I have made the mistake of approaching neighbors and friends about what is going on and where we are headed. 9 out of 10 of them will ignore your thoughts and think you are crazy, but every single one of them will remember you are preparing. So when the SHTF they will be at your door wanting/demanding handouts. While community is imperitive to survival if things get really bad, it needs to be a community you move to that has like-minded people like those that advertise as preppers. Otherwise, if you try to educate friends and neighbors that things are going south and won't get better so that they can also prepare and be somewhat resilient in the face of hardship, all you are doing besides making people think you are paranoid is advertising that you are the one who has things people will need when resources are scarce. Consequently, you are in MORE danger than the average person simply because trying to warn people. Beware…
Getting the attention of 1 out of 10 is no failure, it has to start somewhere. If you just throw in the tall and feel failure about the other 9 then you aren't being realistic or rational. Someone has to build community why not you? Just getting you and your loved ones thru the pinch point is not the objective, is it? Isn't it about the journey and relationships? To close down and lock up tight may work for some but at what cost? How much of your humanity are you willing to risk losing just to survive.
My journey is not and will not be about when or how I die that is an absolute. Helping others even when my resources dwindle is my best chance at telling my story the way my interconnected self relates to the world and relationships.
Rose
NN,It is a slice of heaven, magical is definitely the word.
I just reread my post and realized I didn't proofread…"friends from all walks of life"…to complete the sentence I left unfinished.
You are very lucky to spend time there on a regular basis. I hope to go back next summer!
As I look around my suburban neighborhood in Virginia I also think about what would happen should food become scarce. Since I live in an area that cannot be defended by high walls and fences I will need to get my neighbors fed too. How can I encourage this?
On all sides of me, my neighbors have lots of lawn space but no "edible landscaping." I have considered asking them if they would let me plant a couple of fruit trees, nut trees or berry bush clusters on their lawns. I would buy the tree and plant it and tend to it, and in exchange would ask them to share the fruit with me.
A local nursery specializes in edible plants that grow naturally in our area. I might ask them to choose from the list and suggest the location in their yard where they would like it planted.
I agree that being a paranoid "prepper" might scare some off and has some potential for setting one up for future burglary. So I think that I'll go at it from the angle of promoting healthy fresh fruit, that is organic, non-GMO, close to home and a fun neighborhood friendship project. The secret secondary goal would be to get everyone on my street fed so that MY garden isn't the only food on the block. Once a good crop of berries comes in, I wonder if some interest will spark for growing some more of our own food?
Any other ideas?
If you believe the book "Collapse," the current Easter Island population is around 3% of the peak population before collapse.
Again in "Collapse," deforestation, resource depletion and even cannibalism are not uncommon in historic collapses.
When the food trucks stop delivering to major metropolitan areas, the people in the cities are not going to stay put. When limited resources are not enough to meet global needs, individual countries are not going to sit by and watch rival countries consume resources they need.
The seeds of conflict are already sown into what is happening. It would be great to assume that everyone is going to roll up their sleaves and work side by side. However, even to hope that will happen is to ignore the world we are living in today.
So far, I haven't seen people storing food to prepare for lean times ahead. However, guns and ammo are frequently unavailable and on backorder. That says a lot to me.
I don't believe Earth can indefinitely sustain a population in excess of 7 billion or even anywhere near it. Perhaps, under ideal conditions, Earth could systain that population for a while, giving us an opportunity to work our numbers down logically. But the likely way that we are going to work our population down is through conflict. During that time, we will do serious damage to our planet. By the time we are out the other side of this mess, Earth's carrying capacity will have been anthropogenically diminished significantly.
Sorry, that's not what I'd like to see happen, but it's what I believe will happen.
Les
I don’t want to be target number one simply because I tried to help. I will talk to those who are receptive/know what’s going on, but won’t go there to those who are clueless AND have no interest. I like sand_puppy’s idea. I have even thought of ANONYMOUSLY putting flyers in mailboxes.
we have not made the mistakes of growing and then learning that our neighbors covet what we have
and concurrently they have no idea what it takes to grow food. that said, they for now are the wiser,maybe not holier but the wiser. they see --they take…we toil we suffer loss.
learn this.
we learn what cultivars grow in our area. what insects and pathogens invade. what animals and what people invade our gardens also.
status quo for gardens = me being so naive to think that others will not see the easy pickins at my expense…it’s not negative…it’s human nature under want.
we haven’t seen that for awhile and now we are. and will see more so as time rolls on.
part of resilence means understanding reality. and not wishful thinking the universe is kosher.
i dont know the answer yet but i am working on it here.
c’mon, no time for lamenting,time to figure this stuff out.
this is just what this site is about.
We all know what the possibilities are, but I'm not one for resignation. We really have no idea what the carrying capacity of the planet is, but there are a lot of people working their buts of to find out. As long as we keep pouring old wine into new skins, we'll never find out. The industrial model is broken and failing. Even as “biotechnology” makes it's strange promises, we are already cleaning up the wreckage that it is creating and at the same time building new models. Those new models (permaculture, beyond organic framing, etc.) are just beginning to be constructed.
The house is on fire, and we need to fundamentally rethink what it means to be a human being on planet earth. It time that we step up our game and pull out all the stops. We throw around words and concepts like medieval, cannibalism and collapse , I am certainly guilty of doing the same all the time myself. I think if we had really internalized what that really means, we would be having a very different kind of conversation. If its one of your loved ones, father, brother mother, cousin or child that is dying, you don't say “well we are over populated, we need to let this one go”, you do everything in your power to save that life.
There may be a time that I may have to look a loved one in the eye and say goodbye, but it is not today. Reality is a full contact sport, and its tussle can toss you around like a rag doll. But I would much rather suffer emotional stress and agony, the ups and downs of dealing with it then put on the stolid face of our zombie culture that is walking around medicated most of the time. Emotional resilience is not about being calm all the time, but embracing the intensity of what is coming at us, experiencing it and becoming passionate and active about creating a different world. This is not a dress rehearsal.
We don't know if we have a week, a month, a year, or a decade, but we do know that we have today. And today we have the opportunity to do something different, not to perpetuate business as usual. Every little step we take forward we must celebrate, every little thing cherish. We have much more power to transform the world than we can possibly imagine. This crisis is a gift that we should not let pass by. I believe that we all choose to be hear on planet earth at this time to heal humanity and the planet and we have all the tools that we need at our disposal.
Bernanke is driving a train to oblivion along with his corporate and government cronies. Their sense of reality will die with them, there is no turning them back. We know that the emperor has no clothes, lets stop paying him homage. We do in so many ways without being aware of it, even if we spend time in criticism, the place that it exists within our consciousness is a drain on our energy and resilience.
It is always difficult to hear the tales of the personal impacts of the headline news of corporate malfeasance, but the sharing together of suffering and joys will give us the collective strength to build a better future. We will endure and prosper into the future. I am not afraid of the darkness because we are walking together into the unknown.
Les,If humanity were to become minimalistic vegetarians and move to where food can be grown, I think the planet can sustain our current population. Like you, I don't see that as being likely. Everything and everybody will need to localize. There won't be many options for long distance trade or travel if things fall apart.
Places like Las Vegas, NV will see at least 99% population reduction before the valley reaches sustainable numbers. Small towns in the Midwest may not see any reduction. Look at your local production and the population that must sustain. How much food can be produced in big cities? Most of the city inhabitants have been conditioned to rely on the government. If a singularity event occurs, they will likely wait in place, using up their resources, hoping that the government will save them. By the time they realize help isn't coming, all the resources will be expended. What will they do? That is why I refer to cities as self cleaning ovens.
It is depressing to think in these terms. Nobody can save the world. Just put yourself in a position that you can help your loved ones. You'll have a greater chance of surviving with a strong local community. Depending where you are located, that may not be enough.
I have tried to get coworkers prepared. It has been frustrating. Whenever they say that they'll just come over and "share" my goodies, I tell them to banish the thought. After the singularity, I'll only be sharing high velocity lead, and I'll treat them the same as any other vermin. Until then, I will help with preps, offer advice, be a coach. Some take me up on it. Most don't.
With neighbors, it is more a multi-year endeavor. I generally share the abundance from my garden. Tonight, I gave away green beans to a neighbor who recently moved in. We talked a while and I offered to help them build a garden next year. That was enough at this time. We'll visit the topic many times in the future. I'll ask them what they'd like to grow, where would be the best location, how big they envision the garden, how they'll process the excess. Soon, they'll want to see what the other neighbors are doing. Baby steps work best for me.
It doesn't always work out the way I'd like. At a minimum, they know who I am and they see me as a caring person. Even that bare bones relationship will foster trust and cooperation in a SHTF scenario. What more can you ask for?
Grover
Well said LesPhelps
Any time a species overshoots its ecological support base it is is going to experience a die-off. The level of decline is going to be related to the degradation of the environment we rely on to support us. When the fossil fuel spigot dries up food is going to be an issue. And we don't have to run out of oil for that. Distribution of oil/ petrol requires a high level of infrastructure and economies of scale. It's not just a matter of price.
Here are a few more drivers if we accept the premise that a lower energy future means a less complex and more localized existence. ie less or no benefits leveraged off a global scale and technology
1, availability of highly sophisticated medical treatments
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availability of pharmaceuticals. These two points cut close to the bone as my wife is a pre dialysis kidney patient. She's currently on several medications and even after a kidney transplant will require anti rejection medications. It's hard to be confident they'll be available.
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Bees are currently kept alive by human technology (in my country at least and I believe this is also the case in the US). Varroa treatments are just one example. It's true that it is possible to pollenate by hand and there are other insect vectors. Even so the impact of loosing bees would be huge.
And there are many more factors. None of the above are terminal for the human race but a long term sustainable population in the billions seems improbable to me.
David
[quote=treebeard]Those new models (permaculture, beyond organic framing, etc.) are just beginning to be constructed.
[/quote]
Do you actually think that the 400 lb person riding the electric shopping cart at Walmart is going to become a permaculture minimalistic vegetarian? Obviously, that's an extreme, but look around you. How many people that you see are going to be willing and able to feed themselves.
I have a garden in my back yard that is growing. That does not mean that I planned on or intended to be a subsistance gardener in my declining years. I adopted ZPG (Zero Population Growth) in the early 70s, no more than two kids. I never voted for 7 billion people in the first place. Other people did. I firmly believe that quality of life is every bit as important as quantity of people on the planet.
Look at the pollution around the planet and the resource depletion and tell me again that you believe 7 billion people is a good idea. Sure, some of it is due to extravagent lifestyle, but 7 billion people is a stretch, even if we all become environmental saints.
Another thing people don't think about is that we aren't the only species on the planet. It is sad how few animals and fish we see fit to allow to coexist with is, sad indeed.
Les
With 7 billion people it only takes one or two problems and we are in big trouble. It takes a long time to make some of the changes that will be needed to survive.
…the sounds of nature and especially the dead sounds of nature is unbelievable, and eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (what kind of sandwich NN?) on a tree stump, priceless. I seen you and NN clearly and I liked it.Yogi
Treebeard! Teach, my brother! Amen and Halleluja! Way to wrap it up and bring it on home!
It's not going to be easy, we only get one shot, we're all in this together. Roger, copy that, read you loud and clear!
John G
I made a statement of what is happening right now in Italy between city dwellers and country communities. I'm sure it's happening else where. I remember headlines about LA community gardens getting raided.etc. Jan had a headline on an apple orchard .I'm all for community building like Rosehip and Sand_Puppy and Grover are doing. I doubt it will be your next door neighbor (has a piece of land and will try to adjust) that will be the major problem in the next coming years. It's the people in cities that are out of work or barely making ends meet and depend on a dwindling food supply coming in the city at ever increasing prices. And in the 30's the majority of the people didn't have cars.
People in the cities make runs in the country and raid the huge gardens at night. Italians from the country side are being home invaded by city dwellers and they raid their cantinas (Deep pantry where they cure and dry their sausages ,,,food storage).
I will quote Derrick Jensen's definition of civilization from his book "The End Game"
"I would define a civilization much more precisely, and I believe more usefully, as a culture ----that is a complex of stories, institutions, and artifacts-----that both leads to and emerges from the growth of cities(civilization, see civil: from civis, meaning citizen, from Latin civitatis, meaning city state), with cities being so defined-----so as to distinguish them from camps, villages, and so on-----as people living more or less permanently in one place in densities high enough to require the routine importation of food and other necessities of life."
Hmmmm. How many billions live in cities?
In Germany at the height of hyperinflation when farmers didn't want to sell their produce because they were losing money everyday. Some city dwellers with trucks and guns would ransack farmers lands and slaughtered animals to feed themselves.
I'll stick with my community and try to have alternate side plans just in case.
I'm a realist like most here.
NN
I find myself floundering between the reality of what a collapse will bring, and the negative that that implies, and the possibility of managing this huge predicament, and the positive that that implies. My heart wants the latter, but my brain buys more into the former.
http://stephenkinsella.net/WordPress/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/washingtonpost.com-despair-in-once-proud-argentina.pdf
I still believe that if one is lucky enough to be a part of a tight-knit, small semi-rural community that is self-sufficient, there is some hope. But I have no doubt that chaos will rule just outside the borders of that small enclave, and there will be constant external threats that will require constant vigilance.
Brotherly love and all that stuff only goes so far when people are starving and facing extreme hardship for extended periods of time. If things deteriorate to the point of what is described in the article, that is not a world I want to live in. This line of thinking is when the reality of what we are facing is indeed sobering.
Jan
Obviously, I don't know what is coming. So everything below are guesses. Some educated, some fanciful. My guesses and those of others. In other words: I don't have a clue whether what I'm saying is correct or will turn out to be useful!! However, I will proceed, none the less, with my rumminations on imaginary, but potential troubles.
As many have polnted out, big cities could become areas where a million or so people suddenly find that they are hungry and freakout. And they might be really, really mad about it. Weren't they "promised" a decent life? Who could have ever known there was a problem…? They watch TV and no one ever mentioned this… When we look at the behavior of big city riots, we see that angry entitled people lashout at everything arround them, breaking the store windows, and taking whatever they can find. They are furious against "the system" and smashing the windows of a little family run dry cleaning business seems to make sense at the moment. Not be the ideal place to be at one of these times.
As Nervous Nelly has just reminded us, isolated rural farms can be raided by city dwellers with trucks and guns. IN ISOLATION, rural frams can be picked off one at a time by a group of such raiders. But what if the farms were instead a small community. A couple of trees might be felled across the roadways comming into the community forcing would be raiders to walk. A couple of lookouts with sniper rifles and scopes (don't forget night scopes!!) could make a band of hungry city folk reconsider. If the lookouts had radios, the rest of the community could be summoned. (I'll bet we could talk Aaron M. into a tutorial how to build a defense around a small neighborhood / community.)
FerFal, I believe, describes the city folk of Argentina, waiting a week or so to see if things would get back to "normal" and more food and gasoline arrive. When it did not and the last of the food was gone, they set out walking down the biggest highways into the country to raid farm houses for food. One of his suggestions was to not live right off a major highway leading out of a big city.
JHK suggests the pattern of small (walkable) towns with surrounding agricultural land. To me, this sounds like the best combination. Located at leaset several days hike from the nearest big city.
And last, in the New Mexico / Arizona area, water seems most likely to be the most immediate rate limiting resource. I would really be interested in one of these for my garage.
THX for that info. Helps clarify loose ends in my plans. Still working on it. I just hope I have 3-5 years before things TSHTF. Jan that piece on Argentina gives me the goose bumps.
NN
[quote=LesPhelps]Do you actually think that the 400 lb person riding the electric shopping cart at Walmart is going to become a permaculture minimalistic vegetarian? Obviously, that's an extreme, but look around you. How many people that you see are going to be willing and able to feed themselves.
[/quote]
Les,
Don't forget all the people tied to their social networking devices. I don't think it likely that the current population could exist beyond a singularity event. Overall, my guess is that 70%-90% will perish. It will be higher in artificial environments and minimal in communities that are nearly sustainable now.
The first few months will be the most difficult. As the population dwindles, the pressure will be reduced. After a few years, a new normal will emerge. If we don't start lobbing nukes, the environment will rebound.
Humans are quite good at closing the barn door after the horses have fled. If civilization can be reestablished, strict rules will be enacted to keep the collapse's scapegoat symptom from ever occurring again. Who knows, it might be a great time to live. Then again, it could be a one-world-government, prison planet sort of nightmare.
Grover
…in my community. These kind folks are military trained, brought up to manage and take care of their property and grow food here in my neck of the woods. It is what they live 24/7/365 for. Most all are NRA types who together have networked since their great, great grandfathers settled the lands they now farm and hunt and fish and camp. This is their way of life. It is talked about in every breakfast club and barber shop (hair is cut by the Mayor of our town!!) here much more than most people believe, and this community and many like it have faced many issues we face today with hand me down stories of the last Depression and hard times. Regarding our Mayor who cuts hair, you walk in and on one wall is his guns, fishing poles, hunting gear, a collection of old razors (old fashioned barber razors) and an American Flag. Everything stated is just the truth. He does an active business.
It will take but one episode to make the rounds (minutes from when it occurs) and old plans are dusted off and serious consequences will await the second arrival of armed thugs. No one gets these neck of the woods better than those living in these dwellings. Racial profiling or just knowing who the strangers are isn't really all that difficult, and when you are out there too as spotters then the issue gets resolved on the quick. The raiders raid because of far superior forces or the element of surprise and that is gone with the first raid. So, yes, city folk who have back yard gardens get ransacked, in the country however, trust has been built for generations, hell, half the towns streets are named after one family or another still living in the community. I believe things get bad, for sure, but speaking of my community only, I see no issues taking care of our own. Lord I hope it doesn't come to this but it will happen, it has happened and we just work to take care of our own and share when things settle down.
Whatever you own is the property of someone elses until you figure out what it is you are willing to do and then don't wait. Do not trust family, friends or any such individual until it is clear you have the upper hand. I have said this before but the ones who will take from you first are the ones who know what you have so it is best you keep everything on the low side and your mouth shut and give the appearance of humility and passivity, then do what you gotta do.
I hate, truly hate talking this crap. I'm a lover not a fighter.
BOB