The NFC B-Day Chat Thread

[rjohns39]

Morning and Happy New Year everyone

 

[DigMyChicks]

Morning and Happy New Year everyone

X’s 2!

 

[sunflour]

Good Morning and Happy New Year to Everyone!

I missed midnight, the neighbors who used to wake me up with fireworks moved this past fall , so all we heard were early evening very distant firecrackers.

Here's to a better 2018 .

Happy New Year everybody!
It's 1 AM here in Germany so we're already past the fireworks
What I have seen from BYC so far is a bunch of respectful and friendly people (truthfully wouldn't expect anything else from people with a heart for chickens!) and I'm glad to have found this place.

Almost everyone on BYC meets your description .

I did the same thing with a squirrel stroganoff over noodles. Resulted in vomiting on the part of one person.

Happy New Year, friends.

The best chili I ever had was made with deer/venison ( which I don't eat) it took me days to get my friend to tell me it was deer and not the bell pepper that made it so, so good..

I would not want to try to skin or eat a squirrel, but would love to trap and ship some of ours to whoever wants them .

Recap of 2017. I got through it. The end. Happy New Year! ​

X2 - 2018 has to be better .

 

[CapricornFarm]

Well, I kinda meant in the world as it is now... right now there's a lot of cheap food. Survival or apocalyptic is a bit different, which I think I touched on a little bit in my other post. Besides, that's pretty unlikely.

And oh good! Cause we do have a bb gun and probably air soft somewhere. Can't shoot guns in town anyway though so pellet will have to do. And yeah, rat I definitely wouldn't. Squirrel I might consider even though I said I wouldn't but only if I absolutely HAD to but rat? Most definitely not. No way. They also definitely carry diseases.

As for fire, yeah I do. Or I think I do. But not with any of the hand ways, only with matches or a lighter. But my brothers are both boy scouts and know how to start fires, even though it's been a while. And I think I technically know a lot (or some) of the techniques, I just suck at them all. We probably have manuals somewhere too or Google. And we have gas stoves so I think we would just need a lighter? Or does the gas not even flow?

And yeah, raw squirrel is a no go too lol too much risk of disease. Plus it's just gross. I won't even eat sushi lol but no need for anything raw if I figure out the fire thing.

I also started a garden last year and have the chickens. The garden did pretty decently but I have ideas on how to make it better and I also want to grow more plants and a bigger variety and stuff. But I think the garden would provide a pretty good amount of food. But I might have to rely on only rain which could be a problem. The chickens would provide eggs and MAYBE a meal if I got desperate but they are pets so I would have to be very very desperate. But they aren't laying as well anymore being 2 years old so I might have to get some new chicks. I also think I might need a rooster so then I can breed my own chickens to keep having meat and eggs without needing to be on grid. But then I'd have to learn how to butcher and clean and stuff and get past the pet thing. But then I wouldn't have to eat squirrel either lol but food and water might be a challenge... I could probably just turn them loose though to forage, or at least during the day, and maybe get smaller breeds?

I have theories already and ideally I'll eventually have at least a 10 or 20 acre farm somewhere, preferably way bigger, and have a huge garden, wayyyy more chickens, goats, horses, and possibly a cow or rabbits. Plus lots of dogs and cats and other house pets, like the fish, gerbils, and guinea pigs or a house rabbit. And a parrot. All of which reminds me, I might want a food fish too but that might be too much. Oh and I eventually want sled dogs too but it doesn't really mesh with the whole homesteader thing so either I won't do it and will have to just go to clubs and races and stuff like that and be involved that way OR I will have a whole other section of the property, wayyy away from the farm, which is part of the reason why I need such a big property lol or I might just have like two inside and do skijoring or bikejoring or something.

But yeah.

All of that is probably really expensive and a ton of work though but I do want all those eventually.

Anyway, I meant currently, not including any weird circumstances, but I also love the little bit of farming I've done so far just the last couple years, and plan to do more. And I am also not completely helpless or clueless like lots of city people. Probably partly cause I'm not actually in the city ha we're an hour away and surrounded by tons of farming towns and I'm actually on a homesteading FB group. And our particular property is almost 3 acres even though we can see our rear neighbors, are in a condo/townhome development, and are really close to tons of stores and shops and what some might consider the city or town. And both my brothers are eagle scouts.

Oh and also I almost forgot, I also know how to fish. We are also in a coastal town near the water (ocean) as well as having ponds/small lakes and rivers nearby. And we could dig for clams. Technically you need a permit but not in an apocalypse lol my uncle has some lobster pots too but of course I hate seafood but i might try it in that case

So we would be all set ha

Everyone seems to think the grid going down is unlikely. But guess what? Those transformers we rely on are not made in the US. We do not have a big stockpile of them. If there was a bad storm or solar flare, many of them would be knocked out. It could take a long time to replace them. I don't even know where they are going to get the ones California is going to need to rebuild after those fires.
Sorry to carry on, but so many people are dependent on electric and food in the stores. They assume it will always be there. But maybe not. Food for thought.

 

[sunflour]

Everyone seems to think the grid going down is unlikely. But guess what? Those transformers we rely on are not made in the US. We do not have a big stockpile of them. If there was a bad storm or solar flare, many of them would be knocked out. It could take a long time to replace them. I don't even know where they are going to get the ones California is going to need to rebuild after those fires.
Sorry to carry on, but so many people are dependent on electric and food in the stores. They assume it will always be there. But maybe not. Food for thought.

When Irma hit Macon, several groceries lost power for a week and had to throw out loads of spoiled food...what if all had lost power

 

[CapricornFarm]

Yep and if no power to pump gas, then no trucks to resupply food. Almost nothing is bought locally by stores. Most stores have less than a week supply of food on hand. When people figure out no more food coming they would riot.
Lots of people live day to day. Very little food kept in the house. Some even eat take out or dine out half the time. Maybe a few days worth of food in the house.

 

[sourland]

It's 2018. Welcome to the New Year.

 

[CapricornFarm]

Great, now i have to get used to a new month and a new year! How did December slip by so fast?

 

[bruceha2000]

Poor people and hunters have been hunting and eating squirrels for a long time. As long as they are well cooked i doubt there is any chance of illness.

I don't know if the current version has it but my 40 Y/O copy of "The Joy of Cooking" tells how to skin and cook squirrel. Also rabbit, possum, groundhog, raccoon, even armadillo. Must have been pretty common on the table for them to be included, right? No I've never tried them, but then there are a lot of other recipes I haven't tried either.

Maybe in the apocalypse squirrel might be on the menu, but for now ramen noodles are cheaper than the bullets needed to kill the squirrel, I'll stick to Ramen, oriental flavor please.

Yeah but squirrel has a LOT less sodium to raise your BP

Sorry to carry on, but so many people are dependent on electric and food in the stores. They assume it will always be there. But maybe not. Food for thought.

Yep and while I'm not wringing my hands in fear of a major outage, witness the poor people of Puerto Rico. No power now for HOW many months and no end in sight?? I'm going to look into battery storage for my solar panels. As they are currently installed (and required by law since I have no battery storage) if the grid is down, it doesn't matter how much sun we have, the panels shut down just to be REALLY sure that they don't send any power back up the lines when someone may be working on them. If the grid goes down, like it did for 3 days the beginning of November, I am up sh1t creek, same as everyone else even though on a sunny day I make more power than I use.

 

[Blooie]

This just came out in the Sioux Falls paper today....thought it was timely considering the previous discussions!

http://www.argusleader.com/story/en...-history-south-dakotas-iconic-dish/821229001/