Wanting to Share a Homestead in the Missouri Ozarks

Hey there, Permies! I'm a single, 37-year-old fellow here who recently acquired 24 acres in the Missouri Ozarks. It's a beautiful place, and all that is missing is some other great folks who share the dream of wanting a permaculture-based homestead. I prefer to foster a drug-free, alcohol-free, and Christian environment as well if that makes any difference in your considerations. Let me know if you have any interest in such an endeavor! God bless!

Looks like a lovely place! Hope you find people you like soon!

Thank you very much, Pearl! How is it going over at your place? Are you having to water as much as I am?

You have a beautiful looking homestead!!!

That's very kind of you to say. Thank you! I moved here on a bit of whim just because I randomly found this place on the Internet and liked it that much. I do enjoy living here and love to have visitors.

Nathan May wrote:That's very kind of you to say. Thank you! I moved here on a bit of whim just because I randomly found this place on the Internet and liked it that much. I do enjoy living here and love to have visitors.

I assume you're replying to me?

Yes... I've worked there for 3 months several years ago, in NW AR. Been there on two vacations so far. Beautiful area. I live a few hundred miles straight north.

Nathan- What do you know about working remotely? I noticed in another post that you had that you work on the web. I have a book coming about white hat hacking. Looking into doing that for money- apparently it can be done anywhere and from the little that I read of the book "Hacking the Hacker" when I picked it up at Barnes & Noble it is also very easy. I love research and learning about new things on the internet so thought maybe it'd be a good challenge. I'm also hard of hearing so most normal jobs are a pain in the posterior for me. Mooseage me if you want... (If that's what they call it around here.) Thank you!

Hey Nathan!
Let me try this again, lost a well written reply in a computer crash yesterday. I hit "submit" and blue screened.

Yeah, the dry is intense here too. I put out water for the birds, deer and bunnies yesterday, then put a bowl of water in the barn for the snakes and wasps who live in there, everybody's thirsty. Today I mowed in a seasonal pond that was there when I bought the place, it's dry enough that I could not get stuck in it. It needed mowing, I meant to do it last winter, then my tractor got stolen and I didn't have a way to do it before it got wet again. So making use of the weather. Even drought is an opportunity! First time I have seen the dirt levels in it, mowed out 4 foot tall buckbrush and sericea lespedeza (the kind my neighbor hates, ruins his hay) with a riding mower (my current tractor has a flat tire) which HATES being used as a brushcutter. It did amazingly well! But I can see that the pond was built by someone who just put a pond there without looking at water flow, I'll see if I can fix that at some point, the pond gets 30-40 % of the water going by, it's in the wrong place. There's a fair amount of flow pattern, but it just goes past each side.

This area is interesting, we are in a bubble, we don't seem to get bad storms, ice or tornadoes that hit 10 miles away in all directions, but when it's dry, we watch the rain go past too. I have a picture I kept off the local weather radar, there's rain all around us, but at the county lines it stops. Really weird :)

Your place is lovely! I hope you find people to play with you soon!
I curtsy nicely at you :)
Pearl

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:That's very kind of you to say. Thank you! I moved here on a bit of whim just because I randomly found this place on the Internet and liked it that much. I do enjoy living here and love to have visitors.

I assume you're replying to me?

Yes... I've worked there for 3 months several years ago, in NW AR. Been there on two vacations so far. Beautiful area. I live a few hundred miles straight north.

Well, feel free to stay here if you ever come back down this way. How are things going up your way?

Pearl Sutton wrote:Hey Nathan!
Let me try this again, lost a well written reply in a computer crash yesterday. I hit "submit" and blue screened.

Yeah, the dry is intense here too. I put out water for the birds, deer and bunnies yesterday, then put a bowl of water in the barn for the snakes and wasps who live in there, everybody's thirsty. Today I mowed in a seasonal pond that was there when I bought the place, it's dry enough that I could not get stuck in it. It needed mowing, I meant to do it last winter, then my tractor got stolen and I didn't have a way to do it before it got wet again. So making use of the weather. Even drought is an opportunity! First time I have seen the dirt levels in it, mowed out 4 foot tall buckbrush and sericea lespedeza (the kind my neighbor hates, ruins his hay) with a riding mower (my current tractor has a flat tire) which HATES being used as a brushcutter. It did amazingly well! But I can see that the pond was built by someone who just put a pond there without looking at water flow, I'll see if I can fix that at some point, the pond gets 30-40 % of the water going by, it's in the wrong place. There's a fair amount of flow pattern, but it just goes past each side.

This area is interesting, we are in a bubble, we don't seem to get bad storms, ice or tornadoes that hit 10 miles away in all directions, but when it's dry, we watch the rain go past too. I have a picture I kept off the local weather radar, there's rain all around us, but at the county lines it stops. Really weird :)

Your place is lovely! I hope you find people to play with you soon!
I curtsy nicely at you :)
Pearl

Sorry to hear about your computer crash there! That is the worst. Thank you for making the double effort to write back. It sounds like you are quite dry there also. It seems like there is usually enough rain that even 30-40% flow would fill up your pond. I picked a bad year here to build a pond and to plant a lot of plants. Thankfully most of the plants have survived, and I look forward to seeing the pond when it is completely full.

I share your "bubble" theory. I have watched storms go around me for over a year. It's gotten quite frustrating. Big storm lines will break just before me, go around me, and then come back together afterwards.

It sounds like you have a lovely place as well, Pearl. It sounds like all creatures big and small and all plants big and small are in good care there!

A bow [edited] in return! :)

Nathan May wrote:

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:That's very kind of you to say. Thank you! I moved here on a bit of whim just because I randomly found this place on the Internet and liked it that much. I do enjoy living here and love to have visitors.

I assume you're replying to me?

Yes... I've worked there for 3 months several years ago, in NW AR. Been there on two vacations so far. Beautiful area. I live a few hundred miles straight north.

Well, feel free to stay here if you ever come back down this way. How are things going up your way?

Well, not too far from me is the "Home of Black Soil" so the growing is good and the crops grow well without amendments... it's been dry here for awhile but that's nothing new this time of year. This year, I intentionally  planted my garden on 30" spacing because the city changed their water billing and I wasn't interested in paying $100/ month for water.  So far I've never watered and it's growing quite well.

Of course... the negative parts is the fact that they spray everything around here, I have crop dusters flying over my house every day for several weeks every summer, and I consider myself lucky to have cabbage wasps and other beneficial predators in my garden. Just as a FYI... growing kale year round will keep cabbage wasps in business.

Nathan May wrote:
A curtsy in return! :)

Shouldn't that be a BOW in return? Last time I checked you're not a girl. Girls curtsy, Men bow.

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:
A curtsy in return! :)

Shouldn't that be a BOW in return? Last time I checked you're not a girl. Girls curtsy, Men bow.

There's a reason I live alone in the middle of nowhere. LOL. I've neither curtsied nor bowed.

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:That's very kind of you to say. Thank you! I moved here on a bit of whim just because I randomly found this place on the Internet and liked it that much. I do enjoy living here and love to have visitors.

I assume you're replying to me?

Yes... I've worked there for 3 months several years ago, in NW AR. Been there on two vacations so far. Beautiful area. I live a few hundred miles straight north.

Well, feel free to stay here if you ever come back down this way. How are things going up your way?

Well, not too far from me is the "Home of Black Soil" so the growing is good and the crops grow well without amendments... it's been dry here for awhile but that's nothing new this time of year. This year, I intentionally  planted my garden on 30" spacing because the city changed their water billing and I wasn't interested in paying $100/ month for water.  So far I've never watered and it's growing quite well.

Of course... the negative parts is the fact that they spray everything around here, I have crop dusters flying over my house every day for several weeks every summer, and I consider myself lucky to have cabbage wasps and other beneficial predators in my garden. Just as a FYI... growing kale year round will keep cabbage wasps in business.

That's great that you are able to keep up your garden in spite of the challenges. This is the first year that i have tried kale. I've barely gotten to eat any, because those and the brassicas are prime target for everything around here. I think I shall try growing them under a screen next year. Do you think that would work?

Nathan May wrote:That's great that you are able to keep up your garden in spite of the challenges. This is the first year that i have tried kale. I've barely gotten to eat any, because those and the brassicas are prime target for everything around here. I think I shall try growing them under a screen next year. Do you think that would work?

I would personally [based on my experiences] keep it going through the winter until you find that you're attracting the cabbage wasps... then they will gobble up those caterpillars that destroy it. My first year was horrible... I must have gotten cabbage wasps late that year, and then I had a 30' row of kale that fall, and then I harvested it for seed the next summer in about July. It takes an amazingly long time to go to seed- can be eaten through June. I have some this year that I don't know if it'll go to seed until next year, no sign of seeds this year, even though I planted it late last fall and a lot of it came back. Since that first year I've had NO problems what so ever with brassicas... other than cabbage heads splitting. I have 3 split heads in the garden that are already growing new heads that are nearly as big as the original split heads! But... since that first year I've had brassicas growing constantly in my garden and everyone is happy. However, I have gotten stung by a wasp twice in the last two weeks, first one was a paper wasp and I got rid of their nest which was  in a hole in my vinyl siding corner RIGHT next to the back door, and the other nest is somewhere in the yard in the same vicinity. Aggravating. I don't normally kill wasps... just leave me alone is all I ask.

If you're not desperate to eat it and you have enough ground to play with it's fun to let everything complete their natural cycles. I have also grown beets and spinach to seed as well.

BTW I'm totally over myself so even if our other conversation goes nowhere, I'm probably gonna want to at least pay you a visit sometime, zero awkwardness other than my inherent social awkwardness. I sleep in a tent in my parents yard so I'm totally cool with sleeping in a tent in some other person's yard who's a cool permie who will do bible study with me.

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:That's great that you are able to keep up your garden in spite of the challenges. This is the first year that i have tried kale. I've barely gotten to eat any, because those and the brassicas are prime target for everything around here. I think I shall try growing them under a screen next year. Do you think that would work?

I would personally [based on my experiences] keep it going through the winter until you find that you're attracting the cabbage wasps... then they will gobble up those caterpillars that destroy it. My first year was horrible... I must have gotten cabbage wasps late that year, and then I had a 30' row of kale that fall, and then I harvested it for seed the next summer in about July. It takes an amazingly long time to go to seed- can be eaten through June. I have some this year that I don't know if it'll go to seed until next year, no sign of seeds this year, even though I planted it late last fall and a lot of it came back. Since that first year I've had NO problems what so ever with brassicas... other than cabbage heads splitting. I have 3 split heads in the garden that are already growing new heads that are nearly as big as the original split heads! But... since that first year I've had brassicas growing constantly in my garden and everyone is happy. However, I have gotten stung by a wasp twice in the last two weeks, first one was a paper wasp and I got rid of their nest which was  in a hole in my vinyl siding corner RIGHT next to the back door, and the other nest is somewhere in the yard in the same vicinity. Aggravating. I don't normally kill wasps... just leave me alone is all I ask.

If you're not desperate to eat it and you have enough ground to play with it's fun to let everything complete their natural cycles. I have also grown beets and spinach to seed as well.

I greatly appreciate this advice, J Anders. I feel like I haven't quite become the magnet for beneficial insects just yet, but it helps me to know that it might take more than a year for this to happen. I even put up one of those little beneficial insect houses, but it hasn't had much activity. I'll keep holding out hope for them to come by!

Sarah Koster wrote:BTW I'm totally over myself so even if our other conversation goes nowhere, I'm probably gonna want to at least pay you a visit sometime, zero awkwardness other than my inherent social awkwardness. I sleep in a tent in my parents yard so I'm totally cool with sleeping in a tent in some other person's yard who's a cool permie who will do bible study with me.

I'm honored that you would want to come and check out the place. Adding a Bible study to that would make it very pleasant indeed!

Nathan May wrote:

J Anders wrote:

Nathan May wrote:That's great that you are able to keep up your garden in spite of the challenges. This is the first year that i have tried kale. I've barely gotten to eat any, because those and the brassicas are prime target for everything around here. I think I shall try growing them under a screen next year. Do you think that would work?

I would personally [based on my experiences] keep it going through the winter until you find that you're attracting the cabbage wasps... then they will gobble up those caterpillars that destroy it. My first year was horrible... I must have gotten cabbage wasps late that year, and then I had a 30' row of kale that fall, and then I harvested it for seed the next summer in about July. It takes an amazingly long time to go to seed- can be eaten through June. I have some this year that I don't know if it'll go to seed until next year, no sign of seeds this year, even though I planted it late last fall and a lot of it came back. Since that first year I've had NO problems what so ever with brassicas... other than cabbage heads splitting. I have 3 split heads in the garden that are already growing new heads that are nearly as big as the original split heads! But... since that first year I've had brassicas growing constantly in my garden and everyone is happy. However, I have gotten stung by a wasp twice in the last two weeks, first one was a paper wasp and I got rid of their nest which was  in a hole in my vinyl siding corner RIGHT next to the back door, and the other nest is somewhere in the yard in the same vicinity. Aggravating. I don't normally kill wasps... just leave me alone is all I ask.

If you're not desperate to eat it and you have enough ground to play with it's fun to let everything complete their natural cycles. I have also grown beets and spinach to seed as well.

I greatly appreciate this advice, J Anders. I feel like I haven't quite become the magnet for beneficial insects just yet, but it helps me to know that it might take more than a year for this to happen. I even put up one of those little beneficial insect houses, but it hasn't had much activity. I'll keep holding out hope for them to come by!

I missed this post. Also see other threads about putting tin cans on 3' stakes to give the wasps homes to live in. On another note, after 4 years of gardening, I didn't get hit with blight on my tomatoes until they were practically done anyway. First couple years I got blight real early. Gardening is really a long-term project and like I said, if you want to keep those cabbage wasps around (or any other beneficial) keep them fed as long as they're active.

Looks like a lovely homestead you have! May  the Lord send you just the people you need to help it thrive and if you must do it alone may He give you the strength to keep it up! I'm always so blessed to see others Christians striving to live the homesteading type of life!

Wow this is very interesting

Me and my husband moved to Missouri about four years ago with the intend on building our own homestead/off grid home. But the second we got here we learned what it means to buy land that is part of a HOA oops! But man we got a lot done in a few months before they threatened legal action.

Then we tried to just buy/mortgage a small farm (3 acres) because we figured it would be easier to work on a piece of land that already has a house/well/septic but that sale fell through when it got apprised for less then it's sale price and the seller refused to lower. Can't find another house with that much land near the cities like that one.

Now we're back to square one and looking at lands in other states again. I got lots of phone calls to make to some counties once the weekend is over. We still have all that down payment money/savings.

It's just me and the husband and the little one. We're "dwarves" so we liking digging into the ground and using the stones to make walls. It's amazing how much you can get done with a gas powered jack hammer. We just wanna exit the rat race and live away from people, gaining money making furniture and such.

Hi.... Are you still looking for someone? Bc, we ( Carnell and Beatrice) are looking for a place a opportunity like this !

I’ve got a dream of moving from Kansas City to the Ozarks, tired of big city life! Would like to come down sometime and really do some looking, whether long term living on someone else’s property where we could build a little place if everyone gets along well... or helping out for awhile for a base camp to explore and look for land of our own, etc.

Might be years before we could move down that way... but, would love to grow some friendships for sure, be able to work on some PEP projects, and eventually be a part of a Christian agrarian/permie community. Married with 7 yr old twins, and a very social wife, so prefer to find a place without building codes in Missouri that isn’t TOO far from a city so the wife could continue to work outside the house... socialization/friend time to chat with other adults! lol, don’t think my 20 yr old son would do more than visit... never know though, I guess.

Hi, are you looking for someone to provide labor at your homestead or are you looking to split your homestead so that someone can build up their own portion of the land? Feel free to read some of my other posts to get an idea of what I'm doing and looking for.

Hey brother, do you need two more men of faith to lend a hand on your homestead? Give us a call.
Jason and Bert 239-297-3101

Hello, my name is Jose, American born 38 year old Christian male with conscious moral compass. I have worked For  over decade in various components of construction and buliding maintenance not only as a job preference but for personal interest in the intent of a homestead lifestyle. Was just wondering if you were still looking for potential participants for your amazing Homestead.

Hey Nate,  in which MO county are you located?

Just came across this today. June 23, 2020. Are you still looking for people. I'm retired, very small income. Living in a mini camper, no utilities. Looking for a place to park it, set up a small homestead. Do a little gardening. Make my own tinctures, ferment, a lot. I'm a Christian woman, a grandma, and now great grandma. On my own, looking for like minds, so if need help someone is there. Staying with a friend right now.

Thanks

Good Morning🌞🌞
Are you still seeking Christian homesteader?

Hello my name is Paul McClanahan I'm in Nashville Tennessee I am a maintenance technician of 14 years I have my own seeds in my own supplies a four-season tent that I'm willing to live in and absolutely would be interested in assisting and permanently relocating to the homestead I have a clean record I've got my recent background check from every County I lived in willing to undergo another background check and even meet at the sheriff or local police department to do a background check however is most comfortable and mutually beneficial I am very interested My email is pmcclanahan3@aol.com this would be an awesome opportunity I am absolutely looking forward if this opportunity is still available thank you very much for your time and consideration

Message me I would like to know more - thanks!  
seven2skip@aol.com

Hi,
Is this opportunity still available? I am a Christian, single woman 46 yrs old, and looking for others i could join and live with on this same path, i am looking to find and arrange for something by march. Please let me know? Or guide me in the right direction?
Mera
My email is merabriske@gmail.com

Hi Nate,

Im a retired, but very active groundskeeper. 5 years at Saluti Cellars in California, then 2 caretaker positions since. Good references. I have a nice RV. I arrived in Branson to play music a few days ago from Arizona. Your place sounds nice maybe we could talk about it?

Evod Cole
928 258 0316

Hey I'm looking for a permaculture based homestead and don't use drugs. I'm wiling to put a large amount of work into gardening for a place to stay.

Not sure the best way to contact you but am very interested in knowing more about your homesteading project. I am wanting to relocate from Colorado to the Ozarks and would like to find a homestead opportunity.  Nichole

Oh wow. I didn't realize I had so many responses! I will work through these!

My family is looking for an established homestead to join or network with. PM if you want to collaborate.

I’m interested, if you’re still looking for folks.