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Wow! That’s a hefty price. I got mine through the local Amish made by an Amish man in Ohio and shipped by train. We paid the Amish bishop $900 directly for the stove including the shipping and $150 for a local guy to come install the pipe we bought locally. We went to the Amish because ordering one elsewhere and paying shipping was prohibitively expensive and our Tractor Supply sold only garbage Chinese-made wood stoves, including U.S. Stoves which is all made in China now. Maybe try your local Amish?

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I moved into an off-grid cabin in Alaska with my toddlers years ago. The first things I did were to secure the water supply (well, pump, well house), heating (we had a drip oil stove that did not require electricity), and outhouse. We were able to cook outside until I has a stove and we used lanterns until we had a better lighting system. I’d probably make sure there’s enough feed for the animals upon arrival.

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Field peas are the same thing as black-eyed peas but there are several varieties. Few tend to be called field peas anymore.

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Pacific Northwest Foraging: 120 Wild and Flavorful Edibles from Alaska Blueberries to Wild Hazelnuts (Regional Foraging Series) by Douglas Deur.

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Susun Weed offers several online courses at wisewomanschool.com although the most comprehensive one is not cheap. But I studied with her years ago and loved it. April Graham of She Is Of The Woods has a YouTube channel that teaches a lot of the same stuff. Susun Weed also has a lot of short YouTubes that teach. I prefer that school of herbalism to most others because it’s VERY hands on. I think the main thing is to get right out in your own area and see what grows and follow their growth from spring through next winter. Work with them directly, learn to identify them, when to harvest them, best uses, how to plant some in your own medicinal garden. Herbalism that is all about ordering a bunch of dried plant materials and putting it up in capsules and jars isn’t really herbalism. It’s pharmacology, which is fine, but it’s not going to help you learn how to work with the plants themselves which is ever so much more powerful. The living plants are almost (as in nearly 100%) always more powerful medicinally gathered fresh and locally than dead plants that you have no idea how long they’ve been sitting in bags on shelves somewhere. And working with the plants, you begin to understand botany so when you come across a new plant, it’s easier to identify and then apply because you recognize plant characteristics that have common applications medicinally (although you still should make sure you’ve identified them properly). Using this approach, you will likely find an abundant medicine chest right outside your door, locally, and then you can order what doesn’t grow locally. Plus, you’ll find things grow in waves. I find certain weeds take over some years, for example, something might be growing like mad this year that helps with bronchia and it does so because the next winter might be a bad flu season. I see this happen every year. I’ll go back to a field to get more of what I got the previous year only to find something completely different has taken over and then find that year its benefits are much needed.

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If by older times you mean the days of good manners and trustworthy and helpful neighbors and people who knew how to do basic things like home maintenance and first aid then I am all there. If you mean take away modern conveniences, my husband and I are already doing that more and more. My husband and I already live very simply. It doesn’t take much to strip a world of its knowledge base. So we just keep going backwards in time for working systems that are not dependent on much society and becoming more and more prepared to live comfortably and easily if, for example, the grid went down. Electricity and running water are lovely, but I’ve lived without them and I could do it again. In fact, I prefer a world without money and bankers.

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This is probably the way most people ate in general, eating up what was there in front of them as it was ripe, saving some for winter. We’re so spoiled now. We just want to eat what we “feel like” eating instead of just eating the bounty that is provided when it’s being provided. We see all those peaches and think, oh yum, but not now. We eat a few and can up the rest for another day. I’m sure there’s some balance between eating what’s ripening and preserving for winter, but your method sounds completely natural to me.

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I had to buy the pipe separately and locally. They used the stainless steel pipe from Tractor Supply but we just got the 6″ black pipe except in the ceiling where it’s double walled. I can’t remember if we got it at Tractor Supply in town or maybe a place called Sutherlands/Home Base in Missouri a few miles away. But I think it can also be found at Home Depot. But that reminds me that I do want to get some extra to have on hand should we need to replace it at some point…..

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  Redcap.

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Yes, agreed. We have a wood stove where we live now and heat with it exclusively since the price of gas went nuts. I dehydrated over it this winter for the first time and LOVED it. Once I got started, I put away nearly a year’s worth of potatoes and veg in vacuum sealed jars. I did get a dehydrator recently, used, just to dehydrate eggs while they are coming in fast in spring. But we love our wood stove. If there was an EMP or outage, we would be fine with just that addition to our house.

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States usually have a patient’s bill of rights and because patients are technically “customers” they reserve the right to also take cures while in hospital that are homemade. They may be asked to sign a release from liability for any interactions with other treatments, and you don’t have to sign them, but generally it’s fine to do so. But an individual can do whatever they want in a hospital. They are not prisoners.

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Be careful with plant ID apps. A friend of mine recently used one to identify things on her property and told me she had tons of stinging nettle and when I saw the picture of it, it turned out to be ragweed. LOL

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I’ve been making plant medicines for 40 years ad I was very pleased with that book. I was surprised it was as good as it is but it’s very easy to understand and very specific and a good place from which to do more research about each plant. And most are very commonly found in the US.

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I’m so sorry about your mother. It’s a crime to have taken my son’s quality of life at age 25 and a crime to take away your mother’s golden years completely. And it’s 100% the antibiotic. For most of the time he was in pain, there was no official diagnosis for his condition so insurance kept balking at providing any help. He went to a pain management center and the doctor said he could absolutely help him EXCEPT he couldn’t because he did not have a diagnosis box to tick. So my son continued to suffer until “flouroquinolone toxicity” was recognized as a diagnosis. He never got any compensation from the pharmaceutical company. I hope your mother is being helped, at least, by insurance.

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I love the laziness factor! Sometimes I think modern people work way too hard. That’s why I dehydrated nearly a year’s worth of tubers and veg by the wood stove all winter. No extra electric bill to pay (less work away from home to pay for it).

I also think certain foods grow at certain times to provide us with the right nutrients at the right time of year. That may have more to do with wild foods but must apply as well to most domesticated food as they all came from wild foods.

Modern people are just used to having what they want when they want it. It’s just a habit; it’s not natural.

Eat what’s ripening and store the rest for winter and the following spring until the next harvests. That’s what people used to do.

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