The following article has been generously contributed by Tess Pennington of Ready Nutrition.
Editor’s Note: On a recent trip through Central Texas we noticed land that had been plush with hay, corn and vegetables is now completely barren. It’s been so dry for the last six months in Texas that we’ve broken just about every record since the 1890’s. One of the ranchers in the area we were visiting says that he is being forced to sell all 1500 head of cattle on his property due to lack of water and hay. There is simply no way for him to keep the herd alive unless conditions improve immediately. As Tess points out in the article below, the droughts sweeping not just Texas, but the rest of the country, are threatening to bring about a modern day dust bowl, and it just so happens to be at the worst possible time for the economy. Farmers and ranchers are facing the real possibility that they will not be able to pay for the loans they extended in the previous growing season, or even the mortgages on their homes because their revenue has, quite literally, dried up. In addition to the severe impact these droughts are having directly on the farming and ranching community, the macro impact on the entire system could lead to some serious problems for Americans who are already strained with ever increasing food and energy prices. In the short-term, we may see a break in meat prices as ranchers off-load cattle – but produce prices may not see any such drops. In the long-term, unless we see a return to normal conditions, all food prices will be adversely affected – and that’s on top of rising prices due to the inflationary impact of an ever depreciating US dollar. The effects of these price rises will be felt across all industries, including everything from farm equipment sales and fertilizer, to traditionally non-farm industries as those rural Americans who depend on a normal climate for income are forced to cut discretionary spending in order to make ends meet.
While it can be argued that this drought is a cyclical event that may correct itself next year, we must consider the potential that the cycle is one in the same as that which was experienced during the Great Depression. Those droughts wrecked devastation across the country for nearly a decade. In normal times, we might be able to weather the storm. But these are certainly anything but normal, and as we have mentioned before, it will take only a single catalyst to set off the next round of collapse. The American consumer can’t take much more pressure on their wallets. However, the current conditions indicate that this is exactly what is about to take place.
It is no secret that we are in one of the worst droughts of our lifetime. Could these weather conditions be the beginning of something much worse? Or even create a perfect storm that will lead to the beginning of the end of America’s vitality?
To begin, farmers in Oklahoma and in Texas are already bracing themselves for what may be their largest TEOTWAWKI event ever experienced. These two states are the largest producers of hay and cattle in the United States. However, due to persistent drought conditions plaguing this part of the country, the outcome has the two states seeing the smallest hay crop in over a century, thus creating a shortage of feed for livestock. “Farms may harvest only one crop from alfalfa and Bermuda grass this year, compared with three normally”, said Larry Redmon, a state forage specialist at Texas A&M University. (Source)
The Perfect Storm
The hay shortage is leading many cattle ranchers to sell off their herds prematurely to make any type of profit. Cattle that usually graze on fields through September or October, are instead being sold to feedlots, where they are confined in pens and eat mostly corn. Steven Kay, publisher for Cattle Buyers Weekly admits that beef producers are culling cows and young females, which means smaller supplies [of cattle] for the next two years or longer. Don Close, a market director with the Texas Cattle Feeders Association in Amarillo, TX agrees with these sentiments and adds that liquidating the cattle herds is “going to make a tight supply even tighter, as we get down the road.”
Long-term drought conditions and hay shortages are not the only SHTF events farmers need to worry about. Fred Duvall, a cattle rancher for over 50 years suspects that if the drought continues for another three months it will finish off some cattle-raisers. “They’ll have to completely sell out.” (Source)
The implications of these issues will be felt by the entire country through shortages of meat and surging prices for years to come. In fact, the USDA forecasts that retail-meat prices may increase this year as much as 7 percent and dairy products may jump 6 percent, more than the rate of overall food inflation at 3 percent to 4 percent.
A Modern Day Disaster
As much as we would like to hope and pray for the weather conditions to change, this could be the beginning of a long-term disaster that the entire country will feel. This devastation is very similar to the drought conditions experienced during the 1930’s that brought about the devastating dust bowls which only intensified the suffering during the Great Depression.
Increasing food prices, food shortages, droughts, families losing their homes. Does any of this sound familiar? We all know that history can repeat itself. Whether or not we choose to see history repeating itself is the real question. However we decide to view this scenario, it is a modern day disaster that will be hard to come back from. Preparing for harder days to come is inevitable at this point, especially for those in the farming and cattle business.
This article has been contributed by Tess Pennington of Ready Nutrition. Subscribe to Tess’ Get Prepped Weekly Newsletter for more emergency preparedness tips, homesteading ideas, and insights. Ready Nutrition and SHTFplan.com take your privacy very seriously and will not distribute or share your email address with other parties.
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Crazy! – I think this is the beginning of a 10 year drought cycle for that part of the country just as the south east experienced last decade.
Instead of trying to fix the world and spend trillions doing so… how ‘bout we take all that cash and fix and take care of ourselves first.
Remember: “put your oxygen mask on first and then help your neighbor”, Can’t help your neighbor if you pass out and die America!
Something to think about!
Exactly Man Up…. Did you see the Dow today it shed nearly 200pts… It wont be long before you see the oxygen masks flying off and people running for there Gold. Too bad you cant live off Gold. People will be better off learning how to survive off the Land.. A good place to learn and get supplies is http://www.bereadytosurvive.com.
200 point declines for the Dow are nothing. Increasing viotility on the Dow was predicted 40 years ago in “The Wall Street Gang” It has been occuring for some time.
This is the new normal.
America is not ‘fixing’ the world – it may have come to your attention that much of America’s overseas activity is open and multiple proxy wars. Given this bringing the ‘legions’ home, closing down hundreds of military bases would eliminate Billions if not Trillions of unfunded expenditures – will never happen though.
Anybody else wondering if HAARP has any part of this?
At least one other person is wondering. I’m also wondering if it’s HAARP or the chinese-owned scalar devices. Who’s trying to kill us? Our govt or some other?
Make that three.
I have been wondering about HAARP also.
No I think weather modification has a bigger play in this.
yes, most certainly wondering
Mostly this is due to the La Nina / La Nino effect from the Pacific. A couple years back, Arizona was in a drought. Now our lakes are full, including Mead and Powell.
Lots of rain this monsoon season too.
I don’t buy into that jazz at all, just more cover up stories like man made global warming and CO2 hogwash.
I do know the Gulf stream is dead though, and this isn’t being talked about much and is absolutely huge!! in it’s consequences
Actually…contrary to the other comment you are correct. This weather pattern impacts where I live – Australia (very wet) and South Amercia – drought. The Pacific weather oscillation is also linked to a weather cycle across the Atlantic and when the Pacific cycle and Atlantic cycle ‘lock’ it theoretically creates deeper droughts and wetter cycles of weather. The La Nina and La Nino cycle was discovered way before the climate change circus.
We didn’t get the La Nina that we should have 2010-2011. The gulf had a brief “cold spell”, but it was piddling and short-lived. The consequence is this resulting jet-stream-gone-wild that’s given us this year’s deadly storms, record floods and now drought. In scientific circles, it’s being called La Nada (the nothing).
It is a thought but don’t forget weather goes in long, medium and short term cycles that are directed by oceanic conditions. Diaries and local records going back well prior to white population on the plains show these trends. This cycle of drought was seen in the 1930’s and before that local peoples showed that it occurred in the 1840s when there were mostly native peoples living there.
As modern Americans we tend to forget that the earth has it’s own ways and sometimes they are not so friendly to our ways. That is why people used to have a years worth of food at all times.
Well said C!
True, but I think “nefarious influence” can’t be ruled out. Bill ‘Mr. Moneybags’ Gates has alot of interest and money tied up in projects and research like ‘cloud seeding’.
I know there are long term cycles, and regular hot weather… I just really would like for “them” to stop messing with mother nature, and HARRP does that.
No one knows what type of adverse affects HARRP has on things in the long term… but… anyway….
I dont know what to think, but things sure seem headed South… no matter the topic… our debt(demise), the heat, our wars, our elected officials (what a perverted freak show politicians are)… I am looking for a sign, some positive sign, from somewhere, that things can be OK… but…
…but it seems “they” are dead set on wrecking this thing 🙁
Sorry for the ramble… it is just too dang hot.
Mostly it is the La Nino / La Nina effect. Arizona was in a severe drought a couple years back until the Pacific current change. Now our lakes are full, including Mead and Powell.
Lots of rain this monsoon season too.
Yes very much so since I live in the area mentioned.
Folks its so bad in TX and Ok that fliping a cig out the window will land your ass in jail. This morning our pan evp.rate was .81% what thar means to you city folk is that it would take at least 9 tenths of a inch of rain per day just to gain .09% of soil moisture. and the High was 107 degs where I work in the country. I drank 9 32oz bottles of water today and did piss till 7:00pm. Now thats dry. If you smart get a large freezer and stock it while beef is kinda low.
PS Don’t forget to have the juice to run it when the lights go out. Or learn how to dry it.I just pray for the tropical storm in the gulf to move up to the Panhandle.
Make that 5? Honestly I think I’d be more surprised if it wasn’t HAARP at this point with all the ‘Natural Disasters’ simultaneously going in the US and the entire world for that matter
Also, Ironically, if HAARP wasn’t causing this it could be used to fix it like by bringing the rainfall to the areas in drought…gotta love big brother
I live in Texas, and nobody here as ever seen anything like the drought we’re having now. Giant pin oak trees that have stood for over a hundred years are starting to die. Also peculiar, is my heirloom tomato plants, which I plant every year. This year, my plants all grew fast and EXTREMELY lush (to the point that it’s strange) and they’re all covered in blooms, however not a single tomato. I water regularly- which is why they’re not burned to a crisp, but why no tomatoes? And stranger still, I overheard a woman in the grocery store the other day telling the checker about her tomato plants doing the same thing, so I started talking to people I know that have gardens. Every one has said the same thing, hybrids did alright with regular watering, but heirlooms all over the area perfomed strangely as mine did… I’ve been growing tomatoes for years and years and this is all new to me.
The sooner we learn to grow our own gardens and rain harvest the better. Get started by visiting http://www.bereadytosurvive.com. The better you are at planting and harvesting the better off you will be.
LOL you have to have rain to harvest it.
lmao! I’m a bit south of you, DPS. Just go back from a trip to So Padre Island. The only green we saw was down in the valley. Very few cattle in the fields – everything was dead. Trees have few leaves. I’ve lived in TX since 1960 – have never seen it this bad. We have gone 304 days with only a trace of rain. Hate to see SPI get hit by another hurricane, but sure would love to have a good tropical depression move across the state. We’re so dry here, we’d probably dry it out before it got past! LOL
And just a reminder – it wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark! If it looks like TD Don might actually move into the state, I will be at Tractor Supply buying rain barrels!!!
Native prairie once covered vast amounts of the landscape of America. Almost all of it is gone because of massive mis-management practices within the agricultural and livestock industry for the last 200 years. Cattle are an invasive species. Disturbance, e.g. fire, floods, is a necessary equalizer of Nature, but cattle, along with sheep, severely damage the landscape. As long as humans lack a balanced relationship with the environment, Mother Nature will create balance, one way or another. Cattle ranchers are a dying breed. In 50 years, the whole industry, as it presently exists, will be gone. Not to mention, the industry of growing GMO crops. (It’s not nice to (try to) fool Mother Nature.
When humans learn to work with Nature rather than against her, Nature in turn, will support humans. As you sow, so shall you reap.
An Lakota fellow, who had spent his whole life on the prairie, goes to visit a friend who had moved to town. He’d never seen a train or the tracks they run on.
While standing in the middle of the railroad tracks one day, he hears this whistle — Whooee da Whoee! — but doesn’t know what it is.
BAM!!, he’s hit by the train and tossed to the side of the tracks. It was only a glancing blow, so he was lucky enough to live through it with a few broken bones and some bruises.
After weeks in the hospital recovering, he’s at his friend’s house attending a party one evening. While in the kitchen, he suddenly hears the teapot whistling. He grabs a baseball bat from the nearby closet and proceeds to batter and bash the teapot into an unrecognizable lump of metal. His friend, hearing the noise, rushes into the kitchen, sees what’s happened and asks his Lakota friend, “Why’d you bust up my teapot?” The Lakota man replies, “Shii’ kiis’, you gotta kill these things when they’re small.”
Ha ha, what a nice one. Thanks.
I have another with trains, and since Germany has fucked us it’s related.
There are four people sitting in a train cabin: One Greek guy, one German guy, an 80 y.o lady, and a chick in a mini skirt.
During the trip both the Greek and the German were staring at the girl, but they couldn’t do anything because of the old lady’s presence.
After a while the train enters a tunnel so in the deep darkness a loud smack is being heard.
So each one thinks silently:
-The Greek “This German prick touched the chick and she slapped him”.
-The German “This Greek bastard touched the chick and she slapped me”.
-The chick ” One of those two assholes tried to touch me, but he touched the old lady and she slapped him”.
-And the old woman “You German bastard. I owed you this since WWII”.
I’m sure the buffalo are feeling it too, but I’ll bet they’re fairing far better than cattle. They always do, be it drought or blizzard. Bad choices. Still, some of us haven’t been able to afford beef for over five years anyway. I don’t know who’s been buying it, but their per capita is a darn sight higher than mine.
Unlike cattle, Buffalo know how to adapt. They have a sense for their environment, plus it’s in their nature to Roam, whereas cattle decimate the landscape, i.e. graze until the grass is no more. Buffalo move on, knowing the grass they leave today will be there when they return. Likewise, the Native Americans, prior to the arrival of the “Invasive Species”, the European Settlers, understood how to preserve the resources that sustained life; take just what one needs, whereas, ever since the settlers set up camp, it’s been all down hill since then. If the Invasive Species doesn’t attempt to exterminate the Buffalo once again, the Buffalo will probably outlive the Great White Hunter well into the future. However, if push comes to shove, we know who’s got the fire power and the “me first” attitude.
We have a captive herd here in West Tenn. Come shtf, I’ll be sure to turn them out on my way out of town. That should also slow any exodus that might be on my heels – heh, heh, heh. Note to self: wire cutters.
If the american indians were so fu**ing smart, why are they all so fu**ing dead?
Ben Dover: I am Cherokee and the reason the american Indians got fucked is they had honor and trusted that the Europeans did as well. More Indians died of european disease then were ever killed in battle.
Comanche and Cherokee crossed with European myself. Bloodyfellow is right. The European’s didn’t have the conscience or honor of native people’s and employed barbaric tactics, including germ warfare (the sort of stuff America codemns today, at least publicly). But the number one reason they didn’t win? Technology, pure and simply. It is always the case. The only way to win otherwise is with sheer numbers and great, great sacrifice (think Shaka Zulu) where gret numbers just keep coming and coming. The natives expected the white eyes to eventually show their common humanity. It never happened. Greed won out. If this system crumbles to dust, I don’t see that so much is really lost. No one cries when the man-eating tiger is found dead in the forest.
Have you ever visited Europe…
Is that question directed to me? If so, why do ask?
Anyone knows how many years took for the land to recover back in the 1930s?
I mean the period that the book “Grapes of Wrath” is reffering to.
I remember in a history class i took, the dust clouds moving from one state to another, were enormous.
Manos,
I think it was a full decade. Started with dry years in 1930-31, sprinkled with severe drought in the mid-30’s, followed by dry years in the late-30’s. I don’t think it started to turn around until 1940 or so.
Manos: The Dust Bowl lasted During the 1930’s Depression and through at least the 1950’s. Some tracks of land have never fully recovered.
The 1950’s?!?!?! WOW, I didn’t realize it lasted that long…
My parents lived there The great Dust storms, Dad has some really kickass picture’s of the wall of dust that came to the panhandle. The dust travel all the way to the east coast and after hitting DC I was told that thats when the EPA was formed.
Yes, back in the day EPA stood for “Every Possible Apportunity”!
Nice fairy tale. Richard Nixon founded the EPA. Long after the dust bowl. There were droughts in Calif. that judging from the tree ring evidence lasted four hundred years. It could happen again. the earth does not march to or care about our needs.
History is repeating itself as it always has. I recently wrote a historical fiction novel based in 1929-1930 and the research I did for that book you could easily mistake for current breaking news. The parallels are surreal but so few people see the signs. As a prepper, I have warned as many people as I can, offered to teach storage, canning etc, and very few people are interested. At this point my friends, either you are awake or you are not, and God help those who are not. I do have one question for everyone here. Anyone else experiencing ‘prepper fatigue’ waiting for the other shoe to drop?
Yes, this heightened state of alertness is exhausting. Like you said, no one is really interested. Either that or you know there’s no point mentioning it to most people. You can’t be “on watch” all the time, not when there is no one to relieve you at the end of your shift. If you mention you’re sick of waiting, people accuse you of WANTING something bad to happen, and being cruelly naive about the effects it will have on real people. I think the real people they’re talking about are some of the folks who are walking around with their fingers in their ears, going “lalalalalala”.
MLGardner,
Yep, you know it’s coming, and want to get it over with, so we can re-build and start over again, but the darn thing just keeps inching along. Oh well, the longer it takes the more people will pull their heads out of the sand and wake up.
SHTF may end up being more of a process than a single event. USA is in a downward spiral that will probably be punctuated by various crises along the way.
Me–and I can relate to your ringing the bell—I am so tired of being insulted, made to look like a dingbat….
But, when the time comes, and it will, just as the article of Oklahoma and Texas reads…
Our entertainment is going to Sam’s for rice and tuna!!!
No tv in this house—another reason church thinks I’m a looney tooney!
Hell Gard I thought it was my PTSD kickin in again.
Our society is already artificially sustained as it is. All it takes is a fertilizer shortage, drought (like this one), or an infestation of destructive species to cripple our delicate food supply. These people already out there unemployed maxing out credit cards on food and gas can’t take much more.
Food riots anyone?
100 year cycle 20 years too soon?
and yet in another part of the world or country its flooded..
welcome to earth 3rd rock from the sun
It’s the end of the world….
if you don’t grow it
It’s the end of the world….
if you don’t grow it
and I feel fine!!!
I wonder how meeshell’s gardeners are doing? Mooooooooo
They are busy growing veggies to go in the new Happy Meals while she stuffs her face on burgers, fries and milkshakes. Priorities. Priorities.
Yeah, and her rig makes wide right turns.
You mean left, right?
Meshall needs a “wide load” sign on that thing.
Si’
It’s not the end of the world, but much worse is coming and our government can’t even cope with the debt problem.
Memo to America: Stop waiting for Democrats and Republicans to save you. It’s bad for your health and your future.
“WAKE UP PEOPLE!”
Read “Common Sense 3.1” at ( http://www.revolution2.osixs.org )
“Spread the News”
Mad Max: You have got to be fucking kidding me!!! are you for real Paul Krugman is a Socialist lump of shit!
“We really need a better government than what we have”
– Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize Winning Economist, 2009
Peter Schiff called out Krugman out a long time ago.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11WlFlO_mDg
We can no longer govern ourselves with 17th century governments and ideas.(meaning the U.S. Constitution) The times have changed, so must we.
“We really need a better government than what we have”
– Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize Winning Economist, 2009
Screw..! anyone in this country that are not for the the Constitution!
“Spread the News” you can suck on Saiga 12!!!
bloodyfellow, what we have now is a 21st century perverted form of that”17th century government” EXAMPLE A- we have been seeing alot of stories recently of police being out of line, well in the 17th century government, CITIZENS arrested people(EVER HEAR OF CITIZEN ARREST?) Police were latter HIRED TO PERFORM CITIZEN ARRESTS,FOR US, THE CITIZEN!! EXAMPLE B. NO STANDING ARMY MEANS NO WAR, well let’s look at the 21st century perversion of that one, shall we?? ENDLESS WARS! EXAMPLE C- GOLD AND SILVER LEGAL TENDER, wow what a REALLY outdated 17th century concept. 21st century perversion THE FEDERAL RESERVE NOTE (ok 20th century) A WORTHLESS 21ST CENTURY FIAT TOILET PAPER CURRENCY!! BLOODYFELLOW, YOU ARE A MORON!
SORRY, BLOODEEEY FELLOW, you are a moron!
Kevin: guess what you don’t mount up to dry shit.
hey bloody fellow, at first read of “we can no loner governourselves…………….so must we” I thought YOU were saying that, you were quoting someone else, so I apologise! Looks like I am the moron! Please disregard my earlier rant!
I am not a moron, but hope to be one someday!
and you mount up to what?
Keven: It’s cool! I’m a shooter as well…meaning I shoot first and ask questions later.
I apologize and retract my rant….hope we are eye to eye now. I was quoting some other asshole! 🙂
bloodyfellow, I accept your apology, and are glad you accepted mine! latter brother!
It’s all good…Kevin we know when we are out of line cause we are Men. and except the fact that we fuckup from time to time. A bit of friendly fire but, it’s something we can both walk away from. and in my world that’s a good thing.
Later man.
Bloodyfellow,
You’re absolutely right about Paul Krugman. He’s a brain dead socialist who got his Nobel Prize from the brain dead socialist Norwegians. His head is so far up Obama’s butt they both speak from the same mouth.
A Nobel prize is not the credential it used to be. Obummer got the peace prize and wasn’t even in office as POTUS when nominations were made.
The website you are promoting also promotes FDR’s “new Bill of Rights.” How, praytell, do you think that bunch of socialist BS is going to work this time when it has ALWAYS failed before?
Are you aware that it is a “progressive” answer to the TEA Party movement?
Do you really think we suffer from a paucity of government rules and regulations or government programs?
I wonder how long it would take me to get thrown off a liberal website …lol
Let us know before you take a trip and we’ll fill the SUV!
Mad Max: I wasn’t aware that commies posted here. Another euphanisum to blind the sheeple.
Common Sense 3.1? Thomas Paine is rolling over in his grave.
Call your proposal what it is: Marxism 2.0
Yeah, i say we hire the NFL to run the government. At least they CAME to an agreement!
All the FEMA camps will be built to look like super domes.
Build it and they will come.
Thunder Dome
two will enter, one will leave…..
I need to let out some aggression’s I’ll go first…
You have point…
Georgia’s been in a drought too and I’m sure its affecting crops. Plus for the last 2 1/2 months temps have been upwards of 97 – 100+ degrees. Way warmer than normal – oddly – after a severely cold winter (for GA standards).
We did get some much needed rain this week. Scattered storms – but still rain.
Besides a lack of rain, I thought the dust bowl of the 30’s was also largely due to poor farming techniques? That is, they didn’t understand practices such as planting grass on unused farm land in order to keep the soil there. Did I hear this wrong?
Unfortunately no till is still rare here, sad but true. Topsoil is been gone for a long time.
My garden is green and happy due to irrigation, but still fewer fruits due to overwhelming heat causing low flower production i guess? It is scary since we try to rely upon are “grows” already.
112 degrees today, no joke, and not a dry heat I assure you.
Damn.
We might get to 80 degrees. Hasn’t rained for about a week.
Our gardens are not as productive as we would like because winter seemed to go until about June.
Kansas: I understand your pain. Even at 122 in Arizona it was a dry heat.
With respect you can thank God that “no-till” is rare in your area,lots of us wish it was rare to the point of extinction….no-till is a farce,it may save some topsoil but it kills your water…no till depends on applications of herbicides like Roundup to kill everything except the GMO crop plant,this causes superweeds and water table poisoning and cancers in the farmworkers and God knows what in those who eat the crap,sure there are bad farming practices but by far the worst is allowing govt/corporate and folks who got their farming background from some ivy covered building to mess with farmers,these people will kill us all if they get their way!
REB…..you got that right Brother!
I aggree with everything you said, period. However, we know that traditional methods will go away, and all I meant to convey is that the dust bowl was caused by open soil, which is still a problem.
Permacultre, forest gardening, call it what you will, no tilling is needed, not to mention no pesticides or petro-fert!
Heres to natures way!
My damn citrus trees didn’t even bloom this year, whata crock.
from what i have read this is true
You are right. But before the dust bowl occurred, the nation had been in a drought, which ended up causing the dust bowl.
Ironically, it was the dust bowl that caused some much suffering during the Depression and not the stock market crash.
IMO – another severe drought is upon us. Time to start prepping!
Parabellum!
Any wonder why Soros’ is stocking up on Farmland in Africa and we can’t get any!
With any luck he will move there and fuck up Africa like he has fucked up America. I say we need a Constitutional amendment so Americans can vote on foreigners posing as dual citizens and immigrants and vote them out of the country.
Mr. Schwartz would be in the first wave out.
Wowo, tight group here. Is there a rule book for this commentary? Bet it says, be a dumbass comedian and you’ll get your message posted, give good info and get axed!
We just might junk you jayhawk.
Yep, jumped the gun there, my bad. However, never had a comment take twenty minutes to post.
Again, my bad.
We don’t discriminate Kansas. Everyone gets posted.
It drier than a “popcorn fart” here in the Mid Atlantic. I’ve got a garden thats approx. 150 ft. by 50 ft. Worst potatoe (red pontiac) crop I’ve ever had. The sweet corn is doing so-so. Front and backyard is burned up (hurray, I hate cutting grass) and the field corn on the farm I butt up to is stunted and brown. The corn around the region for the most part looks that way for the exception of those irrigating. Those that do run irrigation are paying heavy diesel fuel prices to run the well pumps. I just hope with the price of beef set to skyrocket I can continue to knock deer down at my usual rate this fall.
Here in the Pacific NW, we’ve been having rather cool temps for this time of year. No records either way.
Bumper crop (in my organic garden) of red skin potatoes, carrots along with Zukes, raspberries, kale, chard, to name a few
Without extended sun, though, tomatoes not so happy.
Water is not an issue, plenty of it.
Sun’s out today, though.
Beef won’t skyrocket as ranchers take their cattle to market. Prices will drop, and advertising will increase. It will be a good time to stock up.
Back up the truck and make jerky.
thats right DK however the point your missing is that if we sell our cattle now then what do we breed with for the winter months? No clafs means not more 2 yr heffers which makes some of the best ribeyes in the world. And I have to agree in part to the la’nino pattern. but the true is our lakes have been dropping in the panhandle for the last 4 yrs. Punch in Lake Meredeth or lake Greenbelt and look at the past 4 yrs.
DPS: What goes around comes around: unfortunately its drought that coming your way. The Big ranchers I know have ranches in many states.
They will just truck in new beef from a ranch somewhere else: Montana, California, etc.
Been bone dry in Florida too. I had to have a new well put in, the old one started sucking air. Luckily, we are in the rainy season now so things should get back to “normal” for us at least. For anyone fortunate enough to have some investment cash laying around; a good commodity ETF might just be a good choice.. things aren’t getting cheaper anytime soon.
Drought Withering Away Any Chance of Recovery. WTF???
What chance of Recovery!?! How do you recover from $14 trillion in debt??? Answer is you don’t!!!
Answer is printing press…..of course you recover from a $14 trillion debt. You just make it worth $1.4 million instead.
Jim: hey man explain your meaning/math to me, cause you lost me with $1.4 million. A country can’t reduce it’s debt by printing money.
How to you bring $14 trillion down to 1.4 mill by printing more money???
I simply mean they make the dollar so worthless – hyper inflate it – that it only takes $1.4 million in current value (gold) to pay off $14 trillion in fiat material (dollars).
A 10 fold inflation would mean we only need $1.4 trillion in present value right? A 100 fold inflation means we are down to $140 billion. A 1,000 means 14 billion…..you get the point.
So everyone gets a social security check for $75,000 a month…..and a loaf a bread is $3,750.
Cool…I’m with you. Glad I did not brake out the baseball bat on you Jim you’er ok.
Thanks for the reply back.
I’ll be the first one to admit I shoot first and ask questions later.
More like 16+ here in a few weeks. Got to get elected again, that’s what important. Starting to believe that there will not be an agreement then the anointed one will declare an emergency and decide himself.
The principle has never been intended to be repaid since 1980 when GHW Bush was Vice President and the Globalists put their plan in action.
We’ve had sporadic, stationary showers in West Tenn that do little to help, but the biggest impact has been the lack of bees. At least, pollenation can be done artificially with q-tips and a whole lot of time on your hands. (Don’t forget the sunscreen and iced tea.)
Can’t afford meat? Beans and rice will form a complete protein, identical to meat protein, in the body. So will milk and peanut butter. Beans and rice are still cheap and have an impressive shelf life.
yep… beans and rice are still extremely cheap.. but beans have jumped 20% in price in the last 4-5 months; at least in the stores I shop in. Better stock up now..The Food Saver vacuum package system works really well for such things.. supposedly they last in excess of 10 years when vac packed and stored in a cool, dark place ( would BHO’s heart qualify ? ). Don’t use the gallon bags though.. they loose their vacuum even when treated with kid gloves. The smaller bags work great though..
Beans last 25-30 years in mylar bags with an oxygen absorber. But if things keep going the way they are, we’ll be dipping into them far sooner than that.
I recently opened a partial bucket of pinto beans from the mid-late 90s. At some point (at least nine years ago), the mylar bag had been unsealed, some contents removed, and the bag reclosed by twisting the bag and securing the top with a piece of #14 copper electrical conductor. The remaining contents looked just as they did when packed.
In an archeological dig, a viable seed was discovered among primitive human stores. It was a species of magnolia that has now been extinct for thousands of years. Nature is truly amazing.
You are right about the bags Sam, I pack with the 8″ bags. Sealing a large amount of product in a long skinny bag as opposed to a wider one works well, one just has to make sure the filled bag is on a level surface to properly seal. Extra note: the “Rival” brand works just as well as the name brand bags.
Beans and rice yep got lots of those, But damn Porky the Pig and lots of Bambi’s are look mighty fine out on the ranch where I’m working now.
Hell if we make it till fall some more elk will be just fine for me.
Plus I got about 10 gals of calf fries in the freezer now, Now thats some good eats
Calf fries? enlighten me. Anything about food I am interested in.
Rocky mountain oysters
Bull Balls
Shelf Life Estimates
White Rice….30+
Pinto Beans….30
Right now I consider anything over two years to be long term storage.
Off topic…. Joint military exercises will commence around Boston area 7/26 through 8/5. How about it Mac, whats going on?
Where did you get that from POP?
i caught a blip on this too..cant find it now
wideawakenews.com
PO’dpatriot… I am jealous of even what you are accomplishing. I am the worst farmer in history. If my plants can figure out a way to die, they do. That’s why my prepping has included much, much freeze dried fruit and vegetables… along with the canned, of course. I know you are all comparing this to the Dust Bowl days, but even that period didn’t have the extremes that we have all over the country today. I can’t get rid of the sick feeling that someone or something (Our trusted govt.) is behind all of this. They F with the weather simply because they can.
I am getting this feeling too concerning the gov. and the weather. I try shrugging it off thinking it ain’t so, but it keeps nawlin’ at me. I haven’t got the excaliber dehyderator yet, but will soon. Keep plugging away at the veggies. I blame my self on the potatoes this year as I didn’t take the time to test my soil ph before I planted. Should of used some lime prior by what I was seeing when I dug them up.
Is there any chance of a recovery? Well, Elvis and the “Fat Lady” have ALREADY sung there duet ……… And have left the building!!!
Interesting that this subject came up today here. I picked up the book “Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck, yesterday at a thrift store. I remember it was mandatory reading in high school, but I wanted to refresh my memory. Steinbeck writes about the dust bowl, and I have read many stories about it. Everyone is right–learn to grow a garden. The misery and suffering will be nothing like any of us have ever experienced–just heard about it. Good luck everyone! Get prepared!
We shall water our crops with the blood of tyrants
-Thomas Jefferson-
it is way past time for prepping…part of the reason for the dust bowl was drought but another part of it was the way farmers were tilling and planting…many farms and lands did not show improvement until farmers got smarter…and those who cant make the garden grow went bust and sold out to the “big giant corporate farms” who could and did make a go of things for a long time. now it is their turn to suffer the consequences of drought, wind, fires, hurricanes and government subsidies that may disappear with everyone elses money…one good thing that could happen is if these corporate farms bust up and sell out 20-40 acre tracts to the little guy who can live a few years on the small garden while working at other things off the farm. in the meantime, if your area is in a drought and you have not prepared yet…you should not only stock up the larder but you need to find other ways to do your garden besides row planting/tilling the ordinary way…it is a time to quickly learn all that you can and put it to work.
Boner better be prepared to go all the way and die on the hill or the pubs are over (including this country). God help us, (and he’s neutral), I think. I take that back. It’s his Au & Ag. Dust to dust.
I’m not sure Boehner has it in him. I heard on the news tonight that his plan saves only $1 billion in 2012. Our debt is increasing by $1 billion PER HOUR for pete’s sake!!!!
I think he’ll cave to the community organizer. You know, he’ll do the Bush “meet in the middle” crap. But. I sure hope not.
They just might cave after 2 Aug. and let skipper Bobo ride this ship down on his next watch. Pretender’s posture seems a little sure and lazy. The man with no A plan. There’s a new sheriff in town and the Swiss is about to blink with the flood of fiat flowing in.
The Dust Bowl
The most visible evidence of how dry the 1930s became was the dust storm. Tons of topsoil were blown off barren fields and carried in storm clouds for hundreds of miles. Technically, the driest region of the Plains – southeastern Colorado, southwest Kansas and the panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas – became known as the Dust Bowl, and many dust storms started there. But the entire region, and eventually the entire country, was affected.
The Dust Bowl got its name after Black Sunday, April 14, 1935. More and more dust storms had been blowing up in the years leading up to that day. In 1932, 14 dust storms were recorded on the Plains. In 1933, there were 38 storms. By 1934, it was estimated that 100 million acres of farmland had lost all or most of the topsoil to the winds. By April 1935, there had been weeks of dust storms, but the cloud that appeared on the horizon that Sunday was the worst. Winds were clocked at 60 mph. Then it hit.
“The impact is like a shovelful of fine sand flung against the face,” Avis D. Carlson wrote in a New Republic article. “People caught in their own yards grope for the doorstep. Cars come to a standstill, for no light in the world can penetrate that swirling murk… We live with the dust, eat it, sleep with it, watch it strip us of possessions and the hope of possessions. It is becoming Real.”
The day after Black Sunday, an Associated Press reporter used the term “Dust Bowl” for the first time. “Three little words achingly familiar on the Western farmer’s tongue, rule life in the dust bowl of the continent – if it rains.” The term stuck and was used by radio reporters and writers, in private letters and public speeches.
In the central and northern plains, dust was everywhere.
Also the friction that was created by the blowing dust caused huge amouts of static electricity
Maybe that’s why dust from farms is becoming a big legal no-no. Your farm turns into part of the Neo Dust Bowl, and you get a huge fine. Can’t pay it? Uncle Sugar takes it away. The issue of a farm being repo’d by a bank is replaced with a farm being seized due to Mother Nature’s whims.
Interesting timing of the anti-dust legislation, just like it was interesting timing of bankruptcy laws getting more stringent just before the bottom fell out of the economy.
Didn’t Phoenix have one of these a few weeks ago?
Its been over a month here since we had any rain(aint nothing compared to Tx but thats dry for here)…been some rain all around me but none right here…my springs still okay but I dont have any irrigation setup,never saw potatos burn up before…flint corn is struggling,but maters and okra,peppers,sweet corn,and such are doing pretty well,beans are about ready to can.
I hand dug a well about 20′ down into a spring seep gonna get that set up for irrigation water(dont intend to allow this to happen next year),usually I deep mulch but it was so wet up till a month ago that I didnt do too much as to not encourage slugs and rot,will be mulching as soon as we get the ground wet again.
Damn 20 ft deep to hit water? My buddy just got his new well 361 ft to hit good water.
Yep 20′ over a spot I was pretty sure held some water layers feeding a spring just off my property 50-75′
But remember, it was 20’BY HAND no power tools,just an old army shovel a miners hand pick,a hammer and a 3′ steel rod w/ a point….through clay,shale and rock all into a 5gal bucket I then winched up and out the hole and if I had a helper(seldom) then I didnt have to climb out the hole everytime I got a half bucket full,it wasnt the easiest job Ive ever bit into but hey,I was short on cash and long on time,besides I had some people telling me I couldnt do it,figured I could so I did 🙂
I would have gone deeper but the rains came and chunks of earth were peeling off and falling in on me and I figured I shouldnt push it too far,so I lined the bottom with bricks and dropped a 18″x20′ pipe into it and filled in along side it(the hole was about 3-1/2 ft in diameter)its not a high volume hole by any means but it has water in it all year round and this spring it was nearly overflowing so if I pump it into a storage tank I can feed it down into the gardens and fields as I need it and itll suffice,if not then Ill get my tools out and dig another one,or maybe just buy some well points and a bigger hammer 😉
Reb, I plan on doing the same thing. Just read an article in Backwoods Home magazine that I get. Good article on driving a shallow well and using the old pitcher pump. Tractor Supply carries the well points and the heavy couplings needed for the shock of driving the pipe. Another way to get extra water for gardening is using the grey water, i.e. shower, washing machine, (no toilet) and diverting it from the house to the garden. This months issue of Motherearth News (I know, I know, its a liberal rag) has details on how its done. Its not a bad Mag, reminds me of the hippies and communes kinda time I grew up in. Its getting interesting, to say the least, on whats going on around the world, but I swear, I wouldn’t want to miss this for anything.
Have you checked out The Backwoodsman Magazine no hype telling it like it is or was and tons of Ideas
I’m on my way to having a year’s supply of food and water stored. I believe corn and wheat prices will be going up significantly in the coming months once it’s obvious how poor this year’s harvest will be.
I bought some oats today and they cost 50% more today than they did a couple months ago when I got some….sure hope the rains come and my corn finishs growing,getting too expensive to feed some of these critters ifn I have to buy grains at these prices!
Socked away 24 5 gallon buckets of wheat, corn, oats, beans, pasta and rice in May while the price was cheaper and can only imagine what the prices are today…..my bet is 25-50% more. Also just bought the Country Living Grain Mill as we plan to start making all our own bread, tortillas and such to help offset the soon-to-be rising prices due to the floods and the droughts.
Just a shorter note(this time!)Planted some squash and pepper plants along with some raspberry plants a few months ago.About 2/3 of the berry plants have slowly started to come up,the rest must have died.The squash started off well enough,then have about all died off as well.Even with watering,it’s like the heat(I suspect,not sure)is killing them even with watering x2 each day.Then peppers are being eaten alive by something I don’t see.I planted a tomato plant and found four(so far)tomato caterpillars(2 inches+!)
One had been taken care of by caterpillar wasps(cheers for God’s balance in nature).Never saw them grow so fast/big in such a short time,though.I don’t spray but do a visual once a week.after cleaning off the first batch,a second group seems to be chomping their way to bug heaven(and that’s even with doing the hands on).I hope when I do a raised garden from scratch that I don’t get a repeat,or “living off the land” is gonna make for some lean times and get a bit depressing.
Still 97 + here in the middle south and no rain in sight!
Seems hot times are the new nice weather…anyone got lemon-aid?
Best to All
GFG
Garden here in New Hampshire is doing fairly well. Tomatoes are starting to come on in droves(cucumbers and squash as well). Beans are coming in fat and juicy while the peppers are slowly maturing. However, the lettuce and cabbage got chewed up badly enough to not be harvestable but it looks like a good year on balance.
grayfoxgreen, I don’t know what part of the south you are in but it sounds as if you have many of the same problems I have had in years past.
my soil around me is VERY lacking so I have tried using some products to AT LEAST keep bugs off the things I spend a lot of time into, they can destroy your hard work waaay to easily..
if you looked at the squash plant one day and it looked healthy, to then come the next day and find all the leaves like wilted down, that means it was attacked.. I don’t know the name of the bug that did it, I do know what it looks like… I do know “now” how to STOP them COLD in their tracks..lol
same as with them LARGE green caterpillar things that destroys the tomato plant by eating it.. first years I use to pick them off as I seen them but that didn’t really do the trick and my tomato harvest was generally sad.. now with this stuff I will link below they have rocked free from bugs.
to make a long deal short here is what I found and I will swear by it for the years to come. (until they get immune to it that is)
the stuff is very cheap really and the size container will last for multi years. (under $15)
I have now stashed 3 away for if TSHTF. when that day comes I will not be able to afford any loss’s in my garden so I will make sure I have it around.
check it out at,
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=buy+bayer+multi+insect+killer&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=7382329034897775743&sa=X&ei=IqwxTreFCILo0QGiwZnYCw&ved=0CFQQ8wIwAw
I am not one for spraying either but I have found here in mid Tennessee the soil itself lacks way to many good qualities to even try for organic only gardening.. I am not saying organic isn’t what I want, but for that, I do in my raised bed 3×8 box’s where I have control of the dirt.
If they sort of resemble a lighting bug, they are most likely “Old fashion bugs”. Some ‘Seven’ will take them out.
I have tried the 7 many years and still use it for my dogs, but in the garden its not too good for me, and costs to much for one coat on a 50×100 garden.
with the bayer, I can spray all a good 10 times in the year and not use more than 1/4 of the jug..
I do 2 tablespoons per gallon of spray.
They are called stink bugs, I hate em
With the flooding at the beginning of the season and the droughts in other areas, we are going to continue to see an increase in food prices. I agree we may see the price of meats decrease for a short time as people sell their cattle and farms, but ultimately, the prices are going one way only. Add this food inflation to the abysmal lack of jobs and we are going to see a very unhappy population by Thanksgiving. What a damn mess.
Amen brother. Buy a chest freezer and put away as much as you can while it is cheap. Hunting will always be an option, but as the price of beef and other meats goes up so will the proliferation of “new” hunters out looking for a cheaper way to supplement their meat intake. I’ll bet the great depression witnessed a large drop in wild animal population due to over-hunting…..bet we see that again.
I read that if Texas sells their stock, look for a shortage in two years; no calfs this year, no meat next year.
The American Dream – Understanding Money and the Banking System
http://www.youtube.com/user/DenverGoldBuyer
Another problem that we will face instead of being Prepared we will not only be facing shortages , gangs but also the Government as they will call the prepared HOARDERS and will also come after your food
Plan to go down swinging……or firing whether long distance or close quarters!! I’ll be happy to dish out some of Obama’s vaunted “shared sacrifice” if the gov’t wants a little!!
Historic floods in the Dakotas and elsewhere. Historic drought in Texas and surrounding areas. Seems to me like it would be a simple solution to begin working on a Nationwide culvert system to divert flood waters from one area to drought or agricultural areas elsewhere. It would be an ambitious project but so was the Hoover Dam and the National Highway system way back when. The country needs jobs now and such a project would improve the quality of life for many generations to come.
Strawman…are you and I the only ones thinking like this??
I just ran this by my dh last week…daunting task?? Yep–but we better start doing something with the unwanted runoff water before we’re all flooded, farm land is diminished by 50%, and insurance companies go out of business.
JFK speech on secret societies
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZYfeYhQ9eU
This is all just conspiracy theories. People have been talking about the SHTF since 90’s and look where we are now, the same as if nothing has happened. There is still food and commodities on the shelves in stores. People are still filling up their gas tanks of their gas guzzling SUVs.
It is a guarantee that the debt ceiling will be raised next week and everything will be ok. To follow up on that, the Fed will print more money and the DOW will hit 14,000 this fall.
Everyone here keeps anticipating the “collapse” and think everything is a conspiracy. Just live life and do what you can to prep without going crazy.
That all sounds great……until it isn’t. Kids do what feels good, adults are supposed to be responsible. I plan to live life as best I can while preparing for the worst because when that game of musical chairs comes to an end…..well I don’t want to be the one left without a chair so I’ll still worry about the future if that’s OK with you??
The warnings from experts – even mainstream ones – are coming fast & furious. I doubt they’re all wrong.
Maybe these charts will help convince you that trouble is headed our way. And that this time its serious. Very serious.
http://www.slate.com/id/2299845/
nighty night
with a screen name like that its no wonder you dont see it or get it
and if they do raise the debt ceiling how does that solve a fuckin thing? huh?
all it does is give those brain dead politicians more time to fuck up even more and screw it up even worse for many more generations to come
When you jump off a 50 story building the first 49 floors go by without a hitch. No problem, you say. Everything is fine, until it’s not!
We don’t need a drought to end our chances of recovery. We’ve got politicians and the elite who support them to do it for us!
Its just going to be another regular day, after August 2nd. People who still have their jobs will go back to work as if this debt ceiling crisis never happened. Precious metals will plunge, again while the Dow will skyrocket as never seen before and the US dollar will blow past 75.00. TPTB can and will kick the can down the road for a lot longer than most of you think, were talking decades.
I tell you what bedhead, you just hold on to those thoughts. I want to tell you about “thought”….. thought is when you think you’re going to fart and end up shitting yourself….thats what “thought” does.
YES! woke up at 5am to the sound of music…er,rain on the steel roof,not enough yet(i/2″) but its a start,corns already perking up,hope y’all get some if you need it!
Hope to see a couple more inches before the return of hot/dry!
ML Gardner – Here’s the saddest part. Close, long time friends flatly refuse to take anything I say seriously, even flinging insults like calling me paranoid, Chicken Little, or the ultimate pessimist. Then when the SHTF, you know where they are going to go. In the early stages I will have no choice but to share my preps, but as it progresses it will be my turn to hurl the insults. They are “eaters”, whose sole capability is to consume the precious food I have been saving. I become like the government, the place they go for a handout. I can imagine this conversation I hope I never have to have: “I begged you to prepare with a good supply of food but you were too stubborn, stupid, or lazy to listen, and now you expect me to bail you out. The food I have is for my immediate family or for those who provide skills or items I need and can obtain in trade. Look, I’d like to help you but doing so puts my children at risk of going hungry, and that ain’t going to happen. Time for you to go. I have nothing more for you. Good luck to you.”
Prepper, the best thing you can do NOW is to let your so called “friends” believe that you agree with them!! Tell them you have “seen the light” and gave all your stored food to a homeless shelter!! Then start weaning yourself from your “friends”!! Otherwise, you WILL be feeding them and THEIR friends and family until ALL your food is gone! We tell NO one what we are doing! Friends and family don’t want to hear it, so we quietly do our thing! We have a few like minded friends that we do talk to, but other than that we keep our mouths shut!! I would suggest you start doing the same…your friends and family see the same news we do…if they can’t figure it out…too bad!
Failure on your part to prepare isn’t an emergency on my part.
Hmm, seem to remember something about successful gardening being a hard learned skill. In good growing years anyone can grow a garden.
Couple tricks.
First. Become familiar with the natural growing environment of each plant specie. Mimic it and you win.
Second. Water heavy rather than several light watering a day. I use a gallon per 5 gallon pot every couple days in Alaska. In the garden, each plant big enough to recognize gets a half to one gallon every couple three days.
For those trying to grow a garden in colder climates, remember that plants are like people; they like warm feet. Cold roots means slow uptake of water and nutrients. Sun and warmth on the leaves increases transpiration faster than the roots can replenish the water.
For soft-shelled insect control, I use Safer’s Insecticidal soap. It is basically soap and salt. The soap plugs thier pores so they suffocate and the salt desicates them in the process. Kinda a one, two punch. Doesn’t work on beetles or other hard-pshelled insects.
In the greenhouse, use Safer’s or (drum roll maestro) break out the dust-buster. Yep, vacuum the little beasties off your plants. They manufacture vacuums for vegetable fields with a steel deflector plate instead of a bag. Vacuum them off, accelerate to 85mph and crash into a steel deflector plate. So cool.
Bedhead, tacit agreement. The PTB will drag this out as long as possible. But conspiracy? I was there helping build personal fallout shelters in the 60’s. I was there during Johnson’s guns and butter “wage and price controls.” I was there for the Arab oil embargoes. The list goes on and on. Were any of them teotwawki? No. But the normalcy bias was reset each time. The rot is terminal. The roof might last another day or five years. But one shit-storm could bring it down on all our heads.
Don’t give up on the gardens. Troubleshoot the problems. Ask questions. Seek local help from successful gardeners; they love to teach and you don’t have to explain why you are growing a big garden. Knowledge + determined effort = success.
Almost any food you buy now will be more expensive in six months. Are you hedging your food bill? Just an extra sack of rice or a jar of peanut butter. Don’t forget some spices and salt. Wanna make any bets on the future price of sugar? In survival scenarios, there is no such thing as hollow calories. Now take you vitamin. You did buy multiple vitamins didn’t you?
The family of humanity as well as much of life as we know it are now here inhabitants of a finite planet with a frangible environment that is failing fast. What really matters is being inadvertently ruined on our watch by the human population, but is not being openly discussed. My ‘blood boils’ in the truth that we have possessed knowledge of so much about ourselves as human beings with feet of clay and acknowledged so little about what has been known for so long about our distinctly human creatureliness, based upon extensive empirical research and unchallenged scientific evidence. Elective mutism and silent consent in the face of the reckless degradation, relentless dissipation and willful sell-off of what everyone knows to be sacred looks to me like the worst of all precipitants of the colossal ecological wreckage that appears in the offing.
Inside and outside the community of top rank scientists, as well as among first class professionals in demography and economics who claim appropriate expertise of issues concerning human overpopulation issues, one issue is not being discussed by anyone. A worldwide conspiracy of silence continues to prevail about the population dynamics of the human species. The last of the last taboos is the open discussion of extant scientific research of human population dynamics. The implications of this astounding denial of what could somehow be real are potentially profound for the future of life on Earth, I suppose.
Within the human community a tiny minority of self-proclaimed masters of the universe hold the ‘destiny’ of all in their hands. This elite group is operating behind the scenes these days and “growing” the global economy to such a colossal scale that it could soon become patently unsustainable on a planet with the size, composition and ecology of Earth because our planetary home is not, definitely not “too big to fail.”
Steven, really now. Frangible? Did you even look up the definition before you cut and pasted?
Finite resources, yes. The problem is not the finiteness, but rather the utilization. When gas is $4-5 a gallon, you don’t pour it on a brushpile to burn it. A far wiser utilization is to use the brushpile as fuel for heating and cooking.
Conservation is NOT nor ever was preservation. Conservation is wise use.
Preservation is only accomplished by continuous applications of more entropy in the form of resources and labor. Example: build a building and without additional efforts in maintenance, the building will deteriorate. It is the natural outcome.
The problem is, was and will continue to be resource allocation. Spend like a fool, starve like a fool. In most of the developed world, the people have finally lost contact with the environment they struggled so hard to avoid; air conditioning, central heating, labor-saving conveniences, the list goes on. Save 1/2 hour doing dishes with a dishwasher and waste the time watching the “Simpsons”.
People appear to need a nanny state. Things are neccessarily what they appear. I contend that people really need to get back to the land. Learn the truth about life and death. Find a balance between your actual needs and nature. Learn to live life instead of constant worrying. If you burnout, you will fall by the wayside.
Note to bonifide preppers: Make your plan, stick to it and then get out and live, love and laugh. Or you can just piss it away worrying. If you don’t start now, when the shtf big-time you will fail. Recall that little term normalcy bias? Reset you bias now while you have the time and resources. After the shtf, you will be unable due to the normalcy bias and fears you currently have.
Change takes determined effort over a period of time. You are discarding poor habits and replacing them with habits more in tune with the situational requirements. With constant application of new habits, the older, less productive habits fall away.
This is a rather off the wall solution to the rain shortages we are experiencing here in the mid West.
It is called Hugelkulture.
Basically you lay a large amount of wood at the base of your garden bed. It robs the soil of nutrients for the first 2-3 years as the wood decays. Once the decay process is complete, the wood is now a nitrogen source that will last for many years.
The decayed wood also acts as a moisture sponge and will hold water through the dry season. This technique has been proven in climates in the world where there is less than 4″ of annual rainfall. The claim is that once the bed is mature, no additional irrigation of the soil is needed.
http://www.richsoil.com/hugelkultur/
Hugelkulture is not a quick solution, but is a good long term answer to the drought cycle we are moving into. There is good chance this cycle could last for several years. I am building several garden beds with this set up, I have planted several fruit trees in my orchard with a base of wood material a couple feet below the root ball. By the time the tree’s roots reach down that far, the wood should be decayed and ready to feed the tree for years.
Jack Spirko of TheSurvivalPodcast did an interview with Paul Wheaton of RichSoil on his program back in February and has done 2 more since. Episodes 598, 612 and 629.
They are worth a listen if you are as concerned about growing your own food in these conditions as I am.
http://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/paul-wheaton-permaculture-hugelkultur-more
Aqueducts–catch the water before it gets to the damaged dikes in the overflowing rivers and re-route it to the states that are experiencing droughts.