Aside from when I was a kid and my parents hobby farmed chickens I have no experience farming, it presents its own benefits and challenges. For some people gardening really fills this void as well. It comes down to your personality in a lot of ways. For me it’s hunting.
My successful large game hunts have involved going away for a week or more with 2-3 other people. If anyone gets something it’s shared equally amongst the group. Pulling the trigger is about 1% of the effort compared to field dressing, packing out, butchering, setting up camp, etc. With a single moose or caribou you’re looking at a share of 70-100 lbs of meat in the freezer in the end.
There’s a substantial startup cost, and a yearly time sink in researching areas and learning about animal behaviour and habitat. Buying a gun and going to a range to learn how to shoot can be cheap or expensive depending on your tastes. Getting the outdoor gear you need is similar.
This is no way to save money on food, but it’s transformative in terms of how you relate to adversity, nature, and the food chain. Taking full responsibility for every aspect of the food that nourishes you, including taking the life of an animal, requires a lot of psychological work for most people.
Of course the meat is amazing and very satisfying to eat, but the payoffs are not really material. There’s something embedded in our evolution as a species that makes feeding your family and friends something you personally harvested deeply satisfying, it’s really hard to describe, and for me the experience was surprisingly profound. I saved some of the meat from my first caribou so it could be one of the first solid foods that my daughter ate. Feeding it to her was a very meaningful moment.
Beyond that, my appreciation of, and commitment to the conservation of wild spaces became a major calling. It’s so different from camping or hiking when you have a goal every day that causes you do endure weather and uncomfortable situations in ways you didn’t think you were capable of. Sitting on a frosty hillside for hours with a friend while you both scan the landscape with binoculars while barely saying a word probably sounds boring to a lot of people but it becomes a communion with nature that is impossible to achieve in other contexts. Intensely watching animals and learning their patterns and habits made me love and respect them in a way that is hard to express to someone who hasn’t been though it. I know this sounds like a paradox, the desire to kill something that you also want to protect and exalt, and it is. Sorting out this paradox is a very human experience, and it’s one that most of us have become disconnected from.
I also really appreciate that this is basically one or two trips I plan each year that have the side benefit of letting me unplug and go off the grid, putting all my other stresses and concerns to the side and focusing on one big goal. I always come back worn out and battered, but also energized and more at ease. And when it’s not hunting season, my time commitment is pretty low.