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Many of us yearn to live the good life, but not all of us can go the whole hog and run a smallholding.
But that shouldn't put anyone off. If you can't become self-sufficient then why not try to become self-sufficient-ish? Twins Andy and Dave Hamilton have established a web site with a modern take on the ethos of self-sufficiency, and aim to show us how.
There are many sites, books, such as John Seymour's the New Book of Self-Sufficiency, and TV programs on the subject aimed at those with considerable amounts of land, time and money. I remember the shop assistant's reaction when I bought Seymour's book it: "oh isn't that just for people who want to live in Spain with a herd of goats" I think she was slightly bonkers but her point was the book would have little relevance to an urban dweller. At present I live in a terrace house in Bristol and although a lot of the book is relevant to the way I am aiming to live, an awful lot of it isn't. I will never have room to keep a pig or a goat and as for the section on managing a five-acre plot!'
That is not to say that the site is exclusive of the country dweller. It began with the aim of encouraging the urbanite to reduce their ecological impact, but as interest in the site has grown the twins are now offering advice for both the urbanite and rural dweller alike.
This is where Selfsufficientish.com's overall philosophy comes in; it doesn't matter if you have 100 acres of land or 1 meter of concrete everyone can lower their ecological footprint.
Put simply, an ecological footprint is the amount of energy needed to sustain your current lifestyle. The New Scientist ran an article on ecological footprints a few years ago featuring a quiz asking a number of questions on personal energy consumption, asking questions such as do you drive to work or get the bus, what was your overall gas/electricity bill last year and have you taken any long haul flights in the last 12 months?
Andy adds: 'It put the results in terms of the number of planets needed to sustain your current lifestyle. At the time I thought I would score quite low but was surprised to find I still needed two planet earths to carry on my way of life. It was clear to me to practice what I preached I would have to make some changes.'
'I bought low energy bulbs, started turning my TV off rather than putting it on standby and would take showers and not baths. These are just some of the small changes I made to cut down my ecological footprint and our site aims to offer more tips and practical advice on doing just that. We feature everything from making your own compost and container growing to advice for those living in rented houses and/or a flat.'
Selfsufficientish.com centres a lot around food, as it is still one of the main problems in terms of energy consumption. Dave says: It seems ridiculous to me that an apple can be flown or shipped in from the other side of the world when English apples are in season. We should all take time to make the most of what was around us, even if it is just making a pie from wild blackberries or a nearby apple tree rather than relying on fruit from South Africa or New Zealand.
Selfsufficientish features growing tips alongside history and nutrition for a selected vegetables and herbs. This is something new for the web; many sites will give advice on just one aspect, and see growing and nutrition as separate entities. I prefer the approach of a renaissance scientist and like to view the subject of vegetables as a whole rather than focus on one aspect, Dave says. For December we featured broccoli and like most plants in the cabbage family they benefit from having the ground 'limed' before they are planted. This technique directly affects the nutritional aspect of the plant as the calcium put in to the soil is taken up by the plant and then in turn by the person eating the plant.
Since they began the twins have had contact from people logging in to selfsufficientish.com from around the globe. The site's message board that acts as a free pool of knowledge for anyone to comment on any subject they wish. They also have an open door policy when it comes writing articles for the site and welcome features on anything in keeping with the site's philosophy.
Says Dave: "We first set up selfsufficientish.com two years ago in April 2004, mainly because there was a lack of anything similar on the net." "Since then other sites have popped up, we still try to regularly offer something new and different to our visitors. This is why we have also set up two new self sufficientish sites, Self sufficient ish.tv and Self Sufficientish.org, the video guide to self sufficiency and the wiki guide to self sufficiency", adds Andy. "Both are very much in their infancy, but over the coming months they will grow to be another valuable resource on the net. With Selfsufficientish.tv we realised that there was a definite need for video guides in order to teach people how to identify the correct wild foods or simply make a newspaper pot; there is only so much that the written word can teach". Andy goes on to say,"The dot org site is really an experiment, I would like it to become a resource that could benefit every selfsufficientish person from anywhere in the world." Selfsufficientish.org uses the same technology as wikidepedia the on-line encyclopedia edited to and contributed by anyone who has knowledge on any subject.
So if you would like to become more self-sufficientish, or just want to
find a recipe for nettle beer, then why not pay the twins' site a visit
at www.selfsufficientish.com.
