[Urban] Today I... for a post-peak oil

wisconsin_cur · Moderator Joined: May 10, 2007 Posts: 3212

Urbanites, suburbanites, those in small towns across the globe who plan to stay there,

My co-workers (dye in the wool urbanites) want to hear what you are doing for a post peak world. They equate preparation with what I am doing (rural) and I am at a lost at what to tell them.

So tell me, what are you doing? Are you organizing your neighborhood? Starting a community garden? Raising rabbits in the garage? This is your place to say what you are doing.

PFTF is primarily a place for people to share or seek advice about doing. Lets try to keep the urban versus rural debate somewhere else.
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The wife and I are planning to turn over the entire back yard (currently grass) and make it into an edible landscape. The lot is about 55'x50' so we can do quite a bit with it. Mainly it is a yard with annuals/perennials. Our biggest hurdle is having 2 big oak trees nearby that shade much of the yard. That's great for the shade plants, but makes it tougher for the ones that like lots of sun.

We are going to plant a few types of dwarf fruit/nut trees and then have lots of berries and vegetables. We have visions of growing as much as possible vertically. We're going to mix in an herb garden with small plots of wildflowers to attract those pollinators/beneficial insects.

Any suggestions from the highly knowledgeable contributers here would be welcome. Smile

thuja · Last edited by thuja on Sun Jul 27, 2008 9:20 pm; edited 1 time in total

OK- I'll go first-

I have spent considerable time and energy working on converting to a post-peak future in the last few years. First thing I did was get a job 2 miles from home at a hospital working on the psych units- should be safe for the first 5-10 years is my guess.

I then retrofitted my old 1906 farm house by insulating it completely, adding a wood burning stove and wood shed for several cords of wood. I built a south facing addition with skylights for growing winter food and for boarders. I built my wife an office in the backyard for her acupuncture/herbalism practice.

I put on a metal roof for longevity and to catch rainwater and am getting ready to add a 1500 gallon cistern to the property. I then converted my yard front and back to growing food and planted fruit trees. I also built a chicken coop and have three layers. My brother bought my neighbors house as a rental and my next project is to convert that property to food production as well.

I also started a farmers market 5 blocks from me and we have a good diversity of local farmers selling food from farms within 60 miles of here.

I purchased a big chest freezer and buy my meat in one year increments such as a quarter beef. I also store a fair bit of food in my root cellar. Finally I purchased a 30.06 and started hunting deer and Elk at my friend's property on the coast and I harvest wood from there as well.

All of this is nice, but I am well aware that I am only fairly better prepared for the first stage of post-peak- AKA The Next Great Depression.

When unemployment, social unrest and crime really take off, along with true scarcity, things will get very tough indeed. I go back and forth on this one. I consider working towards "Stage 2" planning by buying into farmable property or making very good friends with CSA owners in order to go "help out" once things get too tough here but really I am unsure. Perhaps city life here in Portland is tenable in 10-20 years- or perhaps it will be incredibly dire. I'm interested in what other people say...

kjmclark · Heavy Crude Joined: Dec 09, 2005 Posts: 326

We have a 1/5th acre lot in city limits. We're planning to stay here unless things get untenable. We've had this house for 14 years now. Here are some of the things we've done.

- Worked for 15 years or so to make this town bike and pedestrian friendly. I was on a number of city boards and commissions working on this. Our town has been ranked among the best in the midwest for biking and walking, and I'm proud of the small part I played.

- Planted hundreds of trees. In our yard we have 6 dwarf fruit trees, three bearing serviceberries, five bearing grape vines, one syrup producing maple, lots and lots of raspberry canes, three nut trees (one bearing), two sweet acorn producing oaks, and others.

- Work a 120 sq. ft. organic garden. This year we're growing beans, squash, winter wheat, potatoes, tomatoes, broccoli, cabbage, cucumbers, asparagus, rhubarb, garlic, onions, lettuce, carrots, pumpkins, zucchini, chard, peas, peppers, cauliflower, chives, herbs and other stuff I'm forgetting. We also grow lots of clover and the beds are all inoculated naturally at this point.

- We have two bee hives. Our first hive from last year swarmed this spring and we caught it and created a second hive. We may or may not get honey this year. We got the bees for pollination, not honey, and I'd generally rather they have enough for them to get through the winter. We'll see this fall.

- We converted to wood primary heat. We have a fairly small house that we heat on about a cord and a half per winter. We also use the wood stove for some of our cooking and half to most of our maple syrup evaporating. We're slowly switching over to burning the invasive trees in our area. Buckthorn actually makes pretty decent firewood once it's seasoned.

- We hope to get chickens this fall. It just became legal here to raise hens for eggs. If we get our neighbors to OK it, we'll get hens in August or September.

- We have five rain barrels, and three of them are connected so that rain from our roof ends up in our garden about 50' feet away. Most of the water for our garden comes from this rainwater.

There's all the happy city stuff. Now the not so happy.

- Our neighbors have nixed all our requests to put a small community garden in our neighborhood park. There's lots of room, but no dice so far.

- Our city is peaceful, but Detroit is within 50 miles of here. We're expecting violence and have taken precautions.

- One of our precautions was to buy some isolated land farther from Detroit, but near enough for us to get to quickly. We're basically expanding our garden out there as well. Right now it's a time and money pit, but in a few years it should be more valuable. It's a bit of an insurance policy. We have no plans to live there.

thuja

INteresting KJM- it sounds like you have a "Stage 2" plan of having some land nearby outside of the city limits. I really wonder about this. My hope is that I can make a go of it for quite a while hear in the city...but I do think that things will get extremely difficult indeed in about 15-20 years.

I want to stay in the city for numerous reasons- including-

- I can bike everywhere
- Proximity to friends, culture, shops, restaurants, farmers market
- Good job prospctes doing things I am interested in
- Diversity of ideas, people, opinions

But eventually I see the writing on the wall and envision US cities becoming more like Third World Ghettoes replete with crime, rioting, social unrest.

Economically, I can't see trying to make it on a "doomstead", but a part of me wants the best of both worlds...which it looks like you are trying to do.

Karlos4 · Tar Sands Joined: May 22, 2008 Posts: 28

I'm not planning of leaving my city. I live in Barcelona, among almost three-million oither people. Life here has been and is very enjoyable. Besides, my job, my wife's, and my children life is all here. I'm only going to leave if things get really bad, then I'll go north and try to stay in a friend's farm (is a big one, taken care by generations of farmers).
Meanwhile, I've built my own garden in my balcony. I'm talking about a eight floor apartment in the middle of the city. The flat came with a small portion of land covered with grass. I changed the grass for tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce and so on, and I'm already enjoying it. Not enough to feed the four of us, of course, but a good additioin to our daily diet. Also beggining to stock canned food, and thinking about a way to stock water (not so easy). Little things like candles, tools, knifes and so on are being bought those days. Firearms are a delicate subject in this country, so we'll see.

desultorypawn · Tar Sands Joined: Jun 04, 2008 Posts: 41

Thanks for the input Karlos, thuja, and kjmclark.

kjmclark · Heavy Crude Joined: Dec 09, 2005 Posts: 326

Pops

Great idea Cur.
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