Maggie's Farm

Although, as a gardener, I sometimes feel as if I've spent my life warring against varmint hordes and (sometimes) neighbors who filch tempting produce, agriculture is an incredibly easy way to produce food compared to foraging. Not to mention, no danger of eating poison berries or toadstools by mistake. Or being eaten by bears or others competing with one for the tasty wild tidbits. I am curious to know if that whole "rabbit starvation" theory is true ( about one not being able to survive on lean meat only) as there are areas where there is little edible for humans but a few scrawny critters one could shoot.

Whereas on a farm? Quite apart from the meat, milk, eggs, etc. Certain crops are incredibly dense calorifically and one has a surplus, which means one can do something else with one's life some of the time besides scavenge for food. How many bushmen have the time to write novels or get PhDs? They may be brilliant, but scraping out a hunter gatherer existence is so consuming and precarious. In addition, there are only a few parts of the world where there is abundant food to be foraged (probably one could map early humanoid settlements based on these zones). If I wre to try to exist on what I can forage in northern New England, for example, I would be a very lean and hungry dog very quickly.

None of this is to say that it isn't a VERY GOOD THING to know how to forage for food in the wild. when necessary Just that clearing a good plot of land is a more fruitful way to live. Or are we females just boring gardeners by temperament?

I agree, and all the recent research on factory farms as reservoirs for potential pandemics corroborate it. Shepherds ate better than (and were healthier than) people growing lentils and barley. Better quality protein and more fat were probably a factor.

But I was thinking of how difficult it is to forage now that we humanoids are living in areas formerly inhospitable to our species. And now that pesky things like fences and property rights hinder our roaming.

ALso, I was thinking of the great skill it takes to be a hunter, for example, relative to what it takes to plant and tend a garden (it's so easy, a cavewoman could have done it, if they'd figured it out). One can deputize kids to weed, keep birds and rabbits away, dogs to guard, etc. Whereas it takes Eskimos years to develop the skill necessary to hunt well enough to feed a family.

Also, if one lives in an area where one isn't allowed to hunt (laws) and can't trespass to find morels and raspberries, it's at least feasible to grow butternut squash, potatoes, apples, beans and corn and assorted summertime delights like tomatoes and cucumbers and salad in the back yard. In my present neighborhood, such things lure enough squirrels and raccoons and rabbits and deer that one could balance out the meal quite handily if not for neighbors who would object to one hurting the Wild Kingdom off the deck.