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Eastward Missions

Country Living

Darren Greenfield

Food Grows where Water Flows

Well, I'm going to share a couple of things here just initially before we get into looking at water sources and irrigation and so forth We'll have a look at what God says about His his way of irrigating and I notice you're getting some nice rain through here.

I don't know if that's normal all the time, but...

New Zealand, you know, it's so beautiful and green and we get lots of rain.

Although I have noticed in the last decade of, you know, each time I go back to New Zealand, I've had some droughts and for the first time in my life I've seen brown dry paddocks, you know, which I've never seen before.

But notice what it says here in Deuteronomy 11, 11 through 17.

Of course, this is talking about the promised land that the Israelites were going towards.

It says, But the land which you cross over to possess is a land of hills and valleys, which drinks water from the rain of heaven, a land for which the Lord your God cares.

The eyes of the Lord your God are always on it from the beginning of the year to the very end of the year.

And it shall be that if you earnestly obey my commandments, which I command you today, to love the Lord your God and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul, then I will give you the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the latter rain, that you may gather in your grain your new wine and your oil." Pretty amazing to think about what it was like.

I don't know if you've seen much about Israel.

Actually over there in Israel, they're some of the world's leading experts in utilizing water efficiently because they have such a scarcity of it and they have to use it very very wisely because they're not, the conditions are not like we just read.

And I think around the world, we're seeing conditions, water is becoming scarcer, and especially where I'm in California, you know, the aquifers are getting lower.

We've had droughts, you know, for decades.

The drought has broken in California now that just water is becoming quite a valuable commodity.

The price for water is increasing and actually driving through the Valley of California from northern to southern.

It's interesting that when they were starting to restrict water use, you see these farms and all these orchards and trees just drying up and dying, you know, because they didn't have water and it was too expensive or there was something that was preventing them getting the water.

It says, you visit the earth and water it.

You provide their grain for so you have prepared it.

You crown the year with goodness and your paths drip with abundance.

Wouldn't it be amazing if that's the way it was?

You know I have to think about why are the conditions not like that anymore?

And you know during the time of Elijah Israel was experiencing a drought right?

And did God's people who were faithful, the 7, 000 that didn't bow their knee to bow, did they suffer because of the drought?

Or did God just come over their little property and just rain on their properties and the ones who were unfaithful didn't get it?

Did he have to, he went to the brook Kidron and he was drinking, But what happened to that brook?

The whole nation, the faithful and the unfaithful, suffered under the same conditions.

I think in the conditions that we're in this world now, the more wicked man becomes, God's natural resources are becoming more and more scarce and God's people suffer along with everybody else as these resources are not so available.

I love this promise here that Jesus said in Matthew 5, 45 and 46.

He says, But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.

For he makes his Son rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." So even though we're in the conditions of the world, the wicked world now, God still sends rain, doesn't he?

He didn't dry it up completely he still sends rain to us and he's good to those who don't appreciate it and those who do.

This is the area where I used to live and it's beautiful and green and we really don't have to worry about water too much.

You can have a garden, you can plant your veggies and things out and they'll survive without having to have any sprinkler or anything you know just because the rain the clouds come over and you know the native name for New Zealand is Aotearoa which means land of the long white cloud and so you know rain is very frequent and common and the country stays pretty green most of the time.

So irrigation was not something that that I ever thought much about and a lot of people there just you know plant out their trees and orchard and never water them because God waters them.

But then I moved to California and we have 5 months of no rain through the summer and so the conditions are very very dry that the ground gets dry down deep you know and we have to have an alternative form of watering.

And most of the watering in California in the San Joaquin Valley, and it's a huge agricultural area that supplies, I've heard a figure of something like 10% of the world's food, It's huge.

But they rely on the snow melt from up in the mountains.

There's a mountain range that goes along the edge of California, right up to northern California.

And they have these big aquifers that the snow melt gets channelled down and then distributed right through the valley to the farmers.

So we're very dependent on that snow melt.

And during the drought years, the thing, you know, we're used to having 5 months of no rain.

The winter droughts were the ones that really affected us because there wasn't the snow build up in the mountains to melt and then supply the water.

So Rod asked me to cover kind of if you're thinking about moving the country and you're choosing a property, what are the things that you need to be thinking about when it comes to your water supply?

So here are some of the things that I would suggest making a list when you look at properties or if you have a property I guess it does it's not relevant but is there a water source there like is there a creek a river or you know do they have a well on the property what what sort of water sources are there or if there's nothing then you have to consider is it possible to dig a well and get water and so on.

And if there is water what is the quality of the water?

Because when you're growing food if the pH of the water is you know too high or there's issues with with the water that can drastically affect your garden It can mess up the chemistry in the soil.

So having a test and seeing what the pH is, what the sodium levels, I don't know if you have issues here with sodium levels in water in some places, but in the States, definitely in some of the drier states like New Mexico, Arizona and so on, they have issues with sodium levels being high in their water and in the ground.

And so it's worthwhile to have the water tested.

If you're gonna put a well in, how much water, what volume should that well be able to produce?

What is the cost to secure the water supply, including storage if necessary.

So it's not just the price of a property that you have to think about, it's the price of what does it cost to get the water supply and it can be very expensive if there's not a supply already there.

And then 1 thing that can be very helpful is to check around with neighbours and find out what their experience is, what do they do for their water and you know mine the knowledge that they have.

So what amount of water do you need to be able to survive?

So here's a list it's in gallons, sorry about that, just basically times it by 4 and you'll be pretty close if you want litres, but you know each person in the household is probably going to use somewhere between 20 and 40 gallons, or you could say 80 to, what would that be?

There's all the amounts there and then if you've got animals if you've got a cow or More than 1 cow if you've got horses or chickens or sheep or the garden, you know uses a lot So if you know do the sum and figure out how much water you really need so that you can evaluate either the supply that's there when you buy a property or you can when you put in your own well or another source that you will have what you need because if you don't have water food grows where water flows If you don't have water you're not going to be able to grow your food successfully.

You might not have more than what you need for yourself.

Here is a Suggested conditional purchase agreement.

So if you look in a property, you really like it and it doesn't have a water supply And you know that well needs to be put in This is a suggested water agree, I mean an agreement that you can have in your contract that may be a way of kind of like an insurance if you pay all this money for the property and then you have a well driller come in and they think they're going to find water but they drill drill drill and it's not there and you're paying for every metre of drilling that they do and then they have to move to another spot, it can get really, really expensive.

So the suggestion here is to have this in the contract.

The seller make a diligent effort to locate and develop a year-round adequate water supply for the buyer's needs on the property.

If necessary, the seller shall drill a well to a maximum depth of whatever specifications.

The water supply must have a year-round output of at least, and that would be based on what your calculations are, what your needs will be per minute.

If the seller cannot locate and develop an adequate water supply, then this agreement shall be terminated immediately, and all funds deposited and paid by the buyer shall be returned immediately, and the buyer shall suffer no further liability under this agreement.

So this is just a little safeguard if you don't have water available on a property that you really like and you you want to buy it.

The other thing is the seller may say well that's going to cost me a lot of money but you could say well I'll give you x amount you know whatever your budget is I'll give you x amount extra as long as you you know take care of it and if they think it's doable, then they take the risk that if it doesn't work out, they actually pay it and you don't pay it.

So it's just a way of safeguarding your resources, especially if they're limited.

So here's an article that I found online that's really, it was really, summed up a lot of these items really well.

It's called Country Water Systems, What You Need to Know Before Buying property.

It's an old article from 1989 from the Mother Earth News July-August issue but it really covers all the different things you should be thinking about and it goes into more detail than I'm able to in the time that we have so I'd recommend reading that.

So water sources, what water sources would you be looking for?

So surface waters, which include rivers, streams, creeks, ponds, springs and cisterns.

I don't know if you use that term over here, I guess it's used in America more.

And then water is trapped underground in 2 types of areas.

In aquifers, loose water bearing materials such as gravel, sand and clay or in consolidated water bearing rocks, notably limestone, basalt and sandstone.

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Country Living

Food Grows where Water Flows

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