Every prepper knows how important it is to store food. Many of us also realize the importance of saving and storing seeds to grow our food when our food storage runs low and we can't go buy more. What some don't realize is that just having seeds stored isnt enough. Gardening is a skill that takes practice and time to learn.
If you garden like most people then you are going to have to store a tiller plus gas and oil. You're also going to have to store lots of water, fertilizer, weed killer, bug and insect killers and in the long run you'll probably need a lifetime supply of freeze dried vegetables because you run out of those supplies too and the garden fails season after season. But you can improve your odds of growing a survival garden by making a few changes in how you garden.
First, garden soil that is properly built up over time and not compacted doesn't have to be tilled every year. If you loosen that soil and don't walk on it or put heavy equipment on it (like tillers) and add organic matter to the garden every year then you may never have to use a tiller again. Healthy soil is easy to work with just a few hand tools. Every time you walk on your garden you compress the soil and over time that leads to heavy compacted soil with no air spaces and hard to work gardens. The key is in not making the garden space any wider then you can easily reach and work from the edges. If you get away from those long wide rows then you also won't have to rely on that tiller and all the gas and oil storage that goes with it.
Those long wide garden rows just provide more area that you have to water and fertilize as well as a place for the weeds to grow. If you begin planting in blocks of plants rather then rows then you can focus on watering and fertilizing where its needed at the vegetable plants. So you naturally need less water or fertilizer to get the job done and those weeds that soak it up and thrive with it are kept to a minimum. Plus those plants are closer together and shade out the undergrowth of weeds that compete for your valuable resources. They also keep in the moisture since they are not allowing as much drying to the sun. Add a nice thick compost and you have another layer of moisture retention and weed blocking. You will also notice that the less you water per week the plants tend to grow deeper healthier root systems that reach down for their water. Frequent shallow watering just encourages shallow weak roots that are always starving for moisture while once or twice a week deep watering is better for you, your water storage and the plants.
To keep your soil healthy and full of nutrients you don't have to go buy bags of fertilizer from the store and you don't have to store them for wtshtf. What you need is a compost pile. You can make compost out of just plant materials or you can add a couple of rabbits to the process. Rabbits have the added benefit of providing additional meat but even if you don't want to go that route they make up for their keep in all the fertilizing pellets they provide for the compost pile. That compost feeds and conditions your soil keeping it full of nutrients and loose for your plants. When you start the garden spread compost and work it in. When you remove a plant put it in the compost pile and add compost back where that plant used to be. Next year that plant will be broken down into the pile and come back to the garden to feed the new plants. If you can devote a corner of the garden to a few comfrey plants they are also a great fertilizer for the garden. Chop the leaves and add them to your water and when they break down you can water the garden with a nice rich comfrey tea.
You still might be thinking about those bugs that destroy the garden every year. You will find that a healthy garden doesn't have as many insects eating the plants. Treating the whole garden for pests can create problems with pollinators which are needed if you want to grow anything. It also kills those insects that kill and eat not the plants and vegetables but the pests you want to get rid of. A healthy garden usually has a balance of insects that keep the population small enough that they get a few vegetables but you still get enough that you don't feel the loss. There are ways you can help those beneficial insects do their jobs. You can hang a couple of bat houses and some gourds for insect eating birds to nest. They will pay the rent in catching and ridding the garden of all the bugs they consume. Don't put out bird feeders which attract the wrong kind of birds but you can provide a bird bath. You want bug eating birds not the ones who like seeds, fruits and berries. If you take a few broken or chipped flower pots and tip them over in the garden you also provide housing for frogs to come and feast on the bugs and they don't damage the garden. Leave the spiders and their webs in and around the garden when you can because they also trap those bugs before they destroy your crops. If you want to let the chickens in for a supervised hour of scratching and harvesting bugs in the evenings then that can work too but keep an eye on them to make sure they know they're not there for salad.
So now you have a garden that doesn't require a plow or tilling, doesn't require store bought fertilizer or too much water and isn't infested with vegetable destroying bugs. You can focus more of your energy on watering once a week (or not if it rains). You can also pull a few weeds by hand but you shouldn't need to spend hours with a hoe in the hot sun and you should get more vegetables in less space then ever before. You can devote part of the previously wasted time to adding those fresh vegetables to your food storage and making sure you save plenty of seeds for future years.
In the past you may have plowed those rows and planted and fertilized only to become discouraged and disgusted when the garden got overgrown with weeds while the plants dried up and the bugs ate what was left. You may have spent a small fortune with little to no return and retreated to the air conditioned house in disappointment only to head out to the farmers market to buy inferior vegetables at high prices. Don't give up. Try gardening WITH nature instead of fighting it. Remember that gardening is a skill that we learn and perfect with practice and time. Now is the time to plant the fall garden. If summer was less then you hoped for, get up and try again. Keep on trying until you figure it out because one day you may be wishing you had worked on that garden smarter instead of harder wtshtf.
Southern Wood Elf