Unemployment is capitalism’s way of getting you to plant a garden.
~Orson Scott Card
Being unemployed, underemployed or laid off is no joking matter.
Millions of Americans are out of work today, many with few prospects for work without moving their family or retraining for another career.
While we are blessed to be not only employed, but also an employer, I never get too far in my thinking about how we could make it without an income.
The worldwide economy is suffering right now. When and if we’ll see a recovery is anyone’s guess.
Yet, there’s another economy out there. It’s the economy of the homesteader and there’s no recession going on there. That’s because we play by a different set of rules.
The homesteader’s employer (besides God) is the soil and the weather. While these two can be harsh employers at times, much of the time they can be modified and adapted to.
The soil and the weather do not lay people off, nor do they require much in the way of credentials. Further, once you get the hang of how things work, you’ll be on your way to providing your family with nutritious food and cheap energy!
If I can do this, so can you.
Plant a Victory garden: Regardless of where you live, there is something that you can grow and put in the ground now. A few packs of seeds and you can at least grow some greens for salads. Get a little more organized and you can start growing your own food! I cannot tell you how fulfilling this is! Fall is a great time to plant perennials as well, for free!
Learn how to pressure can: Canning is a skill that will enable you to preserve the food that you come across, without using the freezer. Look on Craigslist, thift stores, garage sales, etc. and find a decent water canner, pressure canner and jars. They will pay for themselves in no time.
Call your local deer processing plant: Many times, you can put your name in for venison that hunters don’t want. I scored two deer last year, enough to feed our family much of the year. For just the processing fee, I got the venison for free.
Start hunting: This is how our forefathers did it. You want meat, you go hunt for it. Check your local laws and ordinances, but think of all the fresh meat you could bring home.
Get rabbits and a hutch: This is easily done by looking on Craigslist, for little or nothing. Rabbits can serve as meat for your family as well as give you excellent fertilizer for your garden! Learn how to raise your own meat here!
Barter your skills: Skills are just as valuable as product these days. Use your skills in exchange for goods and services.
Get chickens: Urban chicken keepers are cropping up all over! Check here for your local ordinances. While many counties won’t allow roosters, to have a few laying hens could be perfectly acceptable.
BIG cities, like San Fransisco, are allowing chickens in town, with limitations. How can a city deny a family’s right to grow some of it’s own food? We’ve done it for centuries, even encouraged to do so by our own leaders during WWII in terms of a Victory garden!
Consider wood heat: Do your homework, but if there’s anyway you can make good use of your fireplace or get a woodstove on the cheap, you should consider it. I see free firewood all the time. Save the money from your electric/gas bill for something else.
Get Your Goat: Goats are cheap (even free!) and hardy animals. Buy a dairy goat, who is currently milking, and you now have your own milk source. Learn all about goats, A-Z, right here!
Glean: I love gleaning. It’s a skill that all homesteaders love! We thoroughly enjoy bragging about what we got for free. Read here for tips.
Forage: Once again, homesteaders relish in the joy of foraging food that we didn’t even plant. Free, organic, nutrient packed food.
Want to learn more about “Beginning Homesteading“? Check out our “Beginner’s Series” and sign up for our monthly newsletter!
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About kmorris
Wonderful post. I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he mentioned how an aunt of his in South Dakota once told him that “as long as people had lawns they weren’t hurting too bad yet, because when we were poor we didn’t have a lawn, we had crops.”
Sadly I think that both people wait too long until they are in dire straits to take advantage of the land they live on, as well as don’t know what to do even if they are out of work and on a shoe string budget.
As an aside, the link for foraging just takes me to a wordpress login, can’t wait for you to fix the link as I’m very interested in the idea of urban/suburban/rural foraging.
Joey,
Link fixed, thanks for letting me know. Sometimes fatigue causes errors when writing!
I don’t know if you’ve ever read “Living More with Less” but in that book, they discuss how third world countries marvel at the amount of time and money Americans spend maintaining a lawn. As you said, they would have been planting food. Reading that changed my thinking immediately. I promptly went out, in our suburban lot, dug up landscaping and planted veggies.
I havn’t read the book, but it sounds right up my alley.
I remember a conversation with my wife once where she was shocked at how in most countries they have an annual salary of $3,000 or less for their whole family. But then I reminded her that if you stop paying for gas, car insurance, rent, electricity, water, sewage, etc. and raise chickens, goats and a nice garden then you’re left with having to buy very few things.
The irony is that its expensive to live in America, but it doesn’t have to be as expensive as we make it out to be.
I’ll check out the new links.
Joey,
Great comment and btw, “Living More with Less” is by Doris Longacre and was written in the 70′s, You should be able to find it in the library. There’s a cookbook as well.
Hi there.
I totally enjoyed this! I got some free deer meat off of freecycle this past year and we are still eating it! My husband LOVES venison! So I am going to make some phone calls today! I still need to learn to can and we can’t have chicken here (yet) but I do quite a few of the other things that you say. Love it!
Adrienne,
Thanks for your comment! Sounds like we think a lot alike! Love your site, liked you on FB.
Hello,
Just shared this on my FB page, because I think you made an important point. You don’t need the government to help you with everything, we can help ourselves! Resources are out there, often free for the taking, if you just look around. I read a blog recently about a woman who has people calling her to pick up the extra fruit off their trees! She shows up, picks the fruit, takes it home and cans it. She always brings a couple jars back to the folks who offered up their harvest. How did she get so lucky? She simply scouts out the trees, off season, and leaves her number for the residents to call in case they have extra. That’s it. Anyone can do it. We just have to open our mind to the possibilities.
Love this post. We are in the beginning stages of homesteading. I agree with you that in order to make it through hard times, the secret is not earning more money, it’s learning how to live with less. It’s very satisfying! Thanks for your always great tips!
Learn how to grow those crops now, it takes a year or 3 to get up to speed on what crops need what care to thrive. Learn how to start your plants from seeds as well. Even onions can grow to a nice size from seed, given optimal soil. And I’m a big fan of extending the growing season using cold frames, plastic over hoops and other ways of protecting plants. I finally figured out that extending the season into the fall isn’t what I need to do here in Front Range Northern Colorado — climate change is extending our falls for us and after Sept. 21, the days start getting too short for the plants to do much new growing anyway. Also, we have enough of the summer bounty in fridge, freezer and cellar to keep us happy for quite a while. However, our last frost in spring comes about May 10. If I can start growing under protection on or around March 21, I can take advantage of six weeks of post-equinox, longer sunlight days. Next Spring I’m making a hoophouse!
http://www.motherearthnews.com/the-farmyard/homegrown101-how-to-build-a-hoop-house.aspx
Great post, great list!
Sue,
Sounds like you’re all over it and have a good understanding of what to expect in your part of the country. That’s key for sure. Great comment.
Should you live in a town or city you might want to check first to see if you are allowed to have a garden along side or in the front yard before you plant one as some cities/towns are prosecuting people for doing so.
If people would simply use common sense they would be able to come up with much if not all of these ideas themselves.
Karen,
Yep, always check with the city! Thanks for your comment.
Great post! I referred to it and shared it on FB because it states simply what people could be (need to be) doing anyways!
http://eatatdixiebelles.blogspot.com/2011/10/occupy-your-own-backyard.html
Thank you, Dixiebell! Great to hear from you.
Love these tips, especially the start a garden one. I don’t think most people realize the empowerment that comes from growing even the smallest amount of the food you eat.
Hunting is also a great one, I’d highly recommend if you want to get into hunting to find someone that’s been doing it for a while and have them teach you. My dad is always willing and happy to teach new folk about hunting, lending out his guns, teaching the skills needed for dressing & processing and so much more.
I too love foraging, there are so many things free for the taking – and they’re so healthy. Investing in a few foraging books is a great way to have lots of fun and free food for the years to come.
Isn’t it interesting that all of these skills are ones that folks used to grow up learning and now many people have to learn how to do them from scratch. I’m happy to hear that many people are heading down this road though, makes me have faith!
Hello Chiot’s Run,
It’s a sad commentary of a nation who has forgotten to pass these vital skills down through the generations, but there are plenty of us who are digging them back up!
Totally agree with the hunting teacher!! I wouldn’t try it without one.
Great post! Thank you for all the great ideas. My wife was laid off 4 months ago and we had to circle the wagons a bit ourselves. One nice thing about it is we eat way more home cooked meals as a family.
Thanks again,
Mike
Mike,
Great to hear from you! Man, we could have retired 6 times on the money we’ve spent eating out over the years. Doesn’t it feel good to save that money??
Anyone who reads my blog will know how much vegetable growing has become a part of our lives. What you can grow (I thought nothing would grow for me!) is amazing.
Think you can’t do it? So did I! I say…. Go for it!
Hey Homeschool OTC,
If I can do it, anyone can!
Good write up! I have some city friends who might be interested in your link to backyard chickens. Here on the OCG homestead, we grow and raise all kinds of things and I can’t imagine any other life!
Niki,
Isn’t it great?? We are very blessed women to be able to live the homesteading life.
This an amazing list…what a wonderful post. Lots I knew but you have just taught me more valuable things. Thank you.
I so truly afraid of pressure canners. Don’t know why…maybe the story of a neighbour who was canning…and the lid ended up in her ceiling (rafters)…almost scared her to death. That fear is very real for me. But maybe it’s time to try it….oh to get over the fear of an explosion.
Thanks for a WONDERFUL post.
Connie,
I hear you. Take a look at my “A Year On A Homestead” video this month. I cover pressure canning, step by step, and address all the fears.
http://www.themorristribe.com/e-store/
Excellent post with some very useful ideas!
Thank you, Kim! Great to hear from you!
After reading this set of posts, I saw that some towns and cities do not allow garden vegetables. One year we planted eggplants just for the flowers IN the flower garden. The town guys actually enjoyed seeing the neat flowers. They were mixed with celery plants which were also placed as background plants. Its like a dandelion- is it a food or a weed? It is in the eye of the beholder…. Lots of regular flowers mask the edible ones… Like the flowering cabbages or broccoli… let one or two go to the beautiful yellow flowers. Pick and eat the leaves- still has nutrition.
Laurie,
I think the key is to not draw attention to yourself. I think veggies make beautiful landscaping!
I like your article a lot. I was thinking though that it is also an idea to consider becoming a vegetarian or even vegan (I have), then you will have a much easier time surviving a crisis!
Lovely pictures too!
All the best from me
Elayne,
You make a great point. I was a vegetarian for 6 years!
Another tip for people who don’t have a spot for a garden is to look into community garden programs, or work on starting one in your community. Ours is a free program, and we even have educational lectured to teach people how to make the most of their plot.
Great article! I just found your website today and can’t wait to dig in to more of it. We are a large family too, and have one income so food is always the area we look to become more self-sufficient in to lower costs.
I have found two websites that have “free seeds ” where you just pay for shipping. The Grange and our homeschool group ordered many packets to share at the local farmers market. Not just to teach ourselves to share the bounty of our gardens but to share with them to plant another pot of food.
Hi Kelly,
Thanks for the great tips. I’ve actually been out of work since December 2010. I applied for a job at my local Whole Foods on Friday. Hopefully I’ll hear a response soon. Love and hugs from the ocean shores of California, Heather
Wonderful post, Kelly! I have a question, though: what is a deer processing plant? Perhaps we don’t have these in Massachusetts, as I’ve not heard of one. Thanks!
Deborah,
We have these meat processing plants in Ohio that process different kinds of meat, they specify which ones they do. In Ohio, deer meat (venison) cannot be sold, but typically the “processing” fee of about $80 is charged and the meat is free.
Some plants will process chickens, beef, etc and even cater events.
I hope that helps.
I love this post but please, a HUGE word of caution. If you are getting free firewood make sure it isn’t coming from a quarantined area with asian long horned beetles or emerald ash borers. Those 2 invasive pest are a huge problem and one of the biggest ways they are spread is by moving wood, usually by unsuspecting people.
Cindy,
Makes good sense, thanks for the advice!
Loved reading this! I am in the beginning stages of learning to homestead….taking baby steps. So many things have hit home. 1, I agree…people wait too long to learn the skills they need. I recently told a resistent-to-learning-new-skills friend of mine…even if you don’t love homesteading and embrace it like I do…at least LEARN the skills you need…like learning how to can foods and make a few homemade products. Our income recently got cut in half…I knew I could either learn to live on less or give in and allow debt to swallow us whole. NO WAY would I give up so easily, so I learned to make about 25 homemade-instead-of-store-bought products and I started “putting away” foods in the freezer and by canning and vacuum sealing. 2, I used to think we didn’t have the type of good soil we needed to grow things…we didn’t “know how”…didn’t have room…etc….NOW I know we need to take small steps, learn how to garden and use/store foods, plan ahead, and ask questions so that we can adopt a more sustainable lifestyle. I appreciate your blog and the comments are helpful and interesting too! Thanks.