Could you survive on your land if you had to? (Metlakatla: landscaping, to buy)

[GrammasCabin]

Hmm, I'd miss a few things but I think I'd be fine. At present, literally all my vegetables come from my garden or gathered in the wild, I harvest all my own meat (well, now I have grandsons big enough to do that for me), I subsistance fish for all my salmon & halibut ( I just took the last of 6 cases smoked sockeye out of the canner). I have great friends who bring all the crab & shrimp I can use but if they quit I have my own pots. I harvest and use nothing but wild medicines & creams. I always tan my deer hides (and anyone elses who'll give them to me) , sew my own furs, raise my own chickens. I make my own wine from wild berries, beer from bulk grains, and make enough wild berry juice to last the year, still have the same sourdough starter given to me in '82 for bread.
I'd miss spices, dried grains, powdered milk & such once the supply runs out but that'd take a long time.
But I gotta tell you, it's a full time job and a half livin' easy.

[AlaskaNana]

Makin me hungry, Gramma. I grow most of my own spices. Would miss Cocoa. Haven't managed to grow that yet.

[GrammasCabin]

Yeah, hot chocolate and warm brownies would sure be missed come winter time!

[lyoness]

Originally Posted by GrammasCabin

Hmm, I'd miss a few things but I think I'd be fine. At present, literally all my vegetables come from my garden or gathered in the wild, I harvest all my own meat (well, now I have grandsons big enough to do that for me), I subsistance fish for all my salmon & halibut ( I just took the last of 6 cases smoked sockeye out of the canner). I have great friends who bring all the crab & shrimp I can use but if they quit I have my own pots. I harvest and use nothing but wild medicines & creams. I always tan my deer hides (and anyone elses who'll give them to me) , sew my own furs, raise my own chickens. I make my own wine from wild berries, beer from bulk grains, and make enough wild berry juice to last the year, still have the same sourdough starter given to me in '82 for bread.
I'd miss spices, dried grains, powdered milk & such once the supply runs out but that'd take a long time.
But I gotta tell you, it's a full time job and a half livin' easy.

But I could not imagine a more rewarding life. This would have been my choice for life if I were younger. You live a lost art, one of self sufficiency, and certainly have my admiration (and more than just a bit of jealously )!

[GrammasCabin]

Originally Posted by lyoness

But I could not imagine a more rewarding life. This would have been my choice for life if I were younger. You live a lost art, one of self sufficiency, and certainly have my admiration (and more than just a bit of jealously )!

Trust me, there times I wish I could just crank up the thermostat instead of heading out in the wind, rain and snow for firewood or head to the nearest burger joint when I'm too tired to cook a real meal. I'm just too independent to live by someone elses clock for a paycheck, no talent involved. Younger sounds good.

[MaggieZ]

I love reading your post, GrammasCabin, I wish now that I had tried such a selfsufficient life years ago ..now I could never even start it...and to think most of my healthproblems are due to stress from years of rat race..

[AlaskaNana]

What happened to this thread? Let's bring it back to life. Maybe drift it towards what you do to live off the land. You know how we prepare for winter, gardens etc. I don't know but this was an interesting thread so let's get it up again

[ZBs]

Assuming the apocalypse affected and prevented travel to other places, the simplest thing to do would be hunt your neighbors as soon as possible for meat and to remove competition and threats. Anchorage only has 2 days of food at any given time; it would be chaos. After hunting your neighbors, you'd get to stockpile all of their food and weapons. After that, eat moose.

It's possible.

[Metlakatla]

Originally Posted by ZBs

Assuming the apocalypse affected and prevented travel to other places, the simplest thing to do would be hunt your neighbors as soon as possible for meat and to remove competition and threats. Anchorage only has 2 days of food at any given time; it would be chaos. After hunting your neighbors, you'd get to stockpile all of their food and weapons. After that, eat moose.

It's possible.

I rarely look at recent replies on this thread even though I'm the one who created it.

However, this was not meant to be Anchorage-specific, but rather asked of those who lived in rural/bush areas of the state.

Alaska is not synonymous with Anchorage.

[Frostnip]

The plot of land I live on is pretty arid and rocky. There are a few berries and edible plants, but not enough to live off of. Maybe enough to stave off scurvy...enough animals come though that a person could probably get sufficient calories if they were lucky, and if people weren't hunting the surrounding land heavily. It's definitely apparent why the people who lived here earlier in history were mostly nomadic and lived in fairly small groups