Gardening time is at hand.

[DIM TIM]

I've been concerned lately with some things, and feel that this is going to be a pivotal year for us all. Not so much because of recent news events, but more of a gut feeling about the natural world.

I'm going to try to plant the biggest garden I have ever planted to date this year, and am praying for a good growing season. I'm also going to try to reserve some cash during the same time for the end of the year to buy some extra produce at some of the local farmers markets as well.
It is my hope, to do a massive amount of canning at seasons end to supliment our food reserves quite heavily. and a lot of dehydrating is going to be the norm around here as well.

On top of the produce part of this concern, is meat for our family to store as well. I've been watching a number of different videos, and reading a bit on canning meat as well. It is really easy enough to do if you already are canning produce, so it seemed like the most logical next step for us.

I'm also thinking that it will be very prudent to find a local honey producer around me, and see if they sell jarred honey with the comb. If I can find a reliable source for now, I'll purchase some, regardless of the fact that honey is rather expensive, and put back as much as I can of this wonderful staple as well.

There are a lot of other things on my to-do list, but to lst them all would take some time, and that is a precious commodity as well, and waste is to horrible to contimplate.
There are many people out there sounding their own alarms, so I won't try to beat folks over the head to get their attention to my concerns. Lets just say that I'm getting REAL concerned about this year (2012 issues aside), and hope that many of you are getting some sort of the same feelings yourselves.

So.......stack it high and stack it deep.......I think we are about to see the worst possible SHTF event ever. I pray to God that I'm wrong, but if I'm right, then everything that we are all working towards in the way of being able to provide for our families, will be worth all the work we put into it. If I'm wrong.......we're still better off than before we started.......RIGHT ?

[Rattailusa]

I too am experiencing the feeling of needing to be even more prepared. I am also enlarging my already big garden to an enormous one. I feel concerned with the gas prices and the possiblity of an economic emergency within the family so at least we can feed our family. I have a small farm but feed costs are insane here in CA with a single <100 lb bale of alfalfa is approaching 20.00 per bale. A stack of about 3 tons cost us about 400.00 a year ago and now is almost a thousand dollars. This makes keeping meat animals a bit expensive but we have decided to keep our meat goats at about 10 breeding females and 2 breeding males. At norm we get twins or tiplets so our return is pretty good. We also are putting in more chickens for both meat and eggs and letting the ducks keep their eggs for hatching. Usually I give away a lot of eggs during the spring and early summer as there are way more than we can eat but this year I will be preserving them for next winter when the hens stop laying. I also am going to add some additional fruit trees this month. My husband wants to bring in a couple of drop calves with the idea of butchering one and reselling one and keeping one back but with feed prices what they are I'm not sure this is a good idea. Any thoughts out there on that?

[ohioprepper]

Hey Tim I see that you are also from Ohio. This will be the first time I put a garden in and I keep getting different answers on this. When should I put the garden in? Or better yet when will you put yours in? I live near Newark.