Wild food through the year

[rich59]

I was trying to imagine what life would be like if you dumped civilization and lived off wild food through the whole year, maybe feeding 2 adults and 2 children. Could you do it in England without resorting to cultivating something or being seriously short of vitamins or something at some points in the year? Would you need to store up food in the Autumn to last you though all the way to next harvest? How far would one have to travel to get your food?

Is this an answerable question? Would probably need to break it down certainly month by month and even week by week.

 

[bilko]

Good question, you mean without farming just gathering?
I imagine you would have to break it down to something like:

Greens or foliage
nuts and seeds
roots
berries and fruit
game
fish
minerals and water

Is your hunter gatherer allowed to preserve things as well?
Wouldn't it be great to break down each heading into a conscise collection and have the calorific figures for each food.
How many calories does a person need to survive, work? and then there are the climate changes to consider in calorific consumption.
Sort of like an almanac.

 

[torjusg]

I think it would work.

To keep it legal, I think you would have to get permissions whereever you find plants and animals though. Have you seen "river cottage"? Making deals and offer to remove his edible pests. Pigeon, burdock, nettle, badgers, crows and so on. All edible. I would do a little poaching though. Bow and arrows with a fair amount of woodskills could keep your family fed without anyone noticing.

If you eat a fair amount of the meat raw (not carnivores or omnivores!!!) it will provide you with quite a lot of vitamins and minerals. Supplementing with raw and boiled plants, fruits etc. will make a much more healthy diet than the common one.

Storing some food may be neccesary, but it will make you less mobile. You may find moving with the seasons better than making granaries.

Torjus Gaaren

 

[bambodoggy]

Hi Rich,

Here's a couple of rather old threads that although they are not exactly what you're asking they may still be of interest to you.

Hope they help Mate...

http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?t=3808&highlight=Brown

&

http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?t=5793&highlight=Brown

Cheers,

Bam.

 

[Marts]

If you were going to do this in the UK then I think your best bet would have to be somewhere with easy access to tidal areas - fish, shellfish, seaweeds etc. Northwest coast American Indian tribes fared extremely well because of such abundant resources.

Actually I seem to recall a couple who did something similar in the Uk and wrote a book or two about it. Living Off Nature by Judy Urquhart. I think it's been mentioned on BCUK before

 

[AlexRowan]

I think to try to do that on principle would be great! But I think it's a tad too primitive, things like farming, preserving, food storing came about because that was what people needed to do in order to survive or maintain a higher standard of living.

The way I look at it, is if you were stranded without any help/contacts you could survive in the short term by foraging and stuff but it would make a lot more sense to try and cultivate food and even catch/farm animals.

i know that this isn't really helping to answer the original question at all but I was wondering about this sort of the thing the other day.

I suppose my answer would be that it may well be possible but would be unnecessarily laborious. If that makes sense?

 

[arctic hobo]

What you'd be short of is vitamin D and calcium, whatever your diet (the two are linked). In this country, there is not enough sunlight to get enough vitamin D for a fully healthy lifestyle, and it has been put in our food (mostly flour and grain-based food) for years now. Without this, you would be susceptible to rickett's, which is a weakness of the bones that shows itself most often in bow-leggedness.
It's debatable how severely this would affect you, as of course most modern Britons spend a huge amount of time indoors - even those with jobs that are outdoors based, and do not suffer from the disease. Depends also on whether you are fully primitive in your living or merely for food only.
Also, many anthropologists note that meat consumption was pretty low before farming became relatively intensive (not a hunter-gatherer lifestyle).
Balancing energy intake and output would also be difficult in the first weeks. And I personally do not believe that there is nearly as much wild food in this country as there was thousands of years ago. Deer and rabbits excepted.

 

[torjusg]

Farming represents a tradeoff between security and life quality. To farm you have to give up freedom and healthy food. The total workload will increase, but so will total amount of harvested food. Staying in one place will allow you to store much more of your surplus food.

Much meat and organs (not from carnivores and omnivores) should be eaten raw to ensure that you get enough vitamins and minerals. If you mix that with fresh greens and other foods this will give you an extremely healthy diet.

Poaching deer and badger (for it's fatty meat) seems like the way to go.

Torjus Gaaren

 

[rich59]

OK. January. UK. No stored food. 4 mouths to feed. Could we put together some practical menus for a week, that tries to address fibre, carbohydrate, protein, vitamin and mineral needs?

 

[torjusg]

One week two roe deer for four persons.

Eat every organ (mostly raw) + contents of the stomach (carbohydrates) + blood (vitamins, minerals ++) + cooked meat (for energy) + raw meat (for vitamins and minerals) and fat.

If the roe deer is lean and/or the weather is cold a nice fat badger would probably be tasty. But remember to cook it or you may end up with trichinosis, a potentially lethal condition caused by a parasite.

Torjus Gaaren

 

[philaw]

Is eating raw herbivore really safe? It sounds like quite a risk, but then you have to deal with the risk of vitamin deficiencies if you don't eat it.

Could somebody out there tell us which animals are safe to eat raw and why? I'd be fascinated to know both answers.

 

[torjusg]

As long as the flesh looks and smells good herbivore flesh is as a rule totally safe. Never heard that anyone has died from eating that. Hygiene is essential when dealing with any kind of food though.

Badgers (tastes like pork they say), bear, fox (tastes really bad they say), wolf, boar, pig and pretty much any animal with pointy teeth are not safe to eat raw because of the possibility of trichinosis (they catch it from eating long dead animals).

Hares, squirells and rabbits are not safe, because they can carry tularemia.

Deer, roe deer, reindeer and moose are totally safe. Don't know about birds, but I would cook them as a rule. Fish is safe as long as the water is safe to drink. But eels have poisonous blood and should be cooked.

Torjus Gaaren

 

[twelveboar]

A quick mention for the marine environment as a valuble source of food, in winter you'll be able to fish, gather shellfish and seaweeds, often with better results than in the summer.

 

[rich59]

Seems a bit high in protein and low in carbs. Any roots useful? How many pounds of meat on a roe deer? How much is the minimum in pounds of meat needed per person per week for protein?

On the subject of vitamin D - is it correct that the fairest haired and skinned folk do not need to worry on this one?

I have heard about fish flukes/ gut worms that we could catch - or is that a problem of the tropics?

I have never heard of tularemia. Is it confined to the US?

Vitamin B - 12 different sorts - I heard that our gut bacteria make vit B12? So we would be advised to eat a little poo?

 

[arctic hobo]

On the subject of vitamin D - is it correct that the fairest haired and skinned folk do not need to worry on this one?

They need less; it is however impossible to either gauge it accurately, or to be certain you have enough. In a UK winter I would have concerns, were I of a darker complexion.
One of the things that kickstarted the inclusion of vitamin D in food was the large influx of Indians to the UK - because of the lower sunlight level and their darker skin, they were not able to produce enough vitamin D.
Carbohydrates are all around you - all edible plants are sources of them. Protein is supposed to make up 15% of your energy intake, which at about 3000kcal/day, for a week would be 3,150kcal, or 788g. How much you'd find per gram of deer meat I couldn't say. Because of the nature of their digestion, however, that plant material inside them is good to eat.
I think it is a good rule just not to eat a sick animal (if it had tularemia you'll know about it), starving or no. Often infected flesh is not made any safer my cooking, and despite those that are, the risk is too great (in my opinion).
Vitamin B12 is abundant in meat, and so you should have no real problem in that area. As to liver flukes and gut worms, I couldn't say, but my guess is it's relatively safe.

 

[Kane]

Unlikely that you would find as much wild food now as you would in the past since so much land is now cultivated (assuming you don't rifle farmed veg - not very good for you since a lot of chemicals used in food production have withdrawal periods before consumption is safe)

Kane

 

[Dennis Mapletoft]

Torjusg this is for you....

Badger dont taste like pork(everything tastes like pork if its undercooked) it tastes like very well hung deer, its a strong, pungent, slightly pheasant taste to it.its stringy in texture and it needs a long slow cook to get the best from it, but if i had the choice i would leave it!!! if you do have to eat it ,, add loads and loads of veg and herbs...

Bear is absolutely mmmmmmmmm,, long slow cooking, or a quick flash fryed thin steak, will taste like the best gamey beef you have ever had, elderberry or red wine will help it along...


as for Wolf, Fox and wild pig/boar.. cook them long enough and a pig would eat them, well i would , yours Den

Hares, squerrels and rabbits i have been eating for years( about 40 now) and i am okiiitmyhdjfjlAS ISH i have a large library of game and wild food cooking recipies, lol i should read them one day

 

[locum76]

Farming represents a tradeoff between security and life quality. To farm you have to give up freedom and healthy food.
Torjus Gaaren

in what way do you think farming means you have to give up freedom and healthy food?

i am an organic farmer and i can guarantee that my diet is as healthy as you're likely to get in this country. as for freedom, surely part of being free is feeling secure? without a steady viable food source, wheres your security?

 

[torjusg]

Of course if you grow enough different plants you will be able to cover the range of vitamins and minerals needed for good health. But your teeth may suffer from such a high carb diet (farmers eat a lot less meat than hunters). Having a fair portion of meat in your diet is important to keep a good health, farmers traditionally had too little meat in their diet. Fresh meat was eaten only on occation. Raw meat will give you everything as most animals consist of the same chemical mixture as we do.

With the freedom part, I mean that the average workload of a farmer is higher than that of a hunter/gatherer. Also, if growing a crop, you have to keep an eye on it. Travelling much is out of the question (freedom to me, don't know about you).

Dennis,
Maybe I have to try badger one day!

Torjus Gaaren

 

[locum76]

fair enough.

we're both free it seems - just in different ways.

l76