Inge Leonora-den Ouden

Jay Angler wrote:...I think a big part of the "automatic backyard food pump" is identifying plants that grow so well in your ecosystem, that you can count on them for your basic calories and nutrition pretty much without fail. Paul has plenty of other plants and young fruit trees on his land, both wild and domestic. Those can supplement and diversify his diet as available (like rhubarb which is only a spring crop due to its oxalic acid content). In my area, the natives relied on the ocean for their "food pump" by harvesting the salmon run. They also grew camas bulbs, but also exported/traded many of those. Many areas around the world had at least one "reliable" staple crop that was well adapted to their ecosystem.

If the information I got is right, the staple crop growing here, and harvested since prehistory, was a wild parsnip. When potatoes were 'discovered', and came to Europe, everyone changed to potatoes. I don't understand why parsnips now are a 'forgotten vegetable' (starting to come back since a few years, mostly in the organic food stores). They grow easily, at least at my allotment garden. Better than potatoes, which get blight and colorado bugs.

Daniel Andy wrote:I'd like to expand on this question for those with greenhouses.

If you have a (small!) greenhouse and can grow tropical (or subtropical crops) year round...which plants are the ideal ones for low effort food?  I assume various tropical fruit trees, but I could be wrong. Beyond that I have no idea and I would love to hear what people think.

The assumption is this is a small greenhouse....

Hi Daniel. Where I live a greenhouse can be used for growing peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, a.a. Real tropical plants need not only more heat, but also more light than there usually is in this cloudy climate. To heat the greenhouse and have grow-lights on ... can't be called 'automatic'.

But of course in other regions, with other climates, tropical plants can be grown in a greenhouse. In that case my first choice would be: bananas! Because I love them.

Nikki Roche wrote:I met a couple of requirements of this thought experiment. I'm in zone 7b in southeastern US, and I have 1/6 acre fenced-in garden that's been largely ignored for about 4 years. I chopped and dropped a lot of it a few years ago, and then health problems got in the way. The lesson I learned was "don't put all of your eggs in one basket." I like the idea and simplicity of 3 main crops, but I think having only 3 and then ignoring them until needed would make me more concerned. Because interestingly, the sunchokes and walking onions, which were thriving and spreading for several years, all died during the last 4 years. There was weed pressure, deer pressure for the sunchokes, record low temperatures in winter, and a record drought one summer. Kale has never reseeded itself for me. A couple of radishes still show up here and there from reseeding, and I find garlic in various places that I missed harvesting.

Over those 4 years, a couple of pine trees and lots of blackberries showed up. Blueberries and muscadines are thriving. Perennial herbs are doing well, and asparagus is still producing, though it's not a fan of all the weeds. Lambsquarter and chickweed show up each year, but often not in the same spots they were in the year before. During the winter, my fresh (not stored) choices were dandelion, henbit, plantain, wild onions, and chickweed, unless I wanted to collect and process acorns.

If I were to plant food that I could leave for extended periods, I'd feel the need to opt for a variety of perennial veggies, lots of berries, trees if there's room, and annual edible "weeds." I might miss some windows of harvest, but there'd be *something* to harvest at almost any time and I wouldn't be in a clutch if one of those harvests failed or died. I imagine 3 core crops would work great for some people, but I'm not built for that after my gardening experiences.

After reading this thread, I want to look into skirret. I haven't had any luck with carrots, yet. And I want to investigate more edible tubers, as I don't know if achira or chufa would be options for me.

Hi Nikki. So your garden showed you what are the kind of plants that grow well, and what plants don't do so good there. In permaculture it's always 'it depends'. There's no general rule 'what's the best to grow'.

I'm a fan of 'edible weeds' and of a wide variation of vegetables and fruits too.

Hi. I did not yet read all posts in this thread.

I just want to say: in case of emergency the sunchokes grow right behind my back door. And some type of Allium (but not exactly walking onions) too. And more herbs.
The rhubarb is doing great, this morning I picked the first two stalks and had them (slightly cooked) with pancakes and honey.
I try to grow more perennial kale now too. The one I had only lasted for a few years. Yesterday I planted seeds of Sutherland kale, I hope that's a more 'perennial' type.

In my allotment garden I grow all kinds of greens and beans (also pulses). My allotment garden has lots of berry bushes too, all different kinds of berries that like to grow in this climate/soil. So I make many jars of berry-jam. I often give a jar of jam as a gift to my friends. But I think : in case of emergency it's good to have friends!

Suzanne Jabs wrote:I love the idea of using nettles for fiber, but just want to note that in the PNW of the US, I was taught by a park ranger that some endangered butterflies lay their eggs on nettles, and so we always harvest very carefully, looking under the leaves before picking leaves to use for tea and only taking a leaf from one plant, not cutting the whole plant. Something to keep in mind depending on where you're harvesting.

Yes, alway, whatever plant you harvest, for whatever use, be careful not to harvest too much! That's one of the 'rules' of foraging in the wild.
If you harvest stinging nettles for the fiber, you need whole plants. So in that case you look for a spot with many nettle plants, and you take only a few of them. You take so little, it looks like no plants are missing.

I read this thread because I just started reading a new book on the permaculture principles. Of course I need to write a review for Permies. I want to know what I have to keep in mind while I am reading, so my review will be useful.
Good tips here. Thank you.

I prefer cloth hankies. I got some 'real' cotton handkerchiefs a friend 'inherited' from her uncle. I don't know why she gave them away, but anyway I am happy with them. Until then I used square 'rags' cut from old T-shirts.

If I really get the flu, then I prefer soft paper tissues for the constantly running nose. But I don't have that very often (only once in several years).

I don't know if one is better than the other. Paper tissues you throw in the bin, cloth hankies you have to wash at a not-too-low temperature.

And if you aren't interested in making boxes from drink cans ...
Atomic Shrimp has videos on so many other subjects! Unbelievable. Foraging, cooking (with the cheapest ingredients f.e.), walking along English beaches, gardening, ... what doesn't he do? And of course all with the typical British sense of humor.

David Milano wrote:...
The interior photo of the old Ford parked inside the better-preserved end of the barn (the other end is not safe to be in) tells its own sub-story. By all appearances it was simply driven into the barn one miserable day when it could no longer justify its existence on the farm and promptly forgotten. I looked it over pretty well, and figured it could probably be started and driven with a bit of tinkering. (I once resurrected a long—30 years long—abandoned field truck that the farmer gave to a friend and myself for free, just for the effort of getting it out of his hedgerow. The rugged old flathead V8 coughed up and the leaky tires held enough air to get it out of the field and into a trailer.) But this truck revival wasn’t to be. The owner (two generations along from the truck’s use-by date) wasn’t interested, and really neither was I, being already overloaded with projects.

I guess the old Ford sits there still. The very likely outcome? Falling timbers will one day finish it off for good.

In their small way, the barn and the truck tell the story of the rise of colossal, centralized systems, and the fall of tiny local ones.

I think collectors of old-timer cars wish they had that old Ford!

Abandoned buildings are rare where I live. Old buidlings are either demolished completely, or renovated.
So when I see an old abandoned building somewhere I do my best to make a photo of it.


old shed in the woods in Twente (region in the very East of the Netherlands).






Three photos of a early-last-century farmhouse that has been 'given back to nature' on purpose, because of 'rewilding'. In Drenthe (2 hours bicycle ride from where I live).


I'm sorry I wasn't able to come closer for a better photo. Another case of 'rewilding', now somewhat more to the North of the Netherlands.