Alright. Have fun. I would suggest another hard look at Vivaldi’s post but I can only suggest things
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Commercial ag averages about 50 bushels per acre. I’d plan for 50% or less efficiency, especially if you are looking at heirloom and other varieties, not dumping tons of fertilizer on it, etc. 25 bushels at 60 pounds per bushel will give you 1500 pounds… just my back of the envelope guess. That translates to around 200 pounds of wheat from the plot you were growing, allowing for a sheep-free season.
Edit to add: It seems strange to me that the annual needs for a person would be described as 2000 pounds of wheat. I would think 100-200 pounds for a person would be adequate, unless your diet was mostly wheat. 2000 pounds of wheat means you are consuming the equivalent of almost 20 cups of flour a day!
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Also not sure on your personal reasons for veganism but chickens for eggs can be done very ethically and turn waste into more food (they enjoy many veggies that wont ve good to eat) and their eggs will be unfertilized if you dont have a rooster if that is an issue for you.
But also i would increase all these space requirements because most assume some %of your diet will be animal products
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One of my favourite gardening books is your kitchen garden by George Seddon and Helena Radecka. In the intro, Seddon writes that
an area of 100 square yards (84 sq m) should provide a family of four with adequate lettuces, runner beans, peas, carrots and turnips in summer, and with leeks, cabbages and sprouts in winter. To be self-supporting in most vegetables, given a family with hearty appetites, four times as much ground, 400 square yards (335 sq m), would be needed.
I was surprised by how small that number was. That’s from the 1970s and written for North America, so it’s possible that you could grow newer varieties of vegetables in less space with more modern methods if you have ideal conditions. That doesn’t account for fruit and nut trees, of course, and the grain is really what requires the most land.
If I had enough land I’d probably grow some grains for fun, but to be self-sufficient in them? No way. I buy a 50 lb bag of organic white flour for $50 every 3 months or so. At that price ($200 / year), it would take decades—if not centuries—to pay for the cost of the 1/4 acre of land used to grow them.
Why do you have sheep on your property? Are they wild or do your neighbours let their sheep wander around? If it’s the latter, I’d be tempted to learn how to shear sheep…
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Much depends on the quality of soil, availability of organic inputs such as leaf compost. I believe I could easily feed 2-3 on .3 of an acre. This would be a low grain diet with some meat such as pork and chicken.
In a space of 4000 sq ft, I grow the following
7 bushels of peaches
8 bushels of potatoes
60 quarts of string beans canned, plus that eaten fresh
3 bushels of apples
An armload of asparagus
5-7 gallons of blueberries
1.5 bushels of chopped broccoli
100 pounds of cabbage
Collards
2 gallons of red raspberries
buckets of tomatoes
At least a bushel of squash
half bushel of cucumbers
30-50 quarts of frozen sweet corn
50 pints of carrots
half bushel of eggplant
5-7 gallons of blackberries
5-7 gallons of strawberries
2-4 gallons of black raspberries
brussel sprouts.
This is just a tenth of an acre.
There are varieties of rice grown in Laos that can literally be grown as yard ornamental grasses if one lives in an HOA jurisdiction.
I’ve placed my beehives on side porch of my house. I live on Main St.
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True. But, it’s perfectly acceptable, and (I think preferred,) to simply take 1000mcg daily as a supplement either pill or easy liquid drop in your water.
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Without knowing how specifically to grow this, from a purely med nutrition side I say: consider oats. They are so nutritious, not enough good things to say even if we (science community) don’t fully understand why they are so magical yet. I would grow them over wheat or in addition to it.
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Oh yes i didnt knoe the op was vegan at the time. Though most b12 has lactose in it so be careful with sourcing.
I had to stop taking b12 because my numbers were too high after getting given a shot and taking it sublingually for a few months
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When supplementing b12 test results are almost always artificially high. Many doctors don’t know this so recommend discontinuing. To get an accurate b12 reading you have to stop supplementing for 6 months.
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Are you intending to do this to save money? Or just because you want to?
I only grow things that I can’t get otherwise or items that are expensive at the store. I would never grow grains. If bought in bulk you can get any grain you want for very cheap. Many bakeries will sell flour or other grains in 50 pound bags for much cheaper than you would expect.
I don’t grow potatoes either as you can buy large bags so cheap. I might consider growing specialty potatoes but I don’t currently.
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Well i get blood work every 3 months for a health condition so ill let yoy know 3 more months from now when i get it checked lol
With 2 acres you could easily grow enough food for a family given the proper soil quality, season length, and knowledge.
You can look into threads I started on vertical farming, home scale irrigation, and check out the concept of permaculture/ alley cropping /agroforestry. Also look into double or triple cropping the same areas based on seasonal variation. You can have a spring, summer, fall, and winter crop in the same growing space if you do your research and plan accordingly.
Irrigation and compost production are likely important factors for high production in a smaller space. Start smaller than you think you want to and invest more in mastering small things than doing everything at once.
For example, learn how to grow rice in a kiddie pool.
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buckwheat also.
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The second one. I have become a doomsday prepper in the last few years. I am amazed how everyone else in society happily is able to just go back to pretending nothing has happened when the whole system was rocked for a few years like that from you know what.
It made me see how fragile our supply chains are. I am not saying everything is going to crumble imminently but just that it could easily given just a few tweaks the pull at the threads of what most people think as immutable institutions.
It is better to prepare for it and if it doesn’t happen then these are valuable skills to learn either way and a healthy lifestyle path regardless. It is like John Seymour said in an interview that he got into self-sufficiency as if the oil dried up then he wanted to be prepared. That was a concern in the 80s apparently with fuel shortages which I guess you older folks here will remember. It didn’t come to pass but still it started him on a road that he continued until his death.
Yes I am planning on humanure composting because once you get over the initial ickiness idea it seems like such a valuable resource and when I read about it many household gardens only back to the 1950s would benefit from this because they had outhouse toilets which would deposit there waste back to the soil. When I read more on it it isn’t so out there anyway since apparently something like 40% of commercial farmers are using ‘bio-solids’ which is the more political correct terms for human waste.
In about 6 months I have filled a hole of something like 1 metre square x 1 and a 1/2 feet deep. I planned to make it 1 meter cubed but it was so difficult to dig deeper once I got to the compacted clay and then, worse, beneath that loads of rocks, I just gave up. This setup is not great though as I had been throwing new stuff on old and the most mature is at the bottom so I am thinking I will try an above ground one next like compost bins where you can take the oldest from a hole in the bottom.
Yea, that is my idea with the small patch I cleared so far to test a few different crops. Once I got a handle on which ones are working well I planned to then scale up. The impetus of the post was to ask how much I might expect to use later so that I should not plant trees where I would later want for crops.
What kind of crops would be your stable carbohydrates for this small scale intensive setup? Rice? Does that take up less space in comparison to wheat?
While perhaps it is possible to do it smaller with the ways you suggest it sounds like I should not be planting any more trees if I want to do more grains, which I do. I am in the UK so rice isn’t really an option here and wheat does all that rice can do and has a long history here so it just makes sense.
I could envision living on wheat as the main staple but no way potatoes. They are just gross and so bland. I would prefer an early death I think lol. I would rather take up 4x the space with wheat.
I had been buying the whole wheat berries and gotten used to just boiling them and using them in place of rice. Much easier than messing about with making bread. I prefer rye or spelt for this as they are much more chewy, which some may find offputting, and keep their shape rather than becoming gelatinous like wheat does when cooked as the berries.
I was reading up last night that rye will grow even in shaded areas and even its natural habitat was in woodland which is an interesting insight I didn’t know. If this is the case it does make me think I might clear away that south side which is shaded by the large treeline to try rye over there which gives me almost a whole other acre to play with. Seems a waste to grow trees there really except for wildlife’s sake because it is too little to be self sufficiency in wood anyway I think.
Total self sufficiency I do not believe is realistic of course, on that small amount of land because you need lots of fuel and space for it for burning wood for heat and food. I still use diesel for those mostly - when my temperamental device I use for it isn’t broken - or otherwise gas canisters.
In my doomsday situation though, there would no longer be boundaries and I could just harvest wood from the local forests as it would be every man for themselves.
In the meantime I can be learning about growing my crops in a small area.
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Potatoes being bland compared to wheat is blowing my mind. Maybe try different varieties of potato? I wonder if america has more variety cause potatoes?? Bland???
Sunchokes are def worth the try though if you’ve never had theyre definately more conplex. Spread like fuck though so grow them in containers if you can. Look into skirret as well.
I dont know if something like yams or yaucon will grow there.
Other carb sources to help diversify to consider: andean tubers, turnips, winter squash, sweet potato, parsnip, celeariac
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I don’t want to squander too many of my limited daily posts as a new user espousing why I don’t like potatoes but the only time I enjoy them and could consider them to have any kind of taste would be when they were deep fried in some form or with heavy additions of other fattening substances like mayonnaise for a potato salad.
Well one other case is called potato cakes, which I don’t know if you have them there in the US but they are potatoes with flour spread like a pancake and lightly fried.
In any case none of the above are things that would be suitable, healthy or pleasant to eat every day. So I could only enjoy them like that maybe once or twice week in some form as a rich rarity.
On the other hand picture/sniff the fresh smell of bread out the oven and a nice slice with some butter/margerine. - ok fat again there. 
As mentioned I would opt not to make bread just for the fuss and mess to create it and boiled wheat berries I have found just fine to use in place of rice and don’t find them boring. Not bursting with flavour sure and you could say they are no more flavorsome than potatoes but they are not super bloaty either, which potatoes are for me.
I do like and enjoy other root vegatables more, like turnips, swede, squash - not root but similar in substance - and stuff like that. I find myself eating those much more regularly. Oh ye and I am more of a fan of sweet potatoes. Now they do have some notable taste which I enjoy which I do buy quite often.
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The people at Ecology Action believe that you can intensively grow in 5,000 square feet and produce enough food for one person, all while building the soil into something bigger. It is an auspicious goal.
http://growbiointensive.org/grow_main.html
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I’m not sure what you mean here. I don’t know what?
The huge pandemic i assume. Global supply chains where messed up.
It is a bit too doomer but i also want some self sufficiency because of grocery prices etc. But mostly to grow superior produce and varieties that are ill suited for mass production
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Question: How do you deal with storage? I’m used to having way more than a family can consume during peak harvest but then what’s left in March / April / May? Poke salad? I know that the problem can be solved with dehydration and containers, but what is your plan?
Historically, mold on stored grain has been a major health hazard. And then there’s rats. Etc.
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