The Coming Food Shortage..."Be honest, now: Can anybody in your house skin a rabbit?"

There's probably not a person out there that has not noticed the increase in the cost of food over the last few years.  But not everyone knows that in times of economic uncertainty price increases always precede shortages...and in some cases, products will completely disappear off the super market shelves.  "What are you going to do about it?"  "How are you going to eat?"  "What are you going to eat?"  "What risks will you take in order to feed your family?"

Be sure to watch the extraordinary video below.

Question: "Do you think there could be another Depression?"

"I don't know. I hope to God not. But, I know the generation now wouldn't know what to do with it. They wouldn't know how to do, they wouldn't know how to go out and milk cows or kill pigs. You know, we even did our own butchering. Butchered our cattle and our beef, and I mean, our pork. Just like chickens – we dressed chickens. I remember one time we dressed 25 chickens at my house." ~ Mildred Opitz on the Possibility of Another Depression

"They're closing down markets to put up pet salons."  Huffington Post August 23, 2011

"Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and Brooklyn community organizer and food justice advocate Mark Griffith discuss the crisis of “food deserts” – local communities where it’s hard to get fresh, healthy food – and what’s being done to improve the way New Yorkers eat." ~ WNYC 93.9 FM

"Be honest, now: Can anybody in your house skin a rabbit?" ~ LA Times December 2008
More suggestions come from: Wild Food Summit

Rose Barlow was an herbalist for over 20 years, practicing in the Wise Woman tradition and director of Coulee Region Herbal Institute in Southwestern Wisconsin. Rose passed on in June 2009. Her wealth of knowledge lives on in her website www.rosesprodigalgarden.org.

Alma Christensen “Lady of the Woods” is a self-taught botanist who used her knowledge of harvesting wild foods to help her family survive the Great Depression.

Steve Dahlberg has fond memories of foraging as a kid, which he now passed on to his triplet teenage boys and two daughters. He is the Director of Extension Services and the Science Chair at the White Earth Tribal and Community College (WETCC). He incorporates wild edible plants and tracking into his classes. He is also an artisan knife maker.

Rebecca Dallinger lives in Ogema, MN and is a wild food enthusiast and herbalist. She is committed to learning and teaching families about wild foods and plants, often found in our yards, that lead to health.

John Kallas has a PhD in Nutrition and a Masters in Education from Oregon. He’s a trained botanist, nature photographer, writer, researcher and teacher. John has led expeditions on wild foods for over 25 years and runs Wild Food Adventures (http://www.wildfoodadventures.com) — an institute foraging and studying edible wild plants. He publishes the Wild Food Adventure quarterly newsletter and the Wild Food Primer. His recent book is Edible Wild Plants: Wild Foods From Dirt to Plate.

Mike Krebill recently retired from 35 years of teaching seventh grade science in Iowa and Michigan, much to the chagrin of parents who were hoping their son or daughter would have him for a teacher. He was famous for getting kids outdoors, and for teaching science research skills by experimenting with wild foods. Honors include Michigan Science Teacher of the Year, Michigan Environmental Educator of the Year, Keokuk (Iowa) Teacher of the Year, and being inducted into the National Wild Foods Association Hall of Fame. Mike is fairly knowlegeable about mushrooms, and is vice president of the Prairie States Mushroom Club.

Kelly Larson has been getting wild for nearly twenty years. Embracing both a spiritual and physical connection to the natural world, she strives to ‘know’ her food sources and take a personal responsibility for the journey to her plate. Fishing, hunting, gardening, mushroom harvesting and chicken wrangling are a few of the self-taught skills of this woman of the woods. Kelly is a Minnesota Master Naturalist and leads occasional mushroom forays and bird walks. She lives in rural Bagley, MN with her husband, four cats, seven peacocks, and flocks of heritage poultry at Northern Flights Farm.

Matt Mattson is a biologist and archaeologist who incorporates the ages and ways of archaeological finds to better understand the ways in which people lived.

Francois Medion is currently a student at the University of Wisconsin -Superior and is a wonderful chef and makes a delectable dutch oven bread that is highly praised at WFS.

Tom Peterson has been teaching mushrooming for 17 years. Starting out at age 8, Tom learned foraging mushrooms and wild foods from Cliff Crow in the White Earth Area. Tom has his own mushroom cultivation business and sells at the St Paul Farmers Market in the Twin Cities.

Laura Reeves is a botanist from Gardenton, Manitoba. She runs Laura’s “You can eat that?!” Wild Edible Adventures“, which offer a hands-on introduction to incorporating wild edibles into everyday meals. She is also a co-instructor of Wilderness Skills courses in southwestern Manitoba. Over the years, Laura has weaned herself off of grocery store produce and now relies solely on the fruits and vegetables that she has gathered or grown, herself. This year WFS 2011, she will focus her talents on showing people how to “break through the wall of green” when identifying wild edibles. It is a unique instructional style that is varies from traditional individual plant identification.

Sunny Savage is a woods woman at heart and loves eating wild things with her son Saelyn. She has a masters in nutrition and is a creator of Wildfoodplants.com, She has since moved on from White Earth Tribal and Community College to Hawaii, where the plants are very different but still very good. To see clips of Sunny’s television series ‘Hot on the Trail with Sunny Savage’ wildfoodplants.com.

Sam Thayer is a nationally known wild food instructor and researcher. He is the author and publisher of The Forager’s Harvest: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting and Preparing Edible Wild Plants and Nature’s Garden: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting and Preparing Edible Wild Plants. He is the creator of the Standish Price Wild Food Interpretive Trail in northern Wisconsin. With a guide booklet and 118 stops, it is perhaps the only trail devoted to edible wild plants in the U.S. Sam is a member of the National Wild Foods Hall of Fame. He was editor of “The Forager,” a wild food periodical with subscribers across the US and Canada. Sam and his family live in Wisconsin near National Forest Land.

foragersharvest.com.
Dana Trickey has spent over 10 years learning to forage for wild foods and medicines from the woods from many elders and teachers.

Michael Wassegijig Price is a Wikwemoikong First Nations of Manitoulin Island band member. He works to keep Ojibwe plant names and culture alive and enjoys sitting by the campfire with his son Che’.

Stephanie Williams: Stephanie is a White Earth band member whose first job is grandmother. She is also the teacher of popular classes on medicinal plants, wild foods and making cremes and salves from natural ingredients.

And if you're really hungry and the local fish market is out of your favorite shellfish you can always do this: