Oh, the joys of self sufficiency

[ncfastdogs]

I would love to be more self-sufficient. My dream is to be able to live completely off the grid. As of right now, we have chickens and soon will be able to use them for eggs and meat. We have bees and a veggie garden. My husband makes beer, wine, and other other beverages and I can sew. We are starting to work on an outdoor smoker. Also, we are hoping to fix my husbands grandparent's pasture to have cows for milk/beef. I would love to try to use some alternative energy solutions. I have had a subscription to Mother Earth News for years now. I get all kinds of project ideas from it.

 

[n8ivetxn]

Sounds like you have a good start! - I sometimes buy Mother Earth, but I find it frustrating that I don't have the "skill set" to do some of those things and DBF has his hands full - we need a couple of 'tween age' boys to help us out

 

[wyoDreamer]

The skill set will come from practice. Start simple.
Look for a basic project, try it, and you may surprise yourself.
Ask DBF to explain the process if you are unsure, but try it for yourself.
Ask on here for guidence if you need it, there are alot of very skilled people that give good advice on this forum.

 

[DenverBirds]

A friend of ours recently used the phrase "we're trying to do 90%" with regard to her and her husband's lifestyle. My wife and I were confused at first, but found out that our friend wants to get 90% of her food (and heat, possibly clothing, etc) from her own work.

We've been striving for that a short while now, but now we've latched onto that mantra and have ramped thing up. We have moved around quite a bit the last few years, which prevented us from having a garden, let alone chickens. We are finally "home" in Denver, at least for a while, so we've gone crazy in the backyard of our rental house. We've got 150 sq. ft. garden, 6 hens, compost, and tried to overseed the lawn with a clover mix so that we can generate some good soil with actual nitrogen in a former sandlot/industrial wasteland. Don't worry, we have a raised bed with 3 feet of soil and garden cloth underneath to provide separation between food and toxins. We're allowed two pygmy breed goats in city limits and I really want them next summer. I've heard that the city is "accidentally overlooking" restrictions against cows in city limits. We also make our own beer, and while the necessary grain crops could grow here, hops just refuse to take from what I've been told - it's just too dry (it's technically a desert here). Currently we use a great store called Stomp Them Grapes/Hop to It for our grains, hops, and yeast. I recent;y found out how to culture our own beer yeast, so after the next batch, we'll do it (especially with our last batch - a belgian farmhouse ale - where the yeast cost $30). If we do take the final plunge into this, we'd move outside of the city, or to the foothills 20 minutes away so that we can have more acreage and rural zoning laws that specifically allow what we're doing, but for now, we're happy doing our best in the city.

My mom is coming for a visit in the fall to teach us canning and freezing. Our crawlspace is apparently the perfect temperature for storing root crops, though I don't quite know how to do that. As I get older (I'll be a young 30 next year), I realize gardening and self-sufficiency isn't just a summer thing. I've been looking into cold frames, and asking a lot of questions of my buddy that has a hoop house in his backyard. My wife worked on a farm that did a tomato/tilapia aquaponics setup, and we were really inspired by that. She also wants alpacas so we can sell their fiber at market.

Denver has recently relaxed laws on not only livestock, but also kitchen specs for selling goods at farmer's markets. We hope to make some small side income from that in the future.

Long story short, I feel a strong connection to how the majority of the "western world" lived up until 70 years or so ago, and how the vast majority of the "third world" still lives today.. I mean, from the beginning of agriculture at roughly 8000 BC (scientists still argue the exact date and circumstances), we all lived like this. Most people in the world still do. It's not phony, it's real. I like life's little luxuries - gas or electric heat, a nice gas stove, bicycles, my little truck, the well-used internet, etc, but I don't belong behind a desk, or participating in wastefulness. One of our neighbors does her yard work and composts all of the waste, while the other has a lawn service and landscapers take care of her "problem". Such is life in America, land of the "free to do whatever you want".

Anybody else who has taken the plunge, please advise me on the pitfalls. My wife and I would be most appreciative.

 

[sumi]

Well, you can tell by my first post this wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be

It's hard work. But it's so rewarding! We are still doing things on a very small scale and we're moving soon, so I won't be doing much else now. But I'd love to have a cow and chickens and veggies one day. And maybe a pig or two.
My DH is still experimenting with the beer, but getting quality products here to work with is near impossible. I didn't know it was possible for beer to taste that vile! But it was his first attempt... How do you culture beer yeast?
Apart from that we grow some veg, get eggs from our hens and make some money from selling the surplus. Occasionally we sell some veg, but I'm more interested in filling the freezer. And we raised and slaughtered pigs, also for ourselves and selling some of the meat.
Unfortunately our farmer's market didn't take off. Not enough vendors, not enough interest

See if you can get a copy of John Seymour's The Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency. It's a great book to read and it tells you in detail what to do with what and when. From animals to home preserves to building.

 

[mohillbilly]

Well, you can tell by my first post this wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be

It's hard work. But it's so rewarding! We are still doing things on a very small scale and we're moving soon, so I won't be doing much else now. But I'd love to have a cow and chickens and veggies one day. And maybe a pig or two.
My DH is still experimenting with the beer, but getting quality products here to work with is near impossible. I didn't know it was possible for beer to taste that vile! But it was his first attempt... How do you culture beer yeast?
Apart from that we grow some veg, get eggs from our hens and make some money from selling the surplus. Occasionally we sell some veg, but I'm more interested in filling the freezer. And we raised and slaughtered pigs, also for ourselves and selling some of the meat.
Unfortunately our farmer's market didn't take off. Not enough vendors, not enough interest

See if you can get a copy of John Seymour's The Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency. It's a great book to read and it tells you in detail what to do with what and when. From animals to home preserves to building.

you dont culture beer yeast as it takes special equipment to do it and you cant buy what you need to do it unless you have a few million laying around.
it is best to buy your yeast as each type will give you a slightly different taste profile.

 

[frank53061]

I have read that some people will buy the yeast and use the yeast left over from the production and keep it in a fridge and then keep using the leftover yeast you just have to keep it alive.
Food for thought so to speak

 

[mohillbilly]

once you activate a dry yeast putting it in the fridge will kill it if your going to try doubling it best to do that at room temp

 

[frank53061]

Ok well that's great to now I have wanted to brew my own and have read a lot in preparation but have not not dived in yet I have drank home brew and its some good stuff I love Beer I have had some of the best I was in the U.S. Army in Germany and talk about great beer most of your generic American style beer is nasty to me after two of them it gives me a head ake.

 

[mohillbilly]

Ok well that's great to now I have wanted to brew my own and have read a lot in preparation but have not not dived in yet I have drank home brew and its some good stuff I love Beer I have had some of the best I was in the U.S. Army in Germany and talk about great beer most of your generic American style beer is nasty to me after two of them it gives me a head ake.

if you need some recipes let me know