halfmoonhead:

tropicalhomestead:

motherearthnewsmag:

Start a 1-Acre, Self-Sufficient Homestead

Expert advice on how to establish self-sufficient food production, including guidance on crop rotations, raising livestock and grazing management.

By John Seymour

Illustration by Dorling Kindersley

I love John Seymour and this little picture was one of the first to get me thinking about homesteading. Some things I’ve learned so far:

1) Don’t wait until you’ve acquired your little patch of heaven to start. Finding land is expensive and time consuming. Start where you are, even if it’s just herbs in the window sill or a patio garden. Grow where you’re planted.

2) Living in the country is cool. Driving 45 minutes to get anywhere is not. Don’t limit your search to rural areas. Empty and abandoned land in urban areas can be a good deal AND you won’t bleed out before the ambulance reaches you. A less dramatic example: forgetting the butter doesn’t mean an hour + round trip.

3) About butter…yeah, you’ll be buying it. It’s incredibly cost prohibitive to to raise large livestock on a small scale. Maybe goats? No matter what size, remember animals are a 24/7/365 responsibility.

4) You would be a god among insects if you grew a 1/10 acre of wheat, harvested it, milled it and baked your own bread. Next level for sure. Just consider: 5 lbs of organic red winter wheat for planting costs $11.75. A FIFTY pound bag of unbleached flour is $18.25. Consider trade offs for time and growing space for every thing you plant.

5) Self-sufficiency isn’t about isolation. You can’t do it alone, no matter how cute the diagrams look. Sharing knowledge and harvests increases your knowledge and builds community. Isn’t the whole point to make something better?

6) Lastly, you will fail. A lot. But the tiny victories will blot them out again and again to woo you into a false sense of confidence so you’ll try the next crazy experiment. And it will be worth it.

^^^ Great insight and as someone living off grid/farming,  I concur. 

Six Senses Svart, Holandsfjorden fjord, Norway,

The hotel is the first building to be designed and built after the highest energy efficiency standard in the northern hemisphere. It will harvest enough solar energy to go back into the system, covering the hotel, adjacent operations, boat shuttle, and the energy needed to construct the building – rendering it independent from the power grid. 

Such energy-positive buildings could deliver 89 per cent of the 45 per cent decrease in emissions required to reach the scenario where global warming is limited to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. 

As such, Six Senses Svart is the northernmost implementation of the Paris Agreement, demonstrating that carbon neutrality can be not only feasible in a sophisticated development at an eco-sensitive site, but can also be profitable.

It will also be self-sustaining, complete with its own waste and water management, recycling, and renewable infrastructure. The team will work with existing sustainable fishing and farming operations and engage local like-minded suppliers for the restaurants and bars.

Designed structurally by Snøhetta, the 94-key Six Senses Svart will combine a futuristic design, led by interior design studio, Space Copenhagen.

Image credit: Snøhetta/Plompmozes/Miris

Got another garbage onion started, this time a sweet yellow onion. Looking at all the divisions in the center, it may send up shoots from multiple places meaning I can divide it and get more than one onion out of the deal. We’ll see!

For those who mentioned having trouble getting this to work, you do have to change the water daily. Not just add more, but pull the onion out of the dish, dump out the water, rinse out the dish, and put new water in (and obviously put back the onion). Other than that and temperature control (don’t let it bake in the sun or freeze in a draft), just leave it alone and it should sprout.

My garbage onion (I grew it from the root end of a store bought onion, something that normally goes in the garbage) finally sent up a shoot! And look at all those gorgeous roots!

I also had some sprouting store-bought garlic (you can see it on the counter behind the onion) so I decided to put those in some dirt as well. So one onion, five cloves of garlic.

I’ll probably sprout another onion bottom after dinner, since I have a couple of yellow onions that need to be eaten and my little sprouting dish is now empty.

Finally getting my seeds started! Since I live in an apartment with no balcony or patio this will all be a 100% indoor garden. Never done this before, so we’ll see how it goes!

I’ve got:
▪rainbow mix carrots,
▪red Russian kale
▪salad bowl lettuce
▪Bloomsdale spinach
▪Oregon spring tomatoes
▪red cherry tomatoes
▪habanero peppers
▪sweet basil
▪Greek oregano

All are heirloom seeds.

Now, this seed starter tray is really nice. I’ve seen a few different versions, but I went with this one (years ago) because the company offered refill pellets so you can reuse the plastic tray and clear greenhouse lid (not pictured).

I will say that these little pellet refills also work well when put in eggshells for those who like to use their old eggshells as seed starter containers. They have biodegradable mesh around them that allows them to more or less keep their shape in case they’re too tall for the eggshell.

To use, just soak them for about 10 minutes or until they’ve expanded, then sink a single seed in the center of each one.

Finally getting my seeds started! Since I live in an apartment with no balcony or patio this will all be a 100% indoor garden. Never done this before, so we’ll see how it goes!

I’ve got:
▪rainbow mix carrots,
▪red Russian kale
▪salad bowl lettuce
▪Bloomsdale spinach
▪Oregon spring tomatoes
▪red cherry tomatoes
▪habanero peppers
▪sweet basil
▪Greek oregano

All are heirloom seeds.

Now, this seed starter tray is really nice. I’ve seen a few different versions, but I went with this one (years ago) because the company offered refill pellets so you can reuse the plastic tray and clear greenhouse lid (not pictured).

I will say that these little pellet refills also work well when put in eggshells for those who like to use their old eggshells as seed starter containers. They have biodegradable mesh around them that allows them to more or less keep their shape in case they’re too tall for the eggshell.

To use, just soak them for about 10 minutes or until they’ve expanded, then sink a single seed in the center of each one.

It’s amazing to me that food grows literally everywhere, but we’ve become so out of touch with nature as a society that we’ve forgotten much of this information.

Purslane and wild amaranth growing between the parking lot and the sidewalk. Both have leaves that can be simply picked and eaten raw (young leaves are best), and amaranth seeds can be used as a grain.

I imagine when I finally get land to grow fruits and vegetables, the weeds will only get pulled because they’re going on the dinner table.

Really though, I will have a section of land I’ll call my native garden where I transplant all the weeds and wild plants I find that are edible. Since they’re wild plants I’ll be able to just leave them alone until harvest. Easiest food garden ever!

I put the root end of a store bought white onion I ate into some water and it’s growing quite nicely; plenty of new roots and an obvious swelling in the center on top. Once it starts turning green I’ll put it in a pot.

Never grown onions before. This will be a fun experiment.

This is a book that I think every homesteader will find intriguing. The bottom says:

“Deftly steering clear of dogma, never sounding like a sanctimonious scold, Eric Brende makes a persuasive case that most of us would enjoy life more by radically minimizing our reliance on modern technology. Better Off is a buoyant, thought-provoking, and very entertaining read.”
~ Jon Krakauer