Joshua States

I saw this post this morning and immediately became depressed by the mere thought of food prices rising 10X.
But I couldn't take the time to post this morning, as today was our day to make the hour drive to what passes for the nearest "city" (pop. 20,000) for several errands, including a stop at the grocery store for a few things.
As always, we try to go to the grocery store on a Wednesday, because that is when the new ads come out and if we wait until later in the week, most of the sale items are gone.
Today, most of the sale item bins in the meat department were already empty by noon. Several other shelves were minimally stocked.
That depressed feeling came back.
We made the drive back home, put all of our purchases away and took care of some chores and minor repairs I had on my list.
I finished reading everyone's' posts and I'm still feeling depressed about the idea that food prices actually could rise 10x.

Now, you may be wondering why I feel this way.
After all, there are all these wonderful stories about all these Permies Goofballs who have gotten their acts together and either have a plan or are living well by practicing some self-reliance.
I have been growing food for about a decade, and every year has been a challenge with ample rewards.
Just this week I attended a "Strategic Planning" meeting in our local community (HOA) and when the conversation about "opportunities" in social trends that we can take advantage of, I immediately brought up the homesteading movement, the permaculture movement, and the self-reliance movement. Suddenly people wanted the Association to start a community garden project. Well, that's a start anyway. Being that every lot in this HOA is a minimum of 5 acres, I was hoping for more self-motivated responses. I guess even out here in the hinterlands, people are much the same as elsewhere.

Think about something and do the online search to confirm, if that's your thing.
Are we talking about a drastic increase in food cost locally, nationally, or globally?

Here in the USA, about 86% of our population lives in metropolitan areas. Probably 60% of them don't have the 200 sq. ft. for a GAMCOD. Most of them probably don't have a little balcony to grow a couple of plants.
How many of the ones that have the dirt do you think have enough food stored to last the couple of months for germination, growth, and eventual harvest? Not many is my guess.

Globally, about 46% of the world's population lives in metropolitan areas and has similar circumstances. That's 4 billion people who largely rely on the mass-agricultural food chain.

So, what happens if food prices increase dramatically? We are not talking "cultural shift". We are talking massive civil unrest. Possibly mass starvation, crime waves (others have mentioned this), and economic collapse.
Not a pretty thought.
Downright depressing really.

I'm very interested to see how you finished out the interior. This is what we call a "Tiny Home" here in the US.
I guess you have to clean the snow off the solar panels in the winter?

I managed to get the invaders out with some amount of root ball still attached. I planted them in between the mush room beds.

Update:
The Pioneer Mac died. I got a replacement, but they sent the wrong variety, (red delicious, which I don't like at all), so I complained and got a Gala instead. I just planted both of them.
All three survived the winter and are now starting to leaf out. The Braeburn is much larger than the other two, which are little more than twigs with some buds.
Sorry about the rotten phone pics.

I was outside today crunching some charcoal I made and stored for a few years. I crush it and use it periodically. I started with 160 pounds of it, so it will last me a while.
Yeah, I know what you are thinking, where did you get 160 pounds of charcoal? (my system is down at the bottom herewebpage.)
Anyway, I decided to chuck it into my little SunJoe woodchipper to see how that worked.
I started with these pieces that are anywhere from 1-1/2" square and 4" long to pieces 1/2" thick and just as long, down to pieces that were about 1" square.



After about 10 minutes or so, I had about 4-gallons of this and a lot of powder at the bottom of the pail.

Nancy Reading wrote:It looks like you have two different plants there -

I'm wondering if the brighter green one is chickweed (Stella media)?

It is a common annual - quite nice as a salad leaf. I can't really tell from the photo though.

The other looks like some sort of Oxalis - maybe oxalis corniculata:
That can be invasive I gather depending on your climate. Again edible leaves, although tend to be a bit tough in my experience.

I think @Nancy Reading is right, there are two different volunteers in there. I also think @Samantha Lewis is right that these came with the nursery plants.

I need some pollinator attraction, so I might try to dislodge them and transplant. They are terribly close to the crown, so that might be impossible without damaging the blueberry.
I'll get some better pics tomorrow.

I started a few blueberry plants last year in containers and moved them into the greenhouse to over winter. They have started to come back around, and I noticed one of them has some new companions.
What the heck are they and should I get rid of them?

I finally found time to watch the video. It was worth it.
Even though it focuses on large scale farms and is just the beginning of research into using biochar as a soil amendment, it has relevant information for much smaller growers and even the home garden. You would just need to create a system suited to the size of your operation.

A couple of points I noticed:
One of the farmers was mixing his biochar with composted material at a 90/10 ratio of compost to biochar. Another farmer was mixing it with non-composted organic matter at a 20/80 ratio of organic matter to biochar and letting the composting process continue. Very different ratios and very different methods. I think the only results we heard about at the end of the video were from the farmer who mixed at the 90/10 ratio.

I remember reading about the discovery of Amazonian soils and realizing that the ancients mixed charcoal with their soil. What strikes me is the apparent dichotomy between the expectations between what the Amazonians did vs. what we Westerners want. The Amazonians were looking at soil health from a generational perspective. They were aware that this process took years, if not centuries, to come to full fruition. We expect to see results after a year or two and that's probably not a reasonable expectation. I am willing to accept small, incremental changes, so I will continue to use charcoal/biochar as a soil amendment in my garden. As this is only my first season in a new climate zone, it's going to take some time.

I have already mixed biochar into my compost pile. Now I have a load of organic matter that is just starting the composting process. I think I will add some biochar to that compost bin and see what happens.

Eric Hanson wrote:Joshua,
Very Nice!
You have a nice wood chip bed for your mushroom spawn.  If you want to encourage them a little more, maybe find some straw and cover with 1-2 inches of light, fluffy straw--don't overdo it.  This is just enough to keep the wood chips damp.
But again, these look very good.
Good Luck,
Eric

Thanks Eric,
IDK if you caught it, but the spawn is scattered between two layers of straw that came with the spawn. The only straw I have access to is the bulk stuff from stores like Tractor supply and other animal feed retailers. This contains seeds and I have vowed never to use it as mulch again. I spend way too much time weeding straw out of my beds. I have a good supply of oak leaves and pine needles though. I am using this as mulch in my new outdoor garden. Perhaps some of that would do?