How self-sufficient are you?

[Mottie]

Oh, my post to Ellal offering an answer and asking a similarly personal question seems to have been deleted. I thought I was imagining things when the same thing happened yesterday when I commented on ellals post telling us all what his 'friends' in various European countries thought of Britain. No privileges removed, (yet) just a post someone didn’t like. How strange, perhaps Ellal has achieved protected status with at least one moderator these days?

 

[johnny2007]

grow any fruit and/or veg?
Not personally, but I help friends with allotments fixing things and transporting material because most don't drive.
They let me have what I want in exchange.

keep animals that contribute to your food intake?
No, living in an urban area I can't.
Hunting hares and birds is forbidden by the snowflakes, so I rely on my butcher.

recycle e.g. clothes, water?
Yes, all the time.
I am known for keeping furniture boards to make more furniture, shelves, etc.
Also keep wood and ply offcuts and reuse them.
When pieces are too small they're used as kindling (if untreated) or taken to the tip.

minimise waste?
Yes, freecycle is a great place to get rid of things you don't need anymore and someone else will use it.

minimise use of vehicles?
Not really.
But I don't go for a drive for the sake of it.
When I use the car I am going somewhere I need to be or on vacation.

compost all suitable matter?
Yes, it all goes in the compost bin.

 

[Mottie]

My allotment plot costs me £31 per year so good value for the vegetables it produces but…….by the time I’ve bought canes, netting, fertiliser, seeds, compost etc etc it will cost considerably more. Oh, and we’ve bought a £600+ shed this year as well and we're thinking of getting a greenhouse too. More of an enjoyable, healthy, outdoor, sociable hobby really rather than a money saving exercise although if you harvested your own seeds and plants and went totally organic you could do it quite cheaply. There is the satisfaction of eating your own grown stuff though.

 

[diy_fun_uk]

What you're asking is if we would survive if everything shut down. After a period of civil rioting, once all the shelves have been stripped bare and the local allotments robbed..........most would starve.

No, I intentionally didn't structure my question in terms of a global catastrophe and loss of all services. That is of course a completely different proposition.