[Common Commando]

In a TEOTWAWKI situation, you are only able to take three kinds of seeds with you to grow and survive on... what three would you take? Would you base your pick on reliability or crop yield? short growing season or winter storage ability? Be as specific or broad as you would like.

... I will post my top 3, once I get some more input from yall

 

[Cryptkeeper]

well i would want plants that where heavey producers.
tomato's
squash
potatos (i know its not seed but)
or beans

 

[Reality Czech]

Purple hulled peas, easy to grow, can be picked as snaps or dried for the beans, easy to save seed.
Disadvantage: requires large planting to be worthwhile.

Mustard greens, grows year round except for the hotest months.


Squash, fast growing and filling.

 

[elkhound]

my prefernces for growing in the garden are potatoes,tomatoes and onions.becuase i use a lot of them.but in a true situation i think i would change it some what.i am going to assume it would be here at my homestead sooooo.....


#1 potatoes= because of the easy of growing and they produce large crops.they also store very well and for long periods if stored correctly.many calories for amount of time in planting and harvesting them.

#2 corn= becuase it can be used in so many different ways.eaten fresh,ground for corn meal/flour and popped too. it stores for years if dried peoperly and kept dry.

potatoes and corn are self sustaining also.meaning they can be produced again and again from what you harvest.this would be very important if no seed was available or no money to get them.also you can turn this into meat and fat in the form of livestock.also if there is any wildlife left they wil come to a corn field.deer,turkeys and bear will raid a corn field for calories....soooo..put the deer in the freezer or in the canning jar.there are many forms of other wildlife that can be eaten.squirrels and ***** raid corn fields too.so your options are many with having a corn field.

#3 i am not sure about the last one.i would probably say some sort of pumpkin.i am not a huge fan of pumpkin.but they store for long periods.livestock can be fed on them as well as wildlife forage on them.

its hard to limit yourself to just 3 seeds.one thing i think about is in the summer i have lived for a long time out of my flower bed gardens.squash,onions,lettuce and radish's in a small area will keep you fed.good question.

 

[Brother Bear]

corn
beans
squash

 

[elkhound]

corn
beans
squash

this is known as the 3 sisters garden.i think the cherokee grew like this.

 

[moses]

beans
corn
potatos

 

[Straight Razor]

Potatoes aren't seeds, weigh a lot, and are hard to store and carry to keep them viable. I would pick:

Tomatoes, pole beans and mustard greens. Here is why.

If you were stranded on an island the only two foods you would need to stay healthy are tomatoes and eggs. Those provide all the vitamins, minerals, fat and energy you need to stay alive. So tomatoes seeds are a must.

Beans provide protein and carbohydrates. Pole beans are high producers and don't take up much space. (Read you don't have to plant them in a garden.)

And mustard greens will grow nearly year round in many climates, and will produce in the shortest of seasons.

 

[oldandcrotchety]

Tobacco, pole beans, potatoes. (yeah I know, but....)

 

[awildchipmunk]

Corn..... easy to cook, can, dry, grind for cornmeal, oil?
tomatoes.... eat 'em fresh off the vine, stew, soup, can, dry
potatoes..... so many ways to prepare a tater :thumb:

All three complement a large variety of other foods and they are three of my favorites.

 

[Straight Razor]

Corn..... easy to cook, can, dry, grind for cornmeal, oil?
tomatoes.... eat 'em fresh off the vine, stew, soup, can, dry
potatoes..... so many ways to prepare a tater :thumb:

All three complement a large variety of other foods and they are three of my favorites.

I wouldn't take corn and potatoes, two sources of starch. Actually, I wouldn't take either. Both are labor intensive. Corn is picky about soil, moisture and weeds. Potatoes have to be hilled, that requires non-rocky soil and a lot of hoeing.

Tomatoes and pole beans can be grown on the same pole or poles and don't require a lot of gardening. Mustards are very hardy and will tolerated a lot of weeds.

 

[Sweeper]

I might have been able to weed it down to 5,but 3 types of seed is not processing.

 

[awildchipmunk]

I wouldn't take corn and potatoes, two sources of starch. Actually, I wouldn't take either. Both are labor intensive. Corn is picky about soil, moisture and weeds. Potatoes have to be hilled, that requires non-rocky soil and a lot of hoeing.

Tomatoes and pole beans can be grown on the same pole or poles and don't require a lot of gardening. Mustards are very hardy and will tolerated a lot of weeds.

I guess everyone is going to be a little different. I could take musterds but I would only eat them once every couple of weeks not such a good choice for me.

Taters.... now I can eat them every day of the week, baked, fried, hashed, boiled, mashed, Mmmmmmm

Corn is good as a side veggie or as a filler in soups and stews but I think it would come in handy for meal in fritters or bread.

Corn is also a good lure for deer and other critters, I like meat too :.

 

[Ramona M. Faunce]

I would grow things that I have been successfull with.

Cherry tomatoes (grow well, dry well, eat well)
squash (grow well, dry well, eat well)
mint (grow well, dry well, eat well)

 

[dirtyape]

Corn
Tomatoes
Marijuana (hey, it has many benefits)

 

[RubberChickenGirl]

I would grow things that I have been successfull with.

Cherry tomatoes (grow well, dry well, eat well)
squash (grow well, dry well, eat well)
mint (grow well, dry well, eat well)

That's the key in bold. If you have not grown anything, good luck. I have tried stuff from seed for 9 years with very little success. I do NOT have a green thumb and growing things is WAY harder than it looks. I have had very little success with tomatoes and basil. Can grow mint. That's about it. My neighbor grows okra, untold okra. Is that a good crop for those who can actually grow things?

 

[FlungPup]

A grain like Amaranth or Quinoa. Perhaps barley or buckwheat?

Beets
Cabbage

Hmmmmm. More thinking is needed.

Here in the Pacific Northwest there's so much food. Dandelion, plantain, sorrel, pines, birch, cattial, hemlock, miner's lettuce, tons of berries and dozens of mushrooms. I'd be tempted to take an apple or pear seed and give it a go off the land till the trees produce.

 

[survivalmama26]

I wouldn't take corn and potatoes, two sources of starch. Actually, I wouldn't take either. Both are labor intensive. Corn is picky about soil, moisture and weeds. Potatoes have to be hilled, that requires non-rocky soil and a lot of hoeing.

Tomatoes and pole beans can be grown on the same pole or poles and don't require a lot of gardening. Mustards are very hardy and will tolerated a lot of weeds.

I grew a ton of potatoes in a non hilled space. It was a 12 foot deep square foot garden. I did nothing to them but water.

I would do potatoes, beans and squash. All three store well and beans give you protein if your hunting isn't going so well.

 

[Grimelda]

I grew a ton of potatoes in a non hilled space. It was a 12 foot deep square foot garden. I did nothing to them but water.

The problem with the square foot gardening method is that it requires extremely high amounts of organic matter to be added yearly in the form of compost and rotted manure (up to a third of the volume of the garden bed), plus other amendments when setting up such as vermiculite and peat moss. Add that to that fact that they dry out extremely quickly (meaning they need lots of irrigation). In my opinion, square foot gardening is about as far from being a viable SHTF gardening method as it is possible to get.

That said, I don't think growing potatoes is really that labour intensive. Granted, we only grew 20 square meters (about 200 square feet) but we grew it on land that was previously sod and nettles. It took a couple of hours to dig the bed, three sessions of hilling (1.5 - 2 hours) and probably a few more hours of digging, cleaning and sorting. We mulched a few times with grass cuttings and added some soil amendments like composted manure and now we have a really nice garden bed that is deeply dug and fertile, ready next year to be planted with legumes. The main problem with potatoes is that if you have aphids your seed potatoes could eventually end up full of disease and growing very poorly. I've been hoping to try growing potatoes from true seed but every variety we have tried produced flowers which then dropped off before setting fruit (no, not a pollination problem).

The original question is a tough one, as living in Sweden limits what we can grow successfully. Plus my DF really hates beans. I assume I am living in the same place which means I still have access to our fruit trees and bushes and am able to forage in the forests nearby which contain plenty of mushrooms and edible berries in the autumn. That said, I'd probably grow peas, potatoes and either swede (rutabaga) or beet. All three can be stored easily without power.

My selection would change depending on the circumstances of where I am living and whether I have to bug out or in.

 

[dayliterun]

lettuce
carrots
corn