I watched a video this morning from one of my favourite YouTube Channels American Homestead (Just so you know I had the name of my place years before).
The video is on "Homestead Outlaws" in America and the things that you can do that can class yourself as an outlaw all in the name of self sufficiency, a good video to watch if you've got the time.
The rules over here in the UK are quite different but there are still many things we can do, either knowingly or not, to be classed as outside the law. In fact after watching this video I'd say that we have many minor rules that make less sense over here and are pretty easy to break.
Some of the rules that are things like feeding your chickens or pigs kitchen scraps and animal paperwork rules, home meat slaughter and butchery, to name just a few.
Oh course we've never broken a single rule over here (*cough *cough), but what rule annoys you the most where you live? Do you think there is too much regulation in these modern times?
I don't find rules too bad, but other peoples limitations which they try to inflict on others drive me mad.
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean. I do find some of the rules frustrating and pointless though.
DeleteWe keep our heads down and carry on doing what we are doing, although have got the sheep and cows registered. I think if you are discrete you can get away with most things.
ReplyDeleteI think many do but it's a shame it has to be like that really.
DeleteI can't say I know much about the rules around your Islands but I did live and travel about in Europe quite a bit in the 80's and early 90's and it seemed there were a lot more rules over there back then compared to the US. However the US has been making great leaps and bounds in the rules and regulation department since that time too.
ReplyDeleteI read somewhere (more than once actually) that pretty much everyone has violated several rules, laws or regulations before the day is half over. Some states and counties int he US are worse than others though.
I think we all break rules without realise it and frequently as well! Europe does seem to have brought many rules with it but I'm fairly sure we'd have plenty of rules without them anyway!
DeleteMost folks don't realize that there's a method to the madness of excessive rules - destroying all initiative and self-reliance of the common man.
ReplyDelete+1,000 to Gorges!
DeleteAh but Gorges why would they want common man to have any form of self reliance? No form of control then!
DeleteI bought milk with the cream from a farmer for years, when my children were little, until it became illegal in the US. I hate that rule!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I've read a lot about that. I think it's the government messing with things that don;t need messing with make people madest!
DeleteThe most stupid rule I have come across is in Wales you are suppose to registred Alpacas with Defra not in England, but there is no restrictions on movement, we dont have to inform anyone and when we lost Daffodil we didnt even have to inform them of the loss and could dispose of the carcass how we wanted, what is the point in registering the herd ? baffles me, there are lots of others that niggle me as well
ReplyDeleteThat is a mental law with the Alpacas. The tagging of animals is a constant annoyance, they don;t even know how many people are over here but expect to know how many sheep there are!
Deleteback in the city, even though we lived in an area known as the "greenbelt" and had a half-acre yard and no neighbours, we were not allowed to raise any animals, not even small ones like chickens or bunnies...because we were inside the "city limits". also, you were not allowed to have a front yard "wild flower garden". we did not know about that one until they fined us...i explained to the officer it was to attract bees and butterflies but that meant nothing. and then they sent in a city crew and mowed it all down. i think i cried for 3 straight days after that.
ReplyDeletesending much love. your friend,
kymber
No way, no wildflowers, what madness is that?!
Deleteit was madness Kirsty. you wouldn't believe the wildflowers that i collected all over from our greenbelt so they were natural to our very area...i made a beautiful rock garden all around the wildflowers - it was beautiful! but neighbours across the street whose lawn was mowed times a week complained it was an eyesore. and not just one neighbour. so they fined us $150 and then a crew showed up the next day and plowed the whole thing down. it broke my heart.
DeleteThe neighbors need to get a life. Good grief. Flowers an eyesore?
DeleteJ & M - we lived in a pretty posh part of the city...the other side of the street was full of very modern-looking houses and their yards were mowed like 4 times a week! we lived on the other side of the street surrounded by protected "greenbelt". so the neighbours thought of our beautiful garden as an eyesore to their lovely manicured lawns. some people DO just need to get a life. thanks for understanding.
DeleteBloody hell kymber that sounds dramatic! I think I'd go up the wall if someone came in and did that. I'd love to live somewhere like you guys that's far enough away from people so nothing gets noticed.
ReplyDeleteKev - when that big, ugly old city by-law officer showed up at my door with a crew of college kids on summer jobs whacking my garden down with weed whackers - you should have seen the mess they left...while this idiot was telling me the by-laws, out of the corner of my eye i saw jambaloney's 5lb shovel just off to my left - i had visions. oh yes - i had visions of just whacking him and burying him in the backyard. the kids with the weedwhackers wouldn't have cared. and they would have left my garden as it was. one girl told me how sorry she was.
Deletebut ya - out here - we can throw junk all around the yard, have overgrown-whatever-we-want...and just be left alone.
to be honest kev - i think it was about that time that we really considered leaving for the island. we could have stayed another 5yrs and made a small fortune, but it was about that time that we said "screw this" and were here on the island about a year later.
thanks for letting me get all of that out. both to you and kirsty!
EEC Red tape and single farm payment forms. Do we own our farms or is it the powers that be?
ReplyDeleteNo single farm payment here - I'd rather loose money than have someone tell me what to do!
DeleteMy two ewes' tags are still in the desk!
ReplyDeleteGood man!
DeleteNo Raw milk sales, no building a pond without a permit, no building any structure over the size of a little garden shed without a permit, no selling over like $200 of animal fiber a year without. investing in and paying yearly licensing on a registered scale. If you can do it there is a permit here for it, and the cost of the permit will prevent you from doing it, because it will cost you more than the $$ you are making.
ReplyDeleteIts so frustrating for someone like me, because I would love to be able to sell some extra meat I've raised, eggs, animal fiber and handmade items, vegetables and whatever else extra I could produce around here to help out my family and maybe even be able to support myself, but our state and country is actually preventing me from being able to do so, because of their stupid red tape.
Kimberly
If the penlties weren't so severe I'd say just do it anyway until you get caught. I have feeling things might change in the next twenty years or so though as oil prices rise, they might even be encouraging small farmers to sell their produce.
DeleteActually its not just penalties. They like to throw people in jail here over things like selling raw milk off their farm. They try to destroy peoples livelihood, and make an example out of them on the news, so that others wont do it.
DeleteWhere I live now has some rules in place. Some make sense, others do not. For instance, I found out that the zoning district in which I live forbids people having boats in their yards. I can show you easily 100 examples of where this rule is broken, and to date, not one person has been fined.
ReplyDeleteThis location and my last one allow raw milk consumption and sales. I don't use much milk but when I do, it's raw, as I digest it far more easily than the pasteurised stuff.
I nearly died from eating raw milk as a child but I still think it's a choice that people should make instead of government!
DeleteI last ve in the city limits, but I am zoned agriculture. My neighbors in the back are zoned residential. I can own roosters and chickens ( I believe up to 100), goats, cows,pigs etc. the zones that are designated residential can only own six. Many neighborhoods have homeowners associations, their by laws do not allow back yard chickens. I refuse to live in a neighborhood with a HOA. I believe we have to get a permit if we build an outbuilding that's more than 200 sq feet. Any laws I am curious about, I have been able to pull up on line.
ReplyDeleteMy fathers farm is set over two counties, but that has advantages as it means you can sometimes apply for two things at once (like planning permission). I hate anything like a homeowners association where other people get involved with things that don't really affect them!
DeleteI can't comment, I'm a natural rule breaker and risk taker and I'd be here all year if I get started on this one!
ReplyDeleteI would go so far as to say there is not a single day that goes by that I don't break at least one law, and I'd consider my life rather dull if that ever changes
Not me. Never broken a single rule...
DeleteI always thought the no kitchen scraps to livestock was stupid. My understanding of it is that if I take a carrot out of my veg patch and throw it to my birds - that's no problem. But if I take a carrot from my veg patch to the kitchen and peel it, I can't give the peelings to my birds. I assume the rule came about because unscrupulous commercial bird owners were feeding things they shouldn't so average joe gets to suffer the consequences
ReplyDeleteI always thought the no kitchen scraps to livestock was stupid. My understanding of it is that if I take a carrot out of my veg patch and throw it to my birds - that's no problem. But if I take a carrot from my veg patch to the kitchen and peel it, I can't give the peelings to my birds. I assume the rule came about because unscrupulous commercial bird owners were feeding things they shouldn't so average joe gets to suffer the consequences
ReplyDelete