Bo's in the house!

For many years, I camped and squatted on forest service and blm land in the western united states. I was consistently careful to maintain a clean campsite, and to improve rather than degrade the land around my temporary homes.

Yet for most of these seven years, off and on, I lived in constant fear of getting the ticket for remaining too long in one place. It is terribly difficult, after all, to move 14 miles in 14 days on foot or by bicycle while staying close enough to town to make it to work every day.

I've finally realized and begun to learn the methods of finding much of my food in the wild and growing it myself in a dispersed manner using microclimates and natural water-concentrating and holding features I learned by researching permaculture.

It was, unfortunately, or fortunately, a bit late. I purchased a small home in town, and on a weekend days before I was to move into it, a blm ranger walked into my campsite. He informed me that they had been chasing my camp around the small town I now live in for two years, trying to catch me at home. I explained that in a few days I would be moving into my home in town, but to no avail, I got the ticket. Luckily the man was a gent and only gave me the two hundred and fifty dollar ticket rather than the five hundred dollar one.

While I understand the government's wish both to prevent damage to public lands and to prevent loss of public lands through squatting leading to acquisition of squatter's rights, the forest service and blm have now moved to a 14 days and thirty five miles policy, which seems terribly onerous in my opinion.

I was disappointed that I was finally caught and reprimanded for exercising what I consider to be a basic human right, I.e. having a place to sleep, however, I've now got to give a huge thumbs up to all the forest service and blm employees out there who never seem to leave their trucks and walk out into the woods. After all, two hundred and fifty bucks ain't half bad for seven year's rent.

This sub is to be about all things pertaining to the hermit lifestyle such as homelessness, squatting, mobile-living, dumpsterdiving, bushcraft, foraging, freeganism, frugality, traditional gypsy living or sheep wagons. Enjoy!