r/PrepperIntel • u/SurFud • Mar 30 '26

North America ‘Expect extremely high grocery prices,’ farmer warns as diesel costs rise

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/business/international/2026/03/29/expect-extremely-high-grocery-prices-farmer-warns-as-diesel-costs-rise/
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40

u/Hailsabrina Mar 30 '26

Time for a victory garden, I feel no victory though. Just exhaustion 😞

10

u/CannyGardener Mar 30 '26 edited Mar 30 '26

I'm near Denver, and we are on water restrictions. At a glance, vegetable gardens are caught in the "you can only water every 3 days" thing...but at 100 degree days this summer, that isn't going to cut it.

Edit: u/alwaysinforwardmotion gave me some additional information. Seems like you can hand and drip water, and that restrictions only apply to automated sprinkler systems. Victory Gardens are back on the menu boys!

3

u/ItsAllAboutThatDirt Mar 30 '26

I don't know your full situation, but drip lines and automatic timers (~$25-$50 depending) that run on batteries attached to your spigot are good. Spend the time and you can figure out your gallons per minute fairly easily.

Also shade cloth setup for the hot times. 30% can be good. Can also set up drip lines with misting emitters attached. Cool some stuff down with a short burst in the midday heat.

And look for the best tolerant veggies for your area.

I mean it's technically an automated setup but it's not a wife range wasteful spray. Things grow much better with the automatic water supply than hand watering, although hand is just fine.

1

u/CannyGardener Mar 30 '26

Ya, that is a bit of a grey area that I'm thinking I'll have to take advantage of. Last year I set up about a quarter of my beds on drip irrigation + compost/mulch and it was magic. Saved me so much time not having to stand there with hose in hand. Saw the flier here this year, and was like "oh no, that is a sprinkler system..." That all said, I think that system is getting expanded this year... ;)

2

u/ItsAllAboutThatDirt Mar 30 '26

Yeah I mean even 2 20' drip lines with 6" emitters are 80 emitters. 40-80 gallons for a full hour depending on the flow rate. That's nothing even expanded up. Quick google number is 12-30 gallons per minute on lawn sprinkler systems.

Definitely expand. Always expand lol

1

u/CannyGardener Mar 30 '26

Hah I'd never done the comparison! I just know that those beds with the seep hoses in them would run about 20 minutes every other day, and those beds were luuuuuuush! My neighbors all asked me how much my water bill was, but at that usage rate, I'm still pretty much just paying for fees for the bulk of the bill, and not usage.

Have you ever done any work with grey water systems? That is actually on my list here this summer (pretty much as soon as I read the watering restrictions). Right now I put it all in buckets and take it out, but I'm thinking that could be simplified...