“Helping people achieve greater self-sufficiency”
Food Storage
Introduction
Developing food storage is definitely a current topic. As people see news stories from around the globe, it is apparent that a variety of economic or civil conditions necessitate food storage. Many folks launch into food storage through purchasing commercially packed nitrogen food storage programs. These have their use, but can be expensive and ultimately result in a lot of wasted food. We focused our food storage program on the fundamentals (whole grains, rice, corn, oats, etc.). We purchase foods we know we will eat and try to grow it or buy local whenever we can.
Firstly, I am not a food storage expert. I would just like to share how my family has gone about food storage and how well it has worked for us. Secondly, I am not one who spends time contemplating various forms of societal demise that would result in the need for stored food. While I recognize those possibilities exist, they are simply too frightening for someone like me to consider. Rather, I love food storage because: It saves me money; Provides healthy, nutritious homegrown food year round; Enhances our ability to be self-reliant; and, I love never running out of anything!
Space
Space is a big issue to consider when you are preparing to start your food storage. We are fortunate to have an unfinished basement which does the job nicely. We store 6-12 months of most everything we consider a necessity, so for a family of 6 that takes up quite a bit of room.
With some commercial style shelving from Sams, a couple of frost freezers and a bunch of mouse proof storage bins, we have safely and effectively stored all of our food.
In order to effectively store food, you need a cool climate (55-60 degree Fahrenheit), relatively low humidity and as pest/rodent free as possible. So let your space determine how much and of what types of food you are going to store.
Quantities
Again, I am sharing with you what our family has done. Adapt this plan to suit the needs, taste and size of your family. We are a family of 6 (5 hungry boys). Some things that we consider luxuries we may only store a 3 month supply (like cocoa powder). Prices on maple syrup and honey (necessities here) fluctuate a great deal based on the season, so we buy those when they are the cheapest and stock a full year supply. Also, we do a few “insurance items”. These are items we probably won’t ever use, but have on hand just in case (i.e. powdered milk). Here is a list of what we might have on hand:
Fruits:
Applesauce (12 jars – homemade and canned in the fall)
Apple Butter (6 jars – homemade and canned in the fall)
Jelly (12 jars – homemade and canned by fruit season)
Pineapple (2 cases of pineapple chunks)
Apple Juice (6 gallons)
Raisins (6 cases)
Blueberries (A bunch! These freeze very well)
Cranberries (Also frozen)
Vegetables:
Green Beans (24 jars – homegrown and canned in the summer)
Peas (2 cases – store brought)
Corn (2 cases – store brought) (hope to grow and freeze this year)
Tomatoes (24 jars – homegrown and canned in the summer)
Pickles (6 gallon jugs – store brought)
Pasta Sauce (24 large jars – store brought)
Meat:
Salmon (24 cans)
Tuna (24 cans)
Chicken (24 cans)
Frozen Whole Turkey (We buy 12 all natural turkeys the day after Thanksgiving for $4 each and freeze)
Frozen Pork (Lots of it, from hogs we raise)
Beef (We buy and freeze as much as we can. But are still looking for an affordable source of natural beef).
Proteins/Beans/Grains:
Peanut Butter (12 large jars)
Baked Beans (2 cases)
Pasta (Lots of it!)
Rice (125 lbs)
Cereal (12 cases)
Oatmeal (12 cases)
Whole Corn (150 lbs)
Whole Wheat Berry (150 lbs)
Dairy:
Cheese (shredded mozzarella freezes well)
Butter
Powdered Milk
Condensed Milk
Misc: Mayo Olives
Soups Canola Oil
Olive Oil Ketchup
Maple Syrup BBQ Sauce
Vinegar Molasses
Honey Spices
Yeast Flour
Sugar Baking Powder
Baking Soda Salt
Cocoa Lemon Juice
Powdered Pancake Mix
Non Food: Lantern Oil Garbage Bags
Zip lock bags plastic wrap
Aluminum Foil Laundry detergent
Dishing washing det. Clorox
Matches Batteries
Light bulbs Cleaning Supplies
Paper towels Toilet Paper
Other than the “insurance items,” all of these items are things we eat and use on a weekly basis. Once you get your storage established, it is not expensive to just replenish as you use something. That way you have a rolling food supply that stays fresh.
When we purchase something for storage it goes to the table in the storage room. We do not put it on the shelf until we date it (black sharpie) and rotate the stock “first in first out” (FIFO).
How to Get Started
Getting started with food storage can be a big challenge for many families. We were fortunate to have been in the position to dedicate a lump sum of cash to get it started. From there, the replenishment fits within our normal grocery budget. I can’t emphasize enough how much we save by buying so many things our family eats in bulk (CERAL). Also, we save a bunch by buying items when they are less expensive (i.e. turkeys the day after Thanksgiving). The joy of homegrown vegetables in the winter is too great to explain. So if you have the ability to have your own garden and do some canning, get started! A great place to start is growing and canning your own tomatoes. Tomatoes are fairly easy and inexpensive to can. I have yet to buy an applesauce (at any price) that is as good as homemade and canned applesauce!
If you don’t have the cash to get established all at once, start where you can. Pick something your family relies on (maybe pasta) and buy 3 months worth. Every time you use one of your pasta supply, replace it. The next time you have some extra room in the grocery budget, buy a 3 month supply of pasta sauce. And so on. Before you know it, you will have a 3 month supply of your most essential items.
Because we are blessed to live in the great state of Virginia we take that into account when planning our food storage. We have a small greenhouse, and without heat, we can keep ourselves in fresh greens virtually year round. Furthermore, the climate in Virginia allows for some type of outdoor garden 9 months of the year. Raising hogs, chickens and hunting is a critical supplement to our meat supply. The fresh eggs are a staple of our diet. If you don’t have space for animals and gardening, visit your local farmers market. BUY LOCAL and can/freeze from the farmers market.
Now if we only could keep a few cattle…We would love to add milk, butter and cheese to our self-reliant list.
No matter how much food you put in storage, ultimately you need to be able to produce food if you are looking for long-term sustainability. Putting up a small greenhouse is a great start. Since ancient times people have been harnessing the power of the sun and producing food year round.
www.HomesteadEssentials.com
“QE2” has a warm, fuzzy and rather majestic sound to it. 
It makes me think of a big ship. If it does the same for you, think Titanic2. In reality the term is Orwellian “doublespeak” for incestuous monetization and all of recorded history says this is not going to end well. This is the decision of the secret meeting held on November 3, 2010, which I previously wrote about. http://offgridexchange.com/the-real-decision-makers/
The way our current monetary system works is that the Federal Reserve (which is neither federal nor reserve) creates money out of thin air and loans it to the US Treasury at interest (usury). The Treasury in turn passes on this newly created debt to the public in the form of US debt obligations. This debt is sold at auction after being packaged in different denominations (amount of money) and different maturity dates (length of time). The debt obligations (US bonds, bills and notes) are guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the US Government. The amount of money (and therefore debt) has continued to increase. [As a side note: if all money is created with usury, (where principal and interest is owed) where would the money come from to retire the debt?]
This kind of monetary system has the (intended) continual erosion of the value of the currency because of the ever increasing supply of money (true inflation). This plan has worked reasonably well to this point, because the amount of US debt has been small enough to be serviced from Government revenues. There has also been an inherent demand for the US Dollar. This is partially due to the elite status of the dollar that was created at the Breton Woods agreement after World War II. This agreement established the US Dollar as the world reserve currency. This means that anything traded between nations was denominated in US Dollars.
The Bretton Woods agreement has given the US a decided advantage for a lot of years. For example, when we buy oil, we buy it in US dollars. For a very long time, when we wanted something, we just created the money to buy it and sold the debt to another country. We have been creating more and more money and trading it for things of value from other nations. This has been going on, while we have produced less and less for ourselves and export. It seems that the only thing we now produce is dollars (debt).
This, of course, places an ever increasing amount of debt obligation on the US Government. This situation has been more or less kept in play by the natural devaluation of the dollar (the more dollars you create, the less they are worth) and paying back debts in continually eroding dollars. In technical terms this is known as repudiation by inflation.
In essence, the US Government has been borrowing the money needed to maintain our way of life, as well as the cost of a military presence in over 130 countries to enforce it. This is probably the largest Ponzi scheme the world has ever known. Now that the “pyramid” is getting larger, we are running out ways to fund it.
The rest of the world understands what we are doing and are through playing the game. China and Japan (historically, the largest holders of US debt) are no longer purchasing US Treasuries. The only reason they have not dumped what they currently hold is concerns of: 1. flooding the world too quickly with US Dollars and making their US Treasuries worthless overnight; and 2. US retaliation. Some countries have decided to start trading among themselves (BRIC nations, among others) using their own currencies and circumnavigating the US dollar. Oil is now being purchased by a number of nations in the same way.
This ebb and flow of current events is set with a backdrop of the US Government needing to pawn off an unrealistic amount of debt. That amount of debt is set to increase exponentially. Future demands will be for propping up states and local municipalities, Medicaid, Medicare, social security and other unfunded liabilities totaling over $100T. We are very close to crossing the line where all of the income (taxes, etc.) that the government receives in revenues will go to paying the interest on US debt obligations. Sure, there will be some attempts to reverse the trend. There is talk of confiscating the $Trillions in private retirement accounts and using the funds to buy US Treasuries. (This, of course, is what they have already done with the social security funds.) There might be attempts to revamp tax revenues with more enthusiasm (European style austerity). There’s no telling where a desperate government will try to find revenues.
But the here and now is, the US Treasury can’t sell enough debt obligations to keep the ship floating. The first step to buy time was an “end around” game played by the Federal Reserve and its member banks. After the latest bubble burst, the banks were holding collateral for loans and mortgages they made which were worth far less that the value of the loans. The Fed allowed the banks to fraudulently call the values of these loans whatever they wished (mark to model). This enabled the banks to sell (dump) these underwater assets to the Fed for 85-100% of face value. This action was actually Quantitative Easing I (QE1). So what was the caveat? All of the money the banks received had to be used to purchase US Treasuries. While this held off an immediate crisis, this was not enough money to keep up with the ever increasing demand to sell treasuries.
The next step was for the Fed to outright loan the member banks a lot of money (they won’t say how much) at 0% interest, so that the banks can purchase US Treasuries. The side game is that banks can earn a lot of money receiving interest on the treasuries (contrived arbitrage). This keeps the “too big to fails” propped up for a while longer, since there isn’t enough economy to loan the money into.
According to history, the final step has begun. Direct, in broad daylight, monetization. With “Quantitative Easing II” the Fed is admitting that the US Treasury can’t sell enough debt to keep up with the need of the US Government to borrow. The Fed continues to create money out of thin air and loan it to the US Government (as they always have). The US Treasury continues to auction the debt obligations (as usual), but NOW the Fed creates MORE money out of thin air and purchases the US Treasuries DIRECTLY!
QE2 is a scheme for the Fed to direct purchase all of the US Treasuries for a period of eight months. It is a purported amount of $600B at a pace of $75B per month. The mortgage securities the Fed bought during QE1 now reaching maturity will continue to be rolled over into Treasuries, as they have been since August. That’s another $275 billion, give or take. To keep this in perspective, the Fed has already surpassed Japan in the amount of US debt it is holding. Two months into this scheme, the Fed will surpass China in the amount of US debt obligations they hold. At the end of the eight month period, the Fed will hold more US debt than China and Japan combined. Keep in mind that all of this monetary expansion is not funded by anything!
This kind of monetization has been tried many, many times in history. It has never worked. Yes, the whole world is holding our debt. Yes, we have the most powerful military (for now), but it is funded with debt. Both situations were true with the Roman Empire, matter of fact the similarities are daunting. With QE2, we have adopted the same monetary policies that have led to the collapse of many currencies throughout history. And yes, the same monetary policy as Zimbabwe!
This is a $100,000,000,000,000.00 Zimbabwe note (dollar). How much is it worth? I saw one listed on e-bay for 2.80 $US, shipping included. Are we going the way of the Zimbabwe note? I don’t know. The more important lesson is that the US Federal Reserve Note can’t be counted on as a reliable storehouse of value. If you haven’t read my article, “Playing Old Maid with Federal Reserve Notes”, http://offgridexchange.com/playing-old-maid-with-federal-reserve-notes/ please do. Most US Dollar denominated paper assets are set to take a big hit as the world continues to distance itself from our debt.
QE2 can prove to be a self-perpetuating disaster. Where do you think all of the private money that was allegedly going into treasuries ($875B) is going to go? I think most of it is going to find its way into commodities, especially gold, silver and oil. If at the end of QE2 oil is over $100 per barrel, gold is over $1,500 per ounce and silver is over $35 per ounce, do you think anyone will be willing to loan the US Government their money at 2% interest? I don’t. (BTW, if interest rates are raised, US revenues won’t even pay the interest on the debt.) Enter QE3, then QE4, etc. Each step is more self-destructive.
We do not have to go to a full out Zimbabwe-type situation to cause a massive devaluation of our currency. For anyone holding their wealth in US paper, they are going to see a great loss in value. This “transfer” in wealth is nothing new. It is a natural occurrence with the devaluation of a fiat currency. I’m not sure this is unintended, but that is another story. The bottom line is that holding US Federal Reserve Notes or US Treasury debt obligations is a sucker’s game, and the rest of the world knows it.
The topic of hydroponics can conjure up mixed reactions where conserving resources and living self-sufficiently is considered. After all, hydroponics is usually thought of as fairly energy intensive — growing indoors requires artificial lighting or at the least lighting to supplement the sun’s energy in a greenhouse hydroponic setup. Nutrients have to be mixed with your water supply and power to circulate the water is required. And further, aren’t the nutrient mixes and pH balancing chemicals basically chemical soup manufactured by industrial/corporate operations? Doesn’t sound very sustainable to me.
True, but let’s consider the side of the argument that says, hey, with hydroponics, we can grow organic, eliminate or nearly eliminate the chemicals and pesticides we put in the earth’s surface, and surely we can use hydroponics in a greenhouse situation, maximizing the use of the sun. With hydroponics we can also minimize water usage and arguably grow closer to our market (important for urban survivalists ). Furthermore, natural source nutrient mixes are available. A lot of information regarding environmentally friendly hydroponics can be found on Site 101, in ezine articles and many others.
I’m just trying to kick off some discussion here. I have very limited experience with hydroponics, but my message is that with some creative dedication, hydroponics can be a powerful part of pursuing a sustainable homestead. As for my experience, back in 2005, I decided to pursue some hydroponic gardening. Mainly to have some good tomatoes out of season here in the Ohio valley. And I mean good, using heritage variety seeds. Growing tough crunchy tomatoes that would travel without harm but land on the plate and palate with no flavor was not my aim.
I had room in my basement to devote about 4′ x 8′ to growing. I worked diligently to make a platform to support the system,to curtain if off and to heat it. I eventually adopted the dutch bucket recirculating system to plant about 13 plants. Discussion of the details of the planting is not included here; my main focus is to be the lighting system which I built from scratch and which is discussed here to promote some thought regarding what can be done.
For lighting, I was considering everything. High Intensity Discharge (HID) lamps were the surest way to make a very substantial indoor sun. These systems have lots of research dollars behind them and provide really amazing results. The downside, where I was concerned, was the high temperature of the fixtures and the high energy consumption. Our basement has a low ceiling and would require close proximity of the fixtures to the wood floor joists. Having had a major house fire in ’95, I am super careful where fire hazards are concerned. Understand, the proximity of the fixtures to combustibles was the problem, not the HID concept. So – I was drawn more toward fluorescent fixtures which operate at a lower temperature than the HIDs, although probably not more efficiently. Considered first the high output T5 (5/8” diameter) tubes which are popular in Europe and were catching on in the US. They looked good, but found that the standard T8 tubes (1” diameter) with electronic ballasts had better warranties for the most part (5 year vs. 2 year) were more efficient and ran cooler and had more tube and spectrum choices. I was leaning then toward the T8 lamp fixtures. I suspect T5′s have made grown in popularity since then and that there are many more T5 choices these days. I found that Plant Lighting had very competitive pricing on good fixtures (8×54 watt lamp fixture for $300). All of the observations I’m relating here are subject to argument; I’m just telling my story, which is how I arrived at my eventual setup.
Given the costs of owning and operating the lighting, I pushed on into the concept of using LEDs for indoor/hydroponic gardening. In 2005, LED systems were expensive, but they could pay for themselves in less than 2 years of daily operation due to their lower energy consumption. There were a handful of LED fixture folks back then. Two web sites that seemed realistic in their performance and efficiency comparisons and their designs were LEDgrowLights and GrowWithLEDs. They are still in business, and their web sites offer some education regarding LED grow lights. There were other good sites and also some other companies online that made ridiculous claims for dinky little LED clusters. Use discretion. There are lots of good sources out there these days.
One of the energy advantages gained by LEDs is derived through their ability to generate the light concentrated only in the wavelength/frequency/color of light that plants need. The main color is an orangey/red, generated in the neighborhood of 640-660nm (nanometers) wavelength. Secondarily, a lesser amount of blue light is required, this light being in the 450-475nm range. Also, since 2005, more has been written about the necessity for some inclusion of a small amount of full spectrum “white” light which makes sense.
At that time, I felt that the LED lighting lamp/fixtures on the market were pretty anemic, so I researched the LED components that were available to build my own. One component family really grabbed my attention and I proceeded to develop a simple fixture based upon it.
These LEDs were an amazing “LED Engine” that clustered 7 groups of 7 junctions in an area smaller than a dime. This device was the Lamina Ceramics BL-2000 series. The red LEDs produced light at 618nm and about 18 ¾ watts! (these devices were listed at 14 watts but could be pushed with heat sinks and cooling) The blue LEDs were good at 470nm and about 4.4 watts. These LED engines were priced temptingly at $20 for the red, quantity 1, and only $17 each for quantity 25. The blues were priced at $12 and $10 respectively.
I contacted Lamina Ceramics at the time to see if a little lower frequency LED engine was available, something in “ideal” 640 to 660nm wavelength. While they could do it, the small quantity manufacture of an LED engine cluster would have been cost prohibitive for me, particularly while developing a prototype.
Before I go further, I must warn you that these items don’t seem to be available now. The company that made them, Lamina Ceramics, still has similar items (see Mouse, Digi-Key, Newark Electronics and others). I believe they still make the BL-2000 series LED engines in RGB (red-green-blue) or nearly full spectrum devices. I cannot find the units I bought previously (from Mouser). Lamina Ceramics has morphed into the Lighting Science Group. The devices I bought still show up in a search engine, but as obsolete items. I should note also that Lamina Ceramics has also released much higher lumen devices than the BL-2000 series. These have lots of promise as well.
Note that Lamina Ceramics sells the (major) heat sinks required to keep these boys from self-destructing. My fixture was built into a new ($8) 4 foot fluorescent shop lite that I gutted. I mounted 4 red BL-2000s and 3 blue BL-2000s LED engines. My ratio of red to blue wattage was about 75 to 13, a little heavy on the blue, but not a problem. Rule of thumb says about 10:1. Each of the 7 LED engines was mounted on a heat sink and the fixture was fitted with a muffin fan to provide forced air cooling.
I used two nice lab grade power supplies. This is not a requirement, but current limiting is necessary.
Powering up this fixture was dramatic. We’re talking retina damage. Looking directly at the red LED engines for only a second produced persistent after images lasting 2 minutes or so. Don’t do that. I was very happy with the amazing flood of light produced by these clusters.
So I grew some tomato plants from seed under this fixture. They grew very well. Very healthy and tall, kept growing up into the fixture which I kept raising. The LEDs did an incredible job. Sorry, no photos of the plants. One thing that doesn’t add up for tomatoes with LED lamps is that tomato plants like it HOT ! In my case, that meant heating the small area I had curtained off with plastic sheeting in the winter or summer. In my case, it didn’t add up. Conclusion here is that LED fixtures would gain the most energy savings by using to grow lower temperature plants, like broccoli, peas, endive, spinach, etc. I had proven my LED lamp grow light concept but did not elect to heat the space and therefore my plants did not yield fruit. My original desire to have tomatoes was met by buying at a good market. My main prospect had become to develop a viable LED grow fixture.
Because my fixture required uncommon voltage levels and current control I moved on from this prototype I switched gears to a design resembling a canister, with 1 cluster only per fixture. I felt these could be built inexpensively and would be very versatile. They were designed to operate on 12 to 14 volt DC, so they could be operated on automotive, RV, solar system 12VDC, inexpensive auto battery chargers/replacers, etc. They were designed using the Anderson Power Product’s Powerpole connectors which are ingenious and should be considered by anyone developing a project requiring 12VDC. ( See APP ) I have no connection (sorry) with these folks, I’m just impressed by this versatile system. My canister system did not get beyond the design stage, because as mentioned before, the Lamina Ceramic components went away.
Revisiting the LED grow light market these days is quite heartening. A quick look on eBay these days pulls up LOTS of nicely priced LED lamps and fixtures. (just search LED grow or similar) I have no experience with them, but I would consider mainly those that include a few white LEDs so your plants get all the spectrum they need.
Obviously, borrowing ideas from both the new and the old, the conventional, the scientific, the spiritual and whatever – is required when walking the path of sustainability. Thinking your way through things is good and pleasurable in my view. Traditions can provide insight; just keep in mind where they came from and how they may be built upon. Our ancestors survived and thrived because they adapted to changing requirements and new abuses from the system. We can honor our ancestors not just by blindly following them, but by progressing from where they were, just like they did themselves.
Are there easy answers where growing your own food is required? Sure, a few; but you’ve got to move on from there. Right now is an exciting time where technology is concerned regarding lighting systems and enhanced awareness regarding sustainability, etc. — This has yielded new LED lamps, new natural source nutrients, efficiently produced equipment, more efficient equipment and so forth. AND pretty much all of my research was done on line when I was experimenting with LED grow lights. Lean on the internet, and keep on keepin’ on.
We keep bees at The Weyr, they help out with pollination and one day we hope to get some honey from them as well! While we are by no means expert beeks with many years of experience under our belts, we have observed bees in the garden, eaten honey, observed a friend who keeps bees on his roof in Philadelphia, and managed to kill a hive last winter.
This year we took a class in beekeeping at the Buckingham County Extension Office. It was taught by Doug Ladd, a beek with lots more experience than us. We learned a lot at this seminar and, perhaps more important, met lots of other local beeks that we can call or email for help. “Beek” is a term of endearment by which other beekeepers refer to each other.
By the time the bee class rolled around, we had already acquired a new nucleus or nuc, of bees, consisting of five frames of workers, brood, and a queen. They were flourishing in our garden and we had already added a new super with ten empty frames that they were colonizing.
This hive has now grown to two medium supers and two deep supers and is full of a healthy queen, workers and brood. There is also a lot of honey in the comb, what looks like more than enough for the winter months, but we are not taking any chances this year that our hard working bees will starve. This year we made them special food and are feeding them regularly.
When it comes to feeding bees, there are several ways to go. In the warm months it is best to give them saturated solutions of sugar water in special feeders. But as the warm days come to an end, the bees need even more concentrated food and this is when we start feeding either dry granulated sugar or fondant.
We opted to go with the fondant because it requires going out and buying marshmallows and then making the stuff as opposed to just opening the bag of sugar and putting some on the tops of the frames.
Bee fondant is actually very easy to make and only requires a pound of mini-marshmallows, two pounds of powdered sugar, and some vegetable shortening. The marshmallows are melted in a large greased bowl in the microwave. It is best to zap them in stages of about 30 seconds each to avoid scorching.
Grease a wooden spoon with shortening and use it to determine when the marshmallows are completely melted. Then stir them and add a few tablespoons of water and slowly add the powdered sugar. Keep mixing until all the sugar is incorporated, eventually this will require your well-greased hands. When the fondant has reached the consistency of Playdoh, keep kneading it until it is smooth and uniform. Add a little more water if necessary.
Roll the finished fondant into a cylinder and slice off a few pieces for the bees. Wrap the rest in plastic and store in the fridge. It will keep a very long time, certainly as long as it will last. You will be feeding your bees regularly throughout the winter, as they consume the fondant patties on top of their frames.
Flatten the fondant slices and lay them on top of the frames in several of the supers. Be careful not to crush any bees while doing this! Bees do not hibernate in the winter but on really cold or overcast days, they will stay inside the hive. This means that they need to eat all winter long and be able to feed the brood too, as it develops.
If the hive was not able to make enough honey during the warm months, it is crucial that they have a continuous supply of sugar to eat all winter. As soon as the days begin to warm up and you see bees flying around the hive, start feeding them sugar water again, this will give them all the energy they need to fly out and pollinate the fruit trees.
If you treat your bees right, they will reward you with extra honey for your use and keep your gardens pollinated all summer long!
December 12, 2010 – A rainy day in Appomattox County.
As we approach the ides of December, we’ve been getting a bit of cold and sloppy weather. It’s difficult to believe that just a few short weeks ago our highs were in the 60s and above freezing overnight. It seemed like fall would last forever and all those year-end garden chores could wait just another week…. Alas, the arctic blast out of Canada proved we could do nothing of the sort and now we are playing catchup in the garden, removing withered tomato vines and cages, cutting the dead tops off the asparagus, and generally neatening up the garden for next year.
At The Weyr, there is a lot to do before the garden can officially be put to bed until March. All the swiss chard that remains will be pulled and fed to the pigs and chickens. Yesterday the pigs enjoyed a feast of spent broccoli plants, tomorrow they may well get some pumpkins and cabbages. Pigs are very handy when it comes to disposing of veggies past their prime and they happily convert all that frostbitten green to tasty pork in short order.
Egg production has been reduced somewhat by the short, chilly days but with the help of a light in the hen house, we still get a decent number. Young peeps are being raised right now and will soon be in production come longer days and warmer nights.
The Winter Solstice arrives at 11:38pm on December 21, which will be the shortest day of the year. Thereafter, until the Summer Solstice in June, our days will become increasingly longer and we will have less and less darkness. This, for me, is the official arrival of the promise of spring, the return of the Sun to our winter skies.
Now is the time to start planning ahead for the next garden and thinking seriously about what plants to start in the greenhouse so they can be set out as early as possible come warm weather. 2010 was a banner year for tomatoes in The Weyr garden, we had delicious vine-ripened fruits in June and they kept it up until the first hard frost finally put a stop to further production. And all this despite a minor set back in the form of a light frost in late April. Our plants were wilted back and some needed replacing, but from then on, it was smooth sailing and tomatoes galore.
So, even though it might be chilly, rainy, and dark, it won’t be much longer until we are again working in the soil. Pull out those seed catalogs or search out companies online that sell your favorite varieties. A pencil and pad and a little imagination is all you need to get 2011′s garden on its way!
Pamela Matlack Klein
I was listening to a talk show on shortwave last night. The guest was Joseph M. Mercola, D.O., a doctor that I had not heard of. I was quite impressed with what he had to say. In the “70′s and 80′s” I was an ardent follower of Paavo O. Airola, N.D. After his death, I found some good work being done by Andrew Weil, M.D., but did not completely buy in. I have not had enough time to read about all of Dr. Mercola’s positions, but he shows a lot of promise. You can check out his website. www.mercola.com
I’ll be the first to admit that I was too preoccupied to pay attention to the noises that were being made during the last (and largest to date) economic bubble we were inflating. This was actually inexcusable because I received an exceptional financial education in the belly of the beast itself. After the ensuing burst and subsequent blood letting (both economically and of ego), I began studying to find answers to what had just happened as well as what was most likely in store for the future. Given that my entire industry had just been wiped out, I suddenly had plenty of time. After two years of intense study, I had pretty well figured it out.
The main question that remained for me was that of the “Inflation v. Deflation” debate being bandied about. This was quite perplexing to me. On the one hand, it is obvious that the Federal Reserve (which is neither federal nor a reserve) was again creating lots of fiat currency on a whim. This in the truest sense IS inflation. This can be easily evidenced by the fact that Fed has inflated the US Dollar to a point that the current value is $.04 compared to the value of the dollar at the time of its inception in 1913, when it really was a DOLLAR. However, what most people think of as inflation is simply the escalation of prices of goods and services. This is actually a byproduct (for the most part) of currency expansion. Escalation of prices, none the less, is what is being referenced in the great “Inflation v. Deflation” debate.
“By this means (fractional reserve banking) government may secretly and unobserved, confiscate the wealth of the people and not one man in a million will detect the theft.” -John Maynard Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace (1920)
In the past, when we actually had an economy, the expansion of the money supply and the escalation of prices were nearly synonymous. This is because the economy had many levels. We extracted raw materials and transformed them into a finished product, which we sold to another country or consumed ourselves. There are many steps in this process and when it was evident that the money supply was being inflated (devalued), people would buy up large quantities of what they would need for the future in anticipation of higher prices. Thus, the needed element of velocity was introduced into the economy.
In order for prices to rise due to the increase of the money supply, there must be velocity. Ah, therein is the rub: We no longer produce anything. 30% of our economy is based on flipping stocks (financial sector), another 30% is from flipping burgers (service industry), and the other 30% is buying crap from China. We no longer have the multi-level economy to keep playing the inflation game the way we used to.
Instead, for too long a time now, we have been playing the one dimensional game of consumerism. The problem now is that consumers are tapped out. Their ATM houses are underwater, we are at an all time high for consumer debt, wages are decreasing, credit scores are lowering and banks aren’t loaning money and why should they? They are borrowing money from the Fed at 0% and loaning it back to the Treasury at 2+%! I’d like to get in on some of that action!
Without velocity of money, it is difficult to believe in the Inflationary side of the debate. The problem is “the too big to fails” (we’ll see about that) are holding beau coups of debt instruments on underlying collateral that is worth substantially less than the debt owed (the mark to model scam will only last so long). They desperately need to force the “values of real estate back up to save their ass(ets). But how? Without velocity in money, the conventional method is DOA. Another possibility, which would have the same results but would be a very dangerous political gamble, is to outright devalue the currency. In essence, this is what they did during the gold confiscation era of The Great Depression. They devalued the currency from $20 dollars per ounce to $35 dollars per ounce. This is where you turn in your green notes and get back blue (or whatever color) notes on a 2 for 1, or 3 for 1, exchange rate. This allows them to repudiate debt by attaching the debt to the value of the old dollar, and simultaneously increase the value of the asset tied to the value of the new dollar. I would only see this, possibly, as a last ditch effort (after blood is running in the streets).
On the surface, the Deflation side of the debate seems to be a good one. It is true that the value of most assets is going down. A little closer look reveals that the things we need on a daily basis, however, are going up. There are a few different reasons for this phenomenon: The world is seeing what we are doing with the dollar and are therefore less willing to take it in exchange for the stuff we need; Peoples’ buying habits are changing and they are concentrating on the basics rather than luxury items such as extravagant housing. Other assets are being withdrawn from en mass out of concern for future values. These include stocks, bonds, treasuries and other equities.
So there we have it, we can stay in a confused state of circular thinking in perpetuity. Fortunately, I recently read two excellent articles written by Gonzolo Lira: “How Hyperinflation Will Happen” http://gonzalolira.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-hyperinflation-will-happen.html, and “Part II: What It Will Look Like” http://gonzalolira.blogspot.com/2010/08/hyperinflation-part-ii-what-it-will.html. These articles allowed me to get beyond this level of thinking. The “Inflation v. Deflation” theory is merely a sad hoax which misses the entire point, much like the “Republican v. Democrat” scam or “Right v. Left” paradigm. I used to think that hyperinflation was merely inflation on steroids. While it is possible that the excessive expansion of the money supply can trigger hyperinflation, it is more fundamentally caused by the lack of confidence in a currency.
Hyperinflation carries both traits: The things we need to survive, or at least symbolically maintain the way we are accustomed to living, will cost more, lots more. As everyone dumps assets to get the things they really need, the value of those assets diminish.
It is most likely that we are going to hyperinflate. A couple of years ago, I made the observation that if we did not collapse deleveraging from the last debt bubble we created (way too much newly created money going into the real estate market), surely the US Government (greatest, mother of all debt bubbles) debt bubble would do it. Each and every bubble is larger and its ensuing burst is more uncontrollable. Just look at the trillions and trillions of dollars of debt we are creating. Who is going to buy all of this junk? It certainly isn’t going to be China or Japan. What we are doing now will continue in earnest. The Federal Reserve is now buying US Treasuries. How incestuous is that?
To quote Voltaire: “At the end fiat money returns to its inner value – zero.” To invest in hyperinflation, you should look at commodities, especially gold, silver and oil.
Wow, sounds a lot like beans, bullets and band aids, doesn’t it? I guess it’s time to bring out the tin-foil hat.
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“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.” -Thomas Jefferson
“Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who makes the laws.” -Amschel Rothschild
Yesterday, disgusted and concerned American voters went to the polls in an effort to change the direction of the country. No matter how many new faces appear in government, the effect will be limited. It is ironic that today a select group of people who are among those that actually decide the future course of our Country are meeting behind closed doors. The Federal Reserve is deciding whether or not to enact Quantitative Easing II. What will be the decision? “If the only tool you have is a hammer…” There will be further creation of money to buy more time, which, of course, further erodes the value of the already sinking dollar. But wait, isn’t that what they want?
