As a home gardener, your goal is to grow fresh vegetables that you and your family can enjoy from spring until fall. Regardless of whether you’re growing a traditional garden in your backyard or are among those using the space-saving raised bed style of gardening, succession planting will enable you to enjoy a more bountiful, … Read more
If you have been growing fava beans then it’s likely that you have run into black flies. Black flies love to damage fava bean plants and ruin your production. But there are a few simple ways to fight back if you notice an infection and even measures you can take to prevent your plants from ever … Read more
I think hogs are some of the best animals to have on the homestead. They are cost efficient and can produce a lot of meat in a short amount of time. And who doesn’t love lots of pork and bacon? Of course, there’s the dirty business of slaughtering them. They’re pretty big, heavy, strong animals, … Read more
When living as self-sufficiently as possible, you want to keep trips to the drugstore to a minimum, naturally. Fortunately, you can find some great medicinal herbs that you can grow and keep around the house that will help to keep you and your family healthy. Of course, there may always come a time when you … Read more
If you have kids in diapers and have gotten on the “green” bandwagon, then you are paying enough for those diapers that you might want to get more than one use out of them. Well, maybe not some of them, but the ones that have only been soiled with urine. If you don’t mind getting your … Read more
It’s really cool to see real-life demonstrations of classic farm work, and shearing sheep is one of the coolest. Modern electric buzzers have certainly made this age-old practice much quicker, but it’s still pretty old-school in our fast-paced age of information. This video shows the Austrailian method of shearing. I think the coolest thing is … Read more
Are you tired of buying overpriced laundry detergent that has too much scent? As a homesteader, you should be making your own laundry detergent. You will find that with a few simple ingredients, you can create laundry detergent that works just as well as what you buy, and it will save you quite a bit … Read more
Fruit trees, like all perennials, are a great source of food for years to come, and should therefore be taken care of to keep them healthy and productive. Some find it hard to bring themselves to cut anything from their fruit trees thinking that pruning will harm the tree, or that it will reduce … Read more