Yes, the avg iq has been dropping for decades. No surprise, and it doesn't hurt my feelings. Enjoy
If it's just now dawning on you that you need to become more self sufficient and put away supplies and food for when things go south, you have a lot of catching up to do.
It's never too late though.
Forget the desert. The desert kills people like you for grins. Seriously.
You may want to rethink Alaska though.
Just now dawning on me? No. You misunderstand. And that's ok.
When you say "people like me" I assume you mean Northern folks. No offense taken. Why, then, rethink Alaska? And why the wink emoji?
I've been looking into getting as distanced as possible from large populations and wildly out of control emboldened government. It's how I want to live my life and I don't care to debate the merits.
I have a lot of experience with cold-weather survival and self-sufficiency, but Northern land is much more expensive. There are small high desert plats that are extremely affordable, because they're in the desert. People do have self-sufficient homesteads in this kind of climate. Solar powered refrigeration, rainwater collection, cisterns, greenhouses, and small livestock such as chickens.
What concerns me is my lack of experience in this kind of climate. Also not having as many meat hunting opportunities. But I could afford a lot more equipment and structures with the much cheaper land. Perhaps more socially interesting on occasion.
Any thoughts/advice/ramblings would be greatly appreciated.
not to put too fine a point on it, but
Cheap Land = Cheap Neighbors
take that any way you care to, just an observation.
In theory living remotely off the grid seems doable and not that hard until reality slaps you silly. Schit always breaks down when its really hot or really cold. If you get injured and you're two hours from a mediocre hospital and have spotty cell service you're phugged. Better hope you have good normal dependable neighbors because that would be one of my top considerations living remotely off the grid.
Buy a cheap travel trailer when you retire and camp for three months remotely and see how you like it. Tow the trailer out to an area in October and spend a few winter month in the snow..
Originally Posted by iHunt20
Originally Posted by rockinbbar
Originally Posted by iHunt20
Yes, the avg iq has been dropping for decades. No surprise, and it doesn't hurt my feelings. Enjoy
If it's just now dawning on you that you need to become more self sufficient and put away supplies and food for when things go south, you have a lot of catching up to do.
It's never too late though.
Forget the desert. The desert kills people like you for grins. Seriously.
You may want to rethink Alaska though.
Just now dawning on me? No. You misunderstand. And that's ok.
When you say "people like me" I assume you mean Northern folks. No offense taken. Why, then, rethink Alaska? And why the wink emoji?
A cistern in the desert? I've heard some far fetched shirt but this one is out there. Man can't survive in one place without a plentiful water supply.
I have a buried cistern. It was originally used by the well to store water so the pump only ran when needed. Well was dry when we bought the place, but we plan on storing rainwater in it. The water collected doesn't all need to come from the roof. A ground level collector can easily feed into a buried tank. One inch of rain on an acre is 27,000 gallons. Most is lost to evaporation, transpiration, runoff, and other means.
For the moment, we are looking to collect non-potable water for bathroom use and use jugs of potable water for drinking and cooking. It's not ideal, nor easy, but it is doable.
Here's a reference: Modern Potable Rainwater Harvesting: System Design, Construction, and Maintenance by Daniel M Brown
Do you own the water rights to collect the rainwater? This is going on in OR right now. People can't have rain barrels because someone else has the rights to all the runoff from their property. It doesn't matter how long your cistern has been there. It's who owns the water rights on the land that matters. If this western drought continues, many people are going to get bit when the rights holders send in the sheriff to shut down their water collecting systems. It's not theirs to collect.
Many desert homes were broken off from ranches that sold off land that wasn't good for grazing. They didn't sell the water rights along with the land.
I understand the legal requirements here, but the sad part is I doubt many of those ranchers have an effective way to retain the water runoff from heavy rains. I mean it's pretty obvious the most effective retention system is immediate capture with retention in an enclosed cistern which greatly limits losses. If the home owner uses the water it is almost certainly discharged back into the water table through drain field leaching or garden watering.
I don't think people are thinking very deeply about this subject.
You're missing the whole dang point. It's not the rancher's water, either. There are stream flow rights owned by the state that have to be filled before the rancher gets anything. Hydro rights. Downstream irrigation rights. Downstream domestic consumption rights. All senior to "the rancher's" rights. Your collection right would be right behind all the others, and you can't collect a drop until all the others are filled.
It doesn't matter who does it the most efficient; Phoenix, Vegas and LA are going to get all their water before you get a single drop.
A cistern in the desert? I've heard some far fetched shirt but this one is out there. Man can't survive in one place without a plentiful water supply.
I have a buried cistern. It was originally used by the well to store water so the pump only ran when needed. Well was dry when we bought the place, but we plan on storing rainwater in it. The water collected doesn't all need to come from the roof. A ground level collector can easily feed into a buried tank. One inch of rain on an acre is 27,000 gallons. Most is lost to evaporation, transpiration, runoff, and other means.
For the moment, we are looking to collect non-potable water for bathroom use and use jugs of potable water for drinking and cooking. It's not ideal, nor easy, but it is doable.
Here's a reference: Modern Potable Rainwater Harvesting: System Design, Construction, and Maintenance by Daniel M Brown
Do you own the water rights to collect the rainwater? This is going on in OR right now. People can't have rain barrels because someone else has the rights to all the runoff from their property. It doesn't matter how long your cistern has been there. It's who owns the water rights on the land that matters. If this western drought continues, many people are going to get bit when the rights holders send in the sheriff to shut down their water collecting systems. It's not theirs to collect.
Many desert homes were broken off from ranches that sold off land that wasn't good for grazing. They didn't sell the water rights along with the land.
I understand the legal requirements here, but the sad part is I doubt many of those ranchers have an effective way to retain the water runoff from heavy rains. I mean it's pretty obvious the most effective retention system is immediate capture with retention in an enclosed cistern which greatly limits losses. If the home owner uses the water it is almost certainly discharged back into the water table through drain field leaching or garden watering.
I don't think people are thinking very deeply about this subject.
You're missing something here. Heavy rains? We haven't had a rain over 1/2" in several years. 1" rains are a pipe dream. Runoff is almost nonexistant. There is no excess water to fill a cistern or pond. This area gets 10" of water a year, mostly in the winter. Most of it soaks and and the soil is bone dry by June. This area is great for agriculture but it's all from irrigation from mountain snowfall. Without that, nothing can grow here but sagebrush. You need to find land with a good strong spring or creek and have the rights to use them. You won't get it by storing rainfall when there is none.
If the rain on roofs is of no value then why on earth would the ranchers sic the sheriff on anybody.
We had a discussion about that a while back. Seems that people in OR got the word that they can't use barrels to collect rain water coming off their roofs. The downstream rights specify that they get a certain amount of water from a creek and they weren't getting it. The creek water comes from a watershed, all the land drained by the creek. Roofs are part of the watershed. Who owns the land is irrelevant. What matters is who owns the senior water rights.Until the senior right owner gets 100% of his water, no one else gets any. It's not divvied up between them. That's the way water rights were handled when the west was settled and it's still that way today.
“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” ― George Orwell
It's not over when you lose. It's over when you quit.
A cistern in the desert? I've heard some far fetched shirt but this one is out there. Man can't survive in one place without a plentiful water supply.
I have a buried cistern. It was originally used by the well to store water so the pump only ran when needed. Well was dry when we bought the place, but we plan on storing rainwater in it. The water collected doesn't all need to come from the roof. A ground level collector can easily feed into a buried tank. One inch of rain on an acre is 27,000 gallons. Most is lost to evaporation, transpiration, runoff, and other means.
For the moment, we are looking to collect non-potable water for bathroom use and use jugs of potable water for drinking and cooking. It's not ideal, nor easy, but it is doable.
Here's a reference: Modern Potable Rainwater Harvesting: System Design, Construction, and Maintenance by Daniel M Brown
Do you own the water rights to collect the rainwater? This is going on in OR right now. People can't have rain barrels because someone else has the rights to all the runoff from their property. It doesn't matter how long your cistern has been there. It's who owns the water rights on the land that matters. If this western drought continues, many people are going to get bit when the rights holders send in the sheriff to shut down their water collecting systems. It's not theirs to collect.
Many desert homes were broken off from ranches that sold off land that wasn't good for grazing. They didn't sell the water rights along with the land.
I understand the legal requirements here, but the sad part is I doubt many of those ranchers have an effective way to retain the water runoff from heavy rains. I mean it's pretty obvious the most effective retention system is immediate capture with retention in an enclosed cistern which greatly limits losses. If the home owner uses the water it is almost certainly discharged back into the water table through drain field leaching or garden watering.
I don't think people are thinking very deeply about this subject.
You're missing something here. Heavy rains? We haven't had a rain over 1/2" in several years. 1" rains are a pipe dream. Runoff is almost nonexistant. There is no excess water to fill a cistern or pond. This area gets 10" of water a year, mostly in the winter. Most of it soaks and and the soil is bone dry by June. This area is great for agriculture but it's all from irrigation from mountain snowfall. Without that, nothing can grow here but sagebrush. You need to find land with a good strong spring or creek and have the rights to use them. You won't get it by storing rainfall when there is none.
If the rain on roofs is of no value then why on earth would the ranchers sic the sheriff on anybody.
We had a discussion about that a while back. Seems that people in OR got the word that they can't use barrels to collect rain water coming off their roofs. The downstream rights specify that they get a certain amount of water from a creek and they weren't getting it. The creek water comes from a watershed, all the land drained by the creek. Roofs are part of the watershed. Who owns the land is irrelevant. What matters is who owns the senior water rights.Until the senior right owner gets 100% of his water, no one else gets any. It's not divvied up between them. That's the way water rights were handled when the west was settled and it's still that way today.
This has been a really interesting conversation. I had naively assumed that desert areas were largely unregulated. I also didn't know about the potential bad water quality another member mentioned earlier.
I've read in some places, rainwater collection is limited to 100-200 gallons, etc. If drought conditions make things worse, that could all become a huge mess soon. Creative harvesting of water was the only feasible way I saw to become self-sufficient in certain areas.
Remote Alaska it is. No shortage of resources. In the right areas, no HOA. No covenants. No property taxes. Effectively no local government.
The water rights issue has the potential to be as big an issue as described in this post. Lots of attorneys have made careers out of arguing water rights especially in arid areas. We have cattle on about 10,000 acres of state grazing land. You have to get a permit from the state to build a fence or do any kind of improvements. We cleaned out three dirt tanks two years ago. State land guy told us you can clean them out and make them deeper but you cannot make them any bigger. Courts have determined the rights to runoff belong to the tribes and you cannot impede it. We asked how they would know since they never come out to look at the property. He said they monitor satellite images.
I've seen numerous land deals in NM,AZ, and West Texas that were selling acreage tracts of land comparatively cheap.
The main problems with them as relating to off grid life are:
1) No water. In most places, you cannot find enough water table to drill even deep, expensive water well. Forget a rain catch system. It won't rain enough to support your living. It may help at times, but not an option.
2) Electricity. Getting power of any sort to your property is probably cost prohibitive with either solar/wind, or power poles from the electric supplier.
3) Forget hunting. It's desert, and it takes many, many acres to support even one animal. And the competition for that one animal is unbelievable.
But, by all means, do try it. Many have. I'd say about 2% last more than a year.... Then the land developer forecloses and sells the tract to another optimist.
You seem to know about Dolan Springs AZ!
The desert is a true treasure for him who seeks refuge from men and the evil of men. In it is contentment In it is death and all you seek (Quoted from "The Bleeding of the Stone" Ibrahim Al-Koni)
Outside of what appears to be some creosote bush..........................
that could be my 'hood!
The desert is a true treasure for him who seeks refuge from men and the evil of men. In it is contentment In it is death and all you seek (Quoted from "The Bleeding of the Stone" Ibrahim Al-Koni)
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