Post-peak life in Canada

[Sammi]

Nobody mentioned Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan needs some love too! 

Saskatchewan has some big pros and some big cons. (I'll be splitting the province in half to discuss pros and cons--the northern forest half and the southern prairie half.)

Northern Saskatchewan
Pros:
-Plenty of lakes and rivers
-Plenty of trees

Cons:
-Short growing season. (Prince Albert, the southern boundary of the forest, has less than 100 frost-free days.)
-Potash, uranium, and tar sands mean that you won't necessarily be left alone.

Southern Saskatchewan
Pros:
-Large, flat areas of farmland.
-Slightly longer growing season. (but still short. If you want to garden year-round, move to Hawaii)

Cons:
-Large, flat areas of farmland. Easy to be turned into FedFarms.
-Not a lot of trees. You'd be better off burning hay or animal dung.

My doomstead is in Northern Saskatchewan (not really by choice. . .it's where the BF's family has their farm)

[peter31]

Yes, winter is the big problem. Food aside, just clearing the snow off roads and highways requires huge amounts of diesel.

I sometimes reflect on how much of our modern lifestyle exists just in order to maintain our modern lifestyle, and how much of it is not really necessary for survival.  Clearing snow off roads, for example.  It's done mainly for the benefit of motor vehicles, and if there are no motor vehicles, why would you do it? - there'd be no point.  People used to use snowshoes or horse drawn sleighs or just not bother travelling.  Same with using gasoline powered lawn mowers: food production in backyard = no lawn = no need for lawnmowers.

[Annie Oakley]

The thing I like most about winter........NO MOSQUITOES!!!
I am one of those people who they seem to like

[sc]

Ok so a couple of folks I know...at least one who is also on here....are looking into really truly honest to god...taking action......I know it is sort of shocking right

We have a huge array of skills between us and we are trying to be proactive in setting up an "eco-village" (I really hate that term) or more likely a biosolar fortress.....(yeah I mean a village/farm with a group of like minded folks up here in the great white north.

We are sort of hard core doomers with a very pragmatic outlook.  We are looking for people (with actual money and serious interest) to set up a retreat (maybe in very small town Manitoba/Sask/Alta/BC)

We are targeting a very business oriented approach where we would incorporate an entity who goals would be biological/ecological research into non fossil fuel production (farming, energy etc) and living.
A no airy fairy approach is needed.....you can be a hippy but you better be a damn hard working hippy

I am personally a medical professional with a wide background in agriculture and business.  I am just throwing open the floor to anyone who would be interested in pooling resources to try and create what would be the modern day equivalent of a medieval monastery (sort of a ecological research facility mated to an Israeli Kibbutz) 


 

[jd]

We're anglophones in the Laurentien mountains, north of Montreal, QC, basically living in the woods.  We're in a town of about 1400 people, and of those, about half are seasonal/weekend residents (most people tend to come up here to ski & camp and that sort of thing).

On a fairly frequent basis my wife and I discuss whether we're in the right place or not.  On the plus side we're surrouded by lakes - water, fish, etc - and wood we can use for heating.  While the patch of land we "own" is just under an acre and we can grow a reasonable amount on it, we'd probably be happier with a) a little more land and b) slightly better soil. 

This year the chicken coop is going to go in, and, despite not having more land to our name, most of the land around here is just bush - new growth forest from the last 100 years or so - and we think we'll be able to make some use of it for firewood, trapping, hunting, etc.  A big downside is, naturally, the language issue.  For the most part our neighbours and friends don't even think about it that much - both my wife and I make an effort to speak French - but if things got tough we think that may change (but we'd hope not).

We're not urbun, not suburban, and not truly rural either.  We're not in the valley, so any MZBs looking for long-pig are going to have a helluva climb to get up here, but on the down side, so would any supplies.  The thing we worry about most is debt.  We're in our early 30s and our mortgage has 12 years left on it - when we bought the place we were considering a more sustainable, low-energy lifestyle, without really being PO aware, and didn't see a big brick wall coming within 5 years.  We're doing everything we can to get that paid off as quickly as possible, but there isn't much more we can do.

I'd rate our preps about 5/10.  We're working to up that number, and we take comfort that this is about 5 more points than I'd give the general population, but who knows what lies in store for everybody...

[peter31]

You're very lucky being able to talk to your wife about this.  Mine is totally resistant to any form of discussion about it, and is still stuck in pre-crash, pre-peak new kitchen / granite countertop mode.

[jd]

You're very lucky being able to talk to your wife about this.  Mine is totally resistant to any form of discussion about it, and is still stuck in pre-crash, pre-peak new kitchen / granite countertop mode.

That much is true - it's easier if you have people around you to talk to.  When we moved here we had mild doom in mind, but that has accelerated for both of us over the last couple of years.

[Capella]

The situation in Canada will be difficult because of the sheer size of the country. Canada might be lucky enough to have its own resources, but if you life in Nova Scotia, the grain producing parts of the country are a world away. They will probably end up eating a lot of potatoes.

Even the people in Newfoundland are fucked, even though they still have a living tradition of growing their own food and many of them can still remember a life without electricity. But the fisheries cannot sustain them any longer and with oil getting more and more expensive, it will become impossible to go fishing in the Greenland or even Iceland waters as the few remaining fishers now do. They will get by for a few years by hunting their moose and reindeer population to extinction, then it's over.

Even though Canada is blessed with a vast amount of wilderness, much of that is really not cut out for growing food and has remained wilderness for exactly that reason. And even though Canada has the image of being an eco friendly country, you only have to take a look at Athabasca or at the clear cuts in the north of BC to see that this is a farce.

There are two reasons why Canada is better off in face of the crash than the US though: it has fewer people and it did not piss off quite so many other countries in the past. 

[Xenopus]

There are two reasons why Canada is better off in face of the crash than the US though: it has fewer people and it did not piss off quite so many other countries in the past. 

Also, it has a national health system and its banksters are noticeably less greedy than those in the U.S. (Maybe they want to be acceptable to society after TSHTF?)