What if we could grow our food locally? As an extreme, what if we could grow all the food we need in our own back yards? While maybe not what most people would want to do, if a few people in each community were to grow their own food, then others would learn from them and could apply their new knowledge to their buying decisions to effect large-scale change. Also, larger but still small-scale farms could evolve on the outskirts of towns and cities bringing many of the benefits of connecting citizens to their food. I set out to try a thought experiment — what if we could feed ourselves from a Backyard Family Farm? I believe it now possible and even desirable. Best yet, it may not be overly difficult to build some test environments.
What would it take to make a successful backyard family farm?
• One hour of work a day per person or less,
• Supports all the food of a typical family of three,
• 1/8 of an acre,
• Vegetables, fruit, fish, chicken, maybe grains,
• Low fuel costs: almost completely solar powered for heat, electricity, and growing,
• Low groundwater use: almost completely run off of rainfall or maybe gray water use, and
• Applicable in many geographic areas.
If we could accomplish most of these goals we could have a replicable model for food production and food production awareness. To say a bit about where these goals come from and how they might be achievable lets start with the first one, which is the labor target.
Talking with friends that have gone into organic farming, they have said that it’s hard work and has led to burnout. We have to make this easy enough to not be a full time job. What if it would take 1 hour per day, per person to tend one’s garden? Since families average about 1/10 of their income on food, and 1 hour is 1/8 of the average workday, then we would be spending about the equivalent amount of our time on the farm, rather than the earning money needed to buy food at a store. An hour a day would keep one in contact with ones food, get some productive exercise, and build confidence in self-reliance. Even if one loses one’s job, one would still have food.
Supporting all the food needs of a family of three is attainable, but Americans have grown accustomed to a very wide variety of food choices. So if this farm were able to achieve the goal, but the family could afford to eat out occasionally or knows other farmers for swapping, we could achieve similar levels of diversity we currently enjoy. I have heard there is an active barter system among farmers at farmers markets. If applied to backyard family farmers, this barter system would build relationships that can further secure our food supply against shortages or crop failures.
An eighth of an acre is a very small farm. A 75 x 75 foot area is about 1/2 of the suburban plots in many areas. But we have reason to be optimistic. The aquaponic system does not grow grains and requires external inputs, but it produces much more than a family needs.
A “typical family of three” is used here rather than the “family of four” because the average United States household size is, in fact, now only 2.61 people. There is nothing in the Backyard Family Farm that would not work for more or fewer people, but some of the parameters might have to change.
Further, many lands lend themselves to better farming of certain plants than others — is there a way to grow a variety of foods in one place, and then can we use a wide range of locales for these farms? By following some of the techniques already explored, the answer is yes. Constructing a green house around our farm would make it more applicable to more environments.
If our family is to have the regulation amount of protein from fish alone, then we need approximately a pound and a half of fish per day. This can be supplied by a tank that is 10 feet by 75 feet of Tilapia. Tilapia is the second most farmed fish in the world, after carp, and can grow in small-scale ponds like this. Unfortunately, some regions such as Northern California, regard it as an invasive species, so it cannot be farmed everywhere. Different fish species can be farmed, and farmed together. Polyculture fish farming has worked for mixing tilapia and catfish, tilapia and carp, tilapia and shrimp, and catfish and paddlefish. Maybe we could have a large number of different fish in the pond. This could keep the families interest in caring for the fish and in eating the fish.
Chickens, ducks, geese could add a source of eggs, meat, entertainment, as well as, fish food. Keeping chickens in greenhouses has the added benefit of helping with temperature regulation. Where factory farmed chicken is slaughtered sooner, “free-range” chickens are often slaughtered at 14 weeks. A productive hen can lay 300 eggs a year, so maybe the farm should have 2 chickens. Chicken waste is commonly fed to fish in pond-based fish farms in Asia.
On the subject of water use, this farm might be able to live just off of rainwater! If this were true, this could be a huge boon in water conservation as current farms use rivers and underground aquifers extensively. To see if this would work here, lets do a few calculations. The average California rainfall is 17 inches per year, 20 inches in San Francisco, 35 inches in the farm country north of San Francisco. The fish tank could be used as a cistern to catch the rain. Assuming the middle of the rain estimates, we would get about 200 gallons/day just from rain. Then there is amount of recycling of household gray water that could be done. Based on the water-use of the larger-than-needed aquaponics system, running our farm on 200 gallons could be feasible.
While some electric power will be needed for pumps and controls, the majority of the energy can come directly from sunlight for the plants and keep the farm warm. It is plausible that this farm would not need much external fuel.
So it is plausible that a Backyard Family Farm could achieve our goals and be a success. There would be significant research and development needed, but it seems possible. The benefits to the individual family, the community, and if copied, the world are significant.
For instance, we might be able to help our current environmental degradation by going to an intensive farming structure like this. The current land used to feed a US family is about 6 acres. If we even reduce this to one acre, then the US could generate $200 billion a year in export revenue (about 10% of the total federal tax revenue), or we could return 600 million acres to prairie and forest — the equivalent of 3 times the Louisiana Purchase.
Based on pioneering work on sustainable and small-scale agriculture we could have a system that can feed ourselves, educate ourselves, and return most of the land and water resources to their pre-human equilibrium. Lets eat.