A Home turned Homestead

[Crispy]

Sickos.


The rabbits we have here could feed a family for a week.

[camulos]

[Nictoe]

[Nictoe]

Jeff Rodriguez,26, a software engineer from Glendale, has stockpiled bags of grain in his garage. Rodriguez belongs to a local network of like-minded people who are studying survival tactics in the face of the economic downturn.

Valley residents growing food, obtaining guns, sharing ideas

Valley residents growing food, obtaining guns, sharing ideas

by Ryan Randazzo - Jun. 23, 2009 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

As the recession lingers, some Phoenix-area residents are shifting attention from their financial troubles, including falling home values and shrinking retirement savings, to stockpiling food and ammo.

They worry the economic turmoil could lead to skyrocketing inflation, food scarcity, even violence. To prepare, they are forming social-networking groups to discuss how to store grains, purify water, plant gardens and, if needed, shoot guns.

"Most of us feel that if things do get better, it will be a long way out," said Jeff Rodriguez, a 26-year-old software engineer from Glendale. "I want to have some preparations in place."

The economy has him thinking a lot more about things like where his food comes from, how much cheap oil is left in the world and how people in the blazing-hot Valley would survive a major economic failure.

He has carefully prepared a 12-row, 384-square-foot garden, stores a ton and a half of grain in his home, and is considering buying pygmy goats or chickens.

He also has researched solar electricity and a rainwater-collection system.

He is far from alone. Rodriguez belongs to a local network of like-minded people who include retirees, young mothers and successful professionals.

These people are joining thousands nationwide who are studying survival tactics far from the backwoods bunkers associated with "survivalists."

At least two survival-related groups have formed in Phoenix since December, and groups with varying outlooks and politics have sprouted nationally from Kentucky to New York.

Of course, it's not unheard of for mainstream groups to prepare for emergencies. The Mormon Church, which reports 13.5 million members worldwide, has long counseled self-sufficiency and encourages families to keep a prudent supply of food on hand.

Disasters such as hurricanes and 9/11, and even perceived troubles like the Y2K bug, always increase interest in survivalism. The men behind the counters at U.S. Surplus Corp. in Phoenix see a crush of new customers every time tragedy strikes.

The newbies stand out from the military personnel and outdoor enthusiasts who stop in for rugged clothing, rations or canteens.

"They are the ones trying to fix up a cave to live in," store manager Gary Pickering said. "They are asking a lot of questions and buying things they normally wouldn't, like water-purification tablets."

Sales at the store haven't slid with the rest of the economy, officials said. Preparing for a disaster makes sense only if people actually know how to use the equipment they are buying, said Cody Lundin, who runs a survival-skills school in Prescott and authored two books on the subject.

He says people should learn to care for themselves in case of emergency whether a disaster is pending or the economy is tanking.

Last year was among the best ever for his school, although it's not always clear what motivates people to sign up.

"I'm seeing an influx of people simply calling to inquire what I think about stuff," Lundin said. "They are probing the waters because they are getting freaked out."

Professional counselor Rita Archambault said her East Valley clinic is treating more people with anxiety over the economy.

"I have not seen so much concern about the economy in my entire life," she said.

If planting a garden, raising poultry or stockpiling ammunition makes people feel better about their situation, good for them, she said.

"If you are not hurting anybody and you are reducing your anxiety, what harm is there?" Archambault said.

The only danger is if people get so obsessed that they neglect their job or family, she said.

It's not surprising that many of the people preparing for tough times are educated professionals, said Heidi Wayment, a social-psychology professor at Northern Arizona University who has researched disasters and anxiety.

"To understand the huge potential crisis that could come from economic collapse, you have to be educated," Wayment said. "I wouldn't say these people are crazy - far from it."

The people who are newly interested in survival skills recognize their eccentricity.

"I'm cognizant that what I'm doing is not normal," said Rodriguez, adding that his roommate thinks the food stockpile and garden are cool.

On a recent Friday evening, he and a few of the nearly 100 survivalism group members gathered at a Scottsdale bar. Amid the pumping dance music, they discussed the jobless rate, harvesting rainwater and protecting their property from looters.

"It would be fair to say most have at least some interest in firearms," Rodriguez said.

That's not to say the members glorify violence.

"I wouldn't even know what to do with a gun!" exclaimed MaryLou Benigno, 68.

Benigno, a retired teacher, has been gardening for years, but the economy has brought more urgency to her hobby.

She lectures the group on how to keep a worm-bed of compost under the kitchen sink from stinking up the house and the best places to buy seeds.

Benigno has been shopping for a cheap foreclosure home with land for a garden, which she hopes to share with friends.

"I don't want to be corny and say something like, 'Getting back to nature,' but if you develop a site properly, you could grow on every inch of the place," she said.

Lynn Smith, a Scottsdale commodities trader, spoke of his plans to head to Iowa for the summer, where his family owns a sprawling piece of land.

"It would be kind of hard to get by in the desert," he said.

Smith, 53, sold his home shortly after the real-estate peak in 2006 when he feared a market collapse and, despite a substantial income, now lives in an RV.

He can work remotely, so he'll spend the summer in the Midwest exploring how to grow food and may come back to Scottsdale next year, "depending what happens."

Smith pulled out aerial photographs of the Iowa property. "It's all flat, and I could see someone coming from any direction except this one patch of trees," he said.

The group nodded in agreement.
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Live Green, LIVE FREE

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[theLIBERTARIAN]

We have some corn growing, some tomatoes hanging and peppers on tables. Those rabbits have changed the way we garden. The birds are still swooping Nictoe.

I also bought some 9mm rounds of snake shot. A lot of places are running out of ammo. Out here in the middle of nowhere I don't think we have much to worry about. But down the hill...

[Biscuit]

Think again. Home invasion robberies are now rising in rural areas because the criminals know that police response time is much longer than in the city.

They also know that people in rural areas are more prone to be caught off guard than some people who live in the city's.

DTA...."dont trust anybody"

Stocking up on food and lots of ammo is a very wise choice!!

[barstow wiz]

sounds like Mormons.
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Aleman & Wood; EEO Consultation Services
http://www.afge1482.org/

[Nictoe]

The letter to Backwoods Home pleaded:

I have long aspired to a simpler life in a quiet area where I may live as my forefathers did and support and sustain myself. I would like to buy a small farm where I could raise poultry and produce and network with like minded people for companionship and barter. The biggest question for me is the one I’ve never been able to glean an answer for from your publication: Where?

Where can a person go to escape the tyranny of overbearing government and brutal law enforcement? Where can a person experience the elusive liberty of days gone by? Where the hell is Hardyville anyway?

Where would someone begin researching “livability” of specific areas? I must get out of this vile, filthy, vermin ridden prison of a city within about 36 months. The farm is the ball and I have had my eye on it but the clock is ticking and I don’t want to do this twice.

Signed, Miserable in Metropolis



Finding your own freedom
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Live Green, LIVE FREE

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[Guitarras Reyes]

[Nictoe]

Modern Survivalism Tenet Number Five

Food stored is an exceptional investment. You simply can’t lose by storing additional food that you use on a regular basis

by Jack Spirko

Food is increasing in cost faster than just about any investment right now and certainly faster than the rate of inflation. It seems the media has become fascinated with people practicing the modern survival philosophy. Indeed I would say that disaster prep has become one of the topics de jour at the moment. As always though mainstream media is myopic and focused on one and only one segment of modern survivalism and for now it seems to be those who store food.

As the host of the survival podcast I have been approached by a lot of media lately and recently was approached by a producer from "The Today Show" about helping them with a segment. When the producer stated to me, "well we have already filmed one family and they had a huge pantry, I got what I needed from them," I was done and politely choose not to be involved. A few weeks later the actual piece aired and after viewing it I am very glad that my name and brand will never be associated with it, you can view the segment on the NBC Website here. Make sure to watch the end when they sample a bit of the poppy seed cake.

One thing you never hear mentioned in any of these media segments about preppers storing food is the investment value the food represents in today's marketplace. In a recent LA Times Article a simple list of foods used in most American homes posted an 11% return on 16 common grocery items between 2007 and 2008. This trend of rising food prices has continued at the consumer level right on into 2009 despite drops in other commodities like oil. Compare that to the performance of stocks, mutual funds and other common investments from 2007–2009.

The key with storing food is you don't run out and just buy 50 cases of military style rations and put them away for a decade in a basement. Instead modern survival philosophy revolves around the mantra of "eat what you store and store what you eat." When you follow that concept you soon realize that storing food for the most part doesn't cost a dime more then you will spend anyway.

Food Storage Rule One – Store What You Eat

Follow the simple logic that if you primarily store food items that you use everyday in your home that every dollar you spend was going to be spent anyway. Those six jars of spaghetti sauce you buy today would have still been purchased just over a few months rather then in one day. Keep in mind that when you go to the grocery store just about anything in the center of the store is storable. Most common food items we purchase today have shelf lives of at least 6 months and by making sure you check dates you can almost always find stuff that will easily go a year. Check in the back of the row for the items that were most recently stocked; sometimes this little trick adds 3–6 months of shelf life if new product was just brought in.

When you store what you eat you are not only spending money you will spend sooner of later, you actually spend less of it in total. How? You mitigate inflation. Buy a year's worth of an item today and six months later go see what the price of the item is, you are now eating that item and you have cheated the inflation. When I explain this to people the common objection is that "sure but sooner or later I have to buy more of it and at that point I pay the higher price." This is true and note I said you "mitigate inflation" not eliminate it. What you didn't pay was all the higher prices during the inflation curve. That may sound complex but it is a simple and proven business principle; it is exactly what Southwest Airlines does with fuel purchases and it is a huge reason why they stayed profitable even when much of the airline industry tanked.

Food Storage Rule Two – Take Advantage of Opportunity Buys

This concept is why you can win big beyond beating a portion of the inflation curve. It is also a two-pronged strategy. Prong one of it is during the build-up phase and simply involves watching for sales and quantity discounts. This concept has been discussed at length in just about every article ever written about the concepts of "thrift" and trimming family budgets so I won't belabor it now. Just understand that by watching for sales you can speed up the cost-effective aspect of getting at least a few months of reserves into your storage program.

Prong two of this concept comes into effect pretty much around the time you get to a 90-day sustainability point in your storage program. While long-term I think you should strive for six months and a year is certainly not overkill, 90 days is a huge accomplishment and it will get most people through 90 percent of the disasters we are most likely to face. Something almost magical will happen at this point though if you are truly "storing what you eat and eating what you store," you will find an ability to take the "opportunity buy" to a new level.

The way it works is choosing what you don't buy. Sound confusing? It isn't, in reality it is extremely simple. During any given 12-week interval you will find that for at least one week almost every common item in your pantry will go on sale. In most instances they will go on sale 2 or 3 times. Over a few months you will identify a few items that just never seem to go on sale and you will simply have to buy those as needed. For everything else though all you do is don't buy them when they are not on sale or if you are into coupons you don't buy them unless you have a coupon.

Now look, I am not talking about being "cheap" here or scraping by like a pauper. I am simply stating what should be obvious if we didn't look at stored food as being something sensational. When you have 90 days worth of an item in you home, you don't need to buy any more of it for 90 days. Now you don't want to run out, so you will have to buy more at some point. What you can do differently then the typical consumer though at this point is wait until the item is on sale, you find a quantity discount or you have a coupon for it before you buy it again. Just by doing this you will end up with a natural rotation of your stored food. In doing so you won't end up with a closet full of items that are all about to expire next month and need to be donated to a homeless shelter.

Food Storage Rule Three – Integrate Long-Term Items as Extenders/Adjuncts

When I speak about "storing what you eat and eating what you store" I am often asked if that means that you don't also store very long-term storage items, the answer is a definitive no. It is simply the case that a solid 60–90 days worth of stored everyday goods will be easier to acquire (or sell a spouse on acquiring) and provide more day to day utility then a case of military style rations and six buckets of wheat, beans and rice. Once you have 60–90 days of sustainability it is time to begin thinking a bit more long-term. As you acquire commercially produced storables you should seek ways to use these items from time to time as either main courses or at least adjuncts in your day-to-day meals.

The beauty of a hybrid approach to food storage is instead of say buying up a bunch of things you will only eat if you are forced to and then stocking six months worth of it somewhere in your home you can slowly over time get to a ratio of about 60% everyday goods and 40% long-term storage. With this ratio by the time you reach six months of sustainability you would have 4 months worth of everyday goods and 2 months worth of extreme long-term storage goods. A home pantry made up of such a ratio has a massive amount of utility, portability and adaptability to a variety of emergency situations. Additionally those who wish to stock up to a full year’s worth of food will often find it almost impossible to do so without some of these items making up a portion of their supplies.

For simplicity in my lectures I divide long-term storables up into two primary categories. While there are many more ways to divide and think about long-term storage this approach is a practical way for people to do the most important thing, get the food stored for the future. The first classification is what I refer to en mass as "commercially prepared storables," these include the infamous MREs (meals ready to eat) that our soldiers rely on for field rations and the far more useful products built specifically for the preparedness industry. MREs are another subject the semi-informed media at once associates with modern survivalists. They always seem to picture us sitting on a thousand cases of the dreadful things in some dark bunker, chewing on some beef jerky and waiting for the black helicopters to show up.

The reality is while a few MREs never hurt to have around or specifically to have in a BOB (bug out bag), for long-term storage you will be a lot better served by the great products from companies like Mountain House, Provident Pantry and Yoder's Meats. These items are available from companies like Ready Made Resources and Safecastle Royal and provide you two primary benefits. First they have extreme storage life well into and over 10 years in the right environments. Second and just as important is they are actually very good food from a taste and usability stand point. I can't overstate how important it is for you to ensure that any of the commercial long-term goods you choose to rely on are something you will actually enjoy eating. For this reason I recommend purchasing a few cans of a few varieties and using them in preparing meals right away. Then over time acquire a supply of the ones that you and your family enjoy. That may sound really obvious but if I had a silver dollar for every person that told me they had "X number of cases stored of items they have never tasted," I would be a very wealthy man.

The second main category of long-term storables are items with huge storage life that you can acquire and store simply in containers like sealed 5-gallon buckets. The primary ones are rice, beans and wheat. This is another area where I have seen my fellow preppers "go off the deep end" and stock some ridiculous quantity at the expense of more practical goods. We have to understand that as preppers we have two primary finite resources, one is money and the other is space. While grains can help us manage our financial limitations they can also when relied on to excess consume our spatial resources beyond what is practical.

Food Storage Rule Four – Become a Producer

In becoming a producer you kick your food storage program into overdrive. There are really two main aspects when it comes to producing vs. simply consuming in regard to stored food. The first and the one most people think of when I say "become a producer" is various methods of growing your own food, foraging wild edibles, maintaining small livestock and perhaps hunting and fishing. Each of these takes upon a level of production vs. consumer-level activity. When properly leveraged they take your efforts beyond what a finite concept like storage can ever do alone.

Of them all hunting and fishing are the most limited. I enjoy both of these sports and see them as a great way to add protein to my home without a trip to the grocery store. However, when we honestly assess them for use in a true disaster scenario we have to accept that we are not going to be the only ones that see wild game as a source of food. In a true long-term disaster game and fish will quickly become scarce, in a personal level disaster we still have seasons, limits and access to contend with. Hence when it comes to wild game your best use of them is in preserving them via canning, drying, etc. (which is part of the second aspect of production).

Moving on to foraging, this is a slightly improved upon method of production. The chief advantage is that you don't really put any work into cultivation, planting and weeding – you simply harvest wild edibles like blueberries, blackberries, miner's lettuce and countless other sources of wild food. There are some commonalties though when it comes to forage with harvesting game. You also have seasons, in this case seasons when the items are available. You won't find beechnuts in March or blueberries in October. You also need access to wild areas where the items are available and once again in a long-term disaster these items will quickly come under pressure as more and more people have to rely on them. Hence again they are best as adjuncts and will do the most good if you utilize methods of preserving them when they are most abundant.

The final methods of direct production revolve around planting gardens, permanent crops (like nut trees, grape vines, fruit trees, etc.) and keeping various forms of livestock. Going deeply into any of these is beyond the scope of this article but suffice to say by practicing seed saving, breeding, etc. these options can represent wholly renewable sources of food. This can include things like your annual apple harvest, eggs from chickens, meat from rabbits, salad greens (often in all seasons) and other options like cheese from fresh milk or even making wine or mead from grapes or honey if you keep bees. When you add even a small amount of gardening, permanent crops or livestock to a well-stocked pantry it greatly extends sustainability and independence. It also compensates for the simple fact that total storage capacity is finite.

The second aspect of being a producer rests upon being a producer of storable items no matter how your possession of them originates. In other words if you grow peppers and dehydrate them or if you buy a bulk deal on beef and can it with a pressure canner doesn't matter, either way you are taking on some aspect of production. When you take on the production role of preservation you give yourself options and resource unavailable to the standard consumer. Say you visit a Farmer's Market during heavy harvest and find a great deal on beans. The consumer eats a few meals for a low cost while the harvest is in peak. The producer that cans or dehydrates can buy a large quantity and preserve them for well over a year for a fraction of the cost of a prepared storable item and at a much better quality as well. Additionally he supports local agriculture and trust me, that farmer you buy from today, is an ally you want if we ever have a food shortage.

There are many methods of preservation we have lost touch with that have been used a great deal over the years. These methods were quite common right up until we had a freezer and a refrigerator in every home. To truly increase your independence and preparations there are a few you should consider. These include root cellaring, canning, dehydration, salting, fermentation, smoking and pickling. If you take the time to slowly develop the resources and skills to use a few of or even all of these methods you will reach a level of self-sufficiency that most modern Americans can no longer even conceive of.

Conclusion – Seek a Holistic Solution Not Magic Bullets

If you think about these four rules as a single process you begin to quickly see how each supports and improves the results of the other. By combining opportunity buying with a method of preservation, you do more for your stability then either could do alone. By purchasing commercial long-term storables that provide quality protein and growing high-quality vegetables in a garden each provides more adaptability to the other. In time with patience and dedication each rule changes the way you think and you soon find yourself empowered. Food storage is not a fear-based activity as it is often painted by the media. Done with rational logic and a well-crafted plan it doesn't appease fear, it abolishes fear and frees you from the gerbil wheel that most Americans call the economy.

A food storage plan based on the four rules is extremely robust and flexible. If any one component fails or falls short during a disaster the others can compensate for it. If a disaster becomes extreme in duration your production capacity allows you to sustain what a finite storage supply can never accommodate. On the other hand your stored reserves give you the critical time to ramp up production without an immediate need that is impossible to meet with pure agriculture, foraging and livestock from a standing start. In short when you have food getting more is relatively easy, when you are out of food finding enough to survive on is very difficult.

Today a person that practices these rules is often referred by names such as "survivalist" or "extremist" or even perhaps they are called an "alarmist." Yet it was only a century ago that such people were simply called Americans. These people were your grandparents and your great grandparents and we can learn a lot from how they lived when putting food on the table involved more then a trip to the drive-through. By practicing the common sense wisdom they left for us, we can live a better life today, if times get tough or even if they don't.

http://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/
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Live Green, LIVE FREE

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[Guitarras Reyes]

....and buy tupperware.
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www.myspace.com/suejacobsband
Hecho en E.U.A. COMING SOON!

[Nictoe]

One of my favorite YouTube videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wslB1TQ2nUE
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[theLIBERTARIAN]

I want to do it too. I see stuff like that in Mother Earth from time to time. That is "Mother Earth" Dave, not Mother Jones.

[Nictoe]

Americans stock up to be ready for end of the world

Recession and the constant threat of terrorist attacks have given new life to the ingrained survivalist instinct

The Observer, Sunday 14 February 2010

Tess Pennington, 33, is a mother of three children, and lives in the sprawling outskirts of Houston, Texas. But she is not taking the happy safety of her suburban existence lightly.

Like a growing army of fellow Americans, Pennington is learning how to grow her own food, has stored emergency rations in her home and is taking courses on treating sickness with medicinal herbs.

"I feel safe and more secure. I have taken personal responsibility for the safety of myself and of my family," Pennington said. "We have decided to be prepared. There all kinds of disasters that can happen, natural and man-made."

Pennington is a "prepper", a growing social movement that has been dubbed Survivalism Lite. Preppers believe that it is better to be safe than sorry and that preparing for disaster – be it a hurricane or the end of civilisation – makes sense.

Unlike the 1990s survivalists, preppers come from all backgrounds and live all over America. They are just as likely to be found in a suburb or downtown loft as a remote ranch in the mountains. Prepping networks, which have sprung up all over the country in the past few years, provide advice on how to prepare food reserves, how to grow crops in your garden, how to hunt and how to defend yourself. There are prepping books, online shops, radio shows, countless blogs, prepping courses and prepping conferences.

John Milandred runs a website called Pioneer Living, which is one of the main forums for discussing prepping. It provides a range of advice for those who just want to store extra food in case of a power cut, to those who want to embrace the "off the grid" lifestyle of America's western pioneers. "We get inquiries from people from all walks of life. We had a principal from a school asking us to talk to their children. We have doctors and firemen and lawyers," he said.

Milandred lives in Oklahoma and, should society collapse around him, he is well placed to flourish. Indeed, he might not notice that much. His house has a hand-dug well that gives him fresh water. He grows his own food. He has built an oven that needs neither gas nor electricity. He can hunt for meat. "If something happened, it really would not affect us," he said.

There are several reasons for the rise of prepping. The first is that, in the post-9/11 world, mass terror attacks have become a fear for many Americans. At a time when US diplomacy is focused on preventing Iran getting nuclear weapons and terror experts continue to warn of "dirty bombs" on American soil, it is no surprise that many Americans feel threatened. Added to that paranoia has come the recession. Suddenly, millions of Americans have been losing their jobs and their homes, reinforcing a feeling that society is not as stable as it once seemed.

Hollywood has caught on. A succession of films, such as 2012, The Road, The Book of Eli and Legion, have tapped into an American Zeitgeist that is worried about the end of civilisation.

"Prepping masks a wide range of stances and ideologies. But the more people are prepared, the more they are likely to have an apocalyptic way of thinking," said Professor Barry Brummett, of the University of Texas-Austin.

Even government officials have accepted that the financial crisis posed a threat to social order. In recent testimony before Congress, treasury secretary Tim Geithner admitted that top-level talks had been held on whether the US could enforce law and order in the wake of a collapse of the financial system.

Certainly, Tom Martin agrees. He runs the American Preppers Network, which helps provide a wide range of resources. Martin, a truck driver who lives in Idaho, believes that more and more people will become preppers. "Millions of people now have the mindset that they want to be prepared for something, but don't know what to call it," he said.

That rings true with Pennington. In the 1990s, survivalism was the province of anti-government militiamen or loners in the woods. But preppers are more concerned with stocking up on food and water and relearning skills so that they can fend for themselves.

To that end, Pennington has set up a website called Ready Nutrition, which teaches basic food skills to prepare for a time when pre-packaged goods at a supermarket might not be available: "Prepping is not taboo, like survivalism. There is no negative connotation to it. We are not rednecks. In many ways, our ancestors were preppers. So were the Native Americans. It is just going back to being able to look after yourself."
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[Nictoe]

Review: The Backyard Homestead

by M.D. Creekmore

June 22, 2010

After examining the results of Fridays poll it’s obvious many readers are interested in setting up and running a small homestead.

And since you’ve shown an interest, I thought it would be fitting (and useful) to do a review of The Backyard Homestead: Produce all the food you need on just a quarter acre! by Carleen Madigan/Storey Publishing.

Actually, I’ve been planning a review this book for several weeks, but was sidetracked by other projects. Too many irons in the fire. Can’t believe, I was thinking about doing a survival podcast. Thank you for setting me straight on that one.

It doesn’t take a lot of land to have a self-sufficient homestead. I have two acres, but use about half of that for my garden, fruit and nut trees, henhouse, grape vines, goat lot, rabbit hutch, bee hive, compost pile, trailer and yard. You don’t need a lot of land.

But you do need to know how to use your small acreage efficiently, The Backyard Homestead will help you do that.

Within it’s 368 pages you’ll find easy to understand, straightforward instructions covering a wealth of information, that’ll help you get the most from a small homestead or even your backyard.

The thing that stood out most was the detailed planning diagrams and breakdowns for different sized plots, arrangements and lists of possible yields from each. Of course the actual yield harvested, would depend on many factors. But the suggestions give something to work for and compare progress.

The Backyard Homestead covers a range of topics, all geared toward those of us homesteading on small acreage, such as: vegetable gardening, fruit and nut trees, herbs, grains, poultry, rabbits, pigs, goats, sheep, cattle, preserving, making wine, cider, vinegar, herbs, making cheese, yogurt and butter and a lot more.

On the back of the book, it tells you that on a 1/4 acre, you can harvest:

* 1400 eggs
* 50 lbs of wheat
* 60 lbs of fruit
* 2000 lbs of vegetables
* 280 lbs of pork
* 75 lbs of nuts

The Backyard Homestead is a great book.

My only complaint (I have to complain about something – no matter how trivial) is that some of the suppliers mentioned are no longer in business. This can be expected as businesses come and go and any such listing is guaranteed to become dated. This isn’t a big deal as other sources and alternatives are easy to find.

I also thought it strange that there were no plans for composting or homemade composters. This isn’t a big deal as this info is all over the web and detailed in just about any book on gardening or homesteading.

Would I recommend this book? Yes; I would.

It is a gold mine of information for those of us homesteading on small acreage.

What about you?

What books would you recommend for those homesteading on a small plot of land?
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