Books

I wanted to make some recommendations on books for the incipient modern homesteader. Rosie and I have learned a lot from our books, and a lot more from the hands on we were inspired to do from our books.

Anything by John Seymour, the man was a visionary. He wrote quite a few books on how to be self-sufficient on a small plot of land, in many cases a small urban back yard. He takes a no nonsense approach to the modern homestead, there is very little philosophy in his books but a damn lot of good advice and guidelines for any one who desires to be more than a "consumer" of our world. I can not recommend his books enough. No really, stop what you are doing right now and go get one of his books.

Farm City by Novella Carpenter. A young woman who decides to start a farm in downtown Oakland. Not a lot of advice for a homesteader but more along the lines of a kindred spirit who goes threw nearly the same experiences Rosie and I have in many ways. If you want to see what is possible in a small space this is a fun read.

The Backyard Homestead by Carleen Madigan. She concentrates on doing more with less, if you have a yard you can have a small farm. For our readers in town and city this is a great book, she can suggest how to get more from a small raised bed garden or a window box.

Storey's Guide to Raising "fill in the blank". I can only half recommend this series. While there is some very good information about building feeders, noting illness, treating mild sickness, picking breeds, and feeding much of the books spend a lot of time on the idea of "profit" and how to make more money off your livestock. While there is nothing wrong with this idea, Rosie and I are not trying to make money on our animals, we are trying to raise them for our own use. So the information is good but the aim is off in our opinion.

I am sure there are more good books out there, but these are the ones I have been reaching for on a almost daily basis. Good luck, good travels and don't let the pigs bite you.

Freeeeedom!!!

Our ducks have watched Finding Nemo too many times... they are taking advise from Dory and are pushing on the door in the morning to knock it over. I discovered this yesterday morning when I couldn't sleep. I heard them all quacking quietly and hearing a commotion from the duck coop. I went out to make sure it wasn't a coyote and watched them all push at the door until they knocked it over. One duck got too excited and quacked loudly, only to be sushed by the other ducks. They all then quacked quietly as they ran over to the pond for a very early morning swim....

That flighty mistress, Fate.

Fate is a fickle mistress and in our home personality counts for a lot. We had been talking about if we wanted to breed from one of our animals, she is reasonably healthy and a decent breed. Then she made a very large mistake.

She snapped at Rosie while Rosie was petting her.

Rosie was not hurt in any way nor was she even startled but in that split second that member of our farmyard lost her chance of passing on her genes and moved from the yard to the menu. Right now we are full up with meat in our freezer from Big Goat, so there is a stay of execution but it is only a matter of time. That one act sealed her fate.

There is no room in our home for a hostile animal, I will not have the threat of injury hanging over the heads of my guests or my family. We had a rooster who was hostile to people...... He was delicious.

Big goat is delicious

Did you guys ever watch the movie Up? Do you remember the joke the dog makes? (It's funny because the squirrel was dead) Yeah, that's what this reminds me of. =) Not that I'm mean or any... ok yeah, yes I am... she had it coming, but for breeding reasons more than anything else: She had a double nipple, which we do not want to pass on to any possible future offspring. She was under developed due to many internal parasites that had lived in her for way too long. So we did the best we could. We took away the parasites, fed her as much as she wanted, and then we're finishing the loop by eating her.

It was a clean kill and she went quickly. We then hung her up, skinned, disemboweled, halved, and put her in the freezer. Thank you, Big Goat, you completed the contract.

And of course we had to enjoy home brew while we slaughtered.... we could not have it any other way.

Friends

This last week we had friends stay over and got to many different projects. I feel a bit bad that I made them work so hard... but on the other hand we did get to finish and work on many different cool things. Thank you Guy and Sharon!!!

Things we got to work on: bread oven.... which is a lot more work than thought out... even for 3 people.
Finished or mostly there: pick up and split firewood, pick up posts for garden edging, slaughtered big goat, weeded the front garden multiple times.

=) Thank you both for all the hard work and letting us hang out with you just that little bit more. You guys are amazing! We look forward to seeing you at SCA events and hopefully (I'm being selfish here) we'll find you jobs down here.

Front garden

I have 7 raised beds, 1 citrus strip, 1 plot, and all the edges next to the gate. At last count we have:

plot:
Corn, onions, squash, bean, and pumpkins

edge:
5 grapes, 2 blueberries, 4 black sage, 3 rosemary, sage (salvia officinalis), english thyme, marjoram, 2 lemon balm, rue, german chamomile, yerba buena (spearmint?) echinacea, strawberries, ollallieberry, and lavander

citrus strip:
tomatoe - Beefsteak, peppermint, nasturtium, aloe, misc. baby plants ... to be determined when they get some more leaves

Trees:
1 almond, 1 apple, 1 lemon (meyer), 1 lemon (kafir), 1 orange(Valencia)

1 raised bed:
chives, lemon balm, borage, fennel, cardamon, 5-6 watermelons, 6 cucumbers, caper bush

2 raised bed:
lettuce, asparagus, artichoke, Chaste tree

3 raised bed:
bush beans, climbing beans, eggplant, pickling cucumber (a lot of each), asparagus, artichoke

4 raised bed: (Salsa)
tomato - Mr. Stripey, tomato - Roma non-hybrid, cilantro, tomatillos, sweet peas, 3 watermelons, 2 chiles, 1 pepino melon

5 raised bed:
celery, spinach, potatoes, sun flowers, pepino melon bush

6 raised bed:
potatoes and sun flowers

7 raised bed:
P(flowering beneficial), stevia, bay laurel, radishes, beets, turnips, okra, squash

Harvesting Almonds

We've started picking the almonds and letting them dry. We have a basket in the back setting. I would love to get a count of how much we're getting but we have a tendency to eat them before we get a chance to weigh them. I'll see if we can actually get a count. =)