Me and my fiancée bought our dream home this summer. On the property is an old cellar that. The entrance is quite ruff and would like to restore that but besides that Any ideas on what I could do with it?

This is our first group of 4 wethers and 1 doe. We got them at 3 months and sent one to the butcher at 8 months today. We love them so much and jokingly called them our “edible dogs”. I’m glad someone came to do the deed because I don’t know if I would be able to do this one myself. I’ve had no issue processing chickens, ducks, turkeys, and rabbits, but goats are a different level of personality and interaction. Anyone else go through this with their first goat? I’m sure it will get easier after this one but man I was sad today. This is the price we pay to respect the circle of life and to ensure our meat comes from a good place 🙏

RIP little Meatloaf. You were the cutest and most annoying hangry goat of them all.

I've been waiting and waiting to get a couple frosts under our belt before harvesting, and it was worth it! These are some of the sweetest, most carrot-tasting carrots I've ever had.

I love growing stuff you just can't get at the store!

640 sqft, 8" CMU, #5 rebar every other cell, horizontal bars every 3rd block up and doubled up top. Grout filled in 3 lifts, had to manually bucket in the middle lift, top used a little auger-type mixer. Back breaking solo work but feels good to finally get it done!

I come from a remote mountain village in central asia. My family owns some land on which we have built quite a nice garden (2nd picture is from the garden). I decided to move to the city and my job requires me to be there or even move abroad in the near future. My mom is now taking care of the land and the small farm we have there by herself (Dad passed away 4 months ago). We have some fruit trees like apples, walnuts, apricots, rosebuds, prunes; and a lot of elms and populus trees, which are quite in demand. We also have a good amount of pasture grass that we use to make hay and feed it to the animals in our farm. After dad's passing, the financial burden of taking care of the garden and the farm has been transferred to me. As I am paying for the expenses, I have realized that the cost of picking the fruits, cutting the pasture and collecting it is much higher than the costs they require. I still want to take care of the land and I never want to sell it, but paying a lot of money and not receiving much in return makes me question whether this is a viable thing in the long term. What do you think would be a balanced decision in terms of expenses and keeping the place taken care of? I appreciate any response. Thanks

PS. Some pictures of my village near my home and the land

Dog wandered off at 6 PM last night. Small 25 lb dog 8 year old chihuahua mix. We are out in the country on 80 acres. Looking for tips on how to find him and any thoughts on what ive done so far.

The property is basically overgrown pasture in the middle with woods surrounding. Occasional dirt/gravel roads and houses/trailers interspersed in adjacent property. Part of the issue is the grass is significantly taller than he is. Some neighbors except in one corner where its pretty much just woods for a long ways. We let our immediate neighbors know.

After we realized he was gone and hadn't come back for a while we started calling for him. Normally when he strays it can take him about 5 actual minutes to come home after calling him. I ran our side by side to the major easily accessible paths on our property, essentially the 4 corners. I left some worn in clothes at the edges of the property to give him a scent to know hes close to home. It was a quiet night. When I took the sxs out I would call for him, stop and listen, motor off. We had no luck, not a peep, not a cry, no rustling brush. I do think I've heard his bark twice at random times throughout the night, each time went to its general location but it stopped before i could get close. I also took a long road around the boarders of our property (about a 20 min one way drive) to see if he had taken a road a ways away.

Got down to mid 50's last night. Supposed to be up to 80 today. We do have snakes and coyotes as our major predators and a decent amount of thorny brush, goat heads, and random broken down old barbed wire fence in sparce locations.

Today, I notified local shelters. Posted on local facebook groups.

I was thinking of mowing the pasture (which was on my list this week anyway), which will take me about 10 hours to do, followed by a few side by side runs to do the same as yesterday, go a little deeper down the trails. Possibly go out on foot. I figured that way I will be systematically checking the tall grasses and also making it so if he does come back on our property he will be able to see where he is going. Of course theres a chance i run him over, but I figure if he is in such poor condition that he can't get up and out of the way of the tractor (which he would know to do normally) then leaving this up to chance means he would likely be injured enough to die anyway.

If not found by tomorrow, im considering doing a walk across the wooded sections, basically an all day hike back and forth through the woods. It'll suck because of the thorns and goat heads and ticks but at least we will have closure that hes not on the property. Whats also weird is our golden doesnt seem to fond of trying to find him, which makes me think he saw him die and is already getting to terms with it? They werent together when he left, as far as i know. Normally they are a relatively close knit group.

Also wondering what others experiences have been with similar - did you end up finding a dead dog or were they just lost to the wind?

Just thought I would share.

A couple of red foxes have taken residence on our property this summer. They seem to have no fear. Almost appear tame. They have been on our deck, under our lean-to. Always moving but do not try to avoid us. Is this typical?

Went to back of our property today and smelled death. Looked around and spotted the offending corpse…a mid sized deer. Of course it’s right up against our (currently vacant) chicken coop. I can’t really do much to move it since there’s a very steel grade in that part of the yard.

Anyway….I’m hoping the coyotes/vultures/whatever find it soon but if the smell is still offensive in a couple days I’d like to do something. Lime and wood chips being the main option but I don’t want to interrupt natural processes. I’m no chemist so I’m wondering if the lime will hinder natural microbial/insect breakdown. If so I’ll wait it out and let nature do its thing.

He's a working dog, he has a job. But he's a hybrid. Because he spends part of his day and Mom's grooming shop when he needs a nap in the AC 🤣

We just moved to an acreage and have a garden planned for the spring. Setup of the rainwater collection was needed before winter so that we can catch the spring runoff.

Located around Edmonton Alberta Canada

- 1500 imperial gallons

- will be pumping to garden using self priming diagram pressure pump located outside the tank.

I don't have anyone in my normal life that would understand what that means. Thought you folks might get it :)

The University of Maine and University of Kentucky created a free video library resource that demonstrates how to cut up beef, pork, and lamb carcasses into their retail cuts. 27 videos all together. We used simple tools, 2 knives and a hand saw.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8WZrPCNyvE&list=PLeiaOD-wUNSI

📊 Survey: Post-Harvest & Supply Chain – Client Needs and Search Behaviour

Hello everyone!

As part of my bachelor's thesis at Fontys University of Applied Sciences in Venlo, the Netherlands, I'm conducting market research at Wageningen University & Research (WUR).

The survey aims to better understand the needs, challenges and search behaviour of current and potential clients in post-harvest and supply-chain activities, with a focus on Europe. If you work in post-harvest, supply-chain management, horticulture or related fields, I'd really appreciate your participation!

⏱️ Duration: Approximately 5 minutes

🔗 Survey link: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/mezqfM19vd?lang=en-GB

Your input will support recommendations on how WUR can better present its expertise and services to relevant organisations.

Thank you, I appreciate your time and support!

As the title says, please recommend me a book on off grid living. I know the concept, but don't know that facts. And I want anything that is more actionable facts than vibes.

Ok dumb question would there be any problem feeding chickens filleted fish carcasses or animal organ like deer turkey rabbit etc that i should be aware about

I posted a brief time ago about the feasibility of having a large number of goats/sheep checked on weekly. The consensus was that’s impossible.

Now I am thinking about hiring a caretaker to live on the property full time. They would manage the livestock and keep an eye on things. Possibly more depending on how this post goes. Maybe they can also give life to other projects we don’t have time for. That would be the minimum I’d expect but if I need to pay a real living wage then I could grow that list by 100x

We would provide a small cabin with water and electricity. A monthly stipend/salary?

Our property is on the central coast of CA outside buelton. It is a beautiful area to retire to but not many opportunities for someone to supplement their caretaker income. We are also 30 minutes from the nearest town.

What kind of person in terms of age, demographic, etc am I looking for? What is a reasonable amount of money to expect to pay them? And, finally, where should I look for them?

I’m basically picturing either someone older who wants to semi-retire who maybe doesn’t have the means, a vet living off some kind of disability, etc. I really don’t have any clue though.

Looking for advice on realistic expectations and rules of the road when it comes to this kind of thing

I made it from an old smoker I had in the barn after cleaning it out really good.

Like definitively if someone says they have a homestead with appliances

Or could it mean apartment or condo

We have two amazing dogs, and they help us out so much on the homestead!

Our white husky mix is our bird wrangler and general enforcer. Whenever a bird gets loose from it's enclosure, she leaps into action. She has learned to catch them and hold them so we can get them back into the chicken tractor.

She is insanely useful. Yesterday, a pheasant got loose on the way to the kill cone, and immediately flew off. I yelled the magic phrase and watched her tear off after it. She chased it through the woods and caught it just on the other side.

Perfection. I thought that bird was long gone. Not with our beauty on duty!

She also kills groundhogs and other pests. She got at least 9 groundhogs this year, several raccoons, a flying squirrel that was living in the house and some other assorted critters.

Our chocolate lab is our rodent patrol. He is so good at it. He is always on the job. A flying squirrel woke me up at 3 am this summer by jumping on me, and across the room, and he was ON IT.

He catches mice and other pesky rodents constantly.

They killed a skunk a few weeks ago, that's why the white dog was all red in those pictures. Tomato sauce....lol.

What jobs do your pups have around the homestead? Got any good stories to share?

not talking about building a house from scratch or anything crazy lol

more like preserving food, drying herbs, saving seeds, making basic stuff at home...

things that used to be normal but now most people have no idea how to do

if you could teach someone just ONE practical skill what would it be ?

So many YouTubers and others talk about getting a piece of land and being able to live on it and use it even if just camping but I have been looking for such land and there seems always to be some legal restrictions. Is there anywhere where I can just live on my own land without having to legally develop it and get permits or at least these are inexpensive and allow me to be able to have an outhouse of composting toilet and live in a self made dwelling or an RV without having to hook up or to allow me to make an RV hook up camp that I'm not limited to using for a short time each year?

Edit to add info: after it’s dirt we plan on planting grass. Yes I do want to keep some of the larger trees, but 98% need to go. I want to do it cheaply if possible, but don’t need it done quick.

Majority is 6-7ft tall trees. Originally planned on burning but was told the trees are a little big for that and I’d be left with a ton of half burnt stumps. Seems too tall for a bush hog. Bulldozer would work but expensive. Thinking about letting goats go through it, chainsawing whatever’s left, then letting pigs rip out the roots to make sure none of it comes back. Thoughts?

My 3 point tiller side shaft cracked, it can't be used until it's replaced, and the part is on back order until December. I need to break up dense sod for next year's potatoes. What's the second best way to kill grass?