How much cultivated farm land is needed to feed someone indefinitely?

Question

Any farmers out there?

I have a basic idea of the types of vegetables that would be necessary since a person would basically be on a vegan diet.

I was thinking the land could be divided into greenhouses so that weather wouldn't be a factor.

Answer 1

Vegan?

Certainly you could grow grain to feed livestock, a pond for fish, hunt for game, etc.

Answer 2

the amount of vegetables you could produce on 1 acreof  good farmland is amazing , but if you were thinking of growing grains to make flour   etc , you will need a few more acres . land is all about quality not quantity , but the amount of food produce on a small amout can be awesome .

Answer 3

You cannot do a sustainable farm that is vegan.  Simply cannot be done.

Nature works in complete systems.  Did you know it is the salmon that fertilize all the evergree forests in the Pacific Northwest?  Remove the salmon, and eventually the forests would fail.

Same with farming the way you are talking about.  Everything needs to be balanced.  If you don't have livestock, to produce the manure, your farm WILL fail.  You cannot depend on the chemical fertilizers.  Eventually they load the soil with so much salt, and kill microbial life that your farm begins to fail.

Nature is balanced...air, water, earth, fire, birds, fish, mamals, ect.  

A vegan farm is not balanced, and will fail.  Greenhouses are not needed to grow ones food.

The knowledge of how to harvest, and then PRESERVE your crops is needed.

That means being able to store grains, can, dehydrate, freeze, root cellar, smoke, ect your harvest.

There's a farmer in Japan.  He has seven acres of rice paddies.  However he also releases ducklings onto the rice paddies, to eat any insects that prey on the rice.  There is also duckweed, snails, and fish, all stocked by the farmer on the seven acres.  On just his tiny seven acre farm, because it is so extremely productive, he grows enough food to feed 300 families.

If one person was very serrious about it, they could probably get by with just one acre of land, as long as it was fertile ariable land (rain falls from the sky to water your crops).

You could have your fruit and nut orchard.  A long strip to grow your grains.  Another strip to grow alfalfa hay.  Another spot would be your perminant gardens, like asparagus, artichokes, herbs, strawberries, ect.  You'd have an area for your yearly plantings of vegtables.  

A medium sized greenhouse would fill all of your needs.  The chickens could roam in the greenhouse, under the tables of seedings.  The chickens should be on deep beding, like straw, or wood chips.  Your greenhouse should be build near your orchard (but not shaded by it).  During the day, after it warms up, the chickens should be free to range into the orchard.  The chickens will provide all the bug control your orchard needs, as well as cleaning up fallen fruits and nuts.

Down the center of your orchar, shaded by your fruit and nut trees, should be your rabbit hutches.  The chickens will help scatter the rabbit manure about the orchard, as well as cleaning up any food the rabbits drop.

You will need to clean out the deep bedding of the greenhouse, and spread it where you are growing your garden, alfalfa, and grains.  

I sugest you have two different garden spots, and alternate years you grow on them.  On the year you are not growing a garden on it, you should be raising a pig in that spot.  The pig will churn up any insects, eggs, and eat any produce you missed.  Be sure to seed the garden area in a fast growing grain, before adding the pig.  Something like wheat, or rye grass.  The pig will eat the fast growing grain, and churn the roots, and stems into the ground.

You will harvest your alfalfa to feed to your rabbits, your pig, and some to the chickens.

Under one of the rabbit pens, fence the chickens off, so they cannot spread the manure.  Raise worms in that spot.  Add that manure to your garden, as it will be extremely rich and healthy with rabbit manure, and worms.

You should be sure to plant a strip of grains, but do NOT harvest them.  Instead when winter comes, allow the chickens to have access to the standing grain.  It will be extremely healthy for them, and will save you the work of having to harvest it.

You could add a beehive to the farm, near the orchard would be best.  That way you could also have some honey.

Now the only thing your farm is not producing is salt, and dairy.  If you want dairy, then you need a goat, as she will provide one person with all the milk, butter, and cheese they could desire.  Salt will have to be imported for both you the human, and any of the four legged livestock.

You would even have room (if you designed correctly) to add a pond, and stock it with fish.  Once your pond is "alive"  (usually takes a couple of years) you can stock it with fish.  Blue gills and big mouth bass are a good combination.  The bass eat the blue gills.  Blue gills breed fast, and eat vegitation, and the insects in the water.  You could eat either of those fish.

Or you could try to grow your foods in a greenhouse.  That way after a few yours, your body will become extremely deficient in lots of trace minerals, because that system simply isn't natural.

~Garnet

Permaculture homesteading/farming over 20 years