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Quick background: When I was growing up in several different states in the late 1960s/early 1970s, our family would make regular visits to my grandparents' small farm in the lush Central Alabama countryside.
There, they raised and kept livestock of all kinds – beef and milk cattle, hogs, goats, chickens and two mules my grandpa used to plow with even when I was in my teens – and they raised cash crops like corn, peanuts, watermelons and cucumbers. Their table vegetables came from a large truck garden, where they grew the tomatoes, peppers, onions, beans of all kinds, egg plant, squash, okra, strawberries and all the other produce they would home-can in the hundreds of Mason jars they kept and used year after year. They also had apple, peach, plum and pear trees, and a large grape arbor. Walnut, chestnut and hickory trees in the woods surrounding the fields kept them in plenty of nuts, as well as wild turkeys, squirrels and other small game, and there was always fish in the creek that kept their pond filled with fresh water. Migratory ducks and geese would occasionally winter over at the pond, too.
There was a large barn with a tack room, a shower house, a building for seed storage, a smokehouse and a blacksmith shop (where my grandpa repaired the farm tools and fabricated any parts for wagons or plows or other implements that he might need. He also had a cobbler’s bench, and he knew how to use it.
There was no running water in the large house, but a dependable well located on the back porch provided all the water they needed – one bucket at a time. They had electricity installed sometime in the mid-1960s, so they had electric lights and a radio; but they didn't particularly need it. They still cooked on a wood-burning stove, and used oil lanterns sometimes at night so that the electricity bill wouldn't be too high. Also, there was no refrigerator (they used a pie safe) and no washing machine. Instead, they washed their clothing in two large iron pots, heated with an open fire, and used detergent they made themselves.
Nothing was ever thrown away, especially metal, fabric or paper. They would get all the free catalogs and newspapers they could, and the paper would be used for starting fires in the stove or the two fireplaces, or left in the outhouse beside the corncob box.
For entertainment, they’d either sing while my grandpa played the fiddle or banjo, or listen to the radio. They got a TV in the early 1970s, but they still preferred the radio or music they made themselves.
In short, almost everything they needed to live was produced by them within sight of the large windows in the kitchen, where my grandma cooked the most amazing meals I’ve ever wished I could sit down to one more time.
If they could do it back then, with their limited technology and labor-intensive farming methods, I’m pretty sure I can do it today.
I own fifteen acres along a quiet county road in East Texas, where I intend to build a house of poured concrete construction, and power it with the two windmills and ten solar panels I bought cheap when the Dallas-area supplier that had them went out of business a couple years ago. I designed the house myself, and it is simple, roomy and as energy-efficient as I could possibly make it. Texas is in “Tornado Alley,” and a poured concrete house is as strong an above-ground storm shelter as there is.
At the farm, I’m planning on raising miniature cattle and pygmy goats, and keeping a hundred or so chickens for the eggs and meat; and a flock of (self-sustaining) pigeons, also for the meat. There are plenty of natural salt outcroppings in that part of the state, so they should take care of another of life’s necessities.
Instead of working large open fields, that will need an expensive and maintenance-hungry gas-guzzling tractor, I’ll do my planting in (eventually as many as fifty, or more) 4’x20’x2’ raised beds (in poured concrete boxes that won’t deteriorate), and work them with a couple of relatively cheap rototillers and a second-hand ATV pulling a small trailer in the 4’ spacing between the rows. I figure the $15k or so I’ll save on a decent tractor will go a long way toward paying for the raised bed boxes. I'll also have a permanent greenhouse for off-season crops.
There’ll also be fruit trees, pecan trees and a grape arbor like my grandparents had, and a concrete-lined root cellar should keep everything as viable as possible for as long as possible.
Overall, the place will be – if I can actually pull it off – at least as self-sufficient as my grandparents’ farm, and hopefully I can provide any grandchildren my own kids might have with the same kind of memories I got from seeing firsthand that it is possible to live off the grid.
We all have our own visions for our self-sufficient paradises, and this is part of mine. I plan on pouring the house foundation footing in the summer of 2013, and with any luck it’ll take off from there.
I hope there are people here, at this forum who have similar visions, and are willing to offer insights and advice on aspects of self-sufficiency I haven’t yet considered.
Quick background: When I was growing up in several different states in the late 1960s/early 1970s, our family would make regular visits to my grandparents' small farm in the lush Central Alabama countryside.
There, they raised and kept livestock of all kinds – beef and milk cattle, hogs, goats, chickens and two mules my grandpa used to plow with even when I was in my teens – and they raised cash crops like corn, peanuts, watermelons and cucumbers. Their table vegetables came from a large truck garden, where they grew the tomatoes, peppers, onions, beans of all kinds, egg plant, squash, okra, strawberries and all the other produce they would home-can in the hundreds of Mason jars they kept and used year after year. They also had apple, peach, plum and pear trees, and a large grape arbor. Walnut, chestnut and hickory trees in the woods surrounding the fields kept them in plenty of nuts, as well as wild turkeys, squirrels and other small game, and there was always fish in the creek that kept their pond filled with fresh water. Migratory ducks and geese would occasionally winter over at the pond, too.
There was a large barn with a tack room, a shower house, a building for seed storage, a smokehouse and a blacksmith shop (where my grandpa repaired the farm tools and fabricated any parts for wagons or plows or other implements that he might need. He also had a cobbler’s bench, and he knew how to use it.
There was no running water in the large house, but a dependable well located on the back porch provided all the water they needed – one bucket at a time. They had electricity installed sometime in the mid-1960s, so they had electric lights and a radio; but they didn't particularly need it. They still cooked on a wood-burning stove, and used oil lanterns sometimes at night so that the electricity bill wouldn't be too high. Also, there was no refrigerator (they used a pie safe) and no washing machine. Instead, they washed their clothing in two large iron pots, heated with an open fire, and used detergent they made themselves.
Nothing was ever thrown away, especially metal, fabric or paper. They would get all the free catalogs and newspapers they could, and the paper would be used for starting fires in the stove or the two fireplaces, or left in the outhouse beside the corncob box.
For entertainment, they’d either sing while my grandpa played the fiddle or banjo, or listen to the radio. They got a TV in the early 1970s, but they still preferred the radio or music they made themselves.
In short, almost everything they needed to live was produced by them within sight of the large windows in the kitchen, where my grandma cooked the most amazing meals I’ve ever wished I could sit down to one more time.
If they could do it back then, with their limited technology and labor-intensive farming methods, I’m pretty sure I can do it today.
I own fifteen acres along a quiet county road in East Texas, where I intend to build a house of poured concrete construction, and power it with the two windmills and ten solar panels I bought cheap when the Dallas-area supplier that had them went out of business a couple years ago. I designed the house myself, and it is simple, roomy and as energy-efficient as I could possibly make it. Texas is in “Tornado Alley,” and a poured concrete house is as strong an above-ground storm shelter as there is.
At the farm, I’m planning on raising miniature cattle and pygmy goats, and keeping a hundred or so chickens for the eggs and meat; and a flock of (self-sustaining) pigeons, also for the meat. There are plenty of natural salt outcroppings in that part of the state, so they should take care of another of life’s necessities.
Instead of working large open fields, that will need an expensive and maintenance-hungry gas-guzzling tractor, I’ll do my planting in (eventually as many as fifty, or more) 4’x20’x2’ raised beds (in poured concrete boxes that won’t deteriorate), and work them with a couple of relatively cheap rototillers and a second-hand ATV pulling a small trailer in the 4’ spacing between the rows. I figure the $15k or so I’ll save on a decent tractor will go a long way toward paying for the raised bed boxes. I'll also have a permanent greenhouse for off-season crops.
There’ll also be fruit trees, pecan trees and a grape arbor like my grandparents had, and a concrete-lined root cellar should keep everything as viable as possible for as long as possible.
Overall, the place will be – if I can actually pull it off – at least as self-sufficient as my grandparents’ farm, and hopefully I can provide any grandchildren my own kids might have with the same kind of memories I got from seeing firsthand that it is possible to live off the grid.
We all have our own visions for our self-sufficient paradises, and this is part of mine. I plan on pouring the house foundation footing in the summer of 2013, and with any luck it’ll take off from there.
I hope there are people here, at this forum who have similar visions, and are willing to offer insights and advice on aspects of self-sufficiency I haven’t yet considered.
Call me Don.
Don, sounds great.
My only advice would be - start small. I have huge plans but experience has taught me to tackle plans one small step at a time. Makes it more fun that way and the occasional failure stings less too
We just finished a 24x10 hay storage shed (our first) and it was a lot of work, made some mistakes here and there but it was a great learning experience.
Next task is building a house. In this part of the Texas rocks grow out of the ground so our home will be a slipform stone house. Can't beat free (materials).
What about defending the place? What's the population density of your county? What are the demographics? Wealthy? Poor? How open are area people to newcomers? And the most important, what's the crime rate? Have you started handloading? Will you set up a blacksmith shop? How good are you at it? Your property is very small; how will you defend it?
Now, how will you prosper? Selling a few eggs won't do it. What about gold, silver, and other tangibles? Do you know how to protect them and make money with derivatives?
Why are you preparing? What sorts of problems do you expect in the economy or in the area of social upheaval?
What's your education? What's your technical background, especially in chemistry and physics?
You're talking about doing things that we do after we've acquired some money and a great deal of knowledge; but you've never mentioned either the basics or what you've already done or know how to do and why it's done.
If you're looking for help you can find it here but you need to tell us more. What your grandparents did is irrelevant.
Quick background: When I was growing up in several different states in the late 1960s/early 1970s, our family would make regular visits to my grandparents' small farm in the lush Central Alabama countryside.
There, they raised and kept livestock of all kinds – beef and milk cattle, hogs, goats, chickens and two mules my grandpa used to plow with even when I was in my teens – and they raised cash crops like corn, peanuts, watermelons and cucumbers. Their table vegetables came from a large truck garden, where they grew the tomatoes, peppers, onions, beans of all kinds, egg plant, squash, okra, strawberries and all the other produce they would home-can in the hundreds of Mason jars they kept and used year after year. They also had apple, peach, plum and pear trees, and a large grape arbor. Walnut, chestnut and hickory trees in the woods surrounding the fields kept them in plenty of nuts, as well as wild turkeys, squirrels and other small game, and there was always fish in the creek that kept their pond filled with fresh water. Migratory ducks and geese would occasionally winter over at the pond, too.
There was a large barn with a tack room, a shower house, a building for seed storage, a smokehouse and a blacksmith shop (where my grandpa repaired the farm tools and fabricated any parts for wagons or plows or other implements that he might need. He also had a cobbler’s bench, and he knew how to use it.
There was no running water in the large house, but a dependable well located on the back porch provided all the water they needed – one bucket at a time. They had electricity installed sometime in the mid-1960s, so they had electric lights and a radio; but they didn't particularly need it. They still cooked on a wood-burning stove, and used oil lanterns sometimes at night so that the electricity bill wouldn't be too high. Also, there was no refrigerator (they used a pie safe) and no washing machine. Instead, they washed their clothing in two large iron pots, heated with an open fire, and used detergent they made themselves.
Nothing was ever thrown away, especially metal, fabric or paper. They would get all the free catalogs and newspapers they could, and the paper would be used for starting fires in the stove or the two fireplaces, or left in the outhouse beside the corncob box.
For entertainment, they’d either sing while my grandpa played the fiddle or banjo, or listen to the radio. They got a TV in the early 1970s, but they still preferred the radio or music they made themselves.
In short, almost everything they needed to live was produced by them within sight of the large windows in the kitchen, where my grandma cooked the most amazing meals I’ve ever wished I could sit down to one more time.
If they could do it back then, with their limited technology and labor-intensive farming methods, I’m pretty sure I can do it today.
I own fifteen acres along a quiet county road in East Texas, where I intend to build a house of poured concrete construction, and power it with the two windmills and ten solar panels I bought cheap when the Dallas-area supplier that had them went out of business a couple years ago. I designed the house myself, and it is simple, roomy and as energy-efficient as I could possibly make it. Texas is in “Tornado Alley,” and a poured concrete house is as strong an above-ground storm shelter as there is.
At the farm, I’m planning on raising miniature cattle and pygmy goats, and keeping a hundred or so chickens for the eggs and meat; and a flock of (self-sustaining) pigeons, also for the meat. There are plenty of natural salt outcroppings in that part of the state, so they should take care of another of life’s necessities.
Instead of working large open fields, that will need an expensive and maintenance-hungry gas-guzzling tractor, I’ll do my planting in (eventually as many as fifty, or more) 4’x20’x2’ raised beds (in poured concrete boxes that won’t deteriorate), and work them with a couple of relatively cheap rototillers and a second-hand ATV pulling a small trailer in the 4’ spacing between the rows. I figure the $15k or so I’ll save on a decent tractor will go a long way toward paying for the raised bed boxes. I'll also have a permanent greenhouse for off-season crops.
There’ll also be fruit trees, pecan trees and a grape arbor like my grandparents had, and a concrete-lined root cellar should keep everything as viable as possible for as long as possible.
Overall, the place will be – if I can actually pull it off – at least as self-sufficient as my grandparents’ farm, and hopefully I can provide any grandchildren my own kids might have with the same kind of memories I got from seeing firsthand that it is possible to live off the grid.
We all have our own visions for our self-sufficient paradises, and this is part of mine. I plan on pouring the house foundation footing in the summer of 2013, and with any luck it’ll take off from there.
I hope there are people here, at this forum who have similar visions, and are willing to offer insights and advice on aspects of self-sufficiency I haven’t yet considered.
Call me Don.
Sounds like your grandparents were very much like mine. And it sounds like you absorbed some of their skills, as I did, and even more so, a longing to return to that sort of lifestyle.
But as more than a few wise folks here have reminded me over the years (as I've posted similar things as you have here), you are not your grandparents. You don't have their skills. Our society has weakened you and dumbed you down, just as it has me. The good advice from above is to start out small.
From my own perspective, all I can say is... yes, listen to constructive criticism and warnings, but at the same time don't let it get you down. You'll hear a lot of folks tell you how hard it is going to be, AND provide reasons AND potential solution or advice from their own similar experience--there are a few participants here who do have those traditional skills. they are the ones who will be helpful to you. On the other hand, you will have a few who will tell you that it is impossible, too hard, won't work, can't be done, times have changes and can't be brought back, you're too old, people can't live like that anymore, so on and so forth. Most have never even tried. Like I said, don't let those folks get you down.
Also, if you don't mind sifting through some rather "challenging" religious points that you may or may not agree with, I strongly suggest the book (or e-book) Surviving Off-Off-Grid by Michael Bunker. He discusses a lifestyle very close to that which you desire from a survivalist/sufficient-living perspective. He talks about living (nowadays) a lifestyle very close to your grandparent's. Don't know if you are interested in a "traditional" lifestyle like that (without electricity, etc), but you did mention it and you do have memories from your grandparents farm. It would at least be an interesting read for you. It's one of the best books I've read on the topic because Mr. Bunker is living a very similar lifestyle to what I hope to achieve.
Also, if you don't mind sifting through some rather "challenging" religious points that you may or may not agree with, I strongly suggest the book (or e-book) Surviving Off-Off-Grid by Michael Bunker. He discusses a lifestyle very close to that which you desire from a survivalist/sufficient-living perspective. He talks about living (nowadays) a lifestyle very close to your grandparent's. Don't know if you are interested in a "traditional" lifestyle like that (without electricity, etc), but you did mention it and you do have memories from your grandparents farm. It would at least be an interesting read for you. It's one of the best books I've read on the topic because Mr. Bunker is living a very similar lifestyle to what I hope to achieve.
But you're planning to live in a hard climate with low population density and you have the knowledge to defend yourself. That's very different from the fair weather areas with their hordes of scavengers. You can also earn a high income in normal times to be able to realistically plan these things.
To Chris and everybody else: have you bought, read, and reread all of the Kurt Saxon books? Do you have his video material as well?
Test question: what lesson can survivalists learn from the building of the Hoosac Tunnel? It's a big one from the standpoint of defence. The answer is in the Kurt Saxon material. Hint: you'll need a bath tub or similar container and a reliable freezer.
What about defending the place? What's the population density of your county? What are the demographics? Wealthy? Poor? How open are area people to newcomers? And the most important, what's the crime rate? Have you started handloading? Will you set up a blacksmith shop? How good are you at it? Your property is very small; how will you defend it?
Now, how will you prosper? Selling a few eggs won't do it. What about gold, silver, and other tangibles? Do you know how to protect them and make money with derivatives?
Why are you preparing? What sorts of problems do you expect in the economy or in the area of social upheaval?
What's your education? What's your technical background, especially in chemistry and physics?
You're talking about doing things that we do after we've acquired some money and a great deal of knowledge; but you've never mentioned either the basics or what you've already done or know how to do and why it's done.
If you're looking for help you can find it here but you need to tell us more. What your grandparents did is irrelevant.
All good questions. The area where my property is located is sparsely populated - mostly large hay and corn farms and small cattle ranches - and what communities there are are old railroad towns, so they're spread out between fifteen and eighteen miles apart (the distance a steam locomotive could go before needing more water). It's not a rich area, but it's not poor, either. I have checked the local crime rates and other demographics in the nearby towns here at the City-Data website, and they're consistently acceptable. How will I defend it? The same as everyone else: any way I have to; but it's also worth mentioning that a fireproof, steel-reinforced above-ground tornado shelter (which is cheaper to build and heat/cool than a conventional house of the same size, by the way) also makes a pretty good shelter for other dangerous situations. And as far as bullet re-loading equipment and supplies...well, those kinds of stores go out of business and sell off leftover inventory cheap, too, and I knew a bargain when I saw it.
How will I prosper? The same way I do now. By working. I've been self-employed my entire adult life, and that won't change just because I change locations. Oh, I might sell some eggs or surplus produce occasionally, but I'd probably be a lot more likely to donate more than I sell to worthy causes and church-based food programs in the area; which will build up good will among the current residents - many of them people I already know because I've been visiting several churches there regularly for the past couple of years.
As far as other sources of income, I'm very fortunate to have a brother with an MBA who is something of a financial wizard. He handles investments for me, and I can trust him to protect my $$$. My own degree (music) is worthless when it comes to living off the grid, but I do know how to learn what I need to know when I need to know it - just like anyone else. But if I put every penny I have into the farm I want to develop, that's okay. What good is even a million dollars on paper if it can disappear in a second because of some unforseen economic blip? My grandparents paid their taxes and other bills by selling cash crops, but that left them very little actual surplus money for luxuries - even with my grandpa working as a carpenter during the winters. They were food rich, but usually cash poor. But they still got by, were happy, and content with the power they had to control their lives.
I already know I can repair a small rototiller or ATV engine, where I'd have to pay someone to fix a full-size tractor. Chemistry and physics? I can research anything I need to know about them - in real books from my home library, not on a World Wide Web that could fail at any time. But my grandparents could just barely read, and they did just fine.
Why am I "preparing?" Who says I'm preparing for anything? I've always wanted to live as self sufficiently as possible, like my grandparents, and this seems like as good a time to start as any. (That said, it IS an ugly, dangerous world we live in today, and I don't intend to be a victim of it. But I'm not running away from something as much as ambling toward something.)
I settled on Texas because I've lived in Montana (just outside of Butte and Great Falls), Colorado (outside of Fort Collins, Colorado Springs and Buena Vista), New Mexico (Ruidoso and Cloudcroft), and other states like Michigan and Wisconsin when I was growing up, and I just don't like the climates in those places. The winters are too long and the summers are too short for my tastes. East Texas is a lot like the Deep South, but without the relentless clannishness and...um, iffy social issues.
Quick background: When I was growing up in several different states in the late 1960s/early 1970s, our family would make regular visits to my grandparents' small farm in the lush Central Alabama countryside.
There, they raised and kept livestock of all kinds – beef and milk cattle, hogs, goats, chickens and two mules my grandpa used to plow with even when I was in my teens – and they raised cash crops like corn, peanuts, watermelons and cucumbers. Their table vegetables came from a large truck garden, where they grew the tomatoes, peppers, onions, beans of all kinds, egg plant, squash, okra, strawberries and all the other produce they would home-can in the hundreds of Mason jars they kept and used year after year. They also had apple, peach, plum and pear trees, and a large grape arbor. Walnut, chestnut and hickory trees in the woods surrounding the fields kept them in plenty of nuts, as well as wild turkeys, squirrels and other small game, and there was always fish in the creek that kept their pond filled with fresh water. Migratory ducks and geese would occasionally winter over at the pond, too.
There was a large barn with a tack room, a shower house, a building for seed storage, a smokehouse and a blacksmith shop (where my grandpa repaired the farm tools and fabricated any parts for wagons or plows or other implements that he might need. He also had a cobbler’s bench, and he knew how to use it.
There was no running water in the large house, but a dependable well located on the back porch provided all the water they needed – one bucket at a time. They had electricity installed sometime in the mid-1960s, so they had electric lights and a radio; but they didn't particularly need it. They still cooked on a wood-burning stove, and used oil lanterns sometimes at night so that the electricity bill wouldn't be too high. Also, there was no refrigerator (they used a pie safe) and no washing machine. Instead, they washed their clothing in two large iron pots, heated with an open fire, and used detergent they made themselves.
Nothing was ever thrown away, especially metal, fabric or paper. They would get all the free catalogs and newspapers they could, and the paper would be used for starting fires in the stove or the two fireplaces, or left in the outhouse beside the corncob box.
For entertainment, they’d either sing while my grandpa played the fiddle or banjo, or listen to the radio. They got a TV in the early 1970s, but they still preferred the radio or music they made themselves.
In short, almost everything they needed to live was produced by them within sight of the large windows in the kitchen, where my grandma cooked the most amazing meals I’ve ever wished I could sit down to one more time.
If they could do it back then, with their limited technology and labor-intensive farming methods, I’m pretty sure I can do it today.
I own fifteen acres along a quiet county road in East Texas, where I intend to build a house of poured concrete construction, and power it with the two windmills and ten solar panels I bought cheap when the Dallas-area supplier that had them went out of business a couple years ago. I designed the house myself, and it is simple, roomy and as energy-efficient as I could possibly make it. Texas is in “Tornado Alley,” and a poured concrete house is as strong an above-ground storm shelter as there is.
At the farm, I’m planning on raising miniature cattle and pygmy goats, and keeping a hundred or so chickens for the eggs and meat; and a flock of (self-sustaining) pigeons, also for the meat. There are plenty of natural salt outcroppings in that part of the state, so they should take care of another of life’s necessities.
Instead of working large open fields, that will need an expensive and maintenance-hungry gas-guzzling tractor, I’ll do my planting in (eventually as many as fifty, or more) 4’x20’x2’ raised beds (in poured concrete boxes that won’t deteriorate), and work them with a couple of relatively cheap rototillers and a second-hand ATV pulling a small trailer in the 4’ spacing between the rows. I figure the $15k or so I’ll save on a decent tractor will go a long way toward paying for the raised bed boxes. I'll also have a permanent greenhouse for off-season crops.
There’ll also be fruit trees, pecan trees and a grape arbor like my grandparents had, and a concrete-lined root cellar should keep everything as viable as possible for as long as possible.
Overall, the place will be – if I can actually pull it off – at least as self-sufficient as my grandparents’ farm, and hopefully I can provide any grandchildren my own kids might have with the same kind of memories I got from seeing firsthand that it is possible to live off the grid.
We all have our own visions for our self-sufficient paradises, and this is part of mine. I plan on pouring the house foundation footing in the summer of 2013, and with any luck it’ll take off from there.
I hope there are people here, at this forum who have similar visions, and are willing to offer insights and advice on aspects of self-sufficiency I haven’t yet considered.
Call me Don.
It all sounds wonderful, Don, and very well thought out. You're well on your way just by already having the land.
What you are hoping to do is something I have been working towards my entire adult life (I am 58) and it is still a work in progress. Unfortunately, my life has taken more than a few detours (this is my second homestead) but I'm still plugging along and trying to turn my little five acre hillside homestead into a somewhat self-sufficient piece of earth by planting fruit and nut trees, berry bushes, and perennial vegetables such as asparagus. When I bought this place seven years ago, there was nothing here but the house; now, it is fenced and cross-fenced (still not fenced all the way to the top of the very steep hill) and has a chicken coop and goat house, along with the fruit and nut trees and berry bushes (blueberries, currants, and gooseberries, so far). And I'm trying to do it as a single woman on a fixed income (disability, after a serious on-the-job injury a little over five years ago).
I also have goats (16 of the critters), one of which I do milk (I'll probably be milking two by spring).
And I have chickens and ducks, neither of which is a paying proposition; in fact, just the opposite. I have never been able to develop a customer base for my eggs because just about everybody out here has their own chickens, and if they don't, they have a neighbor, friend, relative, or co-worker who does.
And, while I have raised animals for meat (pigs, chickens, and turkeys), I don't do that anymore.
Also, I heat with wood and wood only.
I am hoping that by the time my youngest son leaves home (he will likely be going into the Navy after he graduates high school next spring), that for at least a few months out of the year, with my milk and milk by-products and my eggs and my produce from the garden and my fruits and berries and nuts, that I can produce much of my own food. Like I said, I don't have any illusions about being totally self-sufficient (I do can, freeze, and dehydrate) but my goal is to be as close to it as possible. And the reason that I refer to my son no longer living here is because......well, it will just be a whole lot easier. Let's just say that my food requirements and needs are a whole lot simpler than a teenage boy's. LOL
I loved your reference to your grandparents. My grandfather was also a farmer, though not to the same level your grandparents were. Mine had a small orchard in the Hood River Valley in Oregon; before that, he was commissioned by the British government to run a rubber tree plantation in Malaysia (Malaya back then) - which was where my mother was born. I often think there is some sort of predisposition to farming - whether it's "in the genes" or simply because we love what we saw in our grandparents' lifestyle, I don't know. But for whatever the reason, I do think that my grandfather having been a farmer had a whole lot to do with the direction my own life has taken.
I am curious, though, why you mention pygmy goats as part of your long-term plan. I guess some people do eat them, but if you're looking for something that might be a "producer," I'm not sure pygmy goats would be the best way to go. I've had goats for over thirty years (and, yes, I do have a few pygmies), and other than the pet market (and even not so much that), I've never found them to be a particularly efficient or "paying" part of the homestead. It seems to me that if you're looking for a meat type, you would be better off going with one of the bigger meat breeds, such as the Boer (while I do have ONE Boer - Zeus - he is strictly a pet; we don't eat goats on this homestead ). Or, if you're looking for a dairy type, there are a multitude of dairy breeds out there (and crosses); some do better in certain climates, so if you do go that route, please do your homework (I understand that the Nubian, in particular, does well in Texas).
Anyway, I wish you great success. Just remember that "Rome wasn't built in a day" (in my case, it has been a lot of two steps forward, three back). But with planning and perseverance and patience, and even a bit of a sense of humor, I don't see why you can't achieve your goals. Just don't lose your dream if things don't always go according to plan - like when you think you have installed the perfect fencing and the goats still manage to get out and find your new fruit trees or berry bushes. You just have to shrug it off and go plug the hole.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Happy in Wyoming
What about defending the place? What's the population density of your county? What are the demographics? Wealthy? Poor? How open are area people to newcomers? And the most important, what's the crime rate? Have you started handloading? Will you set up a blacksmith shop? How good are you at it? Your property is very small; how will you defend it?
Now, how will you prosper? Selling a few eggs won't do it. What about gold, silver, and other tangibles? Do you know how to protect them and make money with derivatives?
Why are you preparing? What sorts of problems do you expect in the economy or in the area of social upheaval?
What's your education? What's your technical background, especially in chemistry and physics?
You're talking about doing things that we do after we've acquired some money and a great deal of knowledge; but you've never mentioned either the basics or what you've already done or know how to do and why it's done.
If you're looking for help you can find it here but you need to tell us more. What your grandparents did is irrelevant.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Happy in Wyoming
But you're planning to live in a hard climate with low population density and you have the knowledge to defend yourself. That's very different from the fair weather areas with their hordes of scavengers. You can also earn a high income in normal times to be able to realistically plan these things.
To Chris and everybody else: have you bought, read, and reread all of the Kurt Saxon books? Do you have his video material as well?
Test question: what lesson can survivalists learn from the building of the Hoosac Tunnel? It's a big one from the standpoint of defence. The answer is in the Kurt Saxon material. Hint: you'll need a bath tub or similar container and a reliable freezer.
I'm not sure why you have such a focus on defense. I've lived in the country for pretty much all of my adult life - all but about twelve or thirteen years of that as a single woman with kids - and I've never had any fear of "hordes of scavengers." Nor have I seen any, for that matter. Unless, of course, you're referring to the four-legged types (coyotes and 'coons, for example).
I am curious, though, why you mention pygmy goats as part of your long-term plan. I guess some people do eat them, but if you're looking for something that might be a "producer," I'm not sure pygmy goats would be the best way to go. I've had goats for over thirty years (and, yes, I do have a few pygmies), and other than the pet market (and even not so much that), I've never found them to be a particularly efficient or "paying" part of the homestead. It seems to me that if you're looking for a meat type, you would be better off going with one of the bigger meat breeds, such as the Boer (while I do have ONE Boer - Zeus - he is strictly a pet; we don't eat goats on this homestead ). Or, if you're looking for a dairy type, there are a multitude of dairy breeds out there (and crosses); some do better in certain climates, so if you do go that route, please do your homework (I understand that the Nubian, in particular, does well in Texas).
Miniature cattle and pygmy goats because they're just cheaper to raise. They don't need nearly as much feed to grow to full-size, and they don't require as much space. And if I butcher one, I won't have to figure out what to do with (as in the case of full-size cattle) several hundred pounds of meat that will start decomposing right away. Besides a smokehouse, and a root cellar located directly under the kitchen floor, I don't expect to have any other long-term food storage strategies (and besides, freezers eat up a lot of electricity). While I'm okay with goat milk and cheeses, and I do plan on having a small cheese-making setup, I can't imagine ever using more than a few pygmy goats can provide. I've also read where Nubians do, in fact, do well in Texas; but, like you said, I understand they can be really cantankerous, and hard to manage and control.
I might sell some eggs or surplus produce occasionally, but I'd probably be a lot more likely to donate more than I sell to worthy causes and church-based food programs in the area; which will build up good will among the current residents - many of them people I already know because I've been visiting several churches there regularly for the past couple of years.
It seems that you have a good plan and have correctly assessed your capabilities. I've been expecting and seeing a drunkard's walk in economic indicators for more than forty years now, specifically since since Nixon removed the US dollar's gold peg. Should there be an economic collapse or at least times hard enough to stop income to welfare reciipients, government employees, and similar I do believe there's a good chance that there would be many people begging, another word for demanding, and generally making life unpleasant for the "haves". I really don't expect any where I live; that's why I live here. But why take a chance?
This is the reason I would not donate anything to the poor. Word will get around and you could easily be marked as a soft touch. It's safer to put any surplus good right back into the ground and it will definitely improve your soil.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cinebar
I'm not sure why you have such a focus on defense. I've lived in the country for pretty much all of my adult life - all but about twelve or thirteen years of that as a single woman with kids - and I've never had any fear of "hordes of scavengers." Nor have I seen any, for that matter. Unless, of course, you're referring to the four-legged types (coyotes and 'coons, for example).
Four legged creatures don't bother me at all. The coyotes can think of my place as an "all you can eat buffet" of mice. I hardly had any around this summer but there have been a few the last couple of weeks and already I'm seeing fewer mice outside.
Should we see a true financial breakdown I can see oportunistic (human) scavengers popping up anyplace. It only takes one lucky one to take me out. I believe I'm very safe where I live but I don't take chances. Besides, I've always enjoyed guns and have been a student of arms and armor since my age was barely double digit, maybe not even that. I love to learn and have amassed a library of over 1200 volumes on the subject. I know how they function as well.
I'm an old man with one old dog and another dog getting there. I have one cat who has to be at least eight although that's not old at all for a cat. Since my wife died seven years ago I'm the only human here. I'll deal with anyone who tries to harm us in any fashion I decide is prudent. At the rate we've been seeing our rights suppressed for the past twenty years and particularly in the last ten that might be difficult in a few years but right now police state policies seem to be mostly limited to large cities. There are no checkpoints in Wyoming at least; but I've read that there are random weapon searches on the Boston subway system.
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). Or, if you're looking for a dairy type, there are a multitude of dairy breeds out there (and crosses); some do better in certain climates, so if you do go that route, please do your homework (I understand that the Nubian, in particular, does well in Texas).
You just have to shrug it off and go plug the hole. 
Unless, of course, you're referring to the four-legged types (coyotes and 'coons, for example).
