Survival doesn’t hinge on the perfect location—it hinges on guts, graft, and the people beside you. Whether you’re boxed in by concrete, fenced in by suburbia, or wrestling the wilds, collapse doesn’t wait for ideal conditions. What matters is digging in, building trust, and growing something rooted and collective.
Something to be aware of: most cities once had extensive areas of industrial factories and warehousing, including wartime factories, that have been demolished and either built over with housing and gardens, or sometimes made into open spaces and parks.
Former industrial areas are often extremely polluted, including chemicals long-since banned, such as pesticides, industrial chemicals, wartime chemicals, even radioactive isotopes. When housing estates are built on even heavily polluted land, it is common for developers to simply cover the pollution with half a metre of cleaner soil.
Even former farmland can carry high levels of toxic chemicals, such as fertiliser nitrates, and pesticides and sheep dip toxins.
So if you are thinking of growing vegetables, or planting fruit trees that may have deep roots, it is VERY IMPORTANT to get the soil tested, including a metre down, to find out what chemicals you will be feeding your family along with your crops.
This old man absolutely loves the idea of raised beds for gardening. I’m even looking at gardening on tables to give me relief from all of that bend over business.
How I wish that would work for me. I’ve been dealing with chronic back pain for nearly 50 years, due to playing high impact sports in my youth and a botched lower back surgery.
Hi Margi, again thank you very much for your words of advice and encouragement. I much prefer to read your stories on how to prepare, it is inspiring over the doom and gloom that the endless articles on what is happening to Mother Earth are continually being written. Time to move on and prepare. So, I feel relieved when I hear people talk about the same things you have written about, prepare and start doing.
The garden here is growing abundantly, we have been blessed with just enough rain during the autumn, and the extra-long warmer autumn has produced massive growth. The slaters are enjoying life here which means some seedlings disappear. I'm thinking they are another form of earth worm -decomposing what actually might not be healthy.
Are you stuck in another drought along with most of SA and Victoria and is the reciprocity growing in your community and neighbourhood? Warm wishes Ian
So glad to hear your experience has been just enough rain, and not the inverse, Ian. And, I am glad to hear my current writing focus touches the right spot. The stretch of warmth into autumn sure does bring joys and abundance. And, I am either ypu on the slatter front. Once the seedlings toughen up they seem to leave them alone, but early on it can be devastating. I reckon (without ant science to back my hunch, mind) they have a super important role in soil building, so I try to work around them as best I can.
For sure, we're deep in the drought now. It's been a challenging season in terms of wind and water. I irrigate so have been ok, but our water storage is the lowest its ever been, and the old-timers who've spent thier whole lives here say the warm dry autumn has been 'unatural' and 'unnerving'. The season has literally just broken this weekend, with the rains we would have expected 4 weeks ago. And the wind. Oh maird!
But, a bed of carrots are in and growing in a tunnel in the hope they jump forward fast next spring. The possum got all my late plant beetroot and half the sugarloaf cabbages, but we roll on. All the other brassicas have enjoyed the warmth, and now the paddocks are tinged green, so we're all sighing with relief that we made it through another unpredictable summer.
The community building work we've all been committed to has carried us all this season. It's easier to weather hardship with a band of fellows, than alone. No doubt. And for that I have deep gratitude.
Something to be aware of: most cities once had extensive areas of industrial factories and warehousing, including wartime factories, that have been demolished and either built over with housing and gardens, or sometimes made into open spaces and parks.
Former industrial areas are often extremely polluted, including chemicals long-since banned, such as pesticides, industrial chemicals, wartime chemicals, even radioactive isotopes. When housing estates are built on even heavily polluted land, it is common for developers to simply cover the pollution with half a metre of cleaner soil.
Even former farmland can carry high levels of toxic chemicals, such as fertiliser nitrates, and pesticides and sheep dip toxins.
So if you are thinking of growing vegetables, or planting fruit trees that may have deep roots, it is VERY IMPORTANT to get the soil tested, including a metre down, to find out what chemicals you will be feeding your family along with your crops.
Just so you are aware…..
So true. And, maybe going up (raised beds) rather than down is safest if you can't get the tests done.
This old man absolutely loves the idea of raised beds for gardening. I’m even looking at gardening on tables to give me relief from all of that bend over business.
Yes, the 'bend over business' gets harder every year, Walt. Feelin' with you there!
Or alternatively, practice bending and working util your back is stronger and you find it easier?
How I wish that would work for me. I’ve been dealing with chronic back pain for nearly 50 years, due to playing high impact sports in my youth and a botched lower back surgery.
Sorry to hear that.
Hi Margi, again thank you very much for your words of advice and encouragement. I much prefer to read your stories on how to prepare, it is inspiring over the doom and gloom that the endless articles on what is happening to Mother Earth are continually being written. Time to move on and prepare. So, I feel relieved when I hear people talk about the same things you have written about, prepare and start doing.
The garden here is growing abundantly, we have been blessed with just enough rain during the autumn, and the extra-long warmer autumn has produced massive growth. The slaters are enjoying life here which means some seedlings disappear. I'm thinking they are another form of earth worm -decomposing what actually might not be healthy.
Are you stuck in another drought along with most of SA and Victoria and is the reciprocity growing in your community and neighbourhood? Warm wishes Ian
Awesomeness
So glad to hear your experience has been just enough rain, and not the inverse, Ian. And, I am glad to hear my current writing focus touches the right spot. The stretch of warmth into autumn sure does bring joys and abundance. And, I am either ypu on the slatter front. Once the seedlings toughen up they seem to leave them alone, but early on it can be devastating. I reckon (without ant science to back my hunch, mind) they have a super important role in soil building, so I try to work around them as best I can.
For sure, we're deep in the drought now. It's been a challenging season in terms of wind and water. I irrigate so have been ok, but our water storage is the lowest its ever been, and the old-timers who've spent thier whole lives here say the warm dry autumn has been 'unatural' and 'unnerving'. The season has literally just broken this weekend, with the rains we would have expected 4 weeks ago. And the wind. Oh maird!
But, a bed of carrots are in and growing in a tunnel in the hope they jump forward fast next spring. The possum got all my late plant beetroot and half the sugarloaf cabbages, but we roll on. All the other brassicas have enjoyed the warmth, and now the paddocks are tinged green, so we're all sighing with relief that we made it through another unpredictable summer.
The community building work we've all been committed to has carried us all this season. It's easier to weather hardship with a band of fellows, than alone. No doubt. And for that I have deep gratitude.