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Comment by chii | Hacker News Reader

> Most fruits, vegetables and game are also free

if you owned the property you caught them on. Otherwise, no, i don't believe you are allowed to "live off the land" in these day and age.

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In some nations/states, you don't own any of the species that typically migrates on and off your land. So you don't own the deer in your forest, unless you have a deer-blocking fence running all the way around your property. You don't own migratory birds, ever. Fishing in a stream that flows across your borders? Better have a license.

That said, if you are inconspicuous in your harvest, and stay away from the rangers on public land, you are not likely to be caught poaching by landowners, especially if they are absentees that do not live on or visit the property.

So you aren't lawfully allowed to do it, but you could probably do it anyway without much consequence. Just like homelessness in the city, really, except much, much more difficult.

Lots of cities plant decorative fruit trees, and more rural area often has feral fruit. You're allowed to harvest fruit on public property (at least where I live). It's actually better if you do, the sidewalks can get nasty if the fruit is left to fall and rot.

https://fallingfruit.org/

In the neighborhood around my work we have cherries, plums, apples, blackberries and raspberries. By my house there's more cherries, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries. There's tons of it everywhere in the summer and I rarely see anyone picking it.

Won't do you much good out of season, though.

You're not legally allowed to live off the land in many places, but no one is going to stop you either. Especially if you're not uprooting native plants or whatever. If you go into someone's garden and start eating their hostas then that might be a different story.

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