Posts Tagged stockpiling seeds
Projects for 2012
Some random thoughts about projects I want to work on during 2012.
Build a portable chicken coop
Plant a summer garden
Look into building a rabbit pen
Stockpile more seeds
The chicken coop I am looking at building is going to be 4 feet wide, 4 feet tall and 10 feet long. The unit is is going to have a coop on top of the pen, with maybe 4 – 6 boxes for laying hens. No roosters, all the chickens will be for will be eggs. Plucking chickens is a pain, it would be a lot easier and productive to harvest the eggs, and that is what my wife and I am planning on doing.
Stockpiling seeds for SHTF
Lets say that the world goes to crap tomorrow. Some kind of long term SHTF situation has happened – plague, meteor, massive climate change,,,,, what does your SHTF seed stockpile look like this very second? If you walked to where your seeds are stored, pulled out the container, would you be happy, or disappointed?
I have decided to divide my SHTF seed stockpile between my home and my bug out location. the mindset being, lets say that my family and I have to Bug Out and we do not have time to grab the primary seed stockpile, we have a backup. With a variety of seeds stored in each location, if we forget the main seeds, we have the backups.
Some considerations – seeds that grow quick like Radishes, plants that have protein like pinto beans, plants that do not need to be cooked like Squash and Zucchini, cold weather crops like turnip greens, plants that can be dried and stored easily like peas, beans and corn.
Examples of my SHTF survival seed stocks:
Corn:
G-90 – Hybrid sweet corn
Truckers Favorite – Open pollinated field corn
Yellow Dent – Open pollinated field corn
Peas and Beans:
Roma II – snap bean
Texas purple hull pink eye
Mississippi purple hull pink eye
Purple hull pink eye BVR – the BVR stands for virus resistant. If you see some BVR peas, pick them up.
Contender bush bean
Blue lake bush bean
Pinto beans – One thing to take into consideration is pinto beans, which are high in protein. So if there is no meat, pinto beans can be eaten.
I prefer bush beans over climbing beans – its just personal preference.
3 types of seeds to stockpile for shtf
Lets talk about food production during some kind of long term SHTF situation. Whether its nuclear war, some kind of new disease, climate change,,,,, combination of several things, there might come a point in time when you have to grow your own food. So what kind of seeds should you stockpile for some kind of long term SHTF situation? Lets break it down to 3 categories – short term storage, mid term storage, long term storage.
Short term storage foods – these are the foods that need to be eaten within a few days to a couple of weeks of being harvested. This is going to include most of your leafy greens, radishes, cucumbers, broccoli, spinach.
Mid term storage – these are the foods that can be stored for several months before they have to be eaten. This list includes pecans, certain types of squash, potatoes, onions.
Certain fruits can be and dehydrated and stored long period of time. If you have some wire trays available, place the fruit on the tray, and put the tray into something hot – like a car or truck with the windows slightly cracked. During the summer time, the inside of a truck or car can reach 40 degrees higher then the outside temperature. So if its 80 degrees outside, the inside of a car can reach the 120s. With outside temps in the 90 to lower 100s, temps inside a car or truck can reach around 140 degrees. In other words, the inside of a truck or car can act as a dehydrator for drying stuff like apple slices and plums to make prunes.
Long term storage – these are the foods that can be grown in the summer time, dried and stored through the winter. This includes pecans, wheat, barley, peas, beans and corn.
Seeds for a survival garden
Lets talk about stockpiling seeds and the value of having the ability to plant a survival garden. Stockpiling food – dried rice, beans, canned goods – is fine and dandy, but that is a none renewable resource. When you eat that can of beans, are you going to plant the can, and maybe it will sprout a canned bean plant, for you to pick more cans off of? I don’t think do.
Stockpiling food provides a family with a limited food source.
Having a garden can provide an unlimited source of food.
2,000+ years ago, did the Romans and Egyptians have canned foods and mylar bags? Nope, they raised what they wanted to eat. What about the Greeks and the Chinese, did they have mylar bags full of rice and beans? Nope, they raised what they ate.
There is nothing wrong with stockpiling food. It appears to me that a lot of survivalist put more focus on stockpiling a limited food source, then on learning how to develop an unlimited food source.
Saving pumpkin seeds from halloween
Halloween is a good time to stock up on pumpkin seeds. When your carving the jack-o-lantern for Halloween, take the pulp and seeds from the inside of the pumpkin, put into a strainer and wash the seeds to clean them. Getting the pulp off the seeds will help prevent mold growth while in storage.
Survivalist seed stockpile
Do you have a survival seed stockpile? I do. In fact, my survival seed stockpile is something that I like to keep an eye on – its on the top shelf of the freezer. I see it every time I open the freezer to look for something to eat.
If your thinking of stockpiling seeds, certain times are more favorable then others for buying seeds.
Early Spring – this is when the feed and fertilizer stores get their seed shipments in. This is usually the best time to buy fresh seed, and it gives you an idea what might be in short supply.
In the early spring of 2010 I went by 2 different seed stores here in Jasper, Texas and both of them told me the same thing – certain types of cucumbers will be in short supply. Which really did not bother me because I had more then enough of those types of cucumbers stocked up anyway.
Late spring early fall – this is when a lot of stores may put their left over seeds on sale. This is a great time to pick up odds and ends types of seeds. Usually, the more favorable seeds were snatched up in early spring. So the left overs might be a mix of “what is that?” type of stuff.
Stockpiling food
There is an interesting thread in the Survivalist Forum about Food Preps. Some of the topics being discussed are stockpiling canned goods, stockpiling dried or vacuum sealed foods, buying MREs (Meals Ready to Eat), canning your own food, stockpiling family sized or #10 cans of food, or something else.
Regardless of how much food you stockpile, its impossible to stockpile enough food for a lifetime.
Here is what my food preps look like:
Canned goods bought from local grocery store
Dried foods – dried beans, dried rice, and the such stored in mylar bags
MREs and Eversafe meals
Stockpiling as much seed as possible – beans, peas, corn, squash, okra, radishes,,, only to name a few.
Food stored in #10 cans
Freeze dried food in pouches with a 7 year life span
Survival Garden Seeds
Every survivalist should have seeds stockpiled for a survival garden. The first questions is, why would anyone need a “survival garden?” During extended wide spread disasters, food production and shipments might get disrupted. Most grocery stores only have a few days worth of supplies in their warehouse. When the panic buying kicks in, those stocks could be wiped out in a matter of hours.
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