Being self sufficient

[Oblio13]

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Modern woodstoves are orders of magnitude more efficient than fireplaces.

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Yes. Also look at "fireplace inserts".

 

[dixygirl]

Thank you

So the either one will work the same a stove or a fireplace iinsert or would the stove heat more?

 

[chickenannie]

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Although I agree that the Amish are now shopping at WalMart, etc., they are still able to be self-sufficient from what I've observed, and I don't think they would be affected much if there were suddenly no Walmarts around. The energy crisis and Y2K is not an issue for them, although they do have some gas-powered equipment.

However, my main comment is that what makes the Amish system work is that it is a FAMILY enterprise working together -- that means the immediate and extended family as well as the larger community are constantly helping each other and providing each other with supplies and/or helping hands to make the self-sufficiency model work. I don't think the self sufficiency model works with a single household model. Personally, this community-based system is something I would love to see "come back" to American society.

 

[Oblio13]

A fireplace insert is really just a stove made to fit inside of a fireplace. It looks nicer than a jury-rigged stove and doesn't take up as much room.

 

[miss_jayne]

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near here, the Amish buy Smuckers jelly when it goes on sale really cheap and then repack it and sell it!

how funny is that?

 

[seriousbill]

Oh yeah, seems like everyone's got an Amish-"hatin'" story. But I gotta give them credit overall. I drive past several of their homes on my scenic drive to work, and their places are well-kept and neat as a pin; their chicken houses are nicely painted and also neat as a pin, with shiny, healthy birds. This is a STARK contrast to a lot of the other places I see on the same country drive.

 

[miss_jayne]

i totally love them...i just found it funny. hey, you gotta hand it to 'em for ingenuity! (makes them smarter than me!

)

and they make the best pineapple pie i have ever eaten!

 

[kinnip]

I for one don't want to be Amish or living in the Stone Age. I do think it's important to be aware of where my food comes from. I love that I'm growing oodles of food and keep chickens and goats, but I'll never grind flour. I still think good Spanish olive oil is worth the cost and I have quite the collection of artisinal salts. I think some modicum of self sufficiency is great, but not so great that I want to party like it's 1699. I'd like to have some solar power, but I don't want to cut down all of my trees or stop watching t.v., so I doubt I'll ever be off the grid. I don't want to forgo important things like health care and automobiles. I like designer clothes and electronics and going to concerts in the city. I like to read about self sufficiency and choose the parts that suit my lifestyle. When the pursuit of an ideal turns dogmatic, I lose interest fast.

 

[seriousbill]

Well, the biggest legit gripe I've heard about the Amish ingenuity is the one about puppy mills.

That's apparently a bigger problem in PA than it is here in OH. I dunno. I'm not pro or con. I just go by what I see, and what I see chicken-keeping-wise is pretty good, at least here locally.

Edited to add:

When the pursuit of an ideal turns dogmatic, I lose interest fast.

I agree, kinnip.​

 

[Rosalind]

To add to Oblio's post about woodstoves: You really need to have an open floor plan to make the best use of a woodstove or fireplace insert. Even better if your house has a lot of thermal mass, that can hold heat while the woodstove is running and then release heat when you go to bed.

Our woodstove is in the center of a very old timber-framed house. The chimney stack is a real monster of a creation, a combination of granite and brick, and it holds heat like a champ. But, the floor plan is very old-fashioned, designed to shut certain rooms off completely in the winter for heating efficiency as well as for privacy. You can get heat-activated fans to blow the hot air around that sit on top of the stove, but despite all that our brand-new Vermont Castings stove only heats maybe 2 1/2 rooms and a hallway up to a comfortable temperature. In the dead of winter, frost forms on the inside of windows at night, in the rooms furthest from the stove.

Also, they run best on hardwood. When I bought this place, the wood shed was stacked full of about 2 cords of firewood. I thought, yippee! No need to cut or buy firewood for a winter or two! Yeah, uh, it was almost all pine. I can stuff my woodstove full to the top, turn the air vent down to barely-open, and all that pine will be nothing but ash in about two hours. In comparison, two hickory, locust and maple logs will last more like 4-8 hours. Believe me, it really sucks to wake up at 2am freezing your butt off because the woodstove that you crammed full to the top at 10pm is ice-cold.

And, as one of my engineer friends was very disappointed to find out, the house won't smell like a wood fire at all while a super-efficient woodstove is running. So if you're addicted to that nice smoky smell, you're outta luck.