John Natoli

I'd like to build a chicken tractor for about 5 hens that is lightweight enough to pull by hand but that the hens will stay in full-time, has nesting boxes, and can keep predators out. Does this sound unreasonable? Any suggestions? Thanks!

Hey all, I need some advise on what would be the best meat production options for my situation.

My family of 6 including me are all allergic to mammal meat due to the Lone Star Tick, so we can only eat poultry and fish.

I'm currently raising Cornish X chicks for meat, which is going well. However, I'd like to find an option that will cost me less in feed and me more contained to my own property as opposed to buying in feed.

I have about 2.5 acres of lightly treed property in NJ. We've got all the usual "weeds": clover, garlic mustard burdock, plantain, chickweed, violets, etc. I usually never mow my property but it has gotten out of hand at times and led to problems with ticks, so I am going to be more diligent about keeping the vegetation less overgrown.

My thinking is that since I'll be mowing more, I should have lots of clippings of this vegetation that I can feed to my birds. What types of poultry would be most efficient at converting this to meat? Would it be ducks, considering that this is their natural diet?

Thank you!

Hi all, can you help recommend some resources I can learn to deepen my knowledge of the many kinds of useful plants out there? I would like to learn how to identify and understand different families and types of plants, their uses and needs from soil types to chemistry, etc, with the primary purpose of being able to create permaculture projects in the Northeast/Mid-Atlantic US. I am looking for self-learning resources, books, videos and online courses. I know that the best way to learn these things would be directly from experts in the field, but that's just not realistic for me right now. Thank you!

I've butchered my first pig and I'd love to know your favorite pig heart, kidney and liver recipes. Thanks!

I ended up killing one of my pigs this past Friday with a 22. I can't imagine having done it any other way — it was hard enough to get a good shot from less than a foot away with a 22; those things don't stay still around me for a second.

Does it make sense to plant annual cover crops in a perennial bed or will they compete?

What would be the disadvantage if any of hitting it in the head with a full size sledge hammer to really knock it out then cutting the jugular? Would that just injure but not necessarily knock it out? Or would it kill it outright and make bleeding impossible?

Well apparently I take a lot of bug pics. We love bugs.



Water Scorpion








Bee drinking sugarwater

Thanks William, that's a great idea, especially getting some more use out of it with storage.

This is my first time raising pigs. I have 2 in a roughly 18x18' pen. The smell is pretty terrible sometimes. I lined the bottom with logs/sticks and covered with woodchips and other mulch and I clean the poo out regularly, however it still stinks. I've found that after rain is by far the worst. I've also seen some videos on youtube of people using logs on the bottom covered with a very thick layer of mulch (rice husks, banana leaf mulch, woodchips). Their pens have a concrete foundation to block moisture and a roof to keep it dry and they say there is basically no smell. This makes good logical sense to me, but before I invest in putting a roof over this whole thing, I'm wondering, in your experience, does keeping the pen dry significantly reduce the odor? Thanks!