The whole reason for the selfsufficientish website was to offer a place where anyone can ask, HOW DO I...? So who knows why it has taken us so long to have a HOW DO I? section, but here it is. So if you want to know how to do anything selfsufficientish then here is the place to ask.
I did a quick search and couldn’t come up with anything, and I’m hoping someone will be able to help me/push me in the right direction.
I currently own an allotment (hoping to upscale in a couple of years) and I’m looking towards next year, early I know, but I want to get everything sorted as early as possible.
How do I figure out how much I need to grow to make myself as self-sufficient as possible?? Currently I'm really hit and miss. The only way I can figure it out is to do a yearly meal plan and work from there how much I need to plant.
Is there a simpler way? How do you, if you live of your land do it??
That is a big question. It might be worth breaking it down a bit. For example, what kind of stuff do you eat? For example, I probably get through three or four onions a week as I find them a brilliant base for all sorts of things. If I reckoned on growing enough for five a week (to allow for a small degree of failure) I would need to produce 260 a year. Given that the recommended spacing is about 6", I would need a single row 130' long. Of course, you can compress that down. A bed two feet wide could hold the same number in four rows of about 33' long. Of course, that also assumes I have space to store them and I would probably need to use several different varieties to spread the harvest over as long a season as possible.
The seasonality of fruit and veg is probably one of the biggest challenges to drawing up sensible plans. Given a decent patch of allotment, I would probably use less than the figures above for Allium cepa varieties but I would almost certainly devote a patch to Welsh Onions (Allium fistulosum), which are a perennial variety. They don't give such large, bulbous roots but can be "stored" by leaving them growing in the ground and used in a variety of ways (mine are just coming into flower so I'm looking forward to seeing what I can do with the flowers).
Also, how much time and energy do you have for the project? That would be another reason tempting me to relatively hardy, long-lasting things; some crops require a lot of pampering and then produce a glut which you have to process to make the most of your investment.
I am not convinced that it can be calculated with any degree of accuracy. I believe it has to be an organic process ( If you will excuse the pun ! ). Which will gradually work itself out, baring in mind you need to factor in gluts of crops, successional sowing, intercropping, reuse of the same space, methods of storing, tailoring meals to the crops that are ready, swapping gluts of crops with other "growers", what the soil condition lends itself to growing best. (and the inevitable failure or poor harvest of random crops each year) etc etc etc.
I feel that I am working on the gaps, deficiencies and gluts each year with small but consistent steps in the right direction. I think a poly tunnel fills a big gap, I must get one !
I am interested to see if anyone can come up with anything other than your method of breaking it down into individual meals, which I fear will be the best method available ??
Crops behave differently each year and you will find a surplus of one veg one year maybe be followed by a bad crop the following year. Preserving crops by freezing, drying, jam and chutney making and many other methods will ensure nothing grown is wasted and that your food stocks build up.
Variety and succession planting are really key, but plant what you like to eat, and then plan meals around whats in your basket.
Given you are planning early get some perrenials on the go. Babbington Leaks, Turkish Rocket, MInt, Tyme, Sage, Fennel, Rosemarry, Rhubarb, Strawberries, etc All will benefit from getting established this year. You should at least have a salad for next year.
Then I think the big question you need to consider is whether you want to grow your own Onions Potatoes and carrots, at less than 40p a kilo year round, it's a personal thing whether you want devote alot of your plot to these staples.
Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.
i dont think it can be accurate as you have some fails and some gluts etc - as already said
we are guilty of always trying to do more.. Always more, and we have had to learn to cut back or it gets silly - as it is we have 6 freezers (though we do raise our own chickens, pork, duck and mutton) and far too much veg and fruit stashed. I'm not really sure where this year's pigs are going to fit in....
This year we decided to get a bit nerdy about it but actually record what we store and what we eat and try to only grow what we need.
Red
I like like minded people... a bit like minded anyway.. well people with bits of their minds that are like the bits of my mind that I like...
From a financial Stand point it's something I do keep a tab on, when slug pellets are £2 a tub and you use 3 to get 10 lettuce in the same week, which all go to seed and are still full of bugs, you wonder if it's worth it.
Although I was planting out Naturtium seeds the other day in home made compost in pots I was given, and I collected the seeds, and I am using the plants to cover an area to kill the grass, rather than buy matting, I realised you can do things on the cheap!
Currently I spend £200 - £300 a month on the "garden" which is about 60% of what I spend on food! ok it's for tools etc but it never seems to end, I don't actually think it's a profitable enterprise.
Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.
boboff wrote:Currently I spend £200 - £300 a month on the "garden" which is about 60% of what I spend on food! ok it's for tools etc but it never seems to end, I don't actually think it's a profitable enterprise.
How on Earth do you manage that? That's more than I spend in a year!
boboff wrote:From a financial Stand point it's something I do keep a tab on, when slug pellets are £2 a tub and you use 3 to get 10 lettuce in the same week, which all go to seed and are still full of bugs, you wonder if it's worth it.
Although I was planting out Naturtium seeds the other day in home made compost in pots I was given, and I collected the seeds, and I am using the plants to cover an area to kill the grass, rather than buy matting, I realised you can do things on the cheap!
Currently I spend £200 - £300 a month on the "garden" which is about 60% of what I spend on food! ok it's for tools etc but it never seems to end, I don't actually think it's a profitable enterprise.
Do you have access to Diatomaceous Earth? Here it is quite cheap (we buy it in big feed bags from the mill), lightweight to move around, and works wonders on lots of bugs, slugs included.
I mean no offense, but if I had to spend in one year on my garden what you spend in a month, I'd chuck it. We couldn't do it on Hubby's salary. In fairness, we do use a lot of our own manure to fertilize, and we do have an excellent place locally that we order seeds from (Please PM me if anybody wants to know about it--I don't want to get into trouble for advertising them on here--they are a family operation, but they have excellent selection, good prices, and they ship worldwide). Also, at least for now we have a good supply of water from our well. I hope that you can find some more ways to economize to help you out.
What if you're wrong? What if there's more? What if there's hope you never dreamed of hoping for?
Nichole Nordeman----Brave
Oh, it's me, I have about 7 acres of pasture and 4 of woods, and I am rubbish at it!
Well this year it's been £300 on a Strimmer, £60 on a saw horse, £20 on Ear defenders, £80 on Matting, £120 on Bark, £60 on Compost, £30 on Grass Seed & Slug Pellets, £30 on Lawn Sand and Perlite, Petrol for the chain saw and Strimmer £6 a week easy, I pay a lad £10 a week to help me move stuff around, £30 on a scarifier, £20 on Fly Traps, £80 on Perrenial Plants and seeds, well that £1000 so far and there are other things. (£10 a week on Forks at the minute!)
The trouble is I want to do more, I really want a Polly Tunnel, but thats £1200, last year I spent lots on a Composting Toilet and Log Store next to the house, this year the plants I bought are hopefully going to let me take cutting in the future so I can plant things up better.
Things like the matting and Bark will last a few years, and in doing it I have actually discovered a source locally for free, so I have already imported about 8 tonne of that on top of what I bought.
Hmmm, you guys are making me seriously question now whether it's all worth it! I really want to fork out 3 or 4 hundred on Trees this winter as well! ( having tried growing from seed for the last two years I have given up)
Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.
Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.
Read my 
