Farmer Scrub's blog

Theressa and I came up with a list of our needs and wants for our future vision. The Needs list states the things we think we require in our physical set up and in our social tribe. We'd prefer to also have the items in our Wants list, but feel much more flexible about those. NeedsWants Solid water supply Enough land to, in theory, feed at least everyone we start with / 10 people via...

The other day, Corum asked: Scrub, i wanted to ask this for a while, are you going to practice with weapons too? If your tribe is going to be the only ones with food in the area, or even if you are going to have just more comfortable lives than other people... you sure as hell will need to defend your way of life. I/we haven't put a whole lot of thought into this, and at this point my sole...

I picked up this book from the library on a whim, and enjoyed it enough to think I should mention it here: The Nature Handbook: A Guide to Observing the Great Outdoors, by Ernest H. Williams, Jr. The book gives readers insights and shortcuts to understanding various patterns in nature, from bird/animal/insect behavior to plant/tree characteristics to patterns seen across entire landscapes. The...

With one exception, I can pretty easily see how future tribe and I can meet all our physical needs and substitute hand-made items for civilization-dependent, or adapt to going without. But I haven't really known what to do about my dependency on glasses! I have five ideas: Figure on going without glasses. This would suck, since I have very poor eyesight and without my glasses I can't make out...

I didn't make an official New Year's Resolution, but the changes I started in my life a few weeks ago could count! I don't know whether writing this up will have any value for anyone besides me, but I don't have the energy to tackle anything else tonight so this will have to do. Diet: Getting back towards the Paleodiet, especially cutting out wheat and sugar. I know I have had a sugar addiction...

For those unaware of its existence, I wanted to point out a resource I have found very valuable: the National Plant Germplasm System, at http://www.ars-grin.gov/np gs/index.html NPGS preserves genetic diversity of plants, and makes germplasm (ie, seeds and cuttings) available to scientists, organizations, and individuals conducting research. I have requested various rare seeds and cuttings over...

Paul requested a write-up of our experience doing the humanure thing, so here I write! We've been shitting in buckets for two and a half years now, except for the 6 months we lived at the Portland Permaculture Institute. We're following the system laid out in The Humanure Handbook by Joseph Jenkins, which covers pretty much everything you need to know about the topic. Basically, we poop in a...