Where I live, logging is the main industry. We're surrounded by thousands of acres owned by timber companies. Clear cut land is cheap because it erodes rapidly with no tree roots to hold the soil against rain and wind erosion so you would have to get green stuff established ASAP after the trees are gone. If you have some mature trees, you might consider talking to a sawmill and seeing if you can sell them the trees. You would have to get someone to cut the trees and deliver them to the sawmill, but if your timber is good, the price you get for the logs would offset the cost of logging. Another thought is to advertise that you're taking bids to SELL your timber (once again, it would need to have to be enough fairly mature trees for this to be an option. A conservation department or university extension forester might be a good person to talk with). Of course if timber isn't an industry in your area or you don't have enough worthwhile trees these may not be options. Another thought is that there are small chainsaws which are easier for women to start and handle. They won't be much use against really big trees, but they can get a lot of the small stuff and you could probably clear a drivable path at least. Finally, our driveway is just gravel on top of dirt in the area we had bulldozed for the house. I think it cost about $1000 for the gravel (he spread it down the driveway and we smoothed it with the tractor or my father-in-law's skidsteer). I can't remember what the bulldozing cost. We add more gravel when potholes appear. We don't have ditches or pipes or any such things and don't really need them because we're on a ridge and it's the country and if we can't drive down our driveway then the gravel road is impassable too.
It is magical! We've long since finished our last jar that we saved for ourselves. I really do hope we do it again some year when we've got more time. Maybe when our children are big enough to help which will be a while. Those buckets can get heavy!
Unfortunately not this year. Production costs were prohibitively high so we made very little profit last winter and don't think we could charge much more if we were to offer syrup again. Maybe we'll do it again sometime in the future if we can find a way to reduce production costs.
We have a sick month old St Croix bottle ram. I was feeding him a homemade formula (1/4c cream and large egg in bottom of half gallon jar, then top off with whole milk), but switched to Sav-A-Lam when he became ill because we were concerned that he hadn't been getting proper nutrition from the homemade. He's started taking his bottle again and is taking nearly as much as he was before he got sick. Any thoughts on what to do to help him recover from the antibiotics we've been giving him? I am also wondering about cod liver oil or other supplements to help him fight the infection, and regain sight and hearing. Our hope had been to keep him as a ram, but if he doesn't regain sight/ hearing we may decide to fatten him up for slaughter. Any insights appreciated!
Laura Trovillion wrote:We get all of our chicken wheat also known as gravity grains, whole wheat flour, oats and heirloom cornmeal from Brian and his wife. They are good people and are doing really great things with organic heirlooms in the middle of conventional corn/bean country.
I was impressed by their selection and pleased with their pricing. I would have loved to find a place more local to me here in the Missouri Ozarks to buy from, but as you say, we live in the middle of conventional crop country so all the grain sellers I found in Missouri sold conventional seed, with one or two having organic options, but no heirlooms. We are toying with the idea of selling organically raised, heirloom grain in a few years when we get grain growing figured out.
Just realized I needed to update! We ended up buying 50lb of turkey red wheat from https://qualityorganic.net/ in IL. We also bought hulless oats, and popcorm. They aren't seed sellers, but rather grain sellers. They had the best prices that we could find.
We've got wheat and oats up. Of course we'll wait another month or two to plant the popcorn. Our plan is to save enough seed from all three crops to give us the seed needed to feed our family/ livestock next year. Hopefully we'll have enough to eat some too. We definitely have enough popcorn (if we can get it to grow!)
Joseph Lofthouse wrote:Winter rye grows feral in the wildlands here. It takes care of itself with no weeding, and no irrigation. No other grain grows consistently in the wildlands in my ecosystem.
I can harvest and clean enough grain in an hour to feed myself for a week. I love subsistence farming. Makes my heart sing.
I wonder what the yield per acre is, how satisfactorily it can be harvested with a combine, and whether additional processing steps are required before it's ready to turn into the final product (ground, rolled, crimped, etc)? I know many permies enjoy subsistence farming which is why I said we're not very interested in it since the farming methods may well differ!
Robert Ray wrote:Take a look at "Kernza". I'm not sure about how it would grow in your climate. Thynopirium intermedium is what Rodale started out with in the development of "Kernza" Some of the perennial ryes I think are for a bit colder climate. I like Great Basin Seeds they might have a suggestion for your zone .
Kernza would probably grow here, but we're not quite to the level of growing 20 acres which it looks like is the minimum amount they'll sell for planting. I think my husband figured 5 acres to be enough for our personal use with the heirloom wheat we planted this year (can't remember the variety off the top of my head. We planted 1/3 acre and will save the seed to plant next year.) That being said, kernza yields are lower than standard wheat so we'd have to plant more. Might be worth it if we didn't have to mess with plowing, disking, and planting.
Christopher Weeks wrote:Search for Marc Bonfils for no-plow wheat production.
My husband has been looking at that one, possibly planting ladino clover on the field with the wheat (he may have already done that, but I'm not sure), but we're questioning long-term yields with the Bonfils method. Another question is how labor intensive is it? If we can't do it in the same amount of time with similar yields to the traditional plowing and sowing, then it may be unrealistic for our sustainability goals. We're also looking at rocky, clay soil so may need to do other amendments for satisfactory results. That's why Back to Eden is appealing to me right now, though obtaining enough organic matter to cover 5 acres 4-6 inches deep might be problematic... 🤔
My husband and I just watched the Back to Eden film and were contemplating whether grains (wheat, oats, etc) could be grown no till in quantities great enough to feed a family and livestock. Plowing certainly makes it easier to plant in the beginning, but could no till be done successfully long-term without massive amounts of time/ labor/ inputs? We're looking at calories here as well as quality of life. We don't want to be subsistence farmers or to be so involved in growing things to eat that we have no time for other interests (and we have many).
This year my husband tried his hand at making Black Walnut Syrup and the results are amazing! The trees are tapped in the late winter and the sap is collected and reduced by boiling until it is thick with sweet flavor. The catch is that it takes about 80 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup, and black walnuts do not produce as much sap as maples. This is why most producers stick with Maple syrup making this a rare treat, but it is worth it. The taste is somewhat caramelly, smoky, nutty, sweet. I enjoy the flavor in coffee, tea, over ice-cream, and of course on a hot stack of pancakes. You should not consume if you have a nut allergy. Available in 8oz and 4oz jars.
I was talking with my husband earlier trying to figure out if it's worth buying some fayoumis and he asked a crucial question: "Has your mom's flock ever had any problems with disease?"
Hmm... nope! And they don't even have the roomiest setup for their birds. They are mostly crossbreeds of heritage varieties, selected for gentleness to people and each other so none of the modern franken chickens.
So, hybrid vigor might be a thing or it could simply be that their small flock of around 15 chickens (before they've gotten rid of the extra roosters at the end of the summer) isn't big enough or confined enough or kept in an artificial indoor factory (ever) to allow diseases to get a foothold.
My current conclusion is that I'm not going to break the bank to get fayoumis since their disposition is not what I'm going for with my flock. I want kid friendly, dual purpose chickens that aren't going to keel over at the faintest breath of bad air or throw themselves in the way of predators. The only things going for the fayoumis (in my book) is their disease resistance and ability to avoid predators. Their flightiness, unwillingness to roost in coops, and potential aggressiveness of roosters are all things I'd rather not introduce into my flock. All that being said, if I find a great deal on a fayoumi hen, I might add her to the flock.
There is much discussion about disease resistant flora, but disease resistant fauna hadn't really occurred to me until last night when my husband told me about St. Croix sheep and how they are naturally resistant to parasites. That got me thinking about chickens so I searched the internet and lo and behold the Egyptian Fayoumi is resistant to several chicken diseases (possibly including avian influenza) and isn't prone to predation. There is research being done on them at the university level, but I couldn't find much information about what the researchers have found so far. It's a pretty rare breed here in the USA. Anyone have experience with this variety?
We free range our hens and I believe they are quieter because they don't want the predators to notice them. We've got americauna crosses and a pretty white hen of unknown parentage. My parents' chickens are much louder because they are penned much of the day to keep them safe from their dogs which weren't properly trained to be chicken guardians (my parents are older and didn't have the energy to train). The chickens have a large pen, but it's still a pen with no greenery and they tend to squabble and get bored while they are waiting for their turn to roam free outside.
Joshua Berg wrote:I don’t have any punny ideas, but I use whatever trash I can find. Yogurt containers, salsa jars, plastic milk jugs, juice cartons. It all gets saved from entering the waste stream, and saves me money!
Ahhh! *rushes to trash to pull out yogurt container*
I don't have enough pots for my plants so this won't count as clutter! Thanks for the tip!
From an economic perspective, how does hedge laying compare to the modern Midwestern standard barbed wire fence? I factor in labor costs here. Hedges take a lot of labor to install initially and continued maintenence, but materials could be free (would be for us since we have several varieties of trees growing on our property well suited to hedging. They would just need to be propogated). Barbed wire takes much less time and calories to install and (presumably) maintain, but will need to be replaced periodically which costs money.
What about stone and other types of fence? What is the cost/ benefit breakdown here?
We're getting ready to fence our perimeter and have been watching Tales From the Green Valley so the question came up. We're probably going to use barbed wire since we want livestock quickly, but we love the idea of hedges since they are traditional, look cool, are cheap (from a strictly monetary perspective), and resources for repairing are easily obtained (in the possible event of further supply chain disruptions down the road.)
I have a "perennial" potato patch at my in-laws house from where I grew potatoes in 2019 and didn't find all the potatoes when digging that summer.
I'm experimenting with fall planting some yellow potatoes that sprouted in my pantry. I intercropped with onions and garlic in a small bed in the middle of our young orchard and mulched heavily with hay (yes, I know, hay seeds will sprout, but if you keep mulch on all the time you really don't have to worry about weeds much.) I'm planning to do the same with the red potatoes that are also sprouting (except just intercrop with garlic bulbils since I'm out of onion sets and garlic cloves). I think it might work better with storage potatoes like Kennebecs, but it's an experiment and I want to get more Kennebecs for seed when planting the normal way in the spring when I am fairly confident of getting some return on my investment. I know I'll get garlic at least from this fall planting!
Joseph Lofthouse wrote:
I'd suggest that you spend a year learning how to grow wheat. Get a bunch of those 50 seed packets, and plant them to see which thrive with your habits and ecosystem. Then re-plant what did well for you.
You do make a good point about finding which varieties do well here. I have only planted one packet of White Sonora wheat that seemed to do well despite less than favorable conditions, but it was soft winter wheat not a hard variety which is what I really want (I'll continue growing the Sonora to increase my seed, but it's for flat breads not the sourdough I like to make.)
My purpose for asking is that we want to become self/ community sufficient as quickly as possible so we are trying to source larger quantities of wheat for planting since people just don't grow cereals around here anymore and we've got a field without a fence that we want to grow stuff other than grass and briars in.
I also suppose that we could buy that 45lb bag of turkey red wheat and discover that it doesn't grow well here and we're out the money and would be a year behind on the self sufficiency journey. On the other hand, a neighbor from a nearby community has grown this variety in the past and recommended it to us when he found out we were thinking about trying to grow wheat so that suggestion makes me think it's fairly likely to succeed here.
We would like to try growing a years worth of wheat and figure we need to plant around 50lbs to get what we need. I'm looking at Turkey Red right now, and found a source in IL, but want to ask you folks for input on varieties of heirloom (pre-1900) hard winter wheat and where to source it in sufficient quantities for our planting needs. I keep finding it by the 9gm or 50 seed packet, but really don't want to wait a few years to be able to use the harvest!
After having my third child, I am in need of larger shoes. My good old Nikes now pinch my feet something awful so I can't wear them into the ground which is what I normally try to do. I do see this as an opportunity to transition to a more minimalist, more durable type of shoe better suited to life on a farm. I am perfectly willing to buy a small men's or large children's shoe if it fits. My feet are in that size sweet spot where I can pick from any department.
Here's a list of things I'm looking for in a shoe:
- zero or low drop
- wide toe box and normal heel (usually shoes that fit my toes slip on my heel.)
- flexible sole
- water resistant (can walk through dewy grass without wetting feet. I've got Asgard zero drop rain boots for wetter conditions that I love.)
- low top (I hate having my ankles bound.)
- durable (will stand up to daily use around the farm for several years)
- protects from brush, rocks, cold, etc (so no sandals or thin, fabric tops)
- looks good (beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I prefer classic styles that are both practical and can be cleaned up to go with my nice jeans and blouses to go to town without looking like a hobo.)
- less than $150 (I need shoes now and that's what's in my budget)
- bonus points if they are leather, but I'm willing to go for breathable synthetics if they aren't ugly and will hold up
My sister-in-law is a veterinarian and gave me some of her old scrubs. I've found they are very comfortable (just shy of sweats on the comfort scale), easy to bend and squat in (essential for my daily work inside and out), cool and airy in the summer, and have lots of pockets in useful places for carrying hand tools, eggs, veggies, etc. I haven't subjected them to heavy use and they don't offer protection from briars and brush in the woods (I pull out my jeans for that.) I find myself putting them on when I have a big day of housework or gardening or even when I want to be comfy, but still presentable to people outside the family. I've considered buying more since I see them all the time in my local thrift store, but prefer solid colors and apparently most of the ladies who wear my size prefer cute prints with hearts and teddy bears. I wonder how the cotton/ poly blend they're usually made from would take dye?
I love it! I may ask my husband if he can make one for me with his 3D printer. Obtaining filament of the proper colors might make it cost prohibitive, however. I think he just has black right now so it would cost a lot to get set up to do the project, though the filament wouldn't go to waste.
Morfydd St. Clair wrote:Along these lines, can anyone recommend a good introduction to scanning / pattern design process for 3d printers? I have access to a printer at work and want to copy a specific thing I own. Any good tutorials and/or software to start with? Many thanks!
My husband is using FreeCAD to design things to 3D print. He has also scanned his own images into the program to pad out to 3D. He watches tutorials on YouTube and reads the FreeCAD forums to learn how to use the program in general and what he wants to do specifically.
Last summer my toddler boys got stung so many times by wasps. We took out a couple of nests around the front porch. This summer we haven't had any wasps nesting on the porch and only one sting on one of the boys' hands and I think that may have been one of the flightless wasps because he said he was picking up a stick. I've seen quite a few wasps, but they're not very aggressive this year for whatever reason. We even have a wasp entrance into our kitchen around one of the light fixtures that we need to plug up. None of those wasps have stung us. I'm not sure what the difference is. Perhaps it's the drought and heat this year? Regardless, I'm pleased that the wasps aren't as aggressive this year as I'd like to encourage their presence around my garden.
We eat a lot of rice in our family and I'd love to grow it on our USDA zone 6b farm. My favorite variety is arborio and I think it should grow here, but I'm not having any luck finding US seed sources. I know there are growers in my state and I thought I might be able to visit a farm and beg enough seed to grow a small patch, but I'm not confident that will work. Any suggestions from my permies pals? Anyone know where to find anything smaller than wholesale rice seed for the home grower?
A quick meal I learned from my husband uses a simple formula: Starch+veg+protein stir fried in fat in a skillet.
The most common iteration is an onion and a bag of frozen mixed vegetables stir fried with cooked rice (either leftover or made for the meal) and a 6oz package of sliced frozen smoked sausage. We like to let the rice get crunchy on the bottom of the skillet - yum!
Another version is an onion and about 4 cups of cabbage stir fried with potatoes (diced or sliced fresh, frozen, or precooked - if cooked add after onion and cabbage are cooked) and 6oz of sliced frozen smoked sausage.
Seasoning in our household is usually simply salt and pepper, though I use this formula with other veg and meats for curry (I add coconut milk if I have it and omit the starch and serve rice on the side).
Add broth and you have soup.
It's always fast and easy! I regularly cook 20lbs of chicken leg quarters at a time simply so I can have shredded chicken in quart bags in the freezer to use in meals like this. I make broth with the skin and bones and freeze it in quart bags as well.
Marty Mitchell wrote:
What is your climate rain wise?
What is your soil type?
Is it sunny there or always cloudy?
What are the temps normally like there during the upcoming summer days?
Rain stopped and heat set in unusually early this year for us in Southern Missouri. We're looking at occasional showers from now through September, but will need to water the garden pretty deeply pretty much daily. I'm already watering and have had some plant losses in my main garden already due to not watering regularly enough. It is nearly always sunny here. Heat is usually in the mid 90s in July and August is upper 90s.
I'll look into the field peas. Are they more tolerant of tough growing conditions than snap peas?
Marty Mitchell wrote:
Also, for your situation, if your grow season is long enough still... you should still have time left enough for sweet corn. In my area here in Chesapeake, VA our season is long enough to plant two crops of corn in the same spot. Just have to do it with early maturing varieties.
First frost here is usually around November 1 so I definitely have time to grow something if we've got enough moisture in the ground for anything to grow. My potato patch is far from the spigot and I'm not planning to lug very many buckets of water! I may ask my husband to use the tractor to move the nice dirt to a spot where the hoses will reach.
Does anyone know what nutrients potatoes take from the soil? I'd love to plant a fall crop that restores what potatoes take, if possible!
What plants do well being planted where potatoes have been? Any that don't do so well? What about plants that scare away potato pests that might be in the ground?
Right now, I figure I'll plant whatever needs planting that's not a nightshade after I harvest potatoes here in another 4-6 weeks (I think.) However, if there are planting choices at that time, I'd love to plant whatever is most beneficial for my garden!
I started my transition to the no-poo method by doing a 50/50 vinegar water rinse every time I shampooed. This helped with build up and relieved some of the dandruff symptoms. Then I started extending the time between washes. If my scalp was itchy or greasy, I would add a vinegar rinse that day which aleviated itchiness and helped with the grease. I got down to shampooing once a month at which point I tried using my body bar (Kiss My Face Olive Oil Soap at that time, now the much cheaper generic version of that Pappoutsanos from Greece) on my hair and doing the vinegar rinse. It worked. I still had some issues with grease and dandruff, but both were much better than when I was using regular shampoo. What really helped was when I started brushing my long, thick hair more thoroughly. I use a boar bristle brush at it distributes oils more effectively than nylon bristles. I use the old fashioned 100 strokes a day method, attempting to draw my brush along the entire length of my hair from scalp to the ends rotating around my scalp to try to get every bit. This was the final step in my transition. I can go months with just occasional vinegar rinses if my hair gets smokey or sweaty. I only need to use the soap if I slack off on my brushing routine and a lot of oil and dead skin builds up. My hair is shiny and healthy looking and hairdressers usually compliment me on it's health. It doesn't look greasy or unwashed and I have very little dandruff anymore (I think diet might be the key to getting rid of the dandruff once and for all, but I'm not quite ready to part with my ice cream habit.)
As for soapless, I haven't gotten to that point, though I only soap my armpits with the aforementioned olive oil soap (that kind is the only one I can use without my skin drying or breaking out in rash or pimples.) I don't use deodorant so believe the soaping of the pits to be necessary in order to maintain my place in society. I also use the soap for shaving my legs as I don't find plain water to be very comfortable.
When doing mindless housekeeping tasks like dishes, laundry, cooking (not following recipes - that takes too much attention), tidying, etc. I listen to educational podcasts or YouTube videos, often on a subject related to what I'm doing. I sometimes listen to music when working, but I've found that is sometimes overstimulating and droning voices work better for me. I watch videos when I'm trying to learn something, but have a hard time looking at a video while doing something else. I tend to get distracted by the visuals and stop the task at hand or get so caught up in what I'm working on I don't gain anything from the video and get frustrated that I'm not doing either thing well. Multitasking isn't a strength for me, though!
My husband started an Etsy based blacksmithing business last December. I handle packaging and shipping and help with photography, proof reading listings, and brainstorming new design ideas. We may attend a craft fair or rendezvous later in the year and set up a booth (or lay out a trade blanket), but Etsy is the simplest way for us to market his creations without taking too much time away from the farm which we hope to make most of our income from in the future.
If you live close enough to the country, you might explore the possibility of connecting with a local farmer for milk and eggs. Last year, we bought raw milk and fresh eggs from a local farmer. Both were grain fed which isn't a problem for us because we're on a tight budget and beggars can't be choosers (the alternative for us is store bought eggs and milk which are not nearly as fresh or tasty because the cows and hens at our local farm actually eat real green things in pastures, not just what the factory farmer puts in their troughs.) We now trade for raw milk from an Amish neighbor and hope to maintain that relationship for years to come as we value the quality of the milk and the relationship we're building.
There are several butcher shops within driving distance where we can buy meat, some organic and grass fed, though as others have pointed out buying an animal on shares from a local farmer is likely your cheapest alternative. My parents bought a half hog from a local farmer that way last year and were very pleased with the price (higher than the cheap cuts at the grocery store) and the quality of the meat (much better than anything except maybe the best at high end or specialty stores).
Of course we live in the country and the agriculture in this area is primarily livestock (mostly cattle, but there's someone growing about any animal product we might want to buy within easy driving distance.) To find out what's available near you, you can Google your city and the product you're looking for and see if anything comes up. In our state there are a couple web based directories of farmers selling raw milk or pastured meats, etc. As the season for farmer's markets approaches, you might connect with farmers at those (though there are many farmers who prefer to sell direct from their farms rather than through a farmer's market so it might take some searching.)
Right now, we have mud. Some of it's the decent black stuff, other places where we dug trenches last year is the nasty orange clay type that is really sticky and hard to wash out of stuff. The past few days we've been getting vehicles stuck in the mud which is always fun especially when you need to get somewhere and don't have someone to help you get unstuck. We'd love to improve the drainage quality of our dirt so it can be something other than mud February- June and maybe even, you know, grow something. Would dumping wheelbarrow loads of leaf litter/twigs from the woods into the worst problem spots help with the mud issue? What are other creative ideas for dealing with mud?
Stumbled on this article today while looking for a recipe and thought it was a nice, detailed rundown of how to reheat various foods without a microwave.
I use a microwave, but would like to wean myself off.
I have a friend who uses a toaster oven for reheating everything that requires a dry heat for reheating and she uses a pot or skillet on the stove for things that need a wet heat.
Bryant RedHawk wrote: do not use Masa flour, it is different somehow
I stumbled on this thread today and thought I'd clarify the difference between masa and regular corn flour. Traditionally, masa flour is made from whole, dry corn that has been soaked in a lye solution, similar to the African method of bean and grain preparation mentioned by Amber in the previous post. Here's a helpful article about what masa is.
According to the folks at Traditional Cooking School, the lye soak increases the nutrition of the corn. Sounds like I'm going to have to find a source of organic masa now!
I know most cover crops are planted in the fall/ winter so I'm bucking the trend to want to try to get something in the ground in the spring. I did read somewhere that many cover crops can be planted in the spring as well just most people don't think about that as a possibility because they want to plant their regular crops then (me too, I'm just not up for planting 7 acres yet!)
Thank you for the seed company suggestions! Does anyone know if there is a place where I can get the 700 or so lbs of seed in bulk? Most places only sell up to 50lb quantities before the savings stop.
I think my next step is to go to my county extension agent and ask some questions, just trying to figure out what questions to ask!
