, where there were acres of flat farm land open. We were planning on using a similar plan to establish a variety of fruit trees and shrubs there. Since I don’t have that square, open, flat acre, I’m going to implement a similar plan but adjusted to fit my lands topography and dimensions. I know a lot of people here in my area who have acres of flat land that they don’t know what to do with. This is especially useful for those folks.
To be certified organic here in the US, you need to have a 3 year crop rotation. I think it’s a good practice, especially since the plan calls for leaving all of the roots and plants in and on the beds. I’ve experienced serious disease issues growing my tomatoes I the same beds year after year, and I think the rotation will be of benefit. But I may be wrong.
Storage is a big concern, and I plan on doing follow up posts on that. The growing of the food is actually the easiest part, the harvest, processesing and storage is much more time sensitive and labor intensive in my opinion. With that said, all of these crops are designed to be processed, the tomatoes should be canned into soups and sauces, dried or frozen. The potatoes won’t be all of one variety, so harvest and storage would be spread, but you’ll need a larder. I harvested 10 gallons of potatoes back in August, and the have kept perfect at room tempature thus fa. But a larder or a walk in fridge will be necessary to keep all of the food. I’ve processed hundreds of pounds of apples before into applesauce which kept for 3 years. Fermenting will also play a huge role. Cabbages, the soy, green beans, carrots, beets, and others should all be fermented.
I 100% agree that this should be a community undertaking. And adding more vegetables and crops would be great. I wasn’t implying everyone grow this selection of foods. There are so many that I left out. I do believe that’s its a generally good starting point though, if you are new.
Thanks again for your input and thoughts!
Re: storage. Around here, the old-time traditional way for storing potatoes and other root crops, is in some sort of rudimentary root cellar. It's just a hole in the ground, lined with straw and, before industrial revolution allowed for wire mesh, a layer of thorny plants to protect the goods from burrowing rodents.
That is not a working solution for places with high water table, or high rainfall/low drainage soils, but still, I like it because it's low-tech and relatively low labor, after the initial dig.
I totally agree that growing the food is the easier part! What to do with it afterwards - that's the most time and effort consuming part! My parents in law are more inclined to just throw away a bucket of tomatoes instead of put it the time needed for canning or drying or making a passata... :/
Yeah, a root cellar is a must if you are growing any serious amount of food. If it's not possible, a walk in fridge would be the next best choice, although would consume quite a bit of energy if not in a cool basement. Learning how to process and store food is no light matter, I get better at it every year, but there's still so much I need to learn. It's sad that this all used to be common knowledge passed down from generation to generation, no we're completely clueless. 50% of all food grown is thrown out in the US, such a shame.