Living off Social Security

[perchie.girl]

Have you ever considered quail? I would think there would be a market for meat & eggs with them too (but I don't know your area).

Can you do some sort of solar heating for your greenhouse? Maybe you could do the tilapia then. And maybe grow things you wouldn't ordinarily grow in the winter months?

I want to do solar and Wind power for electricity. .... for the green house Possibly a Rocket Mass Heater then do a heat exchange system for the main house... We are talking a one bed one bath house with one foot thick walls and an R value of more then twenty. I can use a single oil heater for my bedroom and it will get so hot I have to turn it way down.

we do get snow but only about seventy two hours of it total.... over the course of a few weeks in the winter. But IN the desert the wind is Very cold and will blow through the screens so that they Scream.... Horse loves it though... I do want to build her a wind break


Rocket mass heater

The whole concrete looking thing is the mass heat exchange system often times they are integrated as a place to sit... Th 55 gallon drum is part of the system...

Here is a prettier one

My green house is on grade on a slab... and shares one wall with the main house. Right now the one window is a chainlink gate so will have to do something like a window or sliding glass doors.

Rocket stoves are incredibly efficient they burn so efficiently they put out very little in the form of gas.... and ash.

The deal is there are several clubs that teach this form of construction here in San Diego. I am hoping to fund the materials for the class to build me one.

deb

 

[perchie.girl]

May I come live with you?!

LOL.... not much to do up there... I am an artist I make jewelry and do art projects that suit my fancy. The guy that built the house was a painter He painted the window in the living room with a parrot.... He did the window sills with broken Cobalt blue tiles

But the wiring is shot there is a hole in the floor of the kitchen The sceptic tank needs attention... I may just go with composting toilets.

Well goes dry if you pump water too long.... and In order to get cell service you have to drive three quarters of a mile to what I call cell phone hill. So internet wont be an option unless I can afford a way to get Huges put in.

I love it though... No random junk phone calls... No TV except videos. The goats rewired my phones so If I want to make a land line call I have to go to the Meter pole and hook up a phone.

But at night you can walk out side and see the stars... Not just the stars the milkey way.... Hear the sleepy voices and rustling of the chickens... The occasional stomp of my horse....

deb

 

[perchie.girl]

I live on SSDI now, and I sell chicken eggs to cover feed and bedding for the chickens, dogs, and cat. I'll be moving to 2 1/2 acres in grazing land, and hope to plant trees for shade and hiding from hawks, no, not me, the chickens, and have a big garden. It is very, very windy there, so I am looking forward to building a windmill for power. The place has a well and septic, so that will save me $100 a month, and the house will be paid for. I was going to raise meat chickens when I move, and maybe turkeys too. I would love to bounce ideas off you.

you can build a wind break out of straw bales for your chickens... Then use it for bedding eventually... I built an igloo for my goats for winter out of straw... OMG they had so much fun they tore it up...

deb

 

[Raenh]

I'm ok with that. The only thing I'd be eh about is my babies being food. I'm ok with their eggs, but them nuh uh. Maybe we could make a deal!

 

[perchie.girl]

I'm ok with that. The only thing I'd be eh about is my babies being food. I'm ok with their eggs, but them nuh uh. Maybe we could make a deal!

LOL I primarily keep my birds as pets... If I start processing my own I will buy chicks bred for that purpose... Meaties ... for wont of a better expression. Besides IF i ever had someone come live with me my birds their birds would be housed separately.... No chicken will be able to free range here... Too many predators. I actually had a coyote take my last hen while she was happily kicking about horse maneure.... NOT twenty feet away from me.... Horse was standing there watching too.

sigh.

deb

 

[Fields Mountain Farm]

I want to do solar and Wind power for electricity. .... for the green house Possibly a Rocket Mass Heater then do a heat exchange system for the main house... We are talking a one bed one bath house with one foot thick walls and an R value of more then twenty. I can use a single oil heater for my bedroom and it will get so hot I have to turn it way down.

we do get snow but only about seventy two hours of it total.... over the course of a few weeks in the winter. But IN the desert the wind is Very cold and will blow through the screens so that they Scream.... Horse loves it though... I do want to build her a wind break


Rocket mass heater

The whole concrete looking thing is the mass heat exchange system often times they are integrated as a place to sit... Th 55 gallon drum is part of the system...

Here is a prettier one

My green house is on grade on a slab... and shares one wall with the main house. Right now the one window is a chainlink gate so will have to do something like a window or sliding glass doors.

Rocket stoves are incredibly efficient they burn so efficiently they put out very little in the form of gas.... and ash.

The deal is there are several clubs that teach this form of construction here in San Diego. I am hoping to fund the materials for the class to build me one.

deb

LOVE rocket mass stoves... been researching them for a few years now. Id like to have one or even two maybe in the dome.. we are surrounded by red clay and sand so just straw and and the stove and pipe materials would be needed here. I haven't found anyone in our area who knows much about building them or Id host a class too.. although I haven't checked on in about a year... could be someone out here doing at this point... I think I'll have another look see into it..

 

[wyoDreamer]

If your greenhouse area gets direct sunlight, you will probably be able to grow some crops all winter long to supplement your diet. Especially if you had a rocket stove/heated bench to garden on. Square foot gardening produces a lot in a small space and works great in raised beds.

Have you seen the systems of passive solar that they have been using in some of the geodesic greenhouses? they use a pond for a heat sink to help moderate the temperatures and install tubes through the garden beds to keep the soil warm.

I had a tiny "grow house" in Wyoming, we lived at 7400+ feet elevation. The grow house was just a 4'x8' wood frame around a 3.5'x7.5' 8" tall raised bed, with wood-frame panels with greenhouse plastic that were planned to be changed out with mesh panels for the summer growing season. The first winter, I closed off the vents and just ignored it until March, when I went to clean it out before spring planting time there were 2 spinach plants that survived all winter. I had a picture of them with little snow banks next to them. After watering them, within a week I had enough spinach that I could harvest off it.

My goal here in WI is the eventually build a decent greenhouse with a rocket stove growing bench. I will have to supplement light though, since our winters don't have long enough natural sunlight to really grow anything. It is amazing how much difference that 10 degrees longitude makes, lol.

 

[perchie.girl]

We got plenty of light When I bought the place the greenhouse room was all plexiglass. It was winter when I signed the paperwork. Bought it from a church so escrow was 45 days and it went another month... No worries.

But by the time I moved in it was spring and the green house room was 90 degrees... By summer it was 140 degrees.... I had to cover the slider to the room with tinfoil to keep the heat out of the house.

South facing Green house in the desert... NO windows that open for ventilation... I eventually had the glass removed the roof rebuilt because it leaked and was threatening to fall in.... Turned the roof into a shingled roof and had the outer wall turned into strucutrual and left a twelve foot wide opening for eventual sliding glass doors.

Now the house is almost cool all summer.... The room is ambient temperature. year round.... The lights are still in place and the Cooling system is in place one swamp cooler and one AC window cooler

The white panels were glass painted with white paint... The roof was plexiglass. Imagine now the three center panels are now open to the elements the two end ones are framed and covered with siding... What you cant see is the whole roof was covered with clear vinyl... By the time I moved in it was in complete shreds...

The side room was the original owners art studio... and about the same length of the green house. I used it as my bedroom.

deb

 

[Fields Mountain Farm]

We got plenty of light When I bought the place the greenhouse room was all plexiglass. It was winter when I signed the paperwork. Bought it from a church so escrow was 45 days and it went another month... No worries.

But by the time I moved in it was spring and the green house room was 90 degrees... By summer it was 140 degrees.... I had to cover the slider to the room with tinfoil to keep the heat out of the house.

South facing Green house in the desert... NO windows that open for ventilation... I eventually had the glass removed the roof rebuilt because it leaked and was threatening to fall in.... Turned the roof into a shingled roof and had the outer wall turned into strucutrual and left a twelve foot wide opening for eventual sliding glass doors.

Now the house is almost cool all summer.... The room is ambient temperature. year round.... The lights are still in place and the Cooling system is in place one swamp cooler and one AC window cooler



View attachment 1538321

The white panels were glass painted with white paint... The roof was plexiglass. Imagine now the three center panels are now open to the elements the two end ones are framed and covered with siding... What you cant see is the whole roof was covered with clear vinyl... By the time I moved in it was in complete shreds...

The side room was the original owners art studio... and about the same length of the green house. I used it as my bedroom.

deb

Thats just too cool Deb!

 

[townchicks]

You might want to look into growing pot in that greenhouse. Good cash crop. I don't know what the regs are for wholesale, but might be easy money?